Petro’s “Total Peace” strategy is under pressure ahead of presidential elections as violence by armed groups escalates

An explosive attack on the Pan-American Highway near the municipality of Cajibío, in Colombia’s Cauca department, left at least 21 people dead and 56 injured, Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez Suárez confirmed.

The attack occurred Saturday, April 25, on one of the main roads in the country’s southwest, an area historically affected by the presence of illegal armed groups.

The minister attributed the attack to alias “Marlon,” described as one of the most wanted leaders in the region, “for whom we are offering a reward of up to $1.4 million USD,” he said.

According to local media reports cited by El Tiempo, “the attack was initially intended to target army troops. However, a change in military plans reportedly led to the explosive being detonated while civilians were passing through the area.”

The impact of the attack was significant. Spain’s El País reported “that the explosion created a large crater, left the road covered in debris, and forced rescue operations that lasted several hours due to difficult access conditions.”

Cauca Governor Octavio Guzmán described the incident as one of the most serious attacks in the region in decades. “What happened on April 25 constitutes the most brutal and ruthless attack against civilians in decades,” he said.

The attack comes amid a resurgence of violence in southwestern Colombia, where illegal armed groups linked to drug trafficking, illegal mining and other illicit economies operate. Authorities continue operations in the area as investigations proceed to clarify the circumstances of the attack and determine responsibility.

According to reports by BBC Mundo, alias “Marlon” is a dissident FARC leader identified as Iván Jacobo Idrobo Arredondo, “the alleged head of the Jaime Martínez structure, part of the Estado Mayor Central (EMC),” one of the country’s most powerful illegal armed groups.

Operations and arrests

As part of response operations, the National Police reported the capture of José Alex Bitoco, alias “David” or “Mi Pez,” identified as the leader of the Dagoberto Ramos structure, another illegal armed faction, who is believed to have acted under orders from alias “Marlon”.

National Police Director Gen. William Rincón Zambrano said the detainee “will have to answer for the wave of terrorist activity” and linked him directly to the attack, stating that “he is responsible for what happened on April 25 in the El Túnel sector on the Pan-American Highway.”

The Defense Ministry reiterated that alias “Marlon” remains a priority target. “He is a high-value target, and we are searching for him with all the capabilities of the state. We have deployed a dedicated intelligence task force to locate him,” Sánchez said, confirming a reward of up to $1.4 million USD for information leading to his capture.

Context: criticism of “Paz Total” policy (Total Peace)

The attack comes amid growing security deterioration in Colombia, intensifying criticism of President Gustavo Petro’s “Total Peace” policy. The Ideas for Peace Foundation (FIP) has warned of a possible failure of the strategy, noting that “less than four months before the end of the government, the lack of progress in peace negotiations and the deterioration of security have become one of the main points of criticism of the Petro administration.”

According to the think tank, during the current administration “the number of disputed territories between illegal actors has nearly doubled, and the number of members in these structures has increased by 85%: they now total more than 27,000 members, including armed individuals and support networks.”

This figure not only represents a significant increase but also places the country at levels similar to, and even higher than, those seen before the peace process with the FARC began. Between 2011 and 2012, the estimate stood at around 26,800 members, compared with 14,600 at the end of Iván Duque’s administration in 2022.

The recent increase has also been rapid. According to the FIP, armed groups grew by 23.5% over the past year (from December 2024 to December 2025), reflecting a swift reconfiguration of these structures. At the same time, violence has intensified. Analysts such as Professor Karol Solís Menco note that over the weekend of April 25–26 alone, “26 terrorist attacks of varying magnitude” were recorded across the country.

Political analysis outlets point to a structural dynamic. According to La Silla Vacía, “Cauca is not experiencing an isolated event, but rather a phase of intensifying territorialized violence, marked by fragmentation among armed actors and a type of violence capable of producing national-level impacts.”

In this context, FARC dissident groups have once again taken center stage in the conflict. “Once again, attention is turning to FARC dissidents. Every attack, every gas cylinder bomb, every assault in Valle and Cauca ends with the same name on the table: the Jaime Martínez structure, one of the strongest groups of Iván Mordisco’s Estado Mayor Central,” El País reported.

Violence indicators also reflect sustained deterioration. “In the first four months of 2026, Colombia has already recorded 48 massacres, with 229 victims, most of them civilians, according to Indepaz. It is the highest figure in the past decade. With these numbers, which represent only a partial picture of the country’s violence, this election year is shaping up to be the most violent since the 2016 peace agreement with the now-defunct FARC guerrilla group,” the same outlet reported.

Cauca, where the attack took place, is considered one of the most sensitive regions. “Cauca is particularly complex because it combines multiple layers of conflict: the historic presence of Indigenous, peasant and Afro-descendant communities; illicit economies; Pacific corridors; disputes over drug trafficking routes; control of the Pan-American Highway; and the presence of FARC dissidents, particularly structures linked to Iván Mordisco,” El País said.

Experts agree that part of the difficulty lies in the design and implementation of the government’s strategy. “Early implementation was a valuable innovation in intent, but it failed to ensure minimum conditions of verification and institutional coherence,” said analyst Germán Valencia of the Peace and Reconciliation Foundation (Pares).

Taken together, these factors have led various sectors to conclude that the “Total Peace” policy faces serious structural limitations amid a scenario of armed fragmentation and territorial expansion by illegal groups.

Bogotá, Colombia – Leftist presidential candidate Iván Cepeda challenged his opponents to a debate on Saturday after turning down previous proposals to face-off with his rivals.

“I challenge the far right, its two candidates – Senator Paloma Valencia and lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella – to a debate,” Cepeda told a crowd at a rally in Fusagasugá, a city near Bogotá. 

His opponents responded by accepting the proposal, while also highlighting that they had been calling for a debate for months.

The possibility of a live face-off between candidates has been a recurring theme ahead of first-round presidential elections on May 31.

Shortly after beginning his candidacy last year, Cepeda dismissed the idea of participating in a debate: “I’m not going to take part in debates—let me make this clear from the outset—to exchange insults with other candidates, or to threaten one another, or to denigrate one another.”

Cepeda’s rivals have repeatedly criticized him for refusing to spar with them on the public stage, something they highlighted following the leftist candidate’s U-turn on Saturday.

“Allow me to correct you: you’re not issuing a challenge; you’re accepting the challenge you were invited to take up months ago,” said criminal defense attorney de la Espriella.

Valencia, the candidate for the Centro Democrático (Democratic Center) party, also seized the opportunity to pounce on Cepeda: “A few weeks ago, it was I who challenged Iván Cepeda several times to a face-to-face debate, yet you chose to hide away in the Senate with a controlled microphone.”

She suggested that Cepeda’s U-turn owes to a worsening performance in recent polls: “Now that the polls are tightening, you’re coming out of Fusagasugá with this challenge.”

Analysts agreed with Valencia’s suggestion, saying that Cepeda’s debate proposal is an attempt to inject life into a stagnating campaign. 

