Colombian presidential candidate Rodolfo Hernández is warmly welcomed at the National Congress of Oil Palm Growers in Bucaramanga, Colombia, on June 3.
Fernanda Pineda / The Washington Post via Getty Images
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Fernanda Pineda / The Washington Post via Getty Images
Colombian presidential candidate Rodolfo Hernández is warmly welcomed at the National Congress of Oil Palm Growers in Bucaramanga, Colombia, on June 3.
Fernanda Pineda / The Washington Post via Getty Images
BOGOTá, Colombia – Shocked by a political system long dominated by traditional parties and machine politics, an eccentric 77-year-old populist promises massive budget cuts and imprison corrupt officials currently leading the race for the presidency.
Most Colombians were unknown until just a few months ago, Rodolfo Hernández, a real estate magnate and former mayor, won enough votes in the first round of elections on May 29. 5 to win a place in the vote against leftist Gustavo Petro on Sunday.
Latest poll Hernández was neck-and-neck with Petro, a veteran guerrilla fighter and veteran politician who had been the clear frontrunner all year.
“Thank you, Colombians,” Hernández said in one video message to his supporters after defeating four other candidates and taking Petro’s runner-up position in the first round of voting. “I’m counting on you to win the flow.”
The video, shot from Hernández’s kitchen with appliances and a stove full of pots in the background, suits his austere image. Although Hernández makes millions from real estate, he says he doesn’t spend much on his campaign.
You can find Rodolfo Hernández on TikTok
Instead of standing in front of the country to give a speech, he communicates through TikTok videos and softball interviews, often focusing on government juxtaposition, which he says is the root of Colombia’s problems. In a recent interview on Colombian television, he said that nearly all politicians are “traitors, liars, clowns and hypocrites and we will get rid of them.”
If he wins, he plans to hold a simple inauguration in a poor town, having the usual swearing-in ceremonies at the presidential palace with hundreds of guests wasting taxpayer money on eggs. salted fish, champagne and whiskey. Despite his age, Hernández said he will work from dawn until dusk to cram five and a half years of work into a four-year presidency.
“Colombia is a beautiful country that has been run by thieves,” he said in the television interview, “and killed as a result.”
Presidential candidate Gustavo Petro, of the Historical Treaty alliance, attends a June 8 meeting with people with disabilities in Bogotá. Colombians will go to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president.
Fernando Vergara / AP
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Fernando Vergara / AP
Presidential candidate Gustavo Petro, of the Historical Treaty alliance, attends a June 8 meeting with people with disabilities in Bogotá. Colombians will go to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president.
Fernando Vergara / AP
Gustavo Petro aims to become the first leftist president
Hernández’s rival, Petro, is trying to become Colombia’s first leftist president. Thus, whoever wins, the next leader will take the country in a new direction. All of this, analysts say, is the result of decades of corruption and unscrupulous promises by traditional politicians as well as the COVID-19 pandemic that has pushed millions of Colombians into poverty. poor.
However, the 62-year-old Petro is a former mayor of Bogotá and a longtime opposition senator who is in his third run for president. According to Lawrence J. Gumbiner, a former US diplomat who has advised Hernández on international affairs, compared to Hernández, he is old news.
Gumbiner said that the feeling of many voters is “all the people that have been around here all these years, we don’t like any of them. We really don’t know who this guy is. [Hernández] yes, but we’re so fed up with the guy who’s been around all these years that we’re willing to roll the dice for him. “
Add to Hernández’s rise to protracted fear by Petro. Business leaders are worried about the Petro’s plans to phase out oil production, the country’s main export, to renegotiate trade deals with countries like the United States, and improve pension system. Petro has also pledged to forge closer ties with the dictatorship in neighboring Venezuela.
Hernández has received endorsements, including from rival candidates
As a result, Hernández received a wave of endorsements from established parties and politicians, including Federico Gutiérrez. He was the conservative, pro-government candidate, finishing third in the May 29 vote. He claimed the Petro could become a leftist dictator, like Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro, and in the post In his concession speech, he urged the Colombians to support Hernández.
“We have to save freedom and democracy because once they’re gone, they won’t come back,” Gutiérrez warned.
However, critics say Hernández has a dictatorial habit.
He praised President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador for ordering army occupy that country’s parliament in 2020 to intimidate lawmakers who support his policies. Hernández lacks a majority in Colombia’s National Assembly but said he would put up billboards about lawmakers accused of corruption and embarrass them by supporting his agenda.
In addition, he refuses to face the scrutiny of televised debates or hardline journalists, preferring to communicate directly with voters via social media.
“His Achilles’ heel was his populist leanings and his appreciation for a strong governance style,” Gumbiner said.
Hernández’s hardline approach was on full display in 2018 when he was mayor of the northern city of Bucaramanga, the only major political post he held. He was arrested video shouting at a city councilor – and then slapping him – during a corruption controversy.
Indeed, for all his talk of clean government, Hernández himself is facing corruption charges over a public employment contract from his time as mayor in a criminal case. set to go to test in July – just weeks before the new president is sworn in.
In one day May 29 speechPetro told supporters: “My opponent is accused of corruption. Do we want that? You don’t fight corruption by sending messages on TikTok.”
Hernández has also produced some stunning tackles. In a radio station interview last year, for example, he said that he was “a follower of the great German thinker named Adolf Hitler”, but later explained that he meant Albert Einstein, saying that he had no love for him. rule Nazi Germany. In video addressed to voters in Vichada, a remote area in eastern Colombia bordering Venezuela, he asked the interviewer: “Vichada? What is that?” However, he still won the most votes in Vichada in the first round of voting.
Ideally, Hernández is hard to beat. He’s pro-business but also pro-abortion rights, gay marriage and drug legalization, and supports Colombia’s 2016 peace treaty that disarmed the country’s largest guerrilla group. However, he has failed to deliver on his proposals on everything from national security to economics.
However, many Colombians are more attracted to Hernández’s style than his substance. Among them is Marco Moreno, who runs a bicycle shop on the outskirts of Bogotá.
Hernández was “very adamant in her decisions,” Moreno said. “He’s radical. And that’s the good thing about him.”
