Cecilia López, at 80 years old, had never been fired from a job until Gustavo Petro closed the door of the Colombian Government only eight months after arriving at the Ministry of Agriculture. He didn't take it well at all, but in the last two months he has spent time with his children, with his grandchildren, he has recovered hours of sleep and he has had time to think. That is why, despite the initial anger, it is determined to continue supporting the government from outside. He thinks that Colombia has a historic opportunity to initiate the necessary changes to solve the enormous inequalities of the country and for that he believes it is necessary for Petro to succeed. In the current crisis and paralysis of the government, he sees blame divided between an establishment that does not assume that the left came to power and a president who responds to resistance by radicalizing. "If Petro does badly, the country will do very badly and all of us will do badly," he will repeat like a mantra in this interview.
Question. How does the government see it from the outside?
Answer. All governments face very serious crises and are ultimately judged by how they respond to those crises. President Petro is now facing a difficult time and I think it's time to think. It is history that judges presidents, when it is already calmly seen what was done and what was not done. The president can go down in history in two ways. One, saying 'I was a victim of this recalcitrant right'. And that's true. But he can also pass as the great hero who, despite having that right and a country so accustomed to inequalities, knew how to overcome and achieve that minimum consensus to move forward with his proposal and begin the process of changes.
Q. You are very kind to him, even though he kicked you out of the government.
A. I'm going to tell you why I'm benevolent, because the phrase that I would like all Colombians to assimilate is: if Petro is doing badly, the country is doing very badly, all of us are doing badly and worse will go to the groups that for the first time are such a clear objective of a government. We have reached a time of too much polarization. From now on I would like to help as someone who was inside, someone who is feeling a radical left that only wants fights, but trusts that the reasons why I joined, which were not ideological but the commitment to a program, will survive. This country has more chance with a government of the left than with one of the right to begin the changes for which we have fought all our lives. We must also tell the private sector that it is wrong. It hurts me as a Colombian that in the opposition march, in which many people came out and that cannot be denied, there were banners with unnecessary offensive phrases and expressions. That cannot continue like this because we already know what the reaction is: the president is radicalized and a radicalized president does not serve us. Let us do our best to create a minimum of dialogue.
Q. Would you like to be in government to be able to say this?
A. Many of the things I am saying I have already said and were not heard. For example, don't confuse economics with neoliberalism. This obsession that everything is neoliberal has prevented recognition of the importance of the economy in all sectors.
Q. The president told him that he was leaving the government because of the breakdown of the coalition and Laura Sarabia because of the slowness in the agrarian reform.
A. I think I left because I didn't accept the express expropriation, that's the truth. Laura was very unfair and I got very brave. I could not accept that I said I was leaving because I had not done the agrarian reform. Agrarian reform is not done in a while, it was beginning to be done. I said it very harshly to her again in the Council of Ministers, when we already knew that we had been kicked out.
Q. And what did the president say?
A. He didn't say anything, but I was very upset with Mauricio Lizcano when he asked the ministers we were leaving not to speak ill of the government. I asked him not to disrespect us, that we are serious people. It was hard.
Q. Had you never been removed from a government?
A. I've never been kicked out of any position in my life. It's the first time anyone has kicked me out of both a public and private position.
Q. And he got upset?
A. Yes, but I was hurt more by the arguments. Laura even offered me an embassy. I told her: 'Don't dare, because if you don't trust me as a minister, why are you going to trust me as an ambassador?' On the other hand, the president was kind, he told me that I was leaving because the coalition had broken up. I said, 'But if neither the Liberal Party nor the Conservative Party appointed me, you appointed me!' And he replied that I represented the establishment. Wednesday, I have never felt representative of the establishment! I have always shared the project of change, but not the how, I think that's why I left.
Q. Are you still upset?
A. More than annoying I am very worried, first for the country and second for the same project of President Petro because, if this dies, we will probably return to more extreme right-wing governments.
Q. If you had not left the government, how would you have lived these last two months?
A. I do not see myself in this government as it is today.
Q. Would he have left?
A. I spent eight months with a president who was undoubtedly difficult, but more open, more conciliatory. Today we have a very radical president and I do not see myself in a government with such a president. I feel better outside to be able to freely opine and help. I want it to be very clear that I am not an enemy, I want to help because I want the country to have the opportunity to make changes.
Q. Why has the president changed?
A. The Colombian establishment behaved badly with the Government, they should have given it a space without so much criticism. It was underestimated that President Petro could react by radicalizing. There was a sin there that I hope will not be repeated. The other thing is that the president has a hard time understanding that he can initiate processes of change, but not change the whole country. I told him in every possible tone, but he became desperate because he underestimated that the processes are delayed. That, plus the lack of understanding of an establishment that could not assimilate that the left had arrived, generated this crisis that we have. There is a mixture of blame.
Q. Is there a "soft coup" of the powerful against Petro, as he says?
A. There is a negative attitude of the powerful, but I am beginning to see a change. Yesterday's statement [Thursday] by the businessmen, that they know they have to be in harmony with the government, seemed to me to be an acknowledgment that this is not where they were going.
Q. What do you think when you hear him talk about "soft coup"?
A. We must admit that he has not had an easy environment. Sometimes talking to my daughter, who is a politician – because my son is a banker and he is the one who says: for God's sake, mom! – we thought about Petro's life. He has been threatened, persecuted, imprisoned. Sensitivity to attacks is part of their history. In that the Colombian establishment has been wrong and has been too harsh.
