Petro in 240 characters

“I can describe to you how the Petro government will be.

The first year he appoints a good National Unity Cabinet, he fails to bring it together, six or eight months go by and not much happens, the government falls apart and Petro starts tweeting like crazy, and basically it is that conflict that he permanently creates and the country's agenda revolves around Petro's Twitter and nothing is done”.

Alejandro Gaviria made this premonition in a humor program before the last Colombian elections.

Gaviria, a politician from the Colombian center, failed in his attempt to be president and was part of the Government of Gustavo Petro after criticizing him, he was Minister of Education in that sort of government of national unity that he predicted.

At seven months he has left the Cabinet.

Or has Petro thrown him out,

although perhaps it is too much to say that the president's government has been disrupted.

What is certain is that Petro has begun - if he ever stopped - to tweet without brake.

And that has pending his partners, his enemies, the press, the citizens, rather, they would say in Colombia.

"I can describe to you how the Petro government will be": Alejandro Gaviria, November 23, 2021.

Today Gaviria leaves the cabinet in the first ministerial crisis of the government.pic.twitter.com/Py7bo39fyn

– Juan David Laverde (@jdlaverde9) February 28, 2023

As Inés Santaeulalia, a correspondent for this newspaper, recounted not long ago, a phrase has begun to become popular in the country: "Someone take the phone from the president."

It is not for less.

The Colombian president has made manifest mistakes, such as announcing a ceasefire with the guerrillas and all the criminal groups in Colombia while his compatriots celebrated the New Year;

He criticized, faster than any president, the rejection of the new Constitution in Chile with a "Pinochet revived."

This week, in addition to announcing that he was asking the Prosecutor's Office to investigate his brother and his son (Colombian magical realism, some thought; tremendous cunning, others) he measured himself on the social network with another tweeter president, Nayib Bukele, who was replied by a message in which he questioned some of Petro's previous statements.

Well Nayib @nayibbuke we went from 90 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 1993 in Bogotá to 13 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 2022. We did not build prisons but universities.

It is good to compare experiences.

I propose an international forum.

https://t.co/UdBWG44aWT

— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) March 1, 2023

The role of the politician who governs in social networks is not new, much less in Colombia, where Petro almost lost the elections against an archaic 77-year-old millionaire who became a star on TikTok.

Petro's former antagonist, former President Álvaro Uribe, concentrated a good part of his opposition to Juan Manuel Santos then in 140 characters.

One had to activate the alerts on Uribe's account because, little given to giving interviews, he launched headlines through the social network.

Infallible, in many cases.

Uribe, whom Petro now calls “Álvaro”, like the good partners they have become, shook everyone who did not share his vision.

Alvaro the demonstrations when they put on the same shirt and the same posters sometimes do not sing reality.

It is the Caribbean coast that needs doctors to go home and improve their public health centers in corregimientos and municipalities https://t.co/TmPDunNm9D

— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) March 4, 2023

The problem does not come from using Twitter or any social network.

Petro is right to use all possible means to bring to public opinion his government plans, changes he is making in the country or even his opinion on politics in Latin America.

The noise comes when this helps to increase a climate of increasingly exacerbated polarization.

The president knows this very well and, far from appeasing him, he adds fuel to the fire.

To the despair of Colombians, in general, and of their advisors and close friends in particular.

It's hard to believe that someone is going to take the president's phone, but more than one will hope that in one of those cases he will have a setback with authentication and leave Twitter alone for a few days.

And to see if, thus, custom is generated.

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