“Cepeda has offered to debate because of his campaign’s inherent lack of momentum and general weakness. He is not captivating any new voters or finding a tangible way of changing the narrative in his favor,” Sergio Guzmán, Director at Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consultancy, told Latin America Reports. 

Internal party polls reportedly show sluggish growth in Cepeda’s polling numbers since he became the official candidate for the Pacto Histórico (Historic Pact) in October. 

Meanwhile, Valencia has been soaring in the polls following her victory in presidential primaries in March; Cepeda and de la Espriella did not partake.

But the debate is not without risk for Cepeda, according to Guzmán: “Cepeda runs the risk of having to go on the defensive of Petro and his administration.”

Others believe that Cepeda’s oratory style does not lend itself to the televised debate format.

“He has a much more academic tendency, which is not so typical in politics, let alone in modern politics,” noted Miguel Jaramillo Luján, a Colombian political strategist. In contrast, he noted that de la Espriella and Valencia have a more media-savvy communication style.

Nevertheless, the analyst told Latin America Reports that Cepeda’s debate style could give him the chance to woo crucial centrist voters: “I believe he can inspire confidence and credibility among his target audience and even among the centre, particularly when it comes to dispelling certain myths and lies that have been spread by the centre and the right.”

With the leading candidates agreeing to debate, the battle over the specifics – including moderators, questions, and location – begins. 

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On Wednesday, the Universidad de la Sabana and the National Federation of Departments (FND) hosted the Governors’ Summit, a rare event that convened almost all of the frontrunners in Colombia’s presidential race.

Paloma Valencia, Abelardo de la Espriella, Sergio Fajardo, Roy Barreras, and Claudia López fielded questions from regional authorities about how they planned to tackle problems in Colombia’s provinces.

While Iván Cepeda, the leftist favorite, was scheduled to attend, his team pulled out at the last minute, fuelling the candidate’s reputation for being media-shy.

Early on Wednesday morning, governors and their aides began filtering into the heavily policed event in Chía, a municipality north of Bogotá.

The FND selected questions from governors which were then posed to candidates by the two moderators: El Tiempo Director Andrés Mompotes and his counterpart at radio station La FM, Juan Lozano.

The main themes of the day were tackling insecurity and armed groups, investing in regional development, and mechanisms to improve provincial representation.

For some governors, the event was an opportunity to redress an acute crisis; Erasmo Zuleta, who heads the local government in Córdoba, used the forum to highlight the ongoing effects of disastrous floods which began earlier this year.

“The emergency didn’t pass, nor did the tragedy. The floodwaters receded, leaving behind widespread damage; they took lives, homes, crops, and material possessions,” Zuleta told The Bogotá Post.

“Now more than ever, we need greater solidarity to recover from the damage,” continued the Governor, in a bid for help from the national government.

Another recurring theme was prison reform, following a recent scandal over a concert that took place in the Itagüí prison in Antioquia.

Abelardo de la Espriella, the firebrand criminal defense attorney and right-wing frontrunner, used the opportunity to push his tough-on-crime proposal.

“In Colombia, there are no prisons—there are universities of crime,” said de la Espriella, who took aim at the National Penitentiary and Prison Institute (INPEC), which he described as “a den of thieves.”

The candidate added that Colombia should look to El Salvador to develop its incarceration model, praising dictator Nayib Bukele’s draconian mass imprisonment efforts that have dramatically reduced crime and drawn condemnation from rights’ groups.

Security, more broadly, was also high on the agenda, as Colombia grapples with a surge in violence related to illegal armed groups.

“Today we are living in the grip of insecurity. They want to drag us back into the abyss we thought we had left behind,” railed Paloma Valencia, the candidate for the right-wing Centro Democrático (Democratic Center) party. 

Fears of insecurity affecting democratic processes have overshadowed the elections, with the United Nations issuing a warning earlier this year that armed groups could disrupt the vote.

The Valle del Cauca department has been one of the most heavily affected by the armed conflict, with its capital, Cali, rocked by a wave of bomb attacks by rebel groups in the past year. 

But its Governor, Dilian Francisca Toro, offered reassurances in conversation with The Bogotá Post: “We ensure that in every municipality and across all regions, law enforcement is present so that we can have free, democratic elections where there is no restriction whatsoever on the ability to vote.”

Toro also cited the elections on March 8 as an example of the success of security planning: “In Valle del Cauca we really had very peaceful elections, and now, God willing, we will have them again.”

Amid the mounting threat by armed groups, candidates De la Espriella and Valencia vow an iron fist, using military force to crush rebel forces. They model themselves after former right-wing President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010), who teamed up with the U.S. to launch a total war on the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). 

But leftist Iván Cepeda highlights the human rights abuses perpetrated by the government during that period, in which thousands of innocent civilians lost their lives. He proposes to continue the current administration’s Paz Total – or Total Peace – policy of negotiating with armed groups.

But Cepeda missed the opportunity to make his case to the public, fuelling criticism by his opponents.

De la Espriella has repeatedly called on Cepeda to agree to a debate, but the leftist candidate has yet to accept.

With less than two months before the May 31st election, there are increasingly few opportunities for the candidates to make their case before the public.

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Stronger peso and oil prices shift Colombian investment landscape.

The Colombian peso (COP) experienced a 2.1% appreciation during March 2026, driven by a recovery in global oil prices and key domestic developments. According to the latest analysis from Bancolombia (BVC: BCOLOMBIA / NYSE: CIB), the performance of the currency coincided with the results of national legislative elections and recent monetary policy adjustments by the Banco de la República.

Global energy markets recorded a significant increase in crude prices throughout the month. Brent crude rose 63% to end March at $118 USD per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate (WTI) increased 51% to close at $101 USD per barrel. These price movements have been largely attributed to geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, which continue to influence international commodity flows and investor sentiment.

On the domestic front, the Gran Coalición por Colombia primary election recorded a turnout of more than 5 million voters. Market analysts indicated that the high participation rate was viewed as a positive indicator of institutional stability. Simultaneously, the Board of Directors of the Banco de la República increased the national policy interest rate by 100 basis points, bringing the benchmark rate to 11.25%. This decision aligns with regional efforts to manage inflationary pressures through tighter monetary control.

International market conditions also reflect a shift in expectations regarding the Federal Reserve. Due to ongoing conflict in the Middle East and persistent economic indicators, markets currently anticipate that the US central bank will maintain existing interest rates without cuts for the remainder of the year.

Looking forward to April, the research team at Bancolombia—led by Chief Economist Laura Clavijo, Macroeconomic Manager Jose Luis Mojica, and International and FX Analyst Maria Paula Gonzalez—projects that the exchange rate will trade within a range of $3,625 COP to $3,725 COP. This forecast accounts for continued volatility and heightened uncertainty in both global and domestic financial markets.

Bancolombia (photo © Loren Moss)

Después de años de documentar de manera anónima proyectos de obras públicas inconclusos en Colombia, Luis Carlos Rúa reveló su identidad días antes de su elección.

The Justice Department is examining Gustavo Petro for possible ties to drug traffickers. U.S. officials have told him that for now he does not face criminal charges arising from the probes.

