Voting Rules (Part III)

Round two of the Colombian presidential elections occured on Sunday, along with another ley seca (dry weekend) and heightened security. This time around the voter turn-out was lower; this is being blamed on voter fatigue, rain in Cali, and the FIFA World Cup 2010 games being on throughout the day. (Father's Day, however, can not be blamed as a reason since, although the rest of the world observed it yesterday, Colombia moved it one week so as to not be affected by the elections-imposed drinking prohibition.)

Juan Manuel Santos emerged victorious with around 69% of the vote over Antanas Mockus. Santos will likely continue the leadership style and philosophy of outgoing president, Alvaro Uribe, who, for the last eight years, has improved security in the major cities and much of the countryside through swift military actions. Uribe has also made many deals both in trade and in the drug war with the United States, making Colombia a friend to the US in a very socialist-dominated continent where Uncle Sam has few allies.

Mockus advocated for change, and while many of his ideas were based on the use of education to better the nation, Colombians as whole decided they were not ready to take on such a drastic shift in idealogy just yet. Partido Verde (Green Party) will no doubt be back in four years and maybe then the country will be more open to that kind of change. In the mean time, I think it is evident that change has occured in that the two political parties that used to dominate the elections did not even make it out of the first rounds this time.

I am leaving for the summer tomorrow and will return on August 8th, the day after Santos takes has taken office. While it would be nice to be here for the inauguration, I look forward to being here from the begin of what will surely be a historic and interesting presidency.

Voting Rules (Part I)

It's the first of several election weekends here in Colombia which means that Cali turns into a very different place for two days. Beginning at 6pm on Friday, for example, the sale of alcohol is prohibited, thus turning the entire country dry. I don't recall "inebriated voting" being an issue in the States, but perhaps, it wouldn't hurt things! There are also several other rules in effect such as the weekend law that does not allow two people to ride on a motorcycle together, unless it is a man and woman. This is due to assassination attempts where one man drives and the other shoots; women, evidently, are not seen seen as potential assassins.

Compared to the US, election season is not nearly as obnoxious in Colombia. There are not a myriad non-stop bombardment of campaign ads on television, one after another for six months or more leading up to election day. I have received only one campaign flier under my door, despite the multitude of candidates running for several offices. Most of the propaganda seems to be relegated to banners stretched across the major thoroughfares, billboards, posters around telephone poles, and the occasional internet pop-up ad. Of these, the only information seems to be the candidate's name, picture, party, and possibly an innocuous slogan like "Por un pais justo" (For a just country) or "Todos al frente con el Presidente" (All in front with the President); public political mudslinging is either veiled or non-existent.

This weekend is the Congressional elections and preliminaries for several other races, including the parties running for President. Two-term current President, Álvaro Uribe, was denied a constitutional referendum for a third term at the end of February. The first official round of Presidential voting will be in May. The way it was explained to me by Colombian colleagues at school was that there will be subsequent elections every two weeks after that until a candidate receives at least fifty percent of the vote. That could potentially mean a lot of weekends where the bars and clubs are dark and people are stocking up on cervezas, ron, and aguardiente!