Weekly Report - 04 June 2026 (WR-26-22)

Colombia faces potentially the most divisive second-round presidential electoral contest in a generation after the far-right populist Abelardo de la Espriella and former left-wing senator Iván Cepeda booked their passage to the run-off in emphatic terms in the first round on 31 May with 85% of the vote between them. De la Espriella defied the polls to finish ahead of Cepeda by three percentage points, profiting on a collapse in the vote share of Paloma Valencia in the final stages of the campaign as closing polls showed her losing significant ground to him on the right. Unless there is a big increase in the turnout, the second round will be decided by moderate centrists and their assessment of which candidate is the lesser of two evils.