The day Petro beat Petro

The newly elected president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, gives a speech at the Movistar Arena in Bogotá, on June 19, 2022, after winning the second round of the elections. Santiago Mesa

The people who packed the hall of the Tequendama hotel, in the center of Bogotá, fell silent.

The results of the first round of the Colombian presidential elections were projected on a screen: Gustavo Petro won with 40%, but in the next vote he had to face a new and groundbreaking candidate, Rodolfo Hernández, who had obtained 28. for granted that the 24% that Fico Gutiérrez, the candidate of the right and the

, had obtained, would automatically go to Hernández.

It was clear that anti-petrism was in the majority again and was going to stop the rise to power of a left-wing candidate.

The same feeling of desolation was experienced by Petro himself, who received the results in a hotel room.

The numbers didn't add up.

Four years in the campaign, since he lost in 2018 against the current president Iván Duque, had not been worth anything.

The 2016 peace agreements with the FARC, which legitimized left-wing democratic options, and last year's protests had placed him as the favorite, but now all that was nothing more than a mirage.

It took him two hours to go out and speak to his people, still a little shaken by the data.

“There are changes that are not changes, they are suicides.

What do we want, change or suicide?” He launched against Hernández first.

The moment he accepted that losing was a real possibility and that his opponent was in the lead, Petro began to cement his victory.

He wanted to win by acclamation when the campaign began and to pronounce a phrase that he had wanted to say for a lifetime: "I am Gustavo Petro and I am your president."

This was the moment.

Uribismo, the movement that brings together the traditional sectors, was at its lowest point in 20 years.

Society demanded a change and Petro believed that he could give it to them.

The left was ready to rule for the first time.

Those who know him say that he has a very high idea of ​​himself and that he tends to be intellectually haughty.

In the debates with the other candidates he showed that he not only wanted to convince the voters who watched television, but also to defeat his opponents with the force of arguments.

The elections were a question of Petro yes or Petro no.

The irruption of Hernández changed the entire strategy.

His advisers made him see that turning the contest into a plebiscite on his figure could lead him directly to defeat.

He has a large number of followers who vote for him no matter what, but also armies of detractors who would not support him under any circumstances.

Hernandez, a 77-year-old real estate businessman, was a novelty three weeks ago and kept rising in the polls.

At the same time, he was a great unknown to most, even to his voters, who trusted him because of his videos on TikTok.

They knew him as El Viejito, he inspired affection.

At that moment, Petro stepped aside and allowed all the spotlight to settle on Hernandez.

It was not easy to make that decision for someone like him, who thinks of his name in Wikipedia terms.

He wants to be a historic president, in the manner of Álvaro Uribe or Juan Manuel Santos, and not a transitional one like Duque.

He had a hard time lowering his profile, but he did.

He stopped giving large rallies throughout Colombia and dedicated himself to visiting ordinary citizens in acts that he broadcast on social networks.

His presence in the media decreased.

Videos and audios from Hernández's past as mayor of Bucaramanga began to circulate in which the worst side of him was seen: sexist, xenophobic and with a tendency to lose his temper in stressful situations.

Direct light scorched him.

Followers of Rodolfo Hernández react to the election of Gustavo Petro as president of Colombia in Bucaramanga.

June 19, 2022. Photography: Chelo Camacho/El PaísCHELO CAMACHO

The engineer, as he is known for his studies, was unaware of the basic functioning of some state institutions.

He blasphemed the Virgin on a television show and criticized the hygiene of taxi drivers compared to the cleanliness of Ubers.

Videos emerged in which he was seen on board a yacht with some lobbyists in Miami, surrounded by dancers.

He was heard to say that the best business for the rich like him, whose fortune is valued at 100 million dollars, was the poor.

His vote began to wane, especially among women.

The final straw was the debate that justice required the candidates to celebrate, three days before the elections.

Petro, who has been speaking in public all his life, happily accepted.

He was convinced that he could easily defeat him.

One of Hernández's strengths was his speech against corruption, but he is also accused of favoring one of his sons with a commission for mediating a garbage contract.

Petro wanted to confront him with that in public.

It was not possible.

Hernández ignored the court ruling and extended it with excuses for it to be held.

In the middle of that discussion, he made an aggressive and rude statement against his opponent, whom he challenged to debate in Bucaramanga, with the moderators he chose and the topics selected by his team.

He did not expect Petro to say yes: “We debate whenever you want,

That was a fatal mistake.

Hernández evaded the response of his rival and before the whole country it was clear that he did not want to debate even dead.

To try to reverse this situation, he read an incoherent statement on social networks in which he accused Petro of actually being the one who did not want to debate.

He appeared shaky, reading with difficulty and disoriented.

Petrism was responsible for spreading the images to every corner.

He was not the image of a president.

The rest is history.

Petro obtained 11.2 million votes on Sunday, compared to 10.5 for Hernández.

He has been the most voted president in a democracy with the highest turnout that he has ever had.

This is the first time that there will be a declared left-wing president in a country where being one only two decades ago was a stigma.

He has ahead of him the task of stitching together a country divided equally in view of the results: those who trust in him to transform a country in need of urgent reforms and those who fear that he will undermine a solid democracy in economic and institutional terms as is the Colombian, despite its ups and downs.

It is in your hands as president-elect.

To get here Petro had to defeat Petro on the way.

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