By Patricia Lara Salíve, CAMBIOColombia, October 20, 2024
https://cambiocolombia.com/poder/vuelven-el-garrote-y-la-zanahoria-entrevista-eduardo-pizarro
(Translated by Eunice Gibson, CSN Volunteer Translator)
“There is a profound change in the politics of peace,” says expert Eduardo Pizarro in an interview with Patricia Lara Salíve. He adds that it looks as if the administration is going back to Santos’ model of negotiation, and we will probably have some “surprises that will lead to improvement in public order.” Besides that, he states that there is no possibility at all that there will be a “soft coup” as suggested by Petro.
Eduardo Pizarro is one of the great experts on military matters and on the Colombian armed conflict. A sociologist at the University of Paris, with post-graduate work in political science at the University of the Andes, Masters and Doctoral degrees in international relations at the Institute for Political Studies in Paris, and a Professor at the National University, he has also been a victim of the armed conflict on three occasions.
He is the son of Admiral Juan Antonio Pizarro and Margot Leongómez de Pizarro, is the brother of Carlos Pizarro, who was the chieftain of M-19, of Nina, who was a militant of that same movement, and of Hernando, the founder of the so-called Ricardo Franco Front. That means that, of the five children of Margot and the Admiral, among whose Matamoros relatives there were several Colombian Army generals, three guerrilla fighters, and two of them were killed because of the conflict.
And the FARC nearly killed Eduardo at the end of 1999 in an attack in Bogotá. So there’s nobody with more experience and familiarity than Eduardo Pizarro Leongómez to talk about war and peace in Colombia, and about the security policies of this administration.
CAMBIO: A year and a half ago, you told CAMBIO that the administration’s policy of “total peace” was characterized by improvisation, that it was very poorly focused, and if they didn’t get it straightened out, the conflict could get worse. At this point, do you think the policy has been straightened out?
Eduardo Pizarro: I think that, far from making progress toward peace, the conflict is getting worse all over the country. There are enormous difficulties in making progress with the ELN, and that was the fundamental pillar of “total peace”. Right now we find ourselves having difficulties getting back to the conference tableto reach some agreements, nothing signed on paper, but some substantial things that would permit a diminution in the intensity of the conflict with the ELN. A few weeks ago, they systematically destroyed the petroleum pipelines, producing environmental damage; it’s incredible that a progressive organization would do that.
Furthermore, there have been actions in which a very high number of soldiers, officers, and noncoms have lost their lives. There are also difficulties with the Dissident group, and also with the FARC that have gone back to fighting, but we could talk about those. And then, with the groups that are more criminal in nature, there are new conference tables, some active and some inactive.
CAMBIO: The President must be really annoyed with the armed groups that, in spite of having some political identification with leftist causes, are torpedoing the standard of “total peace”. Is it possible that we are going to see a warrior Petro?
E.P.L.: A few weeks before he arrived at the President’s Palace, the President claimed that in three months, the ELN would already have laid down their arms. It was an excess of optimism, of thinking that it would be easy to negotiate with those guerrillas. I think that the military takeover of El Plateado in southern Cauca a few days ago, means a profound change in the current administration’s peace policy. It looks as if the administration is going back to Juan Manuel Santos’ model of negotiation, which combines what is popularly known as “the carrot and the stick”. That means security and negotiation. It’s very possible that that’s what will come out of the takeover of El Plateado in Cauca. A profound change where the administration looks to strengthening its military and also its integrated presence in the countryside, landing a blow to the illegal revenue, and at the same time, continuing to negotiate. It’s possible that we’re returning to the Santos model.
CAMBIO: In effect, what took place at El Plateado could mean a change in military strategy. Can the strategy be replicated in other areas?
E.P.L.: A couple of days ago, CAMBIO itself suggested three hypotheses: The first is that it was a short-term idea, just to send a message to the armed groups. The second is that it was an action against the Iván Mordisco group to punish its conduct against the civilian population and its drug trafficking. The third is that we could be looking at a global turnaround in the Petro administration’s policy of obtaining greater control of the countryside, and an attack on the illegal revenues all over the country. That debate is open now. A lot of military analysts, based on the Ayacucho Plan that the Armed Forces have been implementing since 2023, and that they are sharpening this year, think that it’s a global turnaround in the Petro administration’s security strategy; that it’s a pilot plan to see if they can recover control of the countryside, and have a greater presence of the Armed Forces as well as a greater integrated government presence. Many analysts suggest that we are looking at a turnaround in the Petro administration’s peace strategy. That’s what the debate is.
