The Greens and other alternative sectors that won the Governor’s Office of Caldas and the Mayor’s Office of Manizales in the 2019 elections, will seek to repeat next October. However, Uribismo, the U Party and the conservatives want theirs.
There is still nothing concrete between the right and the traditional parties about putting together a coalition to confront the Greens and Petrism, who would play together with a name for the Governor’s Office.
In the Conservative party, deputy Mauricio Londoño seeks to be the candidate, while in the Democratic Center, deputy Camilo Gaviria, son of former parliamentarian Adriana Gutiérrez, sounds.
While the candidate of the Gente en Movimiento party, founded by former Senator Mauricio Lizcano, current director of the Administrative Department of the Presidency of the Republic (Dapre), could be former deputy Manuel Correa.
For his part, the senator and former governor of Caldas Guido Echeverri would support Luis Roberto Rivas, who was the first president of the department and former mayor of Manizales.
The current governor of Caldas, Luis Carlos Velásquez, was elected in October 2019 with more than 208,000 votes, backed by a coalition that included the Green Alliance, the U Party, and MAIS.
Manizales City Hall
For the Manizales Mayor’s Office there are still no definitions in the parties regarding candidacies for the elections on October 29, while due to the mechanism of significant movement of citizens there are several applicants collecting signatures for weeks; they need about 50 thousand to sign up.
They are John Robert Osorio Isaza, secretary general in the previous administration of this capital, with the Yes We Can movement, Manizales; Jorge Alberto Betancourt Raigoza, former councilor of this city, with the Con Más Fe movement; A City for All, with Paula Andrea Toro Santana, former Secretary of Development of Manizales, and Let’s Revive Manizales with Miguel Trujillo Londoño, former director of Bios.
For the next election for mayor of Manizales, the struggle between the alternative movements that brought the current president, Carlos Mario Marín Correa, who ran with the endorsement of the Green Alliance, and the traditional Liberal and U parties, which They are strong in this region of the country.
Mayor Marín’s candidate would be Carlos Alberto Arias, former Secretary of Sports of Manizales.
The leading role that Mauricio Lizcano’s Gente en Movimiento party may have is also yet to be seen.
Taking into account that Lizcano is with the Executive and the Green Alliance is part of the coalition at the national level that supports the policies of President Petro, it is foreseeable that this bloc, together with the Historical Pact, will play together to win the Mayor of Manizales in next october.
The Gente en Movimiento party has one of the five seats that correspond to Caldas in the House of Representatives, with Wílder Íberson Escobar, while the Historical Pact also has a seat.
Advancing in political representation in the Eje Cafetero is a purpose of the Historical Pact coalition in mayors, assemblies and councils and, if possible, a governorship in the elections next October, since in this region in the last 20 years Uribism It has been a protagonist, especially in presidential elections.
In the second round of the presidential elections, in June of last year, Rodolfo Hernández beat Petro in the Coffee Region, which was interpreted by analysts as not support for the former mayor of Bucaramanga, but a vote against Petrism.
For this reason, it would be key for the Historical Pact and other forces of the government coalition to achieve the Mayor’s Office of Manizales.
While the traditional parties could close ranks around the name of former mayor Jorge Eduardo Rojas, who governed Manizales in the period 2012-2015 on behalf of the Partido de la U.
It is said that Rojas would present himself again for the U in a multiparty coalition in which the conservatives and the Democratic Center could be.