Adam and Abigail review the week of July 3-9, focusing on massacres in Colombia, state elections in Mexico, Brazil's presidential race, a clandestine submarine in Ecuador, and recent U.S. naval exercises.
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On Sunday, a Colombian Army jungle raid freed four policemen who had been held hostage by the FARC guerrillas since the 1990s. Colombian Defense Minister Gabriel Silva said that although there was combat, the rescue took place without a single death. It happened less than 20 miles from the site where the 2008 “Operación Jaque” hostage rescue occurred. Details of the operation – in particular, how it happened without the guerrillas carrying out their threat to kill hostages at the first sign of a rescue attempt – are still emerging. We’re posting links to coverage here.
The rescue happened on the same weekend that Colombia’s principal newsmagazine, Semana, reported that the country’s military, angered and “discouraged” by verdicts in high-profile human rights cases, had become almost inoperable. “The situation is so delicate that some analysts have dared to propose it as the reason [the Army] has not repeated its strong blows against the FARC high command, such as the bombing of Raúl Reyes and Operación Jaque in 2008.”
Meanwhile, a week before Sunday’s presidential election runoff in Colombia, former Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos leads opponent Antanas Mockus by a broad margin. 66.5 to 27.4 percent, according to the last Gallup poll.
Mexico is angryabout a June 7 incident in which a Border Patrol agent fired across the border at a group of people throwing rocks, killing a 15-year-old boy in Ciudad Juárez. Mexico’s Interior Secretary issued a diplomatic note expressing concern, and legislators of all major parties have called for the agent’s extradition to Mexico. The State Department’s response was terse.
“[M]ost of Chile didn’t notice the dictatorship of Pinochet. On the contrary, they felt relieved,” Chile’s ambassador to Argentina, Miguel Otero, told an Argentine newspaper. Otero downplayed the 1973-1990 dictatorship’s human rights abuses (“everywhere in the world, there are people who abuse their authority”), adding that had it not been for Pinochet’s coup, “Chile would be Cuba today.” The resulting political firestorm not only forced Otero’s resignation; it shone a light on the pro-Pinochet elements in the right-of-center coalition backing recently inaugurated President Sebastián Piñera.
Peru’s defense minister, Rafael Rey, accused the country’s human rights groups of going on a “witch hunt” against the armed forces.
Honduran President Porfirio Lobo claimed that a conspiracy, possibly involving the right wing of his own National Party, is plotting a coup to overthrow him. “I know who you are,” Lobo cryptically warned the alleged plotters, whoever they are.
Though it wasn’t on the official agenda, the question of whether to re-admit post-coup Honduras to the Organization of American States was a dominant point of discussion at the annual OAS General Assembly meeting in Lima, Peru. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton made a pitch for Honduras’s reinstatement, but a significant number of countries demand that the Tegucigalpa government take further steps to demonstrate that democracy has truly been restored. Meanwhile, U.S. aid to the Honduran military re-started with the delivery of twenty-five trucks.
Secretary Clinton’s trip to the region was also notable for a surprisingly friendly visit to Ecuador, where leftist President Rafael Correa declared, “The new left that I represent is not anti-anything. We’re not anti-American; we love America.” Correa’s new tone has been marked by kind words from Colombia on border-security cooperation, postponed and less-frequent meetings with Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, and increasing opposition to the President on Ecuador’s left.
Polls for the second and final round of Colombia’s presidential elections, scheduled for June 20, have pro-government candidate Juan Manuel Santos leading former Bogotá mayor Antanas Mockus by a 2-1 margin. Read my analysis of Colombia’s first-round elections at the OpenDemocracy.net website. Links to much more coverage of Colombia’s election campaign are here.
Colombian President Álvaro Uribe lashed out last week against a prosecutor who, apparently in error, issued a citation to investigate Gen. Freddy Padilla de León, the chief of the country’s armed forces, for alleged involvement in human rights abuses. “I raise my voice in opposition to the accusations against Gen. Padilla de León. They [the accusers] are useful idiots of terrorism who do nothing more than make false accusations. … Terrorism wants to win by acting through scribblers who want to truncate the Democratic Security policy’s advances.”
Last Friday’s Washington Post led with a report on the Obama administration’s expanding use of Special Operations Forces troops worldwide. “Special Operations forces have grown both in number and budget, and are deployed in 75 countries, compared with about 60 at the beginning of last year.” In The Nation, Jeremy Scahill adds that these countries, in Latin America, have included Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay and Peru.