CAMBIO: There’s a feeling that the Armed Forces aren’t doing anything in the countryside; that armed groups of every hide and pelt are making themselves at home there, and it looks as if the Armed Forces have their hands tied. Is there anything to that?
E.P.L.: I think the bilateral ceasefires were poorly designed, with such a high number of armed groups that the government was dealing with. There are nine. The bilateral ceasefires were intended to diminish humanitarian damages and create spaces for negotiation, but they were made without putting conditions on the other parties. They took advantage of those ceasefires without conditions to expand their control over the countryside, to improve their control over the illegal revenues, and to obtain acts coordinated with local populations that were at risk of retaliation. Those bilateral ceasefires without conditions led to expansion of all the groups all over the country. Although the humanitarian damage has been reduced to some degree, the government has not been able to improve its control of the countryside or to make progress toward peace. That means that what we need now is absolutely to change the model. People that were under arrest are being appointed as peace negotiators, like Sr. Gafas, Ingrid Betancourt’s kidnapper, and now he shows up in Cauca with an adviser that was kidnapped by that group. And Gafas goes out in front of the media demanding that he get out of the territory. We are appointing people that are in custody as peace negotiators, and that is allowing the criminal groups to put their command structures back together with people that have years of experience, and without those people showing that, in all those years, they have ever done anything to make peace.
CAMBIO: Right now there is only a ceasefire with the Dissidents in Calarcá, right?
E.P.L.: Exactly.
CAMBIO: With the Segunda Marquetalia. Is that the situation?
E.P.L.: There are serous difficulties with the Marquetaliagroup because President Juan Manuel Santos elevated the Peace Agreements to a constitutional level and deposited them with the United Nations. And there they have the idea that those that signed the Peace Agreements had broken with the FARC and could no longer be considered political actors but rather, actors that were only seeking to be the objects of negotiation with the government as criminals negotiating a plea agreement. That means there is a legal barrier to negotiating with the Segunda Marquetalia that can only be dealt with through the criminal justice system. That is very complicated, because what the government’s peace negotiators have been told is that, with the Segunda Marquetalia, all you can discuss with them is that they must accept the Peace Agreements that were signed in the Colón Theater, and that there can’t be any negotiation on any subjects different from what they have already signed. And simply that they must be willing to seek the benefits of the transitional justice system for their subsequent conduct. So it’s very difficult to negotiate with that group.
CAMBIO: But there have already been some meetings between members of the new Marquetalia and the government delegation. What happened legally there? Why did they even have those meetings?
E.P.L.: There’s a legal barrier there that the government has not resolved. To make it possible to negotiate with the Segunda Marquetalia, there will have to be a constitutional amendment. That’s an enormous challenge. The negotiator appointed by the administration, who is a distinguished jurist, has to find a legal formula to be able to negotiate with them as a political group, and not as common criminals. It’s urgent to have that debate in the Congress.
CAMBIO: But the law permits ceasefire agreements with them? Or does it?
E.P.L.: They can agree on a bilateral ceasefire. With serious conditions, I insist, to initiate the discussion. But they have to overcome the overhanging legal challenge.
CAMBIO: But they haven’t agreed on . . . . . .
E.P.L.: But the legal barrier remains. And many people think that it’s an insoluble barrier. That means that if Iván Márquez and his group, the Segunda Marquetalia want to return to living within the law, they can’t do it through political negotiations like a traditional guerrilla group could, but rather they have to do it by seeking entry to the justice system as a criminal group would have to do. That is enormously complicated.
CAMBIO: So right now the order that a soldier might receive could be, more or less, “attack everybody but the people in Calarcá” . . .
E.P.L.: Right now there are several groups with signed ceasefire agreements, which certainly provides a kind of institutional paralysis for the Armed Forces. And given the experience that these ceasefires have allowed the groups to expand, we return a little bit to our initial subject. I believe that if the government wants to see results, it will have to extend the El Plateado experience to the whole country, and let all the groups know that negotiations will be proceeding in the midst of a military offensive. That means without the poorly designed bilateral ceasefires that are generating harmful effects on the security of the whole territory of our nation.
