MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Future Colombian VP meets with Lula in Brazil

He “expressed his love for Colombia and his desire to support us in achieving peace and the well-being of the Colombian people,” Márquez wrote about Lula on Twitter.

Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the Workers' Party (PT) welcomed Colombia's Vice President-elect Francia Márquez, who is on a South American tour before taking office on Aug.7.

“I was with Francia Márquez, talking about South America, the fight against hunger and racism in our countries, I wished luck to her and Gustavo Petro's government,” Lula said on social media.

Lula met with Márquez at the Perseu Abramo Foundation headquarters in Sao Paulo, alongside Party Chairwoman Gleisi Hoffmann, who described the occasion as an “exciting” and “historic” event to witness.

He “expressed his love for Colombia and his desire to support us in achieving peace and the well-being of the Colombian people,” Márquez wrote about Lula on Twitter.

Márquez's agenda in Brazil includes meetings with representatives of the Afro-descendant movement and landless workers. She will then go to Chile Thursday and from there she will travel to Argentina, where she will meet with President Alberto Fernandez and hold an event at the CCK.

Márquez was in Argentina in 2021 for the 1st Afro-Argentine Community Meeting organized by the National Institute Against Discrimination (INADI).

Petro will become Colombia's first leftist president, while Márquez is the first person of African descent to reach the Vice Presidency.

The last stop on her South American tour will be in Bolivia, Márquez's press team announced. On July 31, Márquez is to meet Bolivian Vice-President David Choquehuanca, while the following day she is to visit plurinational social organizations of indigenous and peasant women.