After being approved by Colombia’s Congress late on Wednesday, a ratified peace deal with the FARC has officially passed, and Colombia’s 52 year war with the guerrillas is at an end. President Santos had called today D-Day: the day when a countdown begins to a series of deadlines, the main one of which is in 6 months, by which time the FARC must have abandoned all of their weapons and officially formed a political party.
On Tuesday the deal had been ratified by Colombia’s Senate, who passed it with a vote of 75-0, and the following day Congress approved it with another whitewash of 130-0. Although it is worth noting that, due to continued objections to the deal by former President Alvaro Uribe, members of his Centro Democratico party chose not to vote in protest at the new deal. This, however, does not represent a serious threat to the legitimacy of the vote, as Santos and his allies hold a clear majority in the Senate and Congress, meaning the ratifying of the deal had been seen as a formality by many. What Uribe wanted was a second plebiscite on the new deal, which he still sees as too lenient; President Santos, evidently wary of the plebiscite process following his shock defeat in the previous Yes/No vote, chose to push the deal through congress in order to finally implement a version of the peace deal that his government has been working towards for over four years, and which saw him awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
This end to the war with the FARC will not put a stop to violence in Colombia, with the ELN rebels still to come to the negotiating table, and paramilitary successor groups poised to compete over the lucrative drug trafficking routes the FARC will leave behind; however, this peace deal represents a huge moment in Colombian history and a massive step forward towards finally ridding the country of the terrible violence that has plagued it for more than 50 years.
In many ways today marks the first step in the peace process itself: everything leading up to today was simply negotiation and agreement. From today onward Colombia’s government, the FARC, and the Colombian people themselves must be committed to making the signed and ratified agreement work, and making sure that this truly is the first day of peace between Colombia and the FARC after 52 years of war. Colombians deserve that much.
Chris