Funcionarios estadounidenses habrían asegurado al gobierno de Colombia que el presidente no se enfrenta a cargos penales relacionados con sus investigaciones.

After years of anonymously documenting abandoned public works projects in Colombia, Luis Carlos Rúa revealed himself days before his election.

U.S. federal prosecutors have opened preliminary criminal investigations into Colombian President Gustavo Petro over alleged links to drug traffickers and possible illicit financing of his 2022 campaign, according to a report by The New York Times.

The previously undisclosed probes are being conducted by federal prosecutors in Manhattan and Brooklyn and involve specialists in international narcotics trafficking, as well as agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration and Homeland Security Investigations, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Investigators are examining, among other issues, whether Petro held meetings with individuals connected to drug trafficking networks and whether his presidential campaign solicited or received donations from such actors. The two investigations are being carried out independently and remain in their early stages, with no certainty that they will lead to formal criminal charges.

There is no indication that the White House played any role in launching the investigations, according to the report. However, the inquiries emerge in a broader context of heightened tensions and fluctuating diplomacy between Bogotá and Washington.

Relations between Petro and U.S. President Donald Trump have been volatile, marked by sharp public exchanges, threats of tariffs that were never implemented, and the temporary revocation of Petro’s U.S. visa. Trump has repeatedly accused Petro of failing to curb narcotics production and has described him in highly critical terms, while Petro has denounced what he characterises as political pressure and interference.

The U.S. Treasury Department last year imposed sanctions on Petro, members of his family and senior officials, including Interior Minister Armando Benedetti, alleging links to narcotics activity. The measures, which included asset freezes and travel restrictions, were justified by Washington on the grounds that cocaine production in Colombia had reached record levels and that the government had offered concessions to armed groups involved in trafficking.

Petro has rejected those claims, insisting that his administration has strengthened seizures of cocaine and slowed the rate of expansion of coca cultivation. He has also denied any knowledge of illicit funds entering his campaign, dismissing the allegations as politically motivated attacks.

Colombia’s Attorney General  is examining charges that Petro’s son – Nicolás Petro – received money from individuals linked to illicit activities during the 2022 campaign. While his son acknowledged receiving funds that were not reported, no criminal charges have been filed against the president himself, and Petro has maintained he was unaware of the campaign “donations”.

According to the NYT, the U.S. investigations are taking place amid a broader strategy in which Washington has increasingly used legal and judicial tools to advance foreign policy objectives. Analysts say such actions could serve as leverage in bilateral relations or influence political dynamics in allied countries.

The timing of the probes is particularly sensitive, as Colombia prepares for presidential elections on May 31, with a potential runoff in June. Petro, the country’s first leftist president, is constitutionally barred from seeking re-election but has actively backed his political successor with hardleftist Iván Cepeda.

The allegations could reverberate through the electoral campaign, where relations with the United States remain a central issue. Candidates on the right have emphasised the importance of maintaining close ties with Washington, while figures on the left have framed U.S. actions as a challenge to Colombia’s sovereignty.

Despite months of tensions, diplomatic relations between the two countries have shown signs of stabilisation in recent weeks. Petro and Trump held a bilateral meeting at the White House earlier this year, which both sides described as constructive, and officials have since sought to rebuild communication channels.

Even so, uncertainty persists over the trajectory of the relationship, particularly as Washington continues to prioritise counternarcotics cooperation with Colombia, historically one of its closest partners in the region.

Petro has consistently denied any links to drug trafficking and has pointed to his government’s security strategy, which includes negotiations with armed groups and efforts to reduce violence, as evidence of a broader approach to the drug trade.

The start of U.S. investigations add a new layer of complexity to an already fraught political and diplomatic landscape, with potential implications not only for Petro’s post-presidential future but for Colombia’s ties with its most important security ally.

On March 8, for the first time in Colombia’s history, an artificial intelligence candidate appeared on ballot papers across the country. 

Gaitana IA (AI) ran for the Indigenous seat in the Senate and the House of Representatives in the northern state of Sucre.

While Gaitana did not win a seat in either of the country’s legislative bodies, it has sparked debate about the role of AI in Colombian politics.

With the ballots counted, Gaitana won a total of under 3,000 votes – less than 2% of the total votes for the Indigenous seat – suggesting that many people remain skeptical of this new digital approach.

Many questions have emerged surrounding Gaitana, such as why the Registraduría—the Colombian entity in charge of validating and accepting candidates—permitted this unprecedented candidacy, or what the intentions were behind the AI.

“Many local media outlets talked about an AI going to Congress, but that is not the case; they are humans leading the project,” Gaitana’s co-founder, Natalia Aase, told The Bogotá Post. 

“It is actually a consensus tool developed by our community members, between 14 and 25 years old, from the Senú community of Reparo Torrente, in Coveñas,” she explained.

Rather than planning for the AI to assume office, Gaitana was devised as a democratic experiment underpinned by real human candidates

Aase detailed how the platform was designed to work: Colombian citizens could subscribe through a link to virtually participate and propose various debates regarding topics such as healthcare, women’s rights, and more. These interactions would also feed the AI database.

Once an initiative reached a collective consensus, the people occupying the seats in Congress would “decide the direction of the proposed laws.”

The two humans represented by Gaitana were Carlos Redondo Rincón, a Mechatronics Engineer from the Senú community, who was running for Senate, and Luz Rincón, an Embera-Katio Indigenous sociologist, who was seeking a seat in the House of Representatives.

The co-founder of Gaitana also revealed that the team conducted deep research into global democratic models, such as the one in Norway, and compared them with their own community dynamics.

As the research advanced, the team found that their community in Senú had already established a model of social interaction that worked well, prompting them to launch a digital project modeled on their own practices.  

This meant digitizing their traditional way of reaching a consensus; in the Senú community, men, women, and youth gather around tables to discuss specific topics, such as women’s health or local fishing.

“Gaitana IA is not a generative AI; it is a participatory AI. What does that mean? Well, it is not ChatGPT. Instead, it takes the information provided by the users and organizes it,” pointed out Aase. “Transparency and security are the most important things for us; that is why we use blockchain technology—a system of blocks—to power this platform.”

According to Aase, the project was born from a motivation to prevent corruption and explained that with ‘Gaitana AI’, the decisions are not made by a single person but must be approved by at least 100 people. 

“You might be able to manipulate one individual, but you cannot manipulate a hundred if you don’t even know who they are,” she concluded.

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Colombians voted for a new Congress on March 8 in an election that stretched across thousands of rural towns and villages, where geography, infrastructure and the legacy of armed conflict continue to shape how citizens participate in democracy.

“I don’t like politics,” said Silvia Bedoya, 52, a resident of San Pedro de los Milagros in the mountains north of Medellín. “Instead of uniting people to move the country forward, it tends to divide us.”

Despite that frustration, Bedoya said voting still matters. “If you vote, at least you have the chance to raise your voice about something you don’t like,” she said. “If you don’t vote, you just have to accept what happens.”

More than 40 million Colombians were eligible to vote in the elections, with 13,493 polling stations installed nationwide, including 7,482 in rural areas, according to the National Registry Office. Security forces said they deployed 120,000 police officers across the country to guarantee the vote in the nation’s 1,104 municipalities.

