Yesterday's 21 March debate, which was broadcast on RCN and RCN Radio, brought together the presidential candidates vying for the bid to reach the Casa de Nariño, Sergio Fajardo Federico Gutiérrez, Ingrid Betancourt and the candidate of the National Salvation Movement who first appeared in a presidential debate.
The former mayor of Bucaramanga Rodolfo Hernández, since the beginning of his campaign, reported that he would not attend presidential debates, so his absence was common, the significant lack and that evidenced the production of RCN with an empty lectern was that of the candidate for the Historical Pact.
In the afternoon, Gustavo Petro announced through his Twitter account that he would not participate in any discussion between candidates “until transparency of the vote is guaranteed”, referring to the counting of votes requested by the national registrar, Alexander Vega and also denouncing that there is “no chain of custody” transparent”, for the manipulation of the corresponding votes of the elections held on 13 March.
Despite his absence, Gustavo Petro's name was repeatedly named in the course of the debate, including the Colombian team candidate Federico Gutiérrez, took a photo of the candidate and prepared to speak against him.
“As we are used to not seeing him in the debates, I brought them to you: I present to you Gustavo Petro. This man is responsible - for the crisis - and many of those who dedicated themselves to blocking the roads at the time of the strike,” said 'Fico', assuring that the current economic problems were not the responsibility of the current government but of Petro.
This fact was not overlooked by Internet users, who immortalized the moment in numerous memes that invade the social networks of Colombians.
Among many things, the funny images pointed to a strange feeling of 'Fico' generated by Petro or an intention to vote for the candidate of the Historical Pact or even compared them with the characters of the famous soap opera 'Betty the ugly'. The funny images showed that perhaps Federico Gutiérrez's appeal was not a good idea.
The opposition leader and presidential candidate of the Historical Pact, Gustavo Petro, announced on Monday that he was suspending his presence in the electoral debates, which take place within the framework of the first round, until “transparency of the vote is guaranteed” in the country.
This announcement by the left-wing senator, who leads the polls of voting intention in Colombia, comes hours after the national registrar, Alexander Vega, reported that he would request a general recount of the votes for the Senate during the Electoral Guarantees Commission, in the face of repeated questioning by different collectivities and candidates because of the obvious irregularities in the legislative elections.
“I suspend my presence in electoral debates until the transparency of the vote is guaranteed. We will act with the utmost prudence and call on international oversight to act promptly. At the moment there is no transparent chain of custody on the votes already counted,” said candidate Gustavo Petro, after his coalition became the force with the most representatives in the Senator.
In this regard, he asserted that “what the registrar did today is called fraud”, arguing that the chain of custody of the votes ended last Saturday after the consolidation of the counting process in which the Historical Pact recovered 290,000 votes and three seats, becoming the largest bench in Congress with 19 seats.
In turn, he noted that with this announcement the decision of 5,000 judges was unknown, who advanced the counting process, while indicating that “at this time they may be filling the ballot bags. We are facing a real coup d'état promoted by Uribe.”
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