President Alvaro Uribe has been campaigning intensely to persuade voters to turn out for both the referendum on reforms proposed by his government, on 25 October, and the elections of mayors and town councils in 1,100 municipalities, and governors and regional legislators in the country's 32 departments, on 26 October.
The first has been promoted under several guises — as changes crucial to ensuring governability; cost-cutting measures to reduce crippling fiscal deficits; a drive against corruption and politicking. This is only one indication of how complex a set of choices will be put before the voters. Specific measures, most requiring constitutional amendments, include such things as slashing the number of representatives in congress, closing down state agencies, freezing the pensions of former presidents, freezing public-sector pay, and introducing strict controls to prevent corruption. Polls show a high level of confusion among voters.
In the last leg of the campaigns the twin elections have been sloganised by the government as a `referendum for democracy and against terrorism.' The latter is an allusion to the fact that the Farc guerrillas have been conducting a campaign of intimidation and outright attacks against candidates and voters.
Opposition to the government's proposed reforms is as varied as the content of the referendum questions; it embraces opposition parties, civic organisations and unions. Many of these have opted for a simple solution: to campaign for abstention — even before the ballots are counted, the referendum has to be voted on by a quarter of the electorate, more than 6.2m people, to be valid. Opponents have been complaining that the government has improperly thrown public funds behind its campaign, in which urging people to vote meshes with the solicitation of approval, and which also includes slandering the opposition.
Uribe has been proclaiming, `If the referendum founders, so does governability.' While much of the media and most politicians recognise this as hype, its impact on the public at large is anyone's guess.
Senate election scandal
The elections of the coming weekend are not the only political headache for the government. The chief prosecutor's office has just recommended to the council of state that it should annul the senatorial election results of March 2002 in 20,503 polling stations (27% of the total). A careful scrutiny of ballot papers, counts, electoral rolls and appointments of officials produced a host of irregularities: 44,000 cases of substitution of voters, 2,000 forms with erasures and amendments, 97 polling stations with irregularities related to the substitution of jurors.
Six departments accounted for 60% of the polling stations where recounts have been recommended: Bogotá (2,810), Valle del Cauca (2,737), Antioquia (2,586), Bolívar (1,604), Atlántico (1,506), and Santander (1,112).
This is a major embarrassment for the whole of Colombia's political class: the benefits from the irregularities cut across party lines, largely reflecting patterns of local influence. It is the kind of `corrupt politicking' Uribe says his reforms will help weed out, if approved in the referendum.
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