What’s Going On in Colombia?

On October 1, 2016, Colombia failed to pass the peace deal it has been working on for four years with the FARC, A.K.A. the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. The FARC has been financing its anti-government activity mainly through drug trafficking, and with this, there has been a rise of drug-related violence in Colombia throughout the decades. The referendum failed by less than one percentage point, leaving the Colombian people to wonder what will happen now. Both President Juan Manuel Santos and the FARC leader Timolean Jimenez signed the deal, but there is no Plan B in place now that Colombians have not approved it. The Farc and Colombian government have been engaging in a civil war for 52 years now, and over 220,000 people have died in the crossfire.

What was the peace deal?

According to the Former Justice and President of the Constitutional Court of Colombia Manuel José Cepeda, the peace accords stated that FARC members who committed war crimes before the peace accords were signed would be tried in justice tribunals. In these tribunals, FARC members would face a maximum of 20 years in prison, but if they were able to tell authorities where drug money was located (and authorities actually discovered it), their sentences would be reduced. If FARC members committed crimes after the signing of peace accords, they would go through regular Colombian criminal court and would face life in prison. The idea of these reduced sentences within the justice tribunal is that FARC members would be more likely to give up information and money related to their crimes, which would then be used to pay retributions to the families of the victims.

Sounds like a good idea, right?

Why did people vote against it?

Of the 38 percent of voters who showed up at the polls, more than half didn’t think so. Many blamed the Colombian government on being “soft on crime” by not demanding harsher sentences for members of the FARC. There has also been discontent that the Colombian military, who has also been accused of widespread abuses and corruption, is not being tried as an organization the way the FARC is, but instead the government would only be trying individuals within the military once evidence is mounted against them.

What are the next steps?

On October 5, 30,000 Colombians marched in Bogota to support the peace process and amass signatures to reverse the results of the referendum. Both politicians that supported and were against the peace deal are coming together to talk about what can be done to now salvage the agreement. Fifty-two years later, the failure of the referendum is forcing Colombian politicians to reach across the table and discuss their options. Meanwhile, a tenuous cease-fire is being held onto between the government and the FARC, but the future remains unclear.