CAMBIO: In that same interview that I mentioned in the beginning, you told us that the Armed Forces were bewildered because there was no clear security policy. Does that policy exist now and are they no longer bewildered?
E.P.L.: It’s possible that El Plateado means that the administration has a new orientation and that the Armed Forces, after this pilot experience, will start using it in other areas of the country and there will be a profound switch in the military’s orientation in that sense. I believe we are very close to that. In this new model, every one of the forces will have a specialty and they will concentrate on what they know how to do.
CAMBIO: Is this change of model a positive one?
E.P.L.: It’s a very positive change, one that sends a strong message to the groups: Fellas, those bilateral ceasefires without any conditions are over and done. Now there are clear rules of the game that will require you to progress toward abandoning your illegal revenue, stop doing harm to the civilian population, and respect the ceasefires, if you are to be able to have a serious negotiation with the government.
CAMBIO: At that time, you also said you hoped the Defense Minister, Iván Velásquez, would show a more solid recognition of the security issues. Do you think he has learned to do that during his time as Minister?
E.P.L.: I think the Minister is carrying out a very important apprenticeship, and the reading I’ve done of the recent Armed Forces documents shows they are putting together the experience of these two years of frustrated negotiations, and the Armed Forces are making a profound adjustment. I think we’re going to have some interesting surprises that can lead to the improvement of public order and to better results from peace negotiations.
CAMBIO: By now, have they overcome the effects of the enormous purges of generals in the Army and the Police?
E.P.L.: From my point of view, it was a mistake to take out that many generals with that much accumulated experience. The Army was left without enough generals to take over the positions that require the training of a general. So we had an enormous number of colonels who hadn’t done the command staff courses that require the different kind of training needed to be ready to command military units. But I think they’re getting over that rough patch, and by now the colonels have done the courses required for a member of the command staff, and they now have the training to command important units. We now have top military management that is prepared and equipped, and the turnaround required by the Ayacucho Plan is now sustainable for the long term.
CAMBIO: But many of those generals that left had some questionable ethics. Or not?
E.P.L.: That issue doesn’t worry me very much. Obviously, there were generals that were ethically questionable in connection with the “false positives” and other things. However, many of the military who left had blameless resumés and military training and experience that was important and very necessary for this country. But appointing people of lower rank and seniority required them to exit and so officers who had no ethical issues had to leave, so that officers of lower rank and less seniority could be appointed to higher ranks.
CAMBIO: If you were the President of Colombia, what would you do to resolve the conflict?
E.P.L.: I am preparing a document that I’m going to release soon. I am suggesting ten lines of action to seek peace in Colombia. I think the first thing required is to draft a “white paper” on security and national defense. In Colombia, every administration issues a security law. We are living in short-termism, and we don’t have a strategic vision for twenty or thirty years out, and that is weakening our capacity to control the countryside and our security policies for the long term. President Gustavo Petro should get that debate started.
We also need a legitimate monopoly of authority. We can’t continue privatizing security with the indigenous guards, campesinas, and “cimarronas” (tribal communities). There has to be integrated control of the countryside, and better control of the borders, a better mechanism for international cooperation, a weakening of illegal sales, and a profound re-ordering of the Peace Commissioner’s Office and its plan of action. We have to prioritize the groups that have political origin and make peace with them. There also have to be ceasefires with conditions and with clear rules of conduct. And finally, there needs to be a great citizen mobilization for peace. We have to revive the model of Spain’s Basque country, where the citizen mobilization model forced ETA (the armed Basque separatist group) to lay down its arms. I think we need citizens in the streets demanding that the armed groups make peace.
CAMBIO: But that mobilization would be more effective if it happened out in the countryside. That’s where the people are petrified by fear.
E.P.L.: If those groups believe they have legitimate citizenship, they have to demonstrate in the streets that we Colombians are sick and tired of war. There was a very impactful event in 1990 when M-19 got 750,000 in the street for Antonio Navarro Wolf as a candidate for President. In 2018, the FARC Party got 53,000 votes. Then in 2022, they got 23,000 votes for the Senate. After that experience, I think the guerrilla groups have to be aware that the country is sick of violence. At this rate, the Commons Party could lose its legal capacity in 2026. Because now the minimum threshold for representation in Congress is 500,000 votes, and the Commons Party barely got 23,000. That shows how worn out Colombia is, and it’s a message that it’s time to put an end to this chapter right away.