Here is a transcript and video of Assistant Secretary of State Arturo Valenzuela’s briefing on Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s visit to Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Barbados.
Bolivian President Evo Morales called on the armed forces to be more involved in counternarcotics, asking them “to prepare a strategy for the fight against narcotrafficking to guard national sovereignty against foreign interests, principally the United States.” The commander of the Bolivian Army’s U.S.-aided 8th Division responded that his unit has already been involved in counternarcotics for many years.
“The U.S. Southern Command's (Southcom) Joint Task Force Haiti officially completed its mission today marking the end of Operation Unified Response,” reported Southern Command. About 500 National Guard troops remain in Haiti carrying out humanitarian assistance exercises. Much remains to be done in Haiti, a Washington Posteditorial recalls.
Recent arms transfers news: Venezuela will buy K-8 aircraft from China for US$82 million. Argentina will study the possibility of developing nuclear-propelled naval vessels. Brazil, working with France, already has an US$8 billion project to develop a nuclear-powered submarine, scheduled to go online in 2021. The Brookings Institution and the Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies held a conference last week entitled “An Arms Race in Our Hemisphere”; Brookings has made available audio of the event, including my presentation.
Adam and Abigail discuss Colombia's May 30 presidential vote; the upcoming OAS meeting in Peru; Secretary of State Clinton's planned visit to Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Barbados; and Peruvian President Alán García's meeting with President Obama.
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Colombia’s first round of presidential voting is over, and results have been tallied. Former Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos came close to avoiding a second-round runoff vote with 46.6%, about ten points higher than polls had been predicting. Former Bogotá mayor Antanas Mockus will face him on June 20; he won 21.5%, more than 10 points lower than polls had foreseen. Santos won 31 of Colombia’s 32 departments; Mockus only won in Putumayo.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will attend the OAS General Assembly in Peru on June 6-8. She will spend the rest of June 8 in Ecuador and Colombia, and go on to Barbados on June 9.
The Washington Post caused a stir last Monday with an article presenting evidence from a new witness claiming that President Álvaro Uribe’s brother, Santiago, led a paramilitary group in Yarumal, Antioquia, in the 1990s. President Uribe responded by citing the “capacity” of “criminals” to “penetrate a serious newspaper like the Washington Post.”
In the wake of a wave of threats, two human rights defenders were killed in Colombia: victims’ leader Rogelio Martínez, in San Onofre, Sucre; and Alexánder Quintero, in Santander de Quilichao, Cauca.
After an urban offensive in Kingston slums that killed more than 70 people, Jamaican authorities have yet to capture drug lord Christopher “Dudus” Coke, wanted in extradition by the United States.
Two important human rights documents released last week: the Americas section of Amnesty International’s annual report, and the report on Colombia by Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur for Extrajudicial Executions.
12 Republican senators sent a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton calling for Venezuela to be added to the U.S. government’s list of terrorist-sponsoring states.
Though it’s only available to subscribers, William Finnegan’s New Yorker article about the La Familia drug cartel in Mexico is worth a read - or just listen to the podcast interview with the author.
Paraguay ended a 30-day state of emergency imposed in five northern provinces to combat a small guerrilla group called the Paraguayan People’s Army (EPP). Not a single EPP member was captured as a result of the military deployment. No serious human rights abuses were reported, but critics voiced concerns about giving the army an increased internal security role.
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said that he would dissolve the country’s congress if the business community supported his decision.
El Salvador’s president, Mauricio Funes, is completing his first year in office with very high approval ratings but significant disagreements with his own party, the former FMLN guerrilla movement.
The head of Colombia’s armed forces, Gen. Freddy Padilla, announced his resignation, effective on August 7, the day Colombia would inaugurate its next president.
Colombians go to the polls today for the first round of voting to elect a new president. Here is a quick overview of what each of the major candidates has said on the record about Colombia’s relations with the United States.
Antanas Mockus, Green Party
Favors the 2009 defense agreement with the United States. Proposes to rethink drug policy through a “broad national debate.” Supports the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement signed in 2006.
