Abelardo De La Espriella wins Colombia election, continuing rightward trend in Latin America

Colombian right-wing prospect Abelardo De La Espriella has clinched a contract triumph in Sunday's presidential election, according to an initial ballot number, as voters wager on his promise of a crackdown on crime and a stronger economy.

De La Espriella had 49.66 per cent of the vote while his rival, Senator Ivan ‌Cepeda, trailed by some 250,000 votes at 48.70 per cent, according to the national registrar's tally of just under 100 per cent of ballots in the runoff election.

"I will govern for all Colombians, for those who voted for me and for those who chose the other candidate," De La Espriella told a crowd of supporters gathered in the coastal city of Barranquilla, promising to respect all citizens' rights.

Colombia and Peru, with elections this month, are now poised to join Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Bolivia and Panama in moving right. It's a stark reversal of the region's so-called pink tide that brought several leftist governments to power in the early 2020s, including Gustavo Petro, Colombia's first leftist president.

In Peru, where votes from a June 7 ⁠contest are still ⁠being counted, conservative Keiko Fujimori appears poised to win the presidency after three failed attempts.

De La Espriella, also a citizen of the ​U.S. And Italy, received a congratulatory call from U.S. President Donald Trump, who has clashed with Petro since returning to the White House last year.

Cepeda, 63, had vowed to continue the policies of Petro, a former rebel and the country's first leftist president, which include state pension payments for the poor, union-backed labour ​reforms, peace talks with armed groups that have fought the state for decades and a moratorium ​on new oil projects.

De la Espriella has blamed Petro for the country's economic and security woes and has vowed to end peace talks with rebels and criminal groups, boost the oil and gas sector, lower taxes and reduce the size of the state by up to 40 per cent. But he ​has said he will preserve Petro's 23 per cent increase in the minimum wage, along with other popular social measures.

"It is a victory for Colombia — ⁠a change after four lost years with no ⁠clear direction," said Viviana Olivos, a 46-year-old mechanical engineer, as she gathered with other supporters of de la ‌Espriella in coastal Barranquilla.

De La Espriella, a lawyer with no prior political experience, will have to grapple with high public debt. He has presented himself as a businessman, but an investigation by local outlet La Silla Vacia found that many of his businesses have been dissolved, are in debt and lost money overall in 2024, with his law firm being his most profitable endeavour.

The closeness of the race, with ⁠less than one percentage point separating the two candidates, will likely force De La Espriella to water down some of his proposals ‌in order to get support from a divided Congress. Cepeda's Historic Pact party has more seats than any other party in both the Senate and the lower house, although no party has a majority.

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Cepeda told his supporters at an event in Bogota that he would await a final, ballot-by-ballot check of the initial count, saying his campaign is challenging results from some 33,000 ballot boxes, out ‌of 122,000 in total. His supporters are a significant political force, he added, and must have a seat at the table.

"We are open to dialogue; we are willing to reach agreements as long as they are respectful, genuine, and reflected in political actions that benefit the nation and preserve the historical progress we have already achieved,” Cepeda said.

Security was a key concern for many De La Espriella voters, especially in regions where extortion and drug trafficking have risen ​recently.

While many Cepeda supporters feared his bellicose rhetoric about fighting back against armed groups could return the country, where leftist guerrillas and crime gangs founded by former right-wing paramilitaries have fought each other and the state for more than 60 years, to a more active conflict.

Peace talks initiated ⁠by Petro have largely failed as armed groups have grown in power and numbers, and drug-trafficking gangs have expanded, leading to spikes in murders and extortion along the Caribbean ⁠coast.

De la Espriella has cast Petro and Cepeda, the son of a murdered communist leader, as allies of criminals, though Petro's administration says it has seized more cocaine ⁠than any other ⁠government. Cepeda has rejected the accusations, saying there is no evidence for ​them.

Cepeda has critiqued de la Espriella's work as a lawyer for people tied to right-wing paramilitary groups and corruption cases, including Alex Saab, who faces U.S. Charges for allegedly laundering money ​for ousted Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro.

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More than 41 million Colombians were eligible to vote, with more than 26.2 million casting ballots. Some 420,000 voters turned in blank ballots, usually seen as a protest vote, the registrar figures showed.

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