The night of Hallowmas here (Halloween with trick or treat in Colombia, Day of the Dead in Mexico), Annie and I climbed halfway up the mountain to perform our customary ritual to remember the victims of the Inquisition.  A little disquietingly, as we finished, a gargantuan electric storm blew up in all directions and we had to run for home.  People really do die from lightning strikes in the Andes.  The man who built our house was working on a construction site nearby and during an electrical storm, hid in the fireplace.  Not safe enough. He was struck and died in an instant.

This Hallowmas, the sky for the next hours was filled with a million ghoulish lightning men from Kakadu, piercing the thin atmosphere here at 3600 m above sea level to strike single blades of grass with precision.  Then came the torrential rain which didnt stop for two days.  19,000mm is our average rainfall here high in the Colombian Andes so rain is not unexpected. But this storm rained drops the size of tennis balls, and the whole country shared them.  Houses of poor people who build into hillsides in small towns fell in landslides and on the weekend thirteen people died.  More homeless, to swell the armies of them all over the country, 450,000 in Bogota alone, tides of people escaping the war in their municipalities.

The other tide, the political one, has raged like a tempest since the failure of the referendum two weeks ago.  The day after the referendum, President Uribe was given a resignation letter by his entire cabinet who claimed personal culpability at the loss of the referendum.  He declined to accept it.  The same day he gave a national address.  Uribe had sold the referendum as a means of cutting government expenditure on politicians wages and pensions, and thereby putting money into health and education.  In his national address during which he didnt falter for one of the 25 minutes, he said there was no option but to bring in other means of collecting money.  Oh, and by the way, that Colombia had to pay back, yes you guessed it, the World Bank for all its nice war loans.  Taxes on everything have now gone up. He tried to freeze wages but the high court put an end to that the same day with a very quick ruling. 

That same week, demonstrations all over the country persisted where small town people claimed ballot rigging, bribes for votes and violence had failed to give them the referendum and the right mayor for their area.  Investigations at congress level have begun but its a bit late.  This week, the Minister for Internal Relations, Londono, who is a grand-stander on any issue, has asked Uribe to stand down given the business response to increased taxes.  What Londonos real agenda is I am not certain at this point, but as in every political sandpit the world over, there is always a second level.

The rain has eased but it seems the political barometric pressure is rising.  Uribe stands firm and is as busy as ever with the Minister for Defence, Martha Ramirez, visiting sites where young former-guerilla and former-paramilitary soldiers are being reinserted into civil society via their local communities.  The military presence and checkpoints on the roads in and out of Bogota are heavier than ever.  At this point, however, I suspect the threat is not from outside the city, but within the cosy teak walls of the cabinet room.

6 Noviembre 2003

Newsflash This very day, Londono, Minister for Internal Relations and Justice has resigned without a plausible explanation.  It looks very much like resign or be sacked. Simultaneously, the Uribe section of the Senate agreed to pass the raft of legislation which was supposed to follow a passed referendum, on cutting wages and pensions for politicians.  The Minister for Armed Forces reportedly happily at the same time that the lower house had passed anti-terrorist legislation yet another post-passed-referendum item. A curious turn of events since the day before the lower house had to be adjourned because the debate was too heated and members refused to take their seats and stop shouting.  Three seemingly implausible acts in one day.