- By Aleyda Visbal.
- V semester.
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- The Honorable Senator Ingrid Betancourt was one of the guest speakers in the last
Psychology Convention at Universidad del Norte. Her speech was entitled "Leadership
from Opposition". Some extracts are reproduced below.
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- "What we do not have in Colombia is a true democracy, this term could be defined as
"people’s power". It requires a fundamental element to function,
opposition. This nurtures democracy since it enables the existence and interaction of
different points of view. Unfortunately, opposition does not exist in Colombia."
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- Making a historical review, she reminded us of the "Frente Nacional" which she
called "clientelism agreement" due to the way the traditional political parties
assigned the different posts in the government. Liberal and conservatories agreed to take
turns to the presidency every four years. With this decision, opposition was finished.
"This has left us with an imperfect state and people participating in opposition seen
as dangerous to the system and not as democracy agents trying to strengthen it.
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- "Those who participate as oppositors generally end up being killed"
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- Senator Betancourt thinks that opposition must not produce an armed conflict but must be
a right obtained through votes. Colombia has a long way to go in this matter. Our
mentality, inherited from the "Frente Nacional" leads us to question all types
of protesting that take place in our country. We do not believe in or accept Opposition.
We consider it wrong and evil. Ingrid Betancourt affirms that it is necessary to criticize
constructively, to be tolerant with those who think different from us. In Colombia there
is a strong need that people go out to the streets to protest against war as a way to
obtain peace.
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- "Each time there is a guerrilla attack we think: what do we need peace for?
Let’s kill all those guerrilla people". This has been our mentality for thirty
years. Today there is a group of people that want a different country but have not had the
opportunity to express their views.
- In this way, she proposes the legalization of opposition in Colombia" in a proper
way, without killing each other" She proposes a political reform since "it is
the only instrument we have to face our problems". Her initiative is totally ignored
in the Congress since the majority of its members would not support a reform that can be
considered dangerous for their interests. That is why we need our citizens to call for
action. "The referendum is the legal instrument to carry out this political reform so
we can have a new political class, people involved and committed with their ideas leading
the country dialectically".
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- "We have to travel all around the country to have the possibility to construct a
different reform. The possibility to give the opportunity to those elected honestly and
not with the manipulation of the system of the traditional political parties". The
idea is to establish a compulsory vote in this way honest participants will be elected
with an ample margin over the ones supported by the traditional parties and they will
start the change. Our idea is that people can vote from the age of sixteen. Nowadays
sixteen year old people take decisions for their lives. They are parents, workers,
guerrilla members or starting undergraduate studies. In Colombia there are a lot of young
people that will support, with their vote, interests related to education, loans, studies
abroad, ecology campaigns, better jobs, economy issues, military service for women; and
open spaces to debate different topics young people prefer to talk about.
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- "Let’s make decisions about the country we would
like to have, using the revocation of the congress, the political reform and the
referendum, all this in a peaceful context. If we are to talk about leadership from
opposition, the only way is to do it with a real leadership to trace pathways to peace,
that is the kind of leadership we are lacking of."
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