The scale of the operation reflects the logistical challenges of voting in rural Colombia, where many communities remain separated by mountains, unpaved roads and long travel distances.

In San Pedro de los Milagros, a cattle-farming municipality in the Andean department of Antioquia, voters arriving at polling stations described a mixture of civic duty, skepticism toward politicians and concern over the country’s economic and social problems.

Mauricio Martínez, 47, declined to say who he supported, but emphasized the importance of participation. “Voting is the greatest right and duty we have as citizens,” he said.

Others said their choices were shaped by dissatisfaction with the government of President Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s first leftist president, whose progressive agenda – including a major land reform program – has drawn both support and criticism in rural areas.

Maicol Jovani Sepulveda, 28, said he voted for the right-wing Democratic Center (Centro Democrático) party after losing faith in promises he believed would help young people. “I believed they were going to help us study,” he said. “But I didn’t receive a scholarship and I couldn’t go to university, so I was disappointed.”

The Democratic Center won more than 40% of the vote for both the Senate and the House of Representatives in San Pedro de los Milagros, a 24% increase from 2022. Across the department of Antioquia, it was also the most voted list with over 31% of votes, followed by the ruling leftist Historic Pact (Pacto Histórico) coalition with 16%.

Some voters in the town said their support for the right reflected growing frustration with Petro’s government. Among them was María Regina Avendaño Muñoz, 63, who said she cast her vote for Centro Democrático after feeling disappointed with the administration: “I’m very sad because he promised change and convinced many young people and teachers who voted for him.”

Beyond individual concerns, analysts say structural barriers have long shaped political participation in rural Colombia.

Rural voters play an important role in Colombia’s political landscape. Although the country’s largest voting blocs are concentrated in major cities, the countryside has long been central to debates over land ownership, security and development – issues that have shaped the country’s decades-long armed conflict and remain at the center of national politics.

“When we talk about political participation, we’re really talking about processes of democratization – who gets to speak and under what conditions,” Bladimir Ramirez Valencia, a professor at the University of Antioquia’s Institute of Regional Studies who works with farmers’ organizations, told Latin America Reports.

Historically, he said, rural communities have faced both violence and logistical obstacles that limit their ability to vote. About 75% of the victims of Colombia’s armed conflict have been civilians, many of them farmers, according to historical estimates.

Distance alone can also be a barrier. “For many communities, polling stations used to be three or four hours away,” Ramírez said. “Bringing voting sites closer to those places is fundamental.”

Authorities expanded electoral infrastructure for the 2026 vote, increasing the number of polling stations by 5,5% in rural areas compared with the previous 2022 election.

In some regions of Antioquia, Ramírez said, rural residents traveled to voting sites on foot or by chiva, the brightly colored buses that connect remote villages with municipal centers.

Recent government policies may also be shaping political engagement in the countryside. Programs related to land reform, land restitution and rural development have helped strengthen the government’s legitimacy among some farming communities, Ramirez said. “When farmers feel they are being heard and see policies reaching their territories, that can influence how they participate politically.”

Still, rural voting patterns remain complex and vary widely by region. “You can find campesino families involved in social movements defending their land,” Ramírez said. “But when elections arrive, they still vote for traditional parties.”

Across Colombia’s countryside, the election reflected both deep skepticism toward politics and the determination of rural voters to take part in a democratic process that has historically been harder to reach in the country’s most remote regions.

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… but Centro Democratico bounces back, while small parties lose out in March 8 voting.

Last Sunday’s elections brought mixed results to Colombia’s capital with the left-wing Pacto Historico party cementing its position as most popular party in the city even while its main opponent the Centro Democratico showed relatively bigger gains.

With 18 Bogotá seats up for grabs in the Chamber of Representatives, the Pacto Historico, backed by President Gustavo Petro, took a majority of eight, an increase of one seat from the previous period.

And by garnering 900,000 votes the incumbent party upped its count by more than 100,000 compared to 2022, when it was also the most popular party in the city.

But by some comparisons the right-wing Centro Democratico’s result was even more impressive, surging from two to four seats on March 8, totalling 700,000 votes, up from around 300,000 in 2022.

In Bogotá, as at national level, the losers were the smaller independent parties often citizen-led or based on niche issues. Also failing was the Nuevo Liberalismo party, founded by mayor Carlos Galán, which failed to pick up a single seat, a sign perhaps of citizen discontent with the capital’s current administration.

The demise of the small and independents reflected a national trend of voter gravitation towards the two bigger parties, Centro Democratico and Pacto Historico, whose top candidates – Paloma Valencia and Iván Cepeda – are likely contenders for the presidential slug-out in May. 

The remaining Bogotá seats went to smaller traditional parties the Green Alliance (2), and the Liberal Party (1), with one seat awarded to the upstart Salvacion Nacional formed by firebrand right-wing presidential candidate Abelardo De La Espriella.

Political phenomenon

The stand-out result in the Bogotá caucus was Centro Democratico’s first-time congressional candidate Daniel Briceño who captured 262,000 votes for his seat in the chamber.

Not only did Briceño get the highest congressional vote across Colombia, he also out-voted the entire list of senators – which get elected nationally – with one of the historically highest ever recorded in Colombia for a camara or senado representative.

The 34-year-old lawyer was being hailed this week as a political phenomenon. Briceño is currently serving on Bogotá city council where he campaigns against corruption, cronyism and waste through a clever combination of social media and forensic takedowns of his political targets.

The influencer made his name by digging into big data on government databases that has allowed him to uncover contracts and documents embarrassing to the administration of Gustavo Petro.

Since then, he has gained both an online following and voter base by scrutinizing and exposing mismanagement at all government levels.

Defend every vote

Briceño’s jump to congress was mirrored on the political left in Bogotá by the rise of influencers Laura Beltran, aka Lalis, and Daniel Monroy, who both won seats for Pacto Historico.

Despite their success at the urns on March 8, both Monroy and Beltran amplified claims of fraud in the days after the election.

Beltran, posting on X, issued a media alert begging for lawyers in the city to volunteer their time as scrutineers to check the recount after detecting “the winds of fraud”.

“We are defending each vote for the Pacto Historico. In Bogotá we have the chance to recover one more seat,” she said, suggesting the party could up its count to nine.

Monroy, for his part, made a widely echoed claim that  “votes for Pacto Historico are disappearing”.

So far there is no evidence of electoral fraud, though changes in the final vote could come about from errors corrected in the final scrutiny taking place in Bogotá this week.

Meanwhile preliminary declarations by European Union electoral observers  – 145  were deployed to Colombia – stated that the voting process had been “transparent, accurate and well-organized”.

Voter turnout for Bogotá was 48 per cent, similar to the level of participation across the country, with the capital providing 15 per cent of the national vote. A higher turnout is expected for the May presidential elections.

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Colombia’s presidential race entered a decisive new phase this week after Sunday’s inter-party primaries propelled conservative senator Paloma Valencia into the national spotlight and triggered a scramble among political factions to forge alliances ahead of the May 31 election.

