Credit:UN Photo / Paulo Filgueiras / Ryan Brown

The leaders of Venezuela and Colombia are more similar than they would like to admit.

Gabriela Perdomo - One is a left-wing, self-proclaimed revolutionary and the other one won his first presidential election promising a tough hand on armed Marxist guerrillas. One has become Washington’s newest foe, and the other one is considered the United States’ closest ally in Latin America. Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez and his Colombian counterpart, Álvaro Uribe, are antonyms by definition. But many similarities—mostly negatives—between the two leaders lie beneath the surface.

At the best style of caudillos—those who helped liberate the Americas from Spain’s imperial rule—both Chávez and Uribe have become the subject of a personality cult and are considered heroes in their own countries. Chávez brought back the poor majority into the mainstream after years of what he calls, with some degree of reason, "elitist governance." Uribe vowed to defeat once and for all the group of Marxist guerrillas-turned-criminal-organization Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The differences between the left-leaning and right-leaning leaders of the two South American countries are evident. Since his first electoral victory in 1998, Chávez has started a profound transformation of Venezuela by implementing what he calls "21st century socialism." He decries the economic policies pushed by the "imperial" power of Washington and the Western international community, and never fails to remind Venezuelans during his long hours of televised speeches that the country’s ailments are all to blame on the former ruling "oligarchy". He sees himself as a moral leader, a saviour of the poor and the only hope for a ruined country. Under that lens, most Venezuelans judge him as a successful leader. Literacy has gone up, poverty has gone down, and more doctors are available in poor urban centres and rural areas.

Uribe is a more subtle leader but no less ambitious. During his first presidential campaign in 2002, he promised to end Colombia’s 40-year-old armed conflict by strengthening the military and crushing the FARC without any negotiations. His policy of "democratic security" has won praise for lowering the country’s once unbridled homicide and kidnapping rates. His discourