Members of Colombia’s coalition are seeking to revive ‘Primero
Colombia’, the political party of which President Uribe was candidate
for the 2006 presidential elections. They hope to jointly present one
candidate for the 2010 elections.
The small parties in the current coalition — consisting of the Conservative Party and seven small parties — want to revive the party that brought victory to Uribe and allowed the patchwork of parties to take part in the government.
The Conservative Party already announced that they would bring forth their own candidate. Three of their prominent members, former Interior and Justice Minister Carlos Holguín, former Foreign Minister Fernando Araújo and current Agriculture Minister Andres Felipe Arias have shown interest in leading the party through the elections.
The proposal for Cambio Radical, Partido de la U, Opción Centro, Apertura Democrática, Convergencia Ciudadana, Colombia Democrática and Equipo Colombia to form a joint list for the election comes from Cambio Radical Representative Roy Barreras and shows the division in Cambio Radical between its leader German Vargas Lleras and a number of his congressman.
Vargas Lleras has repeatedly showed interest in running for the Presidency himself, but he found that a number of his own people in Congress are against the idea.
Uribe repeatedly called on the coalition to present one candidate that could secure the continuation of the President’s Democratic Security policy in case Uribe is not allowed a second re-election.
