A new violent act has erupted in the Colombian political campaign. President Gustavo Petro denounced this Tuesday a shooting attack against an armored car of the senator of the Historic Pact Alexander López in the department of Cauca, in an attempted kidnapping. The legislator, according to Petro, had changed vehicles for security reasons. The rifles were fired by members of the FARC dissidence led by alias Iván Mordisco, according to the president’s version, who also reported that the car of the mayor of the municipality of Santander de Quilichao was similarly targeted in an attack. The senator and official presidential candidate, Iván Cepeda, has condemned the act. “I request the authorities to conduct an effective investigation and capture the perpetrators of this criminal act,” he wrote.
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On the other hand, the application of the new polling law, which imposes several restrictions to consider a survey valid for public release, has led the National Electoral Council (CNE) to impose precautionary measures against the Brazilian firm Atlas Intel, ordering it to suspend and temporarily prohibit the publication, dissemination, and broadcasting of its surveys, which are published in the magazine Semana. The decision was made following a complaint filed by the Historic Pact representative Alejandro Toro, who questioned the survey published on April 9 in that media outlet. Toro criticized that the data collection method was online, as, according to him, this can generate underrepresentation of population sectors with limited internet access, especially in rural areas.
Iván Cepeda rejects the kidnapping attempt against Senator Alexander López
Senator Iván Cepeda, presidential candidate of the Historic Pact, expressed on Tuesday night his “strong rejection” of the “kidnapping attempt” suffered by fellow senator Alexander López. The congressman, the main coordinator of the Pact’s campaign in the southwest of the country, was returning by road from Popayán to Cali when armed men fired bursts of rifle shots at an armored van of his security detail, according to initial reports by President Gustavo Petro. “Preliminary information indicates that this macabre action is the work of a dissident group,” wrote Cepeda, who had campaign events in Popayán on Tuesday. “I request the authorities to conduct an effective investigation and capture the perpetrators of this criminal act,” he added.
Iván Cepeda denounces new pressures from armed groups on voters
Senator Iván Cepeda, candidate of the Historic Pact, announced this Tuesday from Popayán that he will file a formal complaint with the Prosecutor’s Office regarding pressures from an armed group in the department of Guaviare. “We have received information and documents indicating that an armed group, apparently one of the dissidences, would be carrying out actions to pressure and coerce the electorate,” he said during a last-minute statement in the capital of Cauca. “I will provide both audios and images that will be very clear regarding the complaint I am making,” he promised, without making the details public. He also reiterated, once again, that, together with his vice-presidential running mate, also senator Aida Quilcué, they reject any type of pressure on voters. “We have not requested, nor do we accept under any circumstances, that armed action be used to pressure, limit, censor, or constrain the electorate,” he emphasized.
Uribe, after a mural was painted near his house: “They have to kill me first before coming to mistreat my family”
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Former president Álvaro Uribe, leader of the Colombian right, complained this Tuesday about the painting of a mural on a bridge near his house in the municipality of Rionegro (Antioquia). According to the former president, he had to interrupt his political activities in Medellín to go to the vicinity of his residence after being informed of the presence of members of the Historic Pact in the area. The former president said: “There was a large number of people protecting some painters to affect me, at my house.”
In his statement, released in a video where he is seen with a roller to cover the mural, Uribe said it was a “provocation of violence,” and added: “They have to kill me first before coming to mistreat my family.” However, there was no aggression from any side. Furthermore, he called on his party members: “I ask the Democratic Center to remain very calm with these people, but very firm. Wherever they are going to be attacked in Colombia, they must be confronted.”
Later, without any proof of his claim, he asserted that the mural painting was encouraged by “terrorist groups and their spokesperson Iván Cepeda,” the official candidate and leader for months in all polls. “This is the prelude to a Cepeda government,” he added. A similar accusation, also without evidence, was made against the representative elected by the Historic Pact Hernán Muriel, who made the call and whom he accused of being elected “by votes imposed by terrorism.”
Later, in a public statement, the Democratic Center rejected what it calls “vandal acts carried out by groups affiliated with the Historic Pact,” and added: “We reiterate the complaints we have been making for months regarding the increase in political violence, stigmatization, and systematic attacks promoted by sectors of petrismo and candidate Iván Cepeda against members of our community and the Colombian opposition.” It also demanded guarantees for the opposition and respect for democracy.
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