_{By: Antonio Morales Riveira}

In these presidential elections in Colombia in May and June, the task of the left is singular, but twofold. Another defeat for Uribe in his two far-right versions, Paloma Valencia and Abelardo de la Espriella. For now, the first defeat, that of Paloma, according to polls, trends, and observations, seems cooked.

She will not make it to the second round. His candidate, taken from Uribe’s pocket and assembled like an automated doll, in the image and likeness of her father and creator, will be widely defeated by Iván Cepeda and the ultra-rightist Abelardo de la Espriella. That first defeat implies that, according to all forecasts, the most viable candidate to close in the second round will not be there.

The foolish idea that this Paloma, supposedly from the center, could gather more loose and slightly off-track votes in the second round than those of Abelardo would no longer be valid or have a future. Cepeda’s strongest opponent, due to the division of the far right, the one who could make the biggest dent, will be relegated. One to zero in these soccer times.

But the other match is coming to defeat de la Espriella in the second round, if Iván Cepeda does not defeat them both in the first, an option that is increasingly present. In any case, the final match is easier for Iván Cepeda to win against de la Espriella for a definitive 2-0 against Uribe. Those apparently undecided or center votes, which can reach 15% of the electorate, will largely not be received by de la Espriella as it could have happened with Paloma.

Rather, not a few of them will nourish Cepeda’s figures in the face of the refusal of those center people to vote for such an extreme and frivolous option as that of Abelardo and his theses that are basically primary, commonplace, and recalcitrant. Without a doubt, nothing is better for Cepeda than facing the lawyer and not the landowner. In any case, the great loser, Uribe, will surely be trying to converge all his forces on Abelardo, who will surely moderate his speech, but even so Uribe will not be able to mobilize his non-fanatic electorate.

The averaged polls agree. In the second round, Cepeda would take more than 10 points from Abelardo and only 4 from Paloma, who would no longer be there. Although Cepeda’s triumph would largely be due to the immense current that President Petro contributes, he has also grown on his own, without reaching a ceiling, which gives him options to triumph in the first round.

And the friendly fire from the far right in the first and probably in the second round will end up benefiting him in the midst of a firm unity of the left and a growth of opinion that increases in cascade in the popular Colombian sectors. In the second round, Abelardo has it difficult, because while Uribe would support him, Paloma has said that she is not going to carry his bags. Things of hatred between them, which this time are a guarantee of their division.

Paloma is heading towards the abyss and there seems to be no strategy to stop her fall in the midst of increasingly strange, foolish and negatively effective propaganda campaigns, somewhat ridiculous and too aggressive like her self-debates with herself. Meanwhile, even sectors of the right land in Cepeda’s field, in a correlation of forces widely favorable to the continuity of change. In the elections of May 31, half of Uribe’s defeat seems consummated and in June the final blow will come.

Everything indicates that Uribe loses in all scenarios and with it the country triumphs, which will probably get rid of the intellectual author of a long history of perversities in decline forever.

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