Valencia’s commanding performance in the right-wing “La Gran Consulta” primary – where she secured roughly six million votes – has reshaped the political landscape, opening a contest within the conservative bloc while forcing candidates across the spectrum to recalibrate their strategies.

The vote effectively marks the start of Colombia’s election season, in which presidential hopefuls must broaden their appeal beyond ideological bases while navigating a fragmented political field.

For the right, the central challenge is whether it can attract moderate and centrist voters without alienating the hardline supporters who form the backbone of a political base – and party – associated with former president Álvaro Uribe.

Valencia, a senior figure in Uribe’s Democratic Center, emerged from the primaries as one of the leading conservative contenders after her vote total surpassed the turnout achieved by President Gustavo Petro and Vice President Francia Márquez in their coalition primaries ahead of the 2022 election.

For Uribe’s movement, which appeared weakened after the presidency of Iván Duque and several electoral setbacks, the result represents an unexpected demonstration of political resilience.

Yet the surge of security-focused Senator has also intensified competition from the far right.

Barranquilla-based lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella, who had previously dominated opposition to Petro, now faces a rival capable of consolidating support among traditional party structures while courting voters beyond the hard-right.

De la Espriella announced Tuesday that Ivan Duque’s former finance minister José Manuel Restrepo will join his presidential ticket as vice-presidential candidate, a move widely interpreted as an attempt to add economic credibility to a campaign largely driven by security rhetoric.

Political observers on the night of the consulations emphasized that Uribe will play a decisive role in shaping the outcome of any hard-right and center-right alliance.

The former president remains the most influential figure within Colombia’s right-wing political establishment and will act as “kingmaker” when negotiations begin over a possible understanding between Valencia and De la Espriella aimed at consolidating the anti-Petro vote.

Whether such an agreement materializes remains uncertain, as both candidates seek to position themselves as the principal challenger to the left in the first round scheduled for May 31.

Sunday’s primaries also produced a surprise showing from economist Juan Daniel Oviedo, the former head of Colombia’s national statistics agency (DANE), who secured more than one million votes and finished second in La Gran Consulta.

Oviedo has cultivated support among urban and younger voters, particularly in Bogotá, where his technocratic style and socially liberal positions have resonated with diverse constituencies, including large segments of the LGBTQ community.

Yet his unexpectedly strong performance now places him at a political crossroads.

Oviedo is expected to meet Valencia on Thursday to discuss a possible alliance that could include joining her ticket as a vice-presidential candidate.

Such a partnership could help Valencia reach voters beyond the traditional conservative base. But it also carries risks for Oviedo, whose supporters may question a close association with the Uribe-aligned political establishment that has dominated Colombia’s right for more than two decades.

The two politicians differ sharply on several issues, including the 2016 peace agreement with FARC  and role of the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), the transitional justice tribunal created to prosecute war crimes committed during Colombia’s internal conflict.

While Oviedo has defended Juan Manuel Santos’ peace agreement and role of the tribunal, Valencia has long criticized JEP and promoted reforms aimed at limiting its legal authority.

Despite the shifting dynamics on the right, the left retains an important institutional foothold following Sunday’s legislative elections.

Petro’s governing coalition, the Historic Pact, emerged as the largest force in the Senate with 25 of the chamber’s 102 seats, according to official results, though it fell short of an outright majority and will need alliances with other parties in the fragmented legislature.

Within the progressive camp, however, the primaries exposed clear divisions.

Former Senate president and former Ambassador to London Roy Barreras secured just over 200,000 votes in the left-wing primary and publicly blamed Petro for the weak turnout, accusing the president of discouraging supporters from voting on Sunday to cement the official candidacy of hard-left candidate Iván Cepeda.

The primaries also underscored the continued weakness of Colombia’s political center.

Former Bogotá mayor Claudia López won her coalition’s primary but attracted fewer than half a million votes, a disappointing result that leaves her entering the first round of the presidential race with reduced political momentum.

With nearly three months remaining before the first round of voting, the campaign that begins this week bears little resemblance to the one that existed before Sunday’s primaries.

The conservative opposition remains divided but newly energized, the left retains institutional strength despite internal tensions, and the political center faces an uphill battle to remain relevant.

In a race now expected to be decided in two rounds, Colombia’s presidential contest is once again wide open as candidates maneuver to build alliances and capture the pivotal voters who will ultimately decide the country’s political direction.

Amelia Makstutis, Lily O’Sullivan and Jonathan Hernández Nassif contributed to reporting.

Colombians went to the polls on Sunday to choose new representatives to Congress and the Senate, as well as presidential candidates for three main political blocs. Both the ruling leftist party and opposition right-wing party had good showings, setting up a potentially polarizing next legislative term. 

Despite warnings of possible political violence by the country’s illegal armed groups, elections took place “without any major security incidents” according to the United Nations mission in Colombia. Overall voter turnout was around 48%, about on par with previous legislative election years. 

With over 3,000 candidates competing for 102 Senate and 182 House seats, leftist President Gustavo Petro’s Historic Pact (Pacto Historico) party and the opposition Democratic Center (Centro Democratic) — founded by former right-wing President Álvaro Uribe — had the strongest showing Sunday. 

By 10:00 PM, with nearly 100% of preliminary votes tallied, Historic Pact secured 22.8% of Senate votes while the Democratic Center tallied 15.6%, according to the National Civil Registry. The Liberal Party (Partido Liberal), Green Alliance (Alianza Verde), and the Conservative Party (Partido Conservador de Colombia) trailed with 11.7%, 9.8% and 9.6% respectively. 

Official tallies for the lower house are still unclear, but analysts expect a divided Congress. 

The results could keep Colombia’s legislature polarized as no party was able to secure an absolute majority. Throughout his presidency, Petro has faced barriers in Congress to passing his progressive legislation and he even called for a constituent assembly to circumvent the body. 

His party’s presidential candidate, Senator Ivan Cepeda, who aims to carry the torch for Petro’s reforms, celebrated the party’s win in the senate race saying, “Today our second half begins, with a strong and committed caucus we will begin a new stage of transformations.” 

Political risk consultant Sergio Guzman told Reuters, “The left showed that it is here to stay, the ​right that it is divided, but it is not weak. We are going to have a fragmented Congress for the next legislature.”

Jeni Suarez, 41, who voted for the Historic Pact for the Senate and Congress, told The Bogotá Post in Medellin that the most important problem at the moment is the “political war from side to side.” 

Presidential primaries 

In addition to the House and Senate, Colombia also held three primary elections — known as inter-party consultations – to choose candidates for the three main political blocs: left, centrist, and right-wing. 

Two candidates currently leading in the polls — far-right lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella and left-wing Senator Ivan Cepeda — were not included in the primaries and the eventual nominees from the three consultations – “The Consultation for Solutions: Health, Security, and Education” (center); “Front for Life” (left), and “The Great Consultation for Colombia” (right) – will go on to compete against them in the first round of presidential elections on May 31. 