“While he considered that ‘there are reasons to privilege the relationship with the United States,’ Mockus said he was ‘disposed to understand new facets’ of Colombian foreign policy.” (Source)
“With respect to the presence of U.S. soldiers on Colombian bases, Mockus said he is in agreement with the accord, and that Colombia needs the United States to fight narcotrafficking.” (Source)
“Mockus, the former Bogotá mayor, didn’t refer in today’s debate to the agreement with the United States, but on other occasions he has defended it, though with the nuance that all guarantees must be given, above all to neighboring countries, that the U.S. military personnel will not use the bases for purposes different than what was agreed.” (Source)
“I would like a certain stepping back from current anti-drug policy so that Colombian society can explore all the implications of drug trafficking: the supposed benefits for some sectors and the costs borne by youth, the environment, the justice system and institutions. No one is going to resolve the problem of drug trafficking but Colombians.” (Source)
“Narcotrafficking doesn’t work for Colombia. We are going to shake narcotrafficking off of us. From that point we’ll be able to rethink Plan Colombia and adjust it. The message is that only Colombians can meaningfully contribute to ending the problem. We may need foreign aid, but nobody is going to fundamentally resolve the problem for us. We have to do it ourselves.” (Source)
“Regarding fumigations, the Green Party candidate, Antanas Mockus, proposed that Plan Colombia should continue while a broad national debate occurs that would lead to the eradication of illegal crops through social pressure.” (Source)
“The Free Trade Agreement organizes interdependence, helps us to specialize, and favors long-term investments. At the same time, it makes it possible to clarify which labor sectors in the United States would benefit from trade with Colombia.” (Source)
“The United States should not dictate our relations with Venezuela, and Venezuela should not dictate our relations with the United States.” (Source)
Rafael Pardo, Liberal Party
Opposes the 2009 defense agreement with the United States. Opposes aerial fumigation of coca crops. Supports the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
“In July, Rafael Pardo, Colombia’s former defense minister, called the agreement analogous to ‘lending the balcony of your apartment to someone from outside so that he can keep watch of the neighbors.’” (Source)
“Manual eradication should be maintained, accompanied by development programs. Plan Colombia has not defeated narcotrafficking.” (Source)
“The Liberal Party aspirant, Rafael Pardo, said that to eradication he would add ‘an incentive payment in zones of coca cultivation to fight the narcos, and more social investment.” (Source)
“The negotiation of the FTA is already finished. Its approval brings benefits for the country, and I have always been in favor of well-negotiated treaties, which benefit all sectors of the country.” (Source)
Gustavo Petro, Alternative Democratic Pole
Opposes the 2009 defense agreement with the United States. Opposes aerial fumigation of coca crops. Opposes the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
“He declared himself to be against the broadening of the military cooperation accord with the United States. … He said that it ‘wasn’t valid’ because the Congress wasn’t consulted and because it violated constitutional principles.” (Source)
“Petro said he considers that the current [drug] policy shifts around, but does not solve, the problem, while ‘narcotraffickers embrace governors, mayors and enter the Casa de Nariño [Colombian presidential palace] through the basement.” (Source)
“Fumigation doesn’t guarantee that coca will disappear, it just displaces the problem to other territories. The problem is attacked with more social fairness.” (Source)
“Instead of insisting blindly on its approval, we must seek the renegotiation of this FTA. To create a new treaty with fair terms for the nation, especially with regard to labor rights, the agricultural sector and the environment. The FTAs that become treaties to protect investment or that include unfair trade terms, should be denounced.” (Source)
Noemí Sanín, Conservative Party
Supports the 2009 defense agreement with the United States. Would maintain aerial fumigation of coca crops but supports rethinking drug policy. Supports the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
“Noemí Sanín said that the issue of the bases with the United States was already over, she recalled that Brazil signed one without complaints from any neighbor, and said she would not accept any country giving opinions about the agreements that she would sign.” (Source)
“Noemí Sanín spoke fo the need for an alternative and integral agricultural policy and concluded that ‘fumigation is a lesser evil.’” (Source)
“With the FTA many jobs will be created. These agreements open permanent new markets to our exports and assure us more foreign investment, more better-paid jobs, and the incorporation of new technology. I won’t just insist on the FTA with the United States, but also with other countries.” (Source)
Juan Manuel Santos, “La U” Party
Supports the 2009 defense agreement with the United States. Supports aerial fumigation of coca crops. Supports the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
“Cooperation with the United States ‘is necessary’ and the military accord signed late last year does not contain ‘any threat against any third country,’ Santos emphasized.” (Source)
“[The defense cooperation agreement with the United States] is not a treaty, but an accord, and thus doesn’t need to be approved by Congress.” (Source)
“The [military] accord ‘gives order’ to what was already being done under Plan Colombia, it is ‘a legal umbrella,’ Santos maintained.” (Source)
“Juan Manuel Santos, of ‘La U,’ responded that coca crops are a security problem, which must be fought with fumigations and manual eradication.” (Source)
“Santos will seek ‘to revive’ the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between Colombia and the United States.” (Source)
Germán Vargas Lleras, Radical Change Party
Supports the 2009 defense agreement with the United States. Supports aerial fumigation of coca crops. Supports the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
“The candidate of Radical Change, Germán Vargas Lleras, also defended the [defense cooperation] agreement and affirmed that, regardless of whether it is ‘popular’ or not, it is Colombia’s ‘best instrument to dissuade’ neighbors from ‘an eventual aggression.’” (Source)
“The current [drug] policy has yielded important results that must be maintained and deepened, that’s why I’ll continue with eradication and fumigation.” (Source)
“Free Trade Agreements allow us to reach higher levels of development. That’s why it will be a priority to keep working bilaterally for the approval of the Free Trade Agreement with the United States. Colombia can’t give itself the luxury of wasting the enormous opportunity represented by a market of 300 million people.” (Source)
Colombians go to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president. The country's media published the final public opinion polls last weekend.
