I know that my readers who are primarily interested in domestic politics can’t get enough of discussion of the guy in third place in the polling for the Colombian presidency! No doubt after the kids calmed down after finding their Easter baskets this morning all of you asked yourself, “hmm, I wonder if PoliBlog has more on Mockus? Quick, Robin, to the Internet!”1
So as not to disappoint, there is a headline in today’s El Tiempo that indicates that a further consolidation of Mockus’ position as The Candidate of the the Opposition is going to stall out with the presumed announcement this afternoon of soon-to-be-ex-candidate Sergio Fajarado as Mockus’ veep.2 The headline reads thusly: Es difícil, por ahora, una alianza política con Gustavo Petro, dice Antanas Mockus [A political alliance with Gustavo Perto is difficult for now, says Antanas Mockus].
Petro is the candidate of the center-left Alternative Democratic Pole (aka the PDA or Polo). Indeed, I would be quite surprised to see Petro quit and rally around Mockus at this point for any number of reason that I will leave aside for now.
Really, the interesting thing to watch now is the degree to which this move (adding Fajardo) shifts Mockus’ numbers in the next poll.
- I assure you all that I have at least three readers who find all of this quite fascinating. Although since one of them is currently engaged in planning a massive trip aboard, he probably isn’t reading this, so here’s for the two of you, plus whomever Google might drag in… [↩]
- The story also notes that Fajardo’s official answer to Mockus’ invitation will be this afternoon. I certainly am assuming that the invitation would never have been made if the answer was not already known. If, for some reason, it isn’t accepted, this will end up being the political equivalent of renting the scoreboard at Yankee Stadium to propose to your girlfriend, only to have her say no. [↩]
April 4th, 2024 at 1:00 pm
Well, here is that someone. Maybe not as big a surprise as the girlfriend embarrassing the boyfriend on national TV at Yankee Stadium would be, but it is not as if there were any Easter baskets around here to distract us from the question of how Colombia’s no. 3 is doing…
April 4th, 2024 at 7:45 pm
[...] More Mockus [...]