Q. Why do you think Petro did not accept her resignation a month before firing her?
A. It would have been a scandal if I left because I opposed express expropriation.
Q. Do you think that now there is going to be express expropriation?
A. No, I don't see the instruments, I don't think it can be done. What I would like is that they do not knock down the instruments that we put in the Development Plan to expedite the purchase of land within the rules of the system.
Q. What did Petro tell you not to accept his resignation?
A. He sent me to Laura because it was all through Laura. That day I came out furious and resigned with slaps and all, saying that I was a democrat and that I was not going to expropriate. As soon as I got in the car, Laura called me and told me that the president had said he was taking the item back and was talking to me. That was the first agreement I had with him two weeks later, and he was very kind, very cordial.
Q. Are you proud of your time in government?
A. Absolutely, although many people have told me 'how did you go there if this was going to happen to you'. I didn't think it was going to happen to me, I thought it was going to last a little longer, really. I feel proud because it was an opportunity to initiate a reform and nobody takes that away from me. I also understood many things about the Colombian countryside and I want to write about that knowledge, I want to discuss it, I want to open debates that help the government. The other thing that gave me satisfaction was the team, which was put together without any political influence, and many of them are sitting here today [working with her in the Cisoe office, her think tank]. They threw them all out miserably.
Q. How do you rate your successor?
A. That point I have decided not to touch. I respect her and wish her the best of luck.
Q.She has accused you of spreading "malicious rumors" about the expropriation.
A. I don't do rumors, I'm very busy doing research and that's not my style. If they have anything to say, let them denounce me publicly. I have not made the slightest negative comment about her.
Q. Why did you decide to go to the U.S. the day after your departure and not make the transfer?
A. Because I already had the messages of a WhatsApp group led by the new minister and there were all the people who were going to enter the Ministry. I knew what was coming and I said no.
Q. What did those messages say?
A. Some of the members even threatened me, that I was torpedoing what Petro was doing. That happened a few months before, when Gerardo Vega went to the Rosario Islands and there was that scene where they were recovering a vacant lot. I came out as minister to say that I understood that vacant lands had to be recovered, but that human rights had to be respected, because I did not like to see the attitude of the officials, many of whom are now in the Ministry. As a result of that, that WhatsApp series was put together where they were very me.
Q. What do you think of the case of Laura Sarabia's nanny?
A. I hope that justice will clarify that. I do not want to comment because I believe that there has already been too much speculation and it is already in the instances that it touches. I am very respectful of the institutionality and hopefully that will be clarified quickly.
Q. Have you called her since your departure?
A.No, I never had a friendship. She always seemed to me an intelligent woman, very skilled. Very devoted to the president, but I was always worried that I did not know the state.
Q. And Benedetti's audios?
A. I know Armando and well... that's Armando. I hope that his situation will also be clarified.
Q. Do you give credibility to the issue of illegal campaign financing?
A. I leave that to the appropriate instances, it seems to me that it is the healthiest thing at this time.
Q. Do you still think Petro is not corrupt?
A. I am convinced that Petro is intelligent, a democrat and I have never considered him to be corrupt. I start from these three premises.
Q. Are you also intransigent?
A. The president is stubborn, he is very strong in defending his ideas, but I saw openings in the debates. In almost nine months, I only had two meetings alone: the first when I was going to leave and the second when I was kicked out. The conversations with the president were in the meetings with the ministers and there I saw an affordable, friendly Petro, open to discussion. There is a Petro that is like that. The question is what it takes for that Petro to come back. The right and the establishment have to change, they have to stop insulting and maybe that's how the president will react.
Q. Have you ever regretted saying yes to the Ministry?
A. Many people who love me very much do insist that I must repent, but I do not because I still believe in the project and that this country needs some changes.
Q. What exactly happened when you returned from the United States with your security scheme?
A.They were not waiting for me when I arrived and I was surprised. It seemed dangerous to me not to have a security scheme, but what worried me most was that two days later a very serious person from the Historical Pact came and told me that there were very serious signs of threats and that I should leave the country. The next day, another person who works at the Palace called me and told me that there was a very negative climate against me. The Prosecutor's Office came and they were the ones who decided that I had to have more security now than I had as a minister.
Q. Did you consider leaving?
A. Not at all, this country needs people to help reassure. I think I can help Colombia not continue to face itself in this horrible way.
Q. How has your life changed in these last two months?
A.I sleep more and I go back to jogging almost every day, but I continue with a very intense work. Emotionally I am different. I am terribly worried about the country, which did not happen to me when I was in government. I was so fast and so convinced that we were doing well, that I had a lot of excitement. Once my son called the person who works with me at home and said, 'Ana, I'm very worried, how is my mom?' And she told him: 'Oh, Don Carlos, she is happy, she gets up at four to work like crazy'. I was very happy, now I'm worried.
Q. Maybe that happens to the president.
A. Well, hopefully it's more realistic. I believe that the government has done things well. There is a tax reform, a development plan, an agrarian reform began, there are things. Probably not as much as the president would have liked, but they have been done.
Q. Because of how your departure went, has this been your worst political experience?
A. It's the only time I've been kicked out of such a position Olympically. That's not just anything. But hey, they are things that happen in life.
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