Looking at these polls' results over the past two months reveals a rather dramatic two-man race that is too close to call.
In late March, voter preferences for Sunday's first round were giving a strong advantage to Juan Manuel Santos, outgoing President Álvaro Uribe's former defense minister. In April, however, Santos was rapidly overtaken by a previously marginal candidate, two-time former Bogotá mayor Antanas Mockus.
Mockus's surge appeared to plateau by late April, though. His poll numbers even declined slightly, from the mid-to-high 30s to the mid-to-low 30s. Santos's poll numbers changed little over the entire two-month period, though the trendline showed a slight increase in mid-May that appeared to put him back in first place by the narrowest of margins.
No poll gives either candidate over 40 percent of the intended vote. Four other well-known politicians are in the race, though all are polling in the single digits. (They are excluded from these charts to improve readability.)
Since Colombia's system requires a candidate to win over 50 percent, a second round of runoff voting between the top two candidates is likely. That election would take place on June 20.
Here is what the polls have been saying about Colombian voters' second-round intentions.
Second-round vote intentions (hypothetical Santos-Mockus matchup) Click to enlarge
Here, Mockus appears to have a modestly greater advantage. Polls indicate that a majority of losing candidates' supporters would migrate to the former Bogotá mayor after May 30.
Still, even at that phase this election is too close to call. Polls rarely put a candidate above the 50 percent threshold in second-round voting intentions.
Another reason this election is too close to call are factors that polls might not capture well, in a contest between an old and a new way of doing politics.
Santos, a scion of a publishing family and standard-bearer of "La U," the largest pro-government political party, heads a campaign with extensive resources, which are being spent on advertising and get-out-the-vote efforts throughout the country.
Mockus's Green Party lacks these resources and party machinery, but holds a very strong advantage in cyberspace. "Santos's Facebook page had 178,421 members while Mockus's boasted 687,558" as of May 25, notes Nadja Drost on the GlobalPost website.
In a country where one in five citizens – 9.2 million people – now have Facebook pages, social networking is a very important, and very unpredictable, factor. We will soon find out whether it can actually make up for the lack of a well-funded political operation in Latin America's third most-populous country.
Note: these charts, created with a popular spreadsheet program, are unscientific. Most polling experts would object to placing in the same chart results from pollsters who use different methodologies. Nonetheless, these charts do appear to illustrate the rather dramatic shifts in public opinion that have shaped Colombia's campaign since March.
We're pleased to present the first edition of the Just the Facts Podcast. We expect to make these audio submissions a regular feature.
While the podcast will have its own home page at www.justf.org/podcast, we will post to this blog every time we add an entry. It will soon be on iTunes' podcast directory, and its RSS feed can be found at www.justf.org/podcast/feed.xml.
In our inaugural February 5 post, Adam Isacson of CIP talks about the debate in Colombia over President Álvaro Uribe's apparent desire to run for a third term in office, which just suffered a setback in the justice system.
On Monday, October 19th, the constitutional chamber of the Nicaraguan Supreme Court ruled to lift a ban on re-election by deeming it "unenforceable." The ruling opens the door for President Daniel Ortega to run for re-election in 2011 and was immediately condemned by Sandinista-government's opposition as an illegal political maneuvering intended to avoid having to get the vote for ending term limits approved by the national assembly and passed in a national referendum, both of which appeared unlikely, as indicated by Bloggings by Boz.
