MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

“Spoiler” Uribe replies to the NYT editorial: “an offence to the millions of Colombians who voted NO”

Under the heading of “The man blocking peace in Colombia”, the editorial calls on Uribe to begin behaving as a statesman and adopt a constructive role

Colombia's Democratic Center party founded by former president Alvaro Uribe criticized on Sunday The New York Times for a recent editorial accusing the ex head of government of “blocking” the peace process in the country and calling on him to act as “a true statesman”. The party said that the NYT editorial constitutes “an offence to the millions of Colombians” who voted against the terms of the peace accord between the government and the main guerrilla group, FARC.

 “The statement from the newspaper constitutes an offence for the millions of Colombians who opposed a peace accord which granted total impunity to those responsible for crimes against humanity and even rewarded them with political participation”, points out the CDC release. CDC was the main political force behind the campaign to vote NO in 2 October's referendum, which finally won by a razor-thin margin.

However since then the Colombian government and forces opposing peace accord have started discussions to unblock the situation.

Under the heading of “The man blocking peace in Colombia”, the editorial calls on Uribe to begin behaving as a statesman and adopt a constructive role so as not to block peace.

It is not too late for Mr. Uribe, who remains popular among many Colombians, to begin behaving like a statesman rather than a spoiler. The choices he makes in the weeks ahead may well determine whether the peace deal his successor, Juan Manuel Santos hammered out with the country’s largest guerrilla group will end the bloodshed permanently or be another missed opportunity. Failure would be a tragedy, and would most likely ruin Mr. Uribe’s legacy, particularly since he has not offered a viable alternative“

CDC explained in its release that the peace deal signed last 26 September, ”left the economy and private investments in high risk, and replaced the Constitution from the moment that the 297 pages of the deal were elevated to constitutional rank“. Likewise democracy, as well as the Colombian treasury and the autonomy of the different regions of the country are endangered, ”to grant FARC all the privileges promised“.

Furthermore CDC denounced all the difficulties it encountered during their campaign for the NO vote, because all of the ”government's budget was in support of the YES campaign and we were denied resources“.

Despite all this, many Colombians, besides those who identify themselves with the ideas of former president Alvaro Uribe decided to vote their conscience and supported NO, certainly not tricked as wrongly suggested by the editorial, underlined the CDC statement.

CDC recalls that last Thursday it delivered the government a set of suggestions on the main problems hoping that this will help achieve a new peace deal which includes all Colombians, to remodel the peace treaty with FARC. ”We have always reiterated that we want peace, but a fair peace which does not reward crime or delivers our democracy to terrorism”, concludes the statement.