Starting at 10 am on Tuesday, the presidential debate at the Externado de Colombia University took place. The meeting was attended by Ingrid Betancourt, Enrique Gómez, Luis Pérez, Gustavo Petro and John Milton Rodríguez. In this conversation, Petro, leader of the Historical Pact, returned to this type of forum, after having suspended his presence in these spaces.
(Venezuela divides candidates’ foreign policy proposals).
On March 21, the former mayor of Bogotá had confirmed his absence from talks with other candidates for the House of Nariño: “I am suspending my presence in electoral debates until the transparency of the vote is guaranteed. We will act with maximum prudence and we ask the international oversight agencies to act promptly. At this time there is no transparent chain of custody over the votes already counted. However, Petro was present at the gathering organized by the educational institution.
DISCUSSION TOPICS:
After the applicants’ presentations, the questions were adjusted to three thematic axes (youth agenda, drug policy and gender equity). Next, the declarations of the attending politicians on the respective topics.
YOUNG AGENDA
Ingrid Betancourt:
– “Gustavo Petro is looking at me with a smile. We have to work so that the EPS manage to give us an effective result on mental health”.
– “Depression is not only in adults, it is also in children.”
– “The people most affected by depression and violence are women, it is important to have protection centers for women.”
– “My dad founded ICETEX. He devised a system that trusts the student.”
– “My father wanted all Colombians to have the possibility of educating themselves abroad, it was not a bank, as it is now, we have to give it back its reason for being.”
– He stated that he would promote the modification of ICETEX. He would also hold peace talks with the ELN.
Henry Gomez:
– “The country’s serious problems cannot continue to be solved by giving people money. The problem with ICETEX and higher education is poor quality. Especially public education that does not leave students satisfied. That is the reason for the desertion”.
– I would not modify the ICETEX. Nor would he hold peace talks with the ELN.
Luis Perez:
– “We are going to create more than a million jobs.”
– “There are more than 150 digital trades in the world that do not yet exist in Colombia.”
– “With a neobank, with a trillion pesos, we are going to create cryptocurrencies, work with bitcoin and with new trades.”
– He stated that he would promote the modification of ICETEX. He would also hold peace talks with the ELN.
Gustav Petro:
– “The cause of the violence against environmental leaders has to do with a predatory economy on the environment, burning the jungle, extinguishing the water to extract the oil, preferring mining over agriculture, expelling the peasantry from the agrarian frontier towards the infertile edges of the earth, use excluded territories as drug trafficking routes. There must be a program to restore the balance between nature and economy. We intend to revitalize the Amazon rainforest from a background”.
– “That water be a guiding principle of the economy and not a factor in its destruction. We allow ourselves to produce an inclusion of Afro populations.”
– He stated that he would promote the modification of ICETEX. He would also hold peace talks with the ELN.
John Milton Rodriguez:
– “The virtual economy is a very effective response in the youth labor market”.
– “It is important to create an entrepreneurial ecosystem for young people.”
– “We are going to deepen trade relations with countries around the world.”
– “Exports must be multiplied by three, in a model that favors rural education.”
– He stated that he would promote the modification of ICETEX. He would also hold peace talks with the ELN.
In this thematic segment, all the candidates stated that they would support the regularization of digital transportation platforms in the country.
DRUG POLICY
Ingrid Betancourt:
– “The world passed to another reading of the relationship we have to have with these substances.”
– “We have to decriminalize drug use. If we decriminalize it, we can generate an economy of medicinal use of cannabis.”
– “It is part of our ancestral culture, it is part of the cosmology of many of our tribes.”
– Yes, I would support a reform of the ESMAD.
– Does not support the carrying of weapons.
Henry Gomez:
– “We are in the same failure, consumption has not been controlled in our country.”
– “The narcotic culture destroys our country.”
– “I do not know that coca has pharmaceutical potential.”
– “Marijuana fiber has great agro-industrial uses.”
– “We must end the war on drugs generated by value added and the mafia in Colombia.”
– It would expand the capabilities of ESMAD.
– Supports the carrying of weapons.
Luis Perez:
– “In Colombia we have failed with glyphosate, it seems to be a fertilizer.”
– “There are more than 60 countries that have started to legalize cannabis. If we plant it where there is coca, we are going to generate three million new jobs.”
– “We are going to double exports and it will be the end of the war.”
– Yes, I would support a reform of the ESMAD.
– Does not support the carrying of weapons.
Gustav Petro:
– “We have a huge opportunity to export industrialized cannabis.”
– “We promote the industrialization of cannabis and its export, we replace the coca leaf economy through an agrarian reform.”
– The National Police would be reformed and the ESMAD would not continue.
– Does not support the carrying of weapons.
John Milton Rodriguez:
– “We have to expand the possibility of a mechanized eradication that allows renewing the land for new crops.”
– “The countryside must be the protagonist again”.
– Yes, I would support a reform of the ESMAD.
– Supports the carrying of weapons.
GENDER EQUALITY:
Ingrid Betancourt:
– “We are going to open the possibility that the lists that are presented to Congress are only for women.”
– “That women do not have to elbow their way into politics.”
– “It is very important to work on equalizing wages and pensions.”
– “I will give priority to women in the titling and return of land.”
– Yes, it would restore relations with the government of Nicolás Maduro.
– It would maintain the 4×1,000 tax, since it would not carry out a tax reform.
Henry Gomez:
– “The solutions in the State must be for a maximum common that is the citizen”.
– “For all Colombians, the State must govern.”
– “The problem is not so much stimulating the report, but the total and forceful inefficiency of the Attorney General of the Nation in the attention of these complaints, in the orientation of the victims and in the true development of criminal policies that allow the accusation and the effective conviction of the domestic abuser wherever it may be, regardless of gender. That impunity affects everyone equally.”
– Yes, it would restore relations with the government of Nicolás Maduro.
– It would eliminate the 4×1,000 tax.
Luis Perez:
– “I would change compulsory military service for a social and environmental service, in that social and environmental service I would include the figure of women. They have great sensitivity.”
– Yes, it would restore relations with the government of Nicolás Maduro.
– It would eliminate the 4×1,000 tax.
Gustav Petro:
– “We protect and strengthen the Colombian family, which has different forms.”
– “We protect the rights of people to be as they want to be, we protect freedom.”
– Yes, it would restore relations with the government of Nicolás Maduro.
– I would keep the 4×1,000 for large transactions.
John Milton Rodriguez:
– “We have to break with the hatred between the different sexes completely. It doesn’t take anything away from a man to do housework, it’s my turn to do housework”.
– “We propose family care centers to accompany families in counseling, violence prevention and constructive dialogue with each other.”
– “We cannot leave only women with the responsibility of the family.”
– Yes, it would restore relations with the government of Nicolás Maduro.
– It would eliminate the 4×1,000 tax.
BRIEFCASE
(With information from EL TIEMPO)