CAMBIO: What can be done about the current crisis with the ELN?
E.P.L.: This is something I’m really worried about, because the ELN has been negotiating with every administration since 1991. Obviously, there’s tremendous concern that the ELN uses negotiations, not as a resource for changing from weapons to politics, but rather to fortify themselves militarily. In the case of the ELN, I insist, we have to augment government presence in their strategic area in a systematic way, particularly in Arauca. We need a new citizen mobilization like the one in 2009 against the FARC, so that the ELN gets a very strong message. We are sick of this useless violence that hasn’t benefited anybody in Colombia. For nearly 50 years of armed struggle, probably the only positive result was the Constitution of 1991. Colombia spends measureless amounts of resources for defense that ought to be used for development, for people’s needs, for health and education. Why do we have to spend 30% of the country’s budget for security? That simple fact should make the ELN command staff do some thinking.
CAMBIO: In the case of the ELN, do you think we should continue the Comuneros del Sur (a segment or Front of the ELN) process that led to the crisis in the negotiations?
E.P.L.: There is disagreement in the administration. Some think we have to “save the drowned man’s hat”, or at least demonstrate a successful peace process with the Comuneros. And then, if this peace process is successful, do it with other guerrilla fronts, with the ELN as well as with the FARC Dissidents, starting to negotiate with one in isolation, breaking up the unity of those groups. Others think the negotiations with the Comuneros del Sur are sacrificing the more strategic negotiations with El Coce (ELN Central Command) and the Central Command Staff (EMC in Spanish). So there are two ways of reading this: Otty Patiño’s—he favors territorial negotiations—and those who think that’s a negative because it weakens El Coce’s willingness and introduces difficulties. What I’d do is continue with the Comuneros del Sur and, at the same time, show El Coce the risks that it takes by continuing a useless war that could fracture other fighting fronts and lead them to follow the same path.
CAMBIO: That would require strengthening the military offensive against the ELN.
E.P.L. It would require strengthening the military’s activities while keeping the channels of negotiation open. But at the same time strengthening peace in the countryside as Otty Patiño is suggesting. It’s combining strategies with intelligence.
CAMBIO: It’s like the Communists used to say years ago: it combines all the forms of struggle.
E.P.L.: Exactly. That would be the definition.
CAMBIO: The gossips are saying that Antonio García and Iván Márquez are brand new best friends. How is the peace issue going with the new Marquetalia? Will it be possible to get closer to them if there’s such a tight relationship with García?
E.P.L.: One of the biggest worries we all have is the issue of the border with Venezuela. In the sixth talk with the ELN, they defined themselves as binational guerrillas that have a revolutionary function in Colombia, while protecting the Bolivarian revolution in Venezuela. I worry a lot that not only the ELN in Arauca but also the Segunda Marquetalia in Venezuela are starting to see themselves as binational guerrillas, and that that will lead them to see their function as keeping on fighting because of the risk that the West will intervene against the Bolivarian revolution. Obviously, that would greatly affect the possibility of internal peace in Colombia.
CAMBIO: And what about the Clan del Golfo?
E.P.L. I find it extremely difficult to talk about that subject because the Clan del Golfo and Los Pachenka, who gave themselves bombastic names to give themselves a kind of a political tinge, are not groups that have a political character by any means. Yet they have a certain control over the countryside and over the people, using threats and other kinds of domination; they are organizations of purely criminal character. So negotiations with these groups have to be fundamentally supported in a diminution of illegal revenue. The priority is to combat those revenues, illegal mining and drug trafficking. In the case of the Clan del Golfo, they also deal in human trafficking in Urabá.
I would continue some channels of communication with them, but the strategic necessity is to diminish their illegal revenue. I’ll tell you an anecdote: In 2006, I talked a long time with Mancuso in the prison at Itaguí, on the subject of the disappearance of the AUC (United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia), and I said, “Sr. Mancuso, are you all done?” He told me that there were two mid-level commanders missing, because the incentives for crime were persisting. Those two mid-level commanders will continue if their income isn’t reduced. And the Bacrim surged in 2007. I mean, he predicted what was going to happen. The mid-level commanders are a headache for every peace process in the world. Once the top-ranking bosses get rich and retire from the war, the mid-level commanders will still keep it going.
CAMBIO: This week you’re publishing a book titled “Neither military coups nor civilian coups”. Tell us what that’s about.