Sunday night’s big winner was Paloma Valencia, a protégé of former President Uribe’s Democratic Center party with a political pedigree that includes a former president grandfather and an aunt who was Colombia’s first female cabinet-level minister. 

Addressing her base at her victory party, Valencia lambasted President Petro, calling his administration “a time bomb that’s ticking down the seconds until it explodes.” 

In an interview ahead of the primaries, Valencia told Latin America Reports, “I am Uribista, and I will die Uribista,” and said she plans to follow in her mentor’s footsteps. 

Former Bogotá Mayor Claudia Lopez handily won her Consultation for Solutions primary, and former Medellín Mayor Daniel Quintero conceded to longtime politician and former Senator Roy Barreras in the Front for Life consultation. 

“I want to congratulate Roy on his victory. I will support him as required by law,” said Quintero on X. “I hope he leads us toward a process of unity.”

Election security 

In the days leading up to elections, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights warned that non-State armed groups were using violence to control civilian populations in Colombia and could undermine election security. 

Last year, the UN recorded 18 homicides and 126 cases of attacks and threats against political leaders, including the high-profile assassination of right-wing pre-presidential candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay, who was shot in the head at rally in Bogotá’s Modelia neighborhood in June and succumbed to his injuries in August. 

On Sunday, Minister of Defense Pedro Sánchez said over 240,000 security forces had been deployed to safeguard elections, which a delegate for the National Civil Registry called a “peaceful day at the polls, except for some isolated cases in the regions.”

Voting was temporarily suspended in the rural municipality of La Macarena, Meta following an alleged drone strike by a guerilla group near a polling station, according to the National Civil Registry. The agency also denounced “100 million cyberattacks” against its website.

Other election interference, including vote-buying was also reported. Colombia’s National Police said they captured 88 people related to elections and seized over $990,000 (COP 3,761,000,000) in cash meant to influence voting. 

In the hours leading up to the election, Víctor Hugo Moreno Bandeira, the Democratic Center congressional candidate in the southern Amazonas department, was arrested with $5,200 (COP $20 million) in cash allegedly meant for vote buying. His party later suspended his candidacy. 

And Fredy Camilo Gómez Castro, a senatorial candidate for The U Party (Partido de la U), was arrested and accused of being the right-hand to Colombia’s contraband king, Diego Marín, alias “Papá Pitufo.”

On Colombia’s eastern border with Venezuela, Defense Minister Sánchez denounced mass illegal border crossings, with an estimated 2,400 people crossing the Tachira river “presumably headed to vote.”

While his party had success, Álvaro Uribe fell flat 

For the first time in his storied political career, the History Channel’s “Greatest Colombian in History”, Álvaro Uribe, failed to win a seat in the Senate. 

Projections indicate that Uribe’s Democratic Center party will secure 17 seats in the Senate, and he was placed 25th on the list of his party’s candidates, effectively excluding him from a seat. 

Uribe, who won over much of Colombia’s electorate for beating back leftist guerrillas during his presidential terms between 2002 and 2010, has come under fire in recent years for his ties to drug traffickers and paramilitary death squads. 

Last August, the controversial president was convicted of procedural fraud and bribing a witness and was sentenced to 12 years house arrest before Bogotá’s Superior Court overturned the conviction two months later.

Amelia Makstutis, Lily O’Sullivan and Jonathan Hernández Nassif contributed to reporting.

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Los políticos colombianos se han convertido cada vez más en blanco de la violencia. Un incremento de los secuestros, las amenazas de muerte y los asesinatos ha sacudido al país en vísperas de las elecciones.

Politicians in Colombia have increasingly become targets of violence. A rise in kidnappings, death threats and assassinations has shaken the country ahead of the vote.

Colombia goes off to the polls for the first time tomorrow – but what’s at stake in the first Colombian election of 2026, how does it all work and why are there claims of fraud?

National elections are taking place in Colombia in 2026, with the first taking place tomorrow morning, Sunday 8th March. This returns representatives for both houses of parliament as well as eliminating some candidates for the presidential elections coming in May.

Oversight is carried out by the CNE (Consejo Nacional Electoral). In order to do this over the vast territory and number of stations, over 800,000 citizens are selected to be vote-counters. This is similar to jury duty in other countries and is compensated with a day off as well as a compulsory day of training a couple of weeks beforehand.

As the electorate is growing, there are now some 13,000 voting sites across the country, most with multiple voting tables. Colombians have to vote where their cédula is registered, so don’t be surprised to see some people trekking to other cities if they forgot to update their registration.

Borders will close, along with various road closures within city limits and ciclovía cancelled to allow for ease of transport to voting stations. There will also be a dry law enacted from this afternoon and you can expect a heightened police and military presence.

This is the first year in which the parties representing demobilised ex-FARC combatants do not receive guaranteed seats and is also the first time the leftist bloc is coming in as incumbents rather than opposition. 

With plenty of rhetoric and conflict in the run up to the election as well as the unusual political situation of the country, these are particularly hard elections in Colombia to call. While the upcoming presidential elections in May are the bigger deal, this round will give some insight into how that might go.

What’s on the table in the Colombian elections 2026?

Both houses of parliament will be fully elected, which means 103 senators and 183 representatives for the lower house, known as the Cámara de Representantes. The key difference in choice here is whether you vote regionally or nationally.

The Senate is voted for on a national basis, with all candidates open to all voters. Of the 103 curules, a straight 100 are chosen by the electorate as a whole, while Indigenous communities select a further two and the runner-up in the presidential election will receive the final seat.

The Cámara is regionally organised, with residents of the capital voting for Bogotá-based candidates and so on. Bogotanos have 18 representatives in total, whereas departments are guaranteed a minimum of two seats. Like the Senate, there are also seats set aside for special groups: afro-Colombians, Indigenous Colombians and conflict victims.

Just in case you thought there was enough on the plate, there are further considerations at stake. To avoid spreading the vote, various presidential candidates with similar positions group together for a preliminary vote. The losers in each consulta will drop out on Monday. This year there are three on the voting card.

They are leftist, rightist and centrist. Ex-mayor of Bogotá Claudia López is nailed on for the latter and ex-mayor of Medellín Daniel Quintero is likely to win the former. The rightist consulta is more open, with Paloma Valencia of the centro democrático leading polls but Juan Daniel Oviedo and Juan Galán eyeing the outside chance of an upset.

While there is a diverse group of parties, they hang together in loose blocs roughly delineated as government, opposition and neutral. With the government only controlling 34 curules and the opposition 24, the neutrals are incredibly important for horse-trading.

This will be a huge litmus test for the ruling leftist bloc. They will lose their guaranteed  Comunes seats, so any further losses will be highly problematic. On the other hand, gaining curules would be a huge shot in the arm in terms of public support, hence why they are campaigning in places like Huila, outside of their traditional strongholds.

Continuity candidate for presidency Iván Cepeda continues to lead polling by a healthy amount, but is closer to Petro’s numbers in 2018 than 2022, which will be a concern. A good performance tomorrow will help him out considerably.

Within the consultas, Paloma Valencia’s support will be the big question. She’s likely to win, but the percentages will be a big sign as to whether she can truly challenge Abelardo de la Espriella for the rightwing vote. 

