Are cartels in control in Colombia? As the presidential election takes place in two weeks, a criminal organization has terrorized the entire north of the country.
Article written by
Published
Reading time : 2 min.
Prohibition to open schools and shops, even prohibition to leave their homes under penalty of taking a burst of automatic weapons… the inhabitants have been intimidated by death threats sent directly to their mobile phones. Blockades on the roads, trucks and cars set on fire, around twenty deaths in total. This terror lockdown was imposed for 6 days in the northern provinces of Medellin. The responsible is the Clan del golfo, Clan of the Gulf, the largest cartel in the country which with a certain irony describes these events as an “armed strike”.
In the delay of this miércoles an ambush of the ‘clan del Golfo’ against miembros del Ejército Nacional was registered. El hecho dejó un soldado muerto y varios heridos. See details of the sucedido.
→ https://t.co/SUMBvNJSov pic.twitter.com/14bMi57aTS— EL TIEMPO (@ELTIEMPO) May 13, 2022
The cartel has taken the population hostage to protest against the extradition of its leader, Dairo Antonio Úsuga alias Otoniel, one of the biggest drug lords wanted for 20 years by the Colombian and American authorities. His head was priced at $5 million. He was arrested last October and after several months of proceedings transferred on May 4 to New York where he will be tried for cocaine trafficking, extortion, money laundering. Extradition is a common practice in this type of case, it prevents traffickers from buying their innocence if they go before the often corrupt Colombian justice system. Obviously it did not please the members of his cartel at all.
Who therefore wanted to make a show of force. The del Golfo clan wants to show that it is not because its head has fallen off that it will cease to exist. Made up of former far-right paramilitaries who raged in northern Colombia in the 1990s and 2000s, it is the main supplier of all the cocaine consumed in the United States. According to estimates, it has between 2 and 3,000 men and remains very influential, especially in all these rural areas abandoned by the state… its members are regularly accused of collusion with the army and the police. Moreover, in recent days neither the police nor the army have succeeded in restoring calm to the northern provinces.
The context is all the more sensitive as the country will vote in two weeks. May 29, first round of the presidential election. The theme of the fight against drug trafficking is of course omnipresent in the campaign. The polls give the advantage to the left-wing candidate, Gustavo Petro, a very atypical profile who, contrary to the security policy of the current head of state, proposes a “collective amnesty” for traffickers, with a process of disarmament and mobilization. Provided that the state can regain control of the territories. What many Colombians doubt after this new wave of violence unleashed by the cartel.