Paola Ochoa accused of racism against Francia Márquez

On the morning of March 24, a new controversy sparked journalist Paola Ochoa, after making a racist comment against Francia Márquez, who is Gustavo Petro's vice-presidential formula for the Historical Pact.

While talking on Blu Radio about who Federico Gutiérrez's vice-presidential formula will be, Ochoa said that the former mayor of Medellín will choose a man, because any female profile would be “very stratum six” compared to Francia Márquez, a woman of African descent of humble extraction.

“He is going to have to name a man because if he gets a woman he is going to look very cute, very nice, very stratum six, compared to France,” Ochoa said in a condescending manner.

Among the laughs of Néstor Humberto Martínez and other panelists, Felipe Zuleta questioned Ochoa's comparison.

It should be recalled that the journalist was approximated by Rodolfo Hernández's campaign to be her vice-presidential formula, but the controversies in which she found herself immersed, and which are at the end of this article, forced her to withdraw from aspiration.

Paola Ochoa only responded by retweeting the trill and saying: “Maybe I'm not going to vote for Petro, but I love Francia Márquez.” These statements did not go well on social networks, as hundreds of comments on Twitter went viral accusing Paola Ochoa of being racist:

The journalist has become famous for a series of polemics on radio and in her columns. One of them was when he asked the national government not to give priority in vaccination to the elderly, saying, “Does it make sense to administer the vaccine first among those who are most likely to die?”

The also radio panelist continued to question the prioritization given to older adults, saying that if young people and adolescents who “have a whole life ahead of them” should not be vaccinated first and said that this idea comes from a proposal by The Boston Globe, one of the most important newspapers in the United States, which wrote an article called 'Vaccine the youngest ones' in which he sets out the objectives of this initiative: to maximize the efficiency of the vaccine and minimize infections.

As Ochoa explained in his text, the idea would be to have the 'millennials', born between 1980 and 1993, and generation Z, who go from 93 to 2000, in the forefront row, “the two large groups of asymptomatic patients and those most responsible for the spread of the virus throughout the globe”. In addition, he said that vaccination days could be implemented in schools, universities, cloisters and campuses, which would simplify and make cheaper the cost and obstacles throughout the country.

“This would put an end to the 'covid-parties' and clandestine rumbas, while a new air would be given to the nightlife industry — bars, discos, cinemas, theaters and restaurants —” and proposes that these spaces modify their routines to receive young people who already have the vaccine, however, the Government has not spoken of any possibility of discriminating because of who has or does not have the vaccine.

In June 2021, Ochoa said that in some areas it is believed that giving breast milk for one or two years is from underdeveloped countries. Speaking to the station, the journalist defended milk in jar and assured that there is no single truth and that the advantage of breast milk is because “it is very economical”.

I have four children, three were born here and one was born there (United States) and the one who was born there told us the pediatrician that we should start giving him milk powder after three months, because these milks are super enriched, they have a lot of amino acids, minerals, vitamins and that precisely what he does is that children can develop much faster in size.

But one of the biggest and most repercussive controversies occurred during the 2021 national strike, when Ochoa asked one of Buenaventura's most important leaders, Leonard Renteria, if he didn't think that blocking the bridge through which 60% of the merchandise entered was irreparable damage to the country. This position won him an angry response from the young artist who said to him ““Irreparable for whom, journalist? (...) The only thing that interests you, from what I have just heard, is that the goods come and go. But who thinks of blacks and blacks, the indigenous people, the mestizos who are here, working so that you have all the comforts in your homes? Who thinks about that? So we have to work at the expense of anything?”

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