Confronted with increasing criticism about the ruling, President Ortega announced that the ruling "is unappealable" and "written in stone," and encouraged his critics to relax and prepare to run against him in the 2011 presidential elections.
Since the ruling, however, the United States Department of State, U.S. ambassador to Nicaragua, Robert Callahan, and Senator John Kerry (D-MA), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, have joined in expressing concern about the recent ruling. Their statements have led to protests outside the U.S. Embassy in Managua and calls for the U.S. ambassador to be expelled. As the Miami Herald reports, "For Sandinistas here (in Nicaragua), the comments by the U.S. ambassador are part of the United States' legacy of continual interventionist policies toward Nicaragua. During the first Sandinista government of the 1980s, the United States funneled money to the contras, who fought to overthrow the leftist regime."
The Nicaraguan government has not indicated that they will expel the U.S. ambassador, though President Ortega quickly blamed Ambassador Callahan and the State Department for instigating the attacks on the U.S. Embassy, stating that "It was not us who started this polemic that led to protests in the country. It was them (the United States) who started it with the statement in Washington and the discourse of the Ambassador in Managua."
Below are excerpts of the statements made by the the U.S. Department of State, Ambassador Callahan, and Senator Kerry.
On October 22nd, the United States Department of State issued a statement expressing concern about the situation in Nicaragua:
We share the concern of many Nicaraguans that this situation is part of a larger pattern of questionable and irregular governmental actions, beginning before the flawed municipal elections of November 2008, that threatens to undermine the foundations of Nicaraguan democracy and calls into question the Nicaraguan government's commitment to uphold the Inter-American Democratic Charter. The ruling appears to short circuit, through legal maneuverings, the open and transparent consideration by the Nicaraguan people of the possibility for presidential re-election.
As we approach the first anniversary of the November 2008 municipal elections, it is important to note that decisions that have such a profound impact on democratic governance should be taken in a manner that fosters a sense of legitimacy and ownership among those who are governed. Attempts to short circuit constitutional authority, regardless of ideology or country, threaten democratic governance and are of concern to all members of the Organization of American States.
The United States' ambassador to Nicaragua, Robert Callahan, told a group of businessmen that "From our point of view, the Supreme Court acted improperly and with unusual speed, in secret, with the participation of judges from only one political movement and without any public debate or discussion."
In response to the protests outside the U.S. Embassy, Ambassador Callahan announced that he will not leave Managua, despite calls for him to be expelled. "I am staying here to continue my functions as the U.S. Ambassador," he said. He also noted that "no one has the right to attack an embassy; an embassy is sovereign territory of another country and the protests were violent... Protest yes, but please, peacefully."
Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also condemned the recent ruling by the Nicaraguan Supreme Court and compared President Ortega to the leaders of the de facto government in Honduras:
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega's manipulation of the Nicaraguan Supreme Court this week to circumvent constitutional limits on his term in office reeks of the authoritarianism of the past. Coming on the heels of universally condemned municipal elections last year, his power grab deepens a crisis that Nicaragua can ill afford.
Nicaragua and Honduras are obviously different, but unconstitutional actions are unacceptable anywhere. President Ortega appears to be following the cues of the coup-plotters in Honduras, where the president of the Congress and the military have manipulated the Supreme Court to rationalize a coup d'etat, resist the restoration of democracy, and impose martial law repression.
(This post was researched and written by CIP Intern Hannah Brodlie.)
Over the next twelve months presidential elections will take place in Uruguay, Chile, Colombia, Bolivia, Honduras, Costa Rica and Brazil.
In Uruguay the first round of legislative and presidential elections were held last Sunday. While the governing center-left Frente Amplio’s candidate, Jose Mujica, a former Tupamaro guerrilla, received a majority 47 percent of the vote, it was not the outright majority necessary to avoid a runnoff against former president Luis Lacalle, who received 28.5 percent. Pedro Bordaberry of the Colorado Party got just 17 percent, and immediately endorsed Lacalle, in an effort to avoid a Mujica victory at the runnoff, which will be held on November 29. The winner will take office on March 1, 2010.