The most likely outcome is that there will be little change in the makeup of the Senate, with neither the government nor opposition likely to take outright control or make large gains. Whichever of those two groups increases their representation will quickly turn it into a sign that they are on the right track and use that as support for their presidential campaign.

What’s the background to these elections?

The run-up to the first Colombian elections of 2026 has seen a lot of criticism of the system, almost all of it coming from the national government. President Gustavo Petro has been front and centre on this issue, repeatedly questioning the neutrality of the elections.

Petro’s concerns rest on the fact that Thomas Greg and Sons handle the software used in the election system, a firm that he’s clashed with repeatedly, especially over Colombian passport printing.

He says that the systems are opaque and he has not received answers from the CNE or Registraduria over various concerns he has. However, both groups, along with Colombia’s neutral election observers MOE have been clear about the processes.

Online, there are hundreds of posts claiming that a key part of the alleged fraud will be in the reports made by the jurados. This echoes previous elections, where there was a flurry of images purporting to show electoral forms that had been altered. With AI entering the scenario, expect more of this from midday or so tomorrow onwards.

Voy a escribir porqué los escrutinio son opacos y vulnerables al fraude en las elecciones.

No porque crea que nuestro proyecto democrático vaya a perder sino porque es mi deber como jefe del estado al menos informar sobre uno de los peores riesgos de la democracia hasta ahora…

— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) March 1, 2026

Of course, Petro is only claiming that electoral fraud exists against him, not in the multiple occasions in which he’s won at the voting urns. This is a well established populist tactic – calling elections into doubt before they happen. It’s likely to rally his turnout and provide an excuse if results are bad.

There is little credibility to most of the vote rigging claims. Colombia does indeed have some serious problems around corruption and influence buying, but this tends to be concentrated in rural zones in the periphery of the country. It’s also worth noting that these seats return candidates from across the political spectrum.

A lot of electoral impropriety is very hard to prove – the machines that promise to deliver blocks of votes are well-versed in legal limits and plausible deniability. Offering someone some free gifts in return for ‘support’, for example, is widespread and while dubious hard to prove in court.

It goes without saying that political attacks on the CNE are particularly unhelpful, especially in what is still a very charged political atmosphere nationwide. The assassination of presidential pre-candidate Miguel Uribe last year was a shock to a country that has a long history of political violence.

Concerns remain over both electoral safety and fraud in much of the country, with over 200 municipios at high risk of fraud and/or violence. 39 of those are classed as very high risk and only 167 at very low risk, mainly in the Andino region. 

How does the system work?

Every Colombian over the age of majority (18) and with a correctly registered cédula ciudandanía can vote. In return, each voter gets a half day off work. Non-citizens are not eligible to vote in national elections, but holders of resident visas will be able to vote in next year’s local elections.

The polls are open from 8am until 4pm and counting is usually very fast with the first results coming in before sundown tomorrow. Due to the PR system (see below), final results for some more isolated zones will come through in the week. 

Land and fluvial borders will be closed for Colombian nationals tomorrow morning, although foreigners can cross. From this afternoon until early on Monday morning, ley seca will apply, meaning no alcohol sales in bars, restaurants or shops. That applies for everyone, so no representation or boozing for foreign residents.

Some parties run a closed list system, meaning you simply vote for them, whereas others have open lists, meaning you vote for the party and can also vote for your preferred candidate within the party. For closed lists, the party will simply enter their candidates in the order they’ve given up to their limit of seats, with an open list it will be done in order of preference.

There’s also the curious option of voto en blanco. Different from a spoiled vote, which is simply disregarded, this is an active protest. If it ranks highest in any race, then a rerun of the election must take place within a month with entirely new candidates and/or party lists. 

A smidgen under 50% turnout is common for house elections, with higher figures expected for the presidential elections later this year. The Colombian parliament is a bicameral system with the Senate acting as the upper and more powerful house and the Cámara the lower house.

Most parties do not really have well-defined manifestos as such, although better-funded candidates will give a range of positions on matters. In general, there will simply be slogans and general aims that give voters an idea of where their candidates stand.

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Colombia’s former president Alvaro Uribe Velez will participate in this Sunday’s congressional election following his conviction and subsequent acquittal for procedural fraud and bribery of a public official. 

While he is last in line for a seat in his party’s list, the Centro Democrático, or Democratic Center, hopes his name will help it secure between 18 and 20 seats in the 103-seat Senate.

Uribe is returning to the ballots after resigning from the Senate in 2020, when the Supreme Court began proceedings against him over witness tampering allegations.

In Colombia’s congressional elections, parties and party coalitions can run either closed lists, where voters choose only the party and seats go to candidates in a predetermined order, or open lists, where voters can select individual candidates. Since the Democratic Center is running a closed list, being number 25 means that Uribe is the least likely candidate to get a seat in Congress for his party.

“The political strategy of placing Uribe in the 25th position is highly effective for pulling in votes and taking advantage of voters’ lack of understanding [about how closed lists work],” political advisor Felipe García told The Bogotá Post. 

The Democratic Center is a hyper-personalized party whose votes rely heavily on the stature of Uribe as the natural leader of Colombia’s political right. Therefore, it is likely that voters will go to the polls on Sunday to vote for whoever Uribe endorsed, regardless of whether he himself ends up being elected.

Legal battle

The legal case against Uribe centered on a libel suit he had brought against Senator Iván Cepeda Castro, the current leftist presidential frontrunner, who accused Uribe of being involved with paramilitary death squads. 

Uribe and Cepeda represent opposite poles of Colombia’s political spectrum. Uribe is a conservative, hardline anti-guerrilla leader, whereas Cepeda supports peace negotiations with rebels.

While investigating a separate case to the libel inquiry, authorities overheard in a wiretap that Uribe’s lawyer, Diego Cadena, had contacted jailed paramilitaries to change their testimony in Uribe’s favor.

This evidence became key to a July 2025 ruling which made Uribe Colombia’s first ex-president to be criminally convicted, with judge Sandra Heredia sentencing him to 12 years of house arrest. 

But the politician’s lawyers appealed the ruling and in October, the Superior Court of Bogotá acquitted Uribe of all charges, as the wiretap evidence against him was illegally collected.

A month before his acquittal, the Democratic Center – which was founded by Uribe – announced that its former leader would be number 25 on the party’s Senate candidate closed list.

Uribe’s 2020 resignation from the senate was seen as both a legal and political move, since it meant that his case would be picked up by the Attorney General’s Office, which at the time was headed by Francisco Barbosa Delgado, an ally of the former president.

After several failed attempts to close the case and after Barbosa left office as attorney general, the office formally charged former president Álvaro Uribe Vélez with bribery and witness tampering in May 2024. By that time, Uribe’s defense team was already alleging that the politician was the victim of lawfare.

Recently, the prosecution team in the Uribe trial and alleged victims of paramilitaries announced they would file an extraordinary appeal before the Supreme Court. The ruling is expected to carry greater legal significance than political or public impact, according to García.

