Colombia's FARC Suggest Delaying Elections

In a sign that peace talks between the Colombian government and the country’s largest guerrilla group are not following the timeline declared by President Juan Manuel Santos, FARC negotiators have asked to postpone next years’ elections.

When peace talks between Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and government negotiators resumed again today, there was reason to be optimistic about the pace of negotiations. Two weeks before, both parties had agreed to include wide-ranging land reform measures in an eventual peace treaty. The preliminary agreement was the result of six months of negotiations, and was seen as a major breakthrough in the talks.

However, on Tuesday it became clear that a final peace accord is still a long way off. El Tiempo reports that when the talks resumed, FARC negotiators made an unexpected and controversial proposal: to postpone the national elections scheduled for 2014 by a year. FARC negotiating head Ivan Marquez said the move would help ensure that the peace process doesn’t become hijacked by political interests during campaigning ahead of legislative elections in March and presidential elections in May.

In a press statement, the rebels asserted they could not call for “anything less than” a national assembly to be established to change the constitution, and that a yearlong pause in the election cycle would facilitate this.

Unsurprisingly, the government rejected the proposal, just as it did when the FARC first suggested a constitutional referendum early this year. Humberto De la Calle, head of the government’s negotiating team, shot down the proposition immediately. “Do not be distracted by proposals that contribute little to clarity, as with the proposed delay of elections. That isn’t happening, [and] a constitutional assembly isn’t happening,” De la Calle said.

President Juan Manuel Santos, who is currently visiting Israel, told reporters: “There is not the slightest chance that can happen. We have an electoral calendar. It will be followed.”

Of course, there is a good chance that the FARC’s suggestion was meant more as posturing for the media, and is not a reflection of their current position. Still, it is a clear sign that the FARC are not overly concerned about meeting the timeline for talks set by Santos. In December 2012, the president said that dialogue with the FARC would not extend past November “at the latest.”  After the agreement on land reform was made, many analysts expected the negotiations to pick up the pace on the next items on the agenda. The mere fact that the guerrillas are still mentioning items considered off the table by the state, however, suggests this may not be the case.


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