Chile is facing a three-way race between opposition conservative Sebastian Pinera, Eduardo Frei, the governing center-left Concertación candidate, and Marco Enriquez-Ominami, a 36 year old congressman and film producer. Enriquez-Ominami split from the governing Concertación coalition to run as an independent and is gaining in the polls. There are a total of four candidates on the ballot; the top two will end a run-off election if none wins an outright majority. The first round of voting is December 13. A poll by the Centro de Estudios de la Realidad Contemporanea (CERC) shows Enriquez-Ominami with 20 percent of the vote, and Pinera leading with 41 percent. The results confirm the likelihood of a tie between Frei and Enriquez-Ominami in the first round of voting. Reuters offers descriptions of each candidate’s positions.
In Brazil, the presidential race remains steady, according to a September Sensus poll, with Jose Serra, Sao Paulo state governor and senior member of the opposition PSDB, at 40%, Dilma Rousseff, Lula’s chief of staff and chosen successor, at 19%, and everyone else under 10%, in a runoff scenario. In the hypothetical runoff, Bloggings by Boznotes, Serra would beat Rousseff 50% to 25%, with a quarter remaining undecided or not voting.
Some analysts have suggested that the Dilma’s fall in popularity is due to recent scandals surrounding the Lula administrations. Lula has dropped a few points in the polls, but he still enjoys a high approval rating of 76.8 percent (down from 81.5 percent). In addition, Dilma underwent chemotherapy for lymphoma earlier this year, however her doctor announced in September that she has beaten the cancer and is in excellent health.
In Bolivia, president Evo Morales will likely be re-elected on December 6, according to a recent poll by Equipos MORI. 46 percent of respondents said they would vote for Morales, 16 percent for former Cochabamba mayor Manfred Reyes Villa of the New Republican Force (NRF), and 8 percent for Samuel Doria Medina of the National Unity Front (FUN). A quarter of respondents were undecided. Bolivia’s first indigenous President and former coca-grower, Morales was elected in December 2005 as the candidate for Movement to Socialism (MAS).
President of Colombia Alvaro Uribe, popular for his hardline security policies, has still yet to announce formally whether he intends to run for a third term next year. Colombia's Constitutional Court approved a referendum on whether to amend the constitution to allow Uribe to run again. However, they will not likely rule on the legality of the bid, clearing him to run, until early next year. Electoral authorities say they need at least two months to organize the re-election referendum, which means that the referendum could take place concurrently with March 2010 legislative voting, only two months before the presidential poll. The president's approval rating is 78 percent, and an Ipsos poll suggests that he would win if the election were held today. In a referendum vote, 65% say they would turn out and of those, 88% say they would vote in favor of allowing reelection.
The Colombian newsmagazine Semana recently published a poll of candidate preferences, both with and without Uribe in the running. According the poll, in an election without Uribe, the top three candidates are (in order of popularity) Juan Manuel Santos, Andres Felipe Arias and Gustavo Petro. The first two have served in Uribe's cabinet; the third is the nominee of the country's main leftist opposition party. In a scenario in which Uribe does run - in which case Santos and Arias would not - the current president wins by a landslide; the distant runners-up are Gustavo Petro, Liberal Party nominee Rafael Pardo and Conservative Party politician Noemí Sanin.
In Venezuela, legislative elections are scheduled for December 2010. The opposition has tried to present a united front, the Mesa de la Unidad Democrática, and decided not to boycott this year’s elections as they did in 2005, resulting in a legislature almost totally controlled by President Chávez's supporters since then. They believe that due to Chavez’s recent decrease in popularity, documented by a number of polls, they can win a majority. Both the opposition and Chávez havementioned the posssibility of moving up the election date to earlier in the year.
Elections in Honduras remain uncertain. The Micheletti regime, which took power in a June 28 coup, insists it will hold presidential and legislative elections on November 29, as planned. However, the international community will not recognize the results of the elections unless deposed president Manuel Zelaya is reinstated. However, according to a CID-Gallup poll, if elections were held today, Porfirio Lobo Sosa of the National Party would be elected president with 59 percent of the vote. Lobo is 16 points ahead of his competition, Elvin Santos of the Liberal Party, and Zelaya’s former vice president. While both Zelaya and Santos are from the same party, Santos has distanced himself from the deposed president since the coup.
Elections will be held in Costa Rica in February. Laura Chinchilla, former vice president and candidate for the governing Partido Liberacion Nacional (PLN), is indisputably in the lead with 43 percent of voter support, according to a poll published by La República in August. Otton Solis, founder of the Partido de Accion Ciudadana and known for his opposition to the free-trade agreement with the U.S. that current president Oscar Arias helped push through, is at 26 percent. According to the same La República poll, 72 percent of voters support the idea of a female president, a slight increase from April.
