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Gustavo Petro’s Strategy to Legitimize Maduro

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DURING the electoral campaign, Gustavo Petro deceived the Colombian electorate, pretending to keep his distance from the Venezuelan regime. In February 2022, for example, the now president of Colombia asked Nicolás Maduro to “step aside” and even called him a coward for not embracing democracy.

This is standard behavior among the members of the São Paulo Forum when they are candidates, so they pretend to distance themselves from radicals such as Cuba’s Díaz-Canel, Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, and Venezuela’s Maduro. Once in power, however, they start working together. This is what Pedro Castillo, Xiomara Castro, and Gabriel Boric did in their opportunity.

Indeed, once in the Palacio de Nariño, Gustavo Petro forgot his alleged differences with Maduro and set in motion a plan to legitimize the Venezuelan tyrant. The first step was to reestablish diplomatic relations and both nations appointed their respective ambassadors. Maduro’s links with the Cartel of the Suns and the accusations of crimes against humanity before the International Criminal Court matter little.

The second step was to announce the opening of the border between the two countries, as well as cargo transport and Caracas-Bogota flights. To justify his decision, Petro said that his objective was to alleviate several problems; such as the organized crime that has taken place on the border and that has proliferated in the illegal trafficking of people. This is a false argument since Petro is well aware that the main protector of the ELN and organized crime in Venezuelan territory is Maduro.

The third step was to ask Maduro to become a mediator in the talks between the new Colombian government and the ELN. The dictator Maduro immediately agreed. In addition, Cuba, Chile and Spain have also expressed their interest in mediating the peace talks, including Norway as another guarantor of the process.

All the countries interested in interceding are governed by socialists and, therefore, allies of Gustavo Petro and the ELN, which guarantees that impunity will be granted to the narco-terrorists, as it was also done with the FARC at the time. The Norwegian government is also a mediator in the dialogues between the Venezuelan regime and the opposition.

And the fourth step was to request Maduro and his other ally in the São Paulo Forum (Nicaraguan tyrant Daniel Ortega) to rejoin the Inter-American Human Rights System, which is part of the Organization of American States. That same day, the NGO Foro Penal reported that the Venezuelan dictatorship continues to hold 245 political prisoners in the regime’s dungeons and 9,000 citizens subjected to arbitrary judicial measures.

This is just the beginning. Gustavo Petro will not rest until he sees Maduro legitimized. However, his strategy could backfire, since, according to a report published by SEMANA magazine, Democrats and Republicans in the United States are beginning to feel uncomfortable with the close relationship between Petro and Maduro.

Democratic Senator Bob Menendez does not see the favorable side of the rapprochement: “The reality is that what Maduro is guaranteeing at this moment is to give refuge to the ELN to carry out acts of terrorism against Colombia. I do not understand that position as something that is positive for Colombia.”

For his part, Marco Rubio, who from the beginning pointed out the risks of a Gustavo Petro presidency has said: “We knew after the elections that we had a new administration in Colombia that was going to get a little closer to Maduro’s regime.”

Perhaps, in his effort to whitewash Maduro, Petro will end up delegitimizing himself.

Nitu Pérez Osuna es una reconocida periodista venezolana en el exilio. Por muchos años fue una de las caras principales del canal de noticias más importante de su país, hasta que fue vendido a aliados de la dictadura chavista, por lo que fue despedida. Nitu Pérez Osuna es perseguida política de Nicolás Maduro y se ha dedicado a denunciar, no solo a la dictadura de su país, sino a los regímenes socialistas de todo el continente.

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