Many victims’ groups celebrated Uribe’s conviction as a symbolic victory. Uribe was the president during the ‘false positives’ killings — cases in which Colombian soldiers killed civilians and falsely presented them as guerrilla members killed in combat.

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Seats are distributed using the D’Hondt method, known in Colombia as the cifra repartidora, which allocates seats proportionally according to the number of votes obtained.

A total of 3,231 candidates will compete for seats in Colombia’s congress in the legislative elections scheduled for March 8, according to the Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil (RNEC), the authority responsible for organizing the country’s electoral processes. In total, 102 senators and 182 members of the House of Representatives will be elected.

According to the electoral authority, 1,124 candidates registered for the Senate and 2,107 for the House of Representatives, the two chambers that make up Colombia’s congress.

As the political analysis website Razón Pública explains, Colombia’s electoral system is based on proportional representation, which seeks to reflect the diversity of political opinions within society in the composition of Congress. For the Senate, or upper chamber, voters may cast their ballots for candidates anywhere in the country, as it operates under a national constituency. In contrast, the House of Representatives, or lower chamber, is elected through territorial constituencies by departments, including Bogotá as the Capital District.

According to the RNEC, 41,287,084 citizens are eligible to vote in the upcoming elections, a key figure because it influences how seats are allocated.

Senate elections

In this election, 102 senators will be chosen by popular vote. According to the Senate’s official website, 100 will be elected through a nationwide constituency and the remaining two seats are reserved for indigenous communities, a special constituency established by the 1991 Constitution to guarantee political representation for these groups.

Voters must choose between receiving the national ballot or the Indigenous constituency ballot, but they cannot vote in both.

House of Representatives elections

For the House of Representatives, 182 members will be elected, distributed as follows:

• Territorial constituencies: 161 seats allocated to departments and the Capital District of Bogotá.
• Special Transitional Peace Constituencies: 16 seats reserved for victims of the armed conflict, created by the Acto Legislativo 02 of 2021.
• Afro-descendant communities: 2 seats.
• Indigenous communities: 1 seat.
• Community of San Andrés (Raizal): 1 seat.
• Colombians living abroad: 1 seat.

Unlike the Senate, each department receives a specific number of seats based on its population, creating regional electoral dynamics in which local political leadership often plays a key role. In practice, more populous departments hold greater representation than smaller ones.

Both the Senate and the House of Representatives receive one additional seat after the presidential election, allocated to the candidate who obtains the second-highest number of votes.

How seats are allocated

Colombia’s electoral system is regulated by the Acto Legislativo 001 of 2003 and the Electoral Law, and operates under principles of proportional representation.

First, the valid votes obtained by each party list are counted. Only those lists that surpass a 3% threshold of total valid votes are eligible to participate in the distribution of seats. In the 2022 legislative elections, this threshold exceeded 509,000 votes.

According to projections by the Misión de Observación Electoral (MOE), the threshold for the Senate in the upcoming elections could reach around 600,000 votes.

This threshold is crucial because if, for example, a candidate obtains 450,000 votes but their party fails to pass the threshold, neither the candidate nor the party will secure a seat in Congress.

Among the lists that surpass the threshold, seats are distributed using the D’Hondt method, known in Colombia as the cifra repartidora, which allocates seats proportionally according to the number of votes obtained. In 2022, the seat-allocation quotient was 144,013 votes.

For the House of Representatives, the process is more complex because the threshold and D’Hondt method are applied separately within each department, producing different results across regions.

With closed lists, voters select only the political party or list as a whole, without choosing an individual candidate.

Open and closed lists

Under the Acto Legislativo 1 of 2003, political parties may register open lists or closed lists. With open lists, voters select a specific candidate within a party’s list. The vote counts both for the political party and for the individual candidate. Seats obtained by the party are then assigned to the candidates who received the highest number of votes, regardless of their initial position on the list.

With closed lists, voters select only the political party or list as a whole, without choosing an individual candidate. Seats are then allocated according to the order predetermined and registered at the start of the campaign by the party.

In the upcoming elections, two of Colombia’s most prominent political forces will present closed lists: the Pacto Histórico, the coalition led by current President Gustavo Petro, and the Centro Democrático, the right-wing party founded by former President Álvaro Uribe Vélez.

Photo courtesy of the National Civil Registry of Colombia,

Colombian Defence Minister Pedro Sánchez urged the public not to trust the National Liberation Army’s (ELN’s) promise to observe a ceasefire during elections this weekend.

In a speech on Monday, Sánchez cast doubt on the ELN’s pledge last month to not launch any attacks during the election period, saying: “It is very easy for them to lie.”

The defense minister reiterated calls for the public to remain vigilant ahead of the legislative elections and presidential primaries scheduled for Sunday, which have been overshadowed by the threat of violence.

“The ELN recently distributed a pamphlet stating that it will not interfere with the elections,” Sanchez said at a press conference in Bogotá on Monday. “Let us remember what happened in December, when they said they would not harm any Colombian,” continued the minister, referring to the deaths of Colombian soldiers during an ELN Christmas ceasefire. 

Sánchez also highlighted additional potential threats to the electoral process coming from dissident factions of the now-defunct Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). 

He said the groups led by Calarcá and Mordisco, as well as criminal organizations such as Los Pachenca and Los Conquistadores de la Sierra, should be closely monitored due to their past acts of violence, particularly interference in efforts to maintain a peaceful electoral environment.

To prevent any possible guerrilla attacks, Sánchez said the government has enacted extraordinary security measures across the country. 

“In response to these threats, we have deployed offensive operations and a security deployment that has allowed us to establish operational control of the area, without denying that the threat persists, but also without denying our will and our capacity to neutralize it,” added Sanchez.

The government has mobilized 246,000 members of the security forces, who will protect more than 13,000 polling stations across the country, according to the minister. Enhanced training is also taking place along with special measures such as drone‑jamming systems. 

Ahead of the elections, Sánchez reported that four ELN members, including one nicknamed “El Mono”, were arrested on March 1 for planning and carrying out terrorist actions against civilians as well as extortion. 

A Colombian Army report from 2025 recorded 165 ELN-related captures, 47 voluntary surrenders, and 15 minors recovered from armed groups during military operations.

Yet, the ELN’s stance toward the election remains unchanged, with its national leadership declaring unilateral ceasefires and emphasizing that it will continue acting in accordance with its policy in favor of the people and their freedom to act.

Previous attacks by the ELN

In the past, the ELN, officially recognized as a terrorist organization in Colombia and the United States, has carried out attacks on security forces, violence towards civilians, and kidnappings for political purposes.

Notably, the group has also launched attacks while engaging in peace negotiations, such as the car bomb at a police academy in Bogotá in 2019, one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in modern Colombian history, which killed 22 people and injured 66. 

President Ivan Duque, who was in office at the time, condemned the attack as a “miserable terrorist act” and vowed to bring those responsible to justice.

Fresh peace talks between the Gustavo Petro administration broke down in early 2025 when the ELN was blamed for violent clashes in the Catatumbo region which affected more than 90,000 people, according to the United Nations. 

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