00:00Let's now welcome Jonathan Mosquera, a member of the October 12th platform
00:03collective to go deeper in Colombia's electoral process and its result. Welcome
00:08Jonathan to From the South.
00:11Hi, hi thank you. Jonathan we have the results is official the candidates for
00:18the candidates Iván Cepeda and Aviladro Espriala will go for the runoff
00:23elections on June 21st. What is your take coming from these results?
00:28I think that is not much of a surprise of course we would have preferred to win in
00:33the first round but it's not much of a surprise when you realize what Cepeda campaign was against.
00:40The Cepeda campaign was against not only the local oligarchy, not only the entire bourgeoisie,
00:48the landlord class, but they were also against the international campaign from Donald Trump to
00:58dominate Latin America and the rest of the world. So we have interventions all the way from Miami
01:04to Ecuador with Honduras, President Milley. We had a lot of interference and attempts to stop Cepeda.
01:15So I think we would have preferred to win in the first round, the Colombian people, but at least now
01:20we have
01:21another chance. We are not surprised. It's always going to be tough.
01:28Jonathan, Colombia now has these three other weeks to prepare for the runoff election.
01:33What strategies do you think the historic pact should implement to try to persuade the undecided voters
01:38or the voters that voted on this occasion for another side to attract that vote?
01:45What should we implement to attract which vote? To attract voters to vote for the historic pact.
01:53Oh yeah, right, yeah. Okay, so I think for the next three weeks we need to focus our campaign
02:01to what really, really matters here. What the Colombians are deciding on the 21st of June is our sovereignty,
02:09whether we have the right to choose our own presidents. I think the campaign in the next three weeks
02:16should be reminding Colombians what it used to be like when we were directly ruled when the United States
02:23used to choose the presidents. That stopped in 2022. That's the first time they haven't chosen a president.
02:29So we need to concentrate on what people really want to know, is whether what Petro did is going to
02:37be continued
02:37and reinforce. So I think we need to be stronger on that and be very careful with imperialism
02:44and educate the Colombian people in the next three weeks. That's what's happening in Cuba, Venezuela,
02:50Iran and everyone else is related to what's happening to us. We are not isolated from the world.
02:55Jonathan, and how do you see the campaign coming in the following, in the next three weeks, especially as you
03:02were mentioning earlier,
03:03about the international interference that have been taking place throughout the electoral process.
03:07Do you think they're going to continue or will they even escalate further to secure a victory for the far
03:13right in the run of elections?
03:16They will definitely escalate. You have the money from the Zionists, from Milley in Argentina,
03:22and even Bernie Moreno, the senator in the United States, say that he was not confident that the United States
03:30was going to recognize the results
03:32in case there were results that he didn't like. Bernie Moreno is a supporter of Trump and a right winger
03:39who supports the Trump ally wing in Colombia.
03:45But we also have the president of Mexico speaking today about the interference in Mexico.
03:51I think the next three weeks are going to be very important because the NGOs, these human rights organizations, think
04:00tanks,
04:01they're going to rush up their campaign of producing misinformation about crime, about supposed alliances between petrol and the drug
04:12dealers,
04:12which are being manufactured by the Ecuadorian president, etc. So we need to be prepared.
04:19But as they rush it up, that only means that we need to be more vigilant and motivate more people.
04:28We also need to stand up.
04:31Jonathan, you were saying, of course, that the historic party would have rather preferred to have won this first election.
04:36So in a way, we could say that it's a sour, maybe a victory because you're going to the second
04:41round. It's a sour victory, but it's also at the feet.
04:44So in your opinion, were there mistakes made during the planning, the strategy for the electoral campaign of Ivan Cepeda?
04:52And what can be done better and seeing ahead for the runoff election?
04:59Well, rather than mistakes, I would say there are some things that we need to concentrate more.
05:03And it's what Cepeda really means to the Colombian people, what it means in the terms of education, in the
05:08terms of health care,
05:10in the terms of access to democratic rights that the Colombians didn't used to have before.
05:15I think the campaign needs to be more focused on that because those who have not decided who to vote
05:22for, they will have in their hearts their day-to-day needs.
05:26The working class in Colombia has been taking a battery for so long.
05:30Things improved a little bit during Petro, but not enough.
05:33So I think in the campaign, we need to admit that even though things were okay with Petro, there was
05:39a hope, a beginning is far from enough.
05:41And we need to emphasize that to convince Deuce that only a large victory of Cepeda could give us an
05:50opportunity to fight for a better Colombia
05:52because the other option is to go back to the days when we used to be called the Israel or
05:57Latin America.
05:59And as you were saying, the other option is to go back, what would that represent for the common people
06:04in Colombia?
06:09You were saying that the other option is to go back to the governments of the past were very harmful
06:15for the common people, for the working people.
06:17So what impact would that have on the working people, on the common people to go back in this election?
06:26Well, just look at this.
06:28They don't even pretend, even though they're doing a campaign where you expect them to lie and to be more
06:34hypocritical than ever,
06:35they can pretend the dislike of the increase of the miserable minimum wage in Colombia, which has always been starvation
06:42wages.
06:43Petro had a record pay rise last year in recognition to the poorest sections or the working class.
06:52And the government and the right wingers like Abelardo de la Spiella and the others,
06:58they are already selling the idea that the problem of workers earning more is that there's going to be inflation,
07:06slowing down the economy.
07:07Basically, the idea that we, the working people, the peasants, always have to pay for the economy.
07:13That there is never going to have a wall in which we, the working people, we who produce the wealth,
07:19are going to be able to enjoy it.
07:20That's the measure they're giving even as a campaign.
07:23So starting for is the soldiers who now are getting a decent wage.
07:28They're going to attack that.
07:29The working class.
07:30Now, also, the land question.
07:32Petro, even though the agrarian reform, that will be something I hope Cepeda does better.
07:37It should be more ferocious in my opinion.
07:40The agrarian reform is very important.
07:42Even though there have been a lot of advances in the landlords are desperate to push the peasants back.
07:49Also, you have the issue of the health sector.
07:53The banks, the banks are making lots of money, of course, with their business, with the racket that is the
08:00health business in Colombia.
08:02And they are desperate to continue with this racket, with this business.
08:07So they never becomes a right.
08:09And they campaign against the right of Colombia.
08:11So basically what is a stage here is whether Colombia have a right to elect our own governments and not
08:17from abroad,
08:18whether we have a right to a decent wage, whether we have a right to education and access to health.
08:27Thank you, Jonathan, so much for your time and your inputs here in this important day for Colombia.
08:32Yeah.
08:35It was our pleasure.
08:36Aloha.
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