Colombian New President Starts Office Amid Enormous Challenges

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, August 09, 2002

Colombian New President Starts Office Amid Enormous Challenges

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Colombia's President-elect Alvaro Uribe was sworn in Wednesday before the congress as the country's new president for the 2002-2006 period, during which he has to face some hard tasks including fighting against armed groups and the cocaine industry, revitalizing the economy and carrying out political reform.

Uribe, a 50-year-old former lawyer and state governor, inherits from his predecessor a 38-year-old civil war that pits the leftist rebels against the right-wing paramilitaries and the government for control of the country.

During his election campaign, Uribe's tough stance against the rebels, right-wing militias and drug traffickers won him a high supporting rate, sweeping him to presidency in the country's May 26 general elections.

Although hopes were high that Uribe could end the civil war in which some 3,500 people are killed every year, there is still no glimmering of a peace process.

It is difficult for Uribe to end the civil war by restarting peace talks with the country's two largest rebel groups, the 17,000-strong Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the 4,500-strong National Liberation Army (ELN).

Uribe's predecessor, Andres Pastrana, who tried for three years to negotiate a peace with the FARC, was forced to suspend the peace talks with the group on Feb. 20 at the height of a series of attacks blamed on the guerrilla group. And on May 31, Pastrana announced the suspension of peace negotiations with the ELN after no substantial results were achieved, completely smashing his dream of negotiating an end to the war.

The FARC and the ELN expressed their readiness to begin peace talks with the Uribe government, but they continued to launch attacks aimed at gaining control of the country.

Since early June, the FARC has conducted a campaign of death and kidnapping threats against town mayors and state officials, with the aim of forcing them out of their posts.

On Monday, just two days ahead of Uribe's inauguration, the FARC, which has bombed civilian facilities such as oil pipelines and electricity towers for years to further undermine the country's already fragile economy, waged a series of bombing attacks, injuring five civilians and at least seven soldiers.

In face of a surge in rebel attacks, Uribe attempts to use military advances against the guerrillas to dry up their financing from drug trafficking and force the rebels to negotiate a peace settlement with the government.

Nevertheless, some analysts noted that this was not likely to happen. "What really is happening is an intensification of the conflict, with a more open confrontation," a UN specialist said.

With strong support from the United States, which recently gave the Colombian armed forces the right to use US-supplied military equipment against the rebels, Uribe was pinning his hope on an escalated war for solving Colombia's armed conflict. However some analysts noted that Uribe's embrace of military solutions to social problems could plunge Colombia into further violence.

Besides the armed groups, Uribe also faces a country in economic turmoil, with some 64 percent of his people living below the poverty line and more than 17 percent of the urban people without jobs. Many people see the social crisis as a time-bomb.

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (CEPAL) said in a recent report that Colombia's economy could worsen in 2002, affected by the breakdown in the peace process, the change of government and the situation prevailing in the international arena.

Other difficulties that lay ahead include a political reform and a campaign against corruption, which he promised in his electoral campaign.

Right after being sworn in, Uribe planned to propose a referendum to cut by half the number of lawmakers and merge the two houses of parliament, with the aim of reducing government waste and boosting defense spending.

However, the proposed parliamentary reform could provoke a battle between the new president and the congress, lessening support for Uribe's other reforms.

On Aug. 2, the majority Liberal Party rejected Uribe's proposal to reduce and turn the bicameral congress into a unicameral one. Legislators even warned that if Uribe insists on the proposal, they would propose a referendum on early general elections.

As the first independent politician to be elected president over the past century, Uribe really needs backing from the two principal political forces, the Liberal and Conservative parties.

After being elected as president, Uribe has laid out ambitious plans to increase the size of the US-backed military, reform the congress and clean up official corruption. With so many tasks ahead of him, peace in the country is the most important issue that Uribe must deal with first.

After so many years of armed conflict and thousands of civilian deaths, a negotiated peace seems the only solution.

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