Feted abroad, vilified at home, leader seeks boost from U.S.
BOGOTA, Colombia — Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos is one of the world’s most respected leaders.
He won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work ending the hemisphere’s longest armed conflict with Marxist rebels. He was named to Time Magazine’s 2017 list of 100 Most Influential People.
Yet his approval ratings in his own country are historically low. In fact, his ratings are only slightly higher than that of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the insurgency group known as the FARC that has terrorized his nation for decades.
When Santos comes to Washington this month, he’ll be leaning on that international support as he asks President Trump to fulfill a $450 million promise made by his predecessor to support the peace deal. The challenge is his local opposition may have got to Trump first, and they don’t like how Santos plans to use the money.
The worldwide jubilation that followed the historic peace deal signed late last year with the rebel FARC group never really took hold inside Colombia, where sobering realities surrounding implementing the complicated deal, uncertainty in Venezuela and a corruption scandal threw the nation into a political tailspin.
Santos climbed to the top of Colombian politics as a fighter rather than a peace advocate. A former newspaper man, Santos served in several administrations, but came to distinction in 2006 when he was named defense minister by then-President Alvaro Uribe.
The two men led a successful military offensive against FARC that helped weaken the rebels and bring them to the negotiating table. He won the presidency in 2010 promising to continue hard-line national security policies.
While Santos started off with high approval ratings in the 80s, his support has deteriorated over the years as he sought the backing of the international community for his peace efforts. In one comprehensive poll conducted by Gallup, Santos had just a 24 percent approval rating in February. By comparison, the FARC had a 19 percent approval rating.
Santos’s greatest adversary was once his biggest cheerleader. Uribe, the popular two-term president, spearheaded the “no” campaign, urging Colombians not to support an accord that would give the FARC guaranteed congressional seats and immunity from jail sentences.
Now, former President Barack Obama’s promised $450 million to help implement the peace plan is in doubt as the Trump administration plans to slash foreign aid. A Trump declaration of support, however, would go a long way toward shoring up Santos’ domestic backing.
But Uribe appears to have delivered another blow by meeting Trump at his Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago. Another opposition leader, former Colombian President Andres Pastrana, described the meeting as a “cordial and very frank conversation” about Colombia.