E.P.L. The book was born at a lunch at a Latin American embassy a month before Gustavo Petro’s inauguration. The Ambassador told us that he was really worried about the possibility of a military coup to keep Petro from being inaugurated. I told him that Colombia is the only country in Latin America where there is no tradition of military coups. We only had one, in the 19th Century. José María Melo in 1854, eight months. And two civilian-military administrations in the 20th century, Rojas Pinilla, and the military junta administration between 1953 and 1958. That means eight years of military government in 200 years. Colombia has an impressive civic tradition.
On the other hand, the last time there was a civilian coup was when Sanclemente, already 80 years old, was not able to govern from Bogotá, and had to go to a warmer climate in Cundinamarca to govern. So my book tries to explain why, in this, Colombia is the great exception in Latin America. Malcolm Deas, before he died, demonstrated in an article that after the United States, Colombia is the country with the second most elections celebrated. We’ve been voting since 1832.
CAMBIO: Is that because the military respects the civilian government?
E.P.L.: I don’t want to keep you from reading the book, but that’s a debate that’s very important now that Petro suggested a risk of a coup d état and the military expressed annoyance because they take great pride in the military’s tradition of respect for civilian authority. They felt that their tradition and their institutional pride had been injured. You don’t wake up in Colombia thinking that the President may be pushed out. That hasn’t happened, I insist, since 1900. So the book is a debate on that subject, showing that there are no conditions that would lead to the breaking of the institutional order and that it would be extremely prejudicial if that were to happen. Petro must finish his term in 2026, without any factor altering the institutional order.
CAMBIO: So you don’t believe in the story that the President is heading for a soft coup.
E.P.L.: No way. Obviously, there are sectors of the extreme right that would love to see the Petro administration end before August 7, 2026. But there is no possibility of that happening, and it would not be a good thing for Colombia. An abrupt change in President Petro’s term could revive the radical citizen protests of ’21 and ’22. It could lead to serious frustration in the sectors that believed in the change, and would make them think that there has been a switch to the extreme right that would be against their interests. For Colombia, it’s very important that Presidents complete their term.
CAMBIO: So you think that the investigations by the National Electoral Council (CNE) and the campaign issues are going to turn out to be nothing much?
E.P.L.: The one from the CNE can go to the Charging Commission in the Chamber. That has 18 members and nine of them belong to the Historic Pact Party. That means that the issue could get there and not go any further. And in case it would go further, it would go to the full Chamber and the Senate. The experience of what happened with Samper is that it’s very complicated to reach a majority vote to unseat a President. I think that would have a political impact eventually on the irregular financing of the Petro campaign, but it would not lead to unseating the President.
CAMBIO: At the end of the Petro administration, what do you think will be the outlook on peace and security?
E.P.L.: There are two years to get it straightened out. If the Petro administration, as it showed in El Plateado, is disposed to do a global reassessment of its strategy, it’s possible that we could have some good results. I want to believe that after the Cauca business, we are going to have a better model of security and peace combined, and we’re going to have better results.
CAMBIO: President Petro talks a lot about his brother, Carlos Pizarro. In fact, he has enthroned his white hat as an important symbol. What do you suppose Pizarro thinks about the Petro administration?
E.P.L.: I can’t speak for him. What I feel deeply is that he was not the one that won the election in 1990. And we would have had a leftist governing ever since then, with the possibility of building a fairer country starting then. And I profoundly regret that Carlos was prevented from governing. I took part, with some professors at the National University’s Political Science Institute in the preparation of his program, which he called “A Country of Ownership”. It was a political plan for a very moderate administration that would try to create social capitalism. I think it was a frustration for Colombia. There is a phenomenon that disturbs me a lot: now all of the political leaders in this country are orphans of murdered fathers. President Uribe, María José Pizarro, Iván Cepeda, los Galán, Cristo, etc. . . . What that means sociologically is interesting, because it suggests a great vacuum.
CAMBIO: Since you mentioned María José Pizarro, would you vote for her for President?
E.P.L.: In ten years, probably yes. When she’s more seriously prepared to govern. Right now, María José could be a good President of Uruguay or Switzerland. Colombia is an enormously complicated country that requires enormous preparation in economics, public administration, national and public security, and I think she should wait and prepare herself better. That’s my message to María José: probably with ten years of learning and preparing yourself, you could be a successful President of Colombia, but you still need maturity.