MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Colombia’s congressional election Sunday, a test for May’s presidential vote

Uribe’s former Defense minister Juan Manuel Santos is the front runner

Colombian congressional elections this weekend may signal how much backing former Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos will have as he seeks to capitalize on the success of Alvaro Uribe’s “democratic security” politics to succeed him as president.

For Santos to consolidate his frontrunner status, his La U party needs to retain close to its current 30 senators and 43 seats in the lower house in Sunday’s vote, said Felipe Botero, an associate professor of political science at Universidad de los Andes in Bogota. Colombian voters will choose all 102 senators and 166 representatives.

“We may get a good idea from Congress which presidential candidate has enough support to get through,” Botero said. “Uribe hasn’t endorsed a party or a candidate, so it’s tough to say whether Uribism is inheritable or it was all about his personality.”

Uribe retained a more than 70% approval rating throughout his eight years in office by pushing back cocaine- funded Marxist rebels and attracting record foreign investment. The US ally, the recipient of over 600 million US dollars in annual American anti-narcotics aid, is barred from seeking a third term in presidential elections scheduled for May 30.

Colombian GDP has more than doubled during Uribe’s time in office to 242 billion, while the benchmark IGBC stock index has risen more than nine-fold and the peso has strengthened more than 40%. The Harvard educated Santos has pledged to continue Uribe’s defense and economic policies if he’s elected.

Uribe has based his presidency on the so-called “democratic security” policy, which aims to destroy the drug trade and reduce violence through an increased military presence.

Opinion polls show Santos is likely to reach a second round of voting on June 20 if no candidate gets more than 50% of the ballots cast in the first round.

Almost 30 million Colombians are eligible to vote this weekend amid heightened security after rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, and the smaller National Liberation Army, ELN, pledged to step up their campaign against government troops and politicians during elections.

“If La U does poorly, it will be a boost for the opposition, which is fragmented and doesn’t have a presidential candidate that stands out,” said Aldo Civico, director of the Center for International Conflict Resolution at Columbia University in New York.

The opposition Liberal Party, which is running former Senator Rafael Pardo on its presidential ticket, currently has 18 seats in the Senate and 39 in the house.

The Alternative Democratic Pole party whose Senator Gustavo Petro has positioned himself as the anti-Uribe choice with pledges to purge “mafias” from the state and improve human rights, has 11 seats in the Senate and 7 in the house.

As many as 80 members of congress have been investigated since 2006 for ties to paramilitary groups, according to Human Rights Watch.

The Conservative Party, whose presidential candidate also will be decided this weekend in a primary, has 20 seats in the Senate and 35 in the house. Felipe Arias, who served as agriculture minister in Uribe’s government, and Noemi Sanin, Uribe’s former ambassador to the U.K., are vying for the party’s nomination.

Sergio Fajardo, a former mayor of Medellin, needs his Citizens’ Movement for Colombia to win at least one seat in Congress for him to be eligible to stand in May.

Santos has said he would seek to form a coalition with the Conservative Party and would consider joining forces with German Vargas Lleras, a former Cambio Radical senator previously allied with Uribe, should he drop out of the race for president.

Santos was favored by 23% of those surveyed by Ipsos Napoleon Franco on Feb. 27. Petro had 11% support and Fajardo had 9% backing, according to the nationwide poll of 1,000 people which had a 3.1 percentage points margin of error.