JUAN MANUEL SANTOS SHOULD NOT BE RE – ELECTED

Mauricio Reyes

Kevin Ramírez

Juan Manuel Santos began his government on august 7 of 2010, with the highest number of votes in the history of Colombia’s elections with the percentage of 69,13 % in contrast, with Mockus 27,47% in the second round. Santos was minister of defense during 3 years when Alvaro Uribe was president of Colombia, Santos was member of “Partido de la U” since 2005. He had a strong position with national security during his government, though. He did not hold his position. He also has had a lot of problems during the three years of his administrations and that is why we think that Santos should not be re-elected.

Some people think that Santos has had a good handle on the different situations that the country had faced, but others think that his efforts are not enough for the country needs. Firstly Juan Manuel Santos has had accurate decisions like re-establishing relationships with neighbors like Venezuela and Ecuador. For instance, he joined the Pacific Alliance (6 June 2012) where other members are Chile, Peru and Mexico, and that contributed to the development of the region by creating agreements that allow citizens to travel to the alliance countries without the need of a visa or the creation of business that promotes economic activities. On the other hand, he did not take the precautions to protect the little producers like the milk, potatoes and coffee sectors. He did not keep control over the foreign product prices, destroy the local agriculture economy, and at the same time increase taxes that produced loss for peasants. 

Mainly, we have to understand what a Free Trade Agreement is. It is a bilateral pact in which two countries import and export their products with less taxes. That means that when a product enters the country, it does not have so many taxes, and that makes the products cheaper to access to the market, however in the United States and Colombia’s agreement, there are certain facts that make it unfair for Colombia, in special for the little producers because peasants in United States have subsidies and support of the government. On the other hand, in Colombia peasants have to pay a lot of money for produce their products. Juan Manuel Santos government did not take the precautions. For example, a peasant has to buy a really expensive fertilizer and transport it is also expensive because of the price of gasoline, taking into account that Colombia is a big producer of oil, that is why Colombia is not ready for a Free Trade Agreement with an industrialized country like the United States. 

On August 19th different sectors of Colombian agriculture stop their activities and began with demonstrations that tried to obstruct the principal highways of the country. Peasants argue against the different Free Trade Agreements that put them in disadvantage with foreign markets and drive them to misery for the expensive costs of production and the little payment they get for their products. The government of Santos did not care about the peasants situation and only sent anti-mob police to unlock the highways. However, the peasants did not allow that, and more sectors of peasants and citizens joined to demonstrations like potatoes, milk, miners and different groups of students. At the same time, they did not allow the transportation of food that make a lot of pressure to the president with all cases. Finally, that makes that a lot of ministers of the government renounced and a group of negotiators were sent to made agreements with peasants. That event left 12 dead, more than 485 injured including peasants and cops. So we think that Santos had a really bad management of the demonstrations. He also encourages violent acts by saying that the national agricultural strike did not exist. 

Another important issue that the government of Santos has failed is in Health. The government has never paid attention, even when they give a lot of money for resources for hospitals, it is spent in unnecessary things, or it is stolen by corrupt organizations. Juan Manuel Santos has never shown interest in solving that, health is really unfair in Colombia specially for people with low economic resources. For example, with people dying in front of the hospitals because the hospital does not give the attention required. Furthermore, in some cases the excuse is that the hospital does not have the appropriate infrastructure, personal, medicine and expenses, but Santos does not think a special solution for that. Besides, the problem has become worse day after day. If he follows with his current policies, Colombia will fall in an abyss, so it is time to change the system and find a solution for this huge problematic. 

In conclusion, Juan Manuel Santos and his work’s group did not accomplish the majority of his goals, he did not do what people expected of him. He follows the same   policies and made the same mistakes of the last governments. In Colombia, we need a government that improves our life quality and specially for the ones who need it more. Santos did not take the correct decisions in many issues, as we can see the enormous problem with the peasants; the lack of support to the industry and agriculture, or the wrong management of the demonstrations and the continuous problem of the health system. Maybe a lot of problems did not begin with Santos, but he did not solve them, and what Colombian needed is a president that contributed to the development of our country.