And in the Colombian elections....

[Michael B]

FARC is doing their best to disrupt the elections via violence and intimmidation. It's going to be very close, 25% of the registered voters have to vote or the election isn't valid. As of midnight, with 92% of the precints giving at least peleminary counts, it was running at the pace of 24.41% voter turnout. Meanwhile, all day FARC has been attacking polling places and military installations. The road from Cali to Buenaventura is closed, blocked by burned out (civilian, commercial) trucks distroyed by a FARC ambush. 13 persons (some police, some military and, alas, some civilians attempting to vote) are known dead so far. Martha says the military helecoptors have been over the hills south of Cali all day, but she didn't hear any gunfire, reports all quiet in her neighborhood (barrio Cuidad de Cordoba).

[Michael B]

... in response to And in the Colombian elections...., posted by Michael B on Oct 26, 2003

I Looked at various news sources in Colombia again this morning. Nothing conclusive, still a cliff hanger. Apparently, you can vote 'yes', 'no' or 'abstain' on each indiviual question, and each question has to get 25% on it's own (in other words, if you vote 'yes' on one, 'no' on two,' abstain' on three and don't mark four, four doesn't get any credit toward making its 25%, the articles weren't clear (or perhaps my Spanish wasn't up to snuff) if they count 'abstain' towards the 25% or not). With 97.32% of the precincts counted, all of the questions are strongly passing (three are running over 80% 'yes', the rest are running over 90% 'yes'), but so far none of them has hit the magic 25% mark. Turn out appears to be lowest in the areas under FARC control (duhhh, ya think?) but also light in Cartagena and Barranquilla, where there were heavy rains and some flooding. Medellin and Bogota are both reporting that many would be voters were turned away because of problems with their registrations (apparently they claimed to be registered voters but the clerks couldn't find them on the rolls--maybe they never registered, maybe they went to the wrong poll, maybe the rolls have clerical errors, who knows?). One article said they might do a recount--not of the votes cast, but of the number of voters registered (such as reviewing death records and dropping off people who have died since they registered and stuff like that) in an atempt to make the required 25% be a smaller number.

[DavidMN]

... in response to Re: And in the Colombian elections...., posted by Michael B on Oct 26, 2003

Hey Michael -

If you haven't already found it, this site is the source for the online newspapers. You can click on the article/pregunta number and see how it fared across departments. If you explore the menu on the left there are additional statistics for international voters.

http://www.registraduria.gov.co/

Overall, a pretty sad commentary on Colombians. Some of the departments had a 10% turnout and even in highly urbanized Bogota D.C. it was no better than 30%.

There are a couple million overseas Colombians, yet only 178,000 bothered to register to vote. Of those, less than 20% actually voted (Washington D.C. and New York City appeared to have close to a 50% turnout, Miami and most of Spain was rather pathetic at 15-20%).

I can understand the low turnout in some of the most remote departments where people probably feared going to the polls, but for those overseas Colombians, presumably living better lives than their friends and family at home, I don't know how you explain it other than apathy.

As H.L. Mencken said, "we get the government we deserve" and someone else said "if you don't exercise your right to vote you will soon lose it."

-David

 

[Locii]

... in response to Re: And in the Colombian elections...., posted by Michael B on Oct 26, 2003

I'm not positive, but I'm hoping JimC is in Cartagena and can stop looking at girls long enough to turn on the TV and tell us whats up.

Then again, I know what I would be doing on a Sunday morning, and it doesn't involve church.

Ciao

[cancunhound]

... in response to And in the Colombian elections...., posted by Michael B on Oct 26, 2003

That road has always been dangerous, especially near the tunnels.  Being the major Pacific transport route, it has always amazed me that it's not more secure.  I read that one senator yesterday was in that mess, they did a u-turn and escaped with only bullet scratches on their car.

[Cali vet]

... in response to Cali --+ Buenaventura, posted by cancunhound on Oct 26, 2003

Cancunhound, Joahny of Eco-Av told me on the return ride from San Cipriano that the route is ok on weekends but not advisable midweek. For what it's worth. We both know that any route in Colombia no matter how "safe" is always a crapshoot.

[Keith Smith]

... in response to And in the Colombian elections...., posted by Michael B on Oct 26, 2003

Hi. Do you know when the elections will be done?

[Michael B]

... in response to Re: And in the Colombian elections...., posted by Keith Smith on Oct 26, 2003

Saturday they voted on a 15 question referendum. Sunday they vote for city councilmen, mayors and congressmen.....then they're finished until next time.

[Keith Smith]

... in response to Re: Re: And in the Colombian elections....., posted by Michael B on Oct 26, 2003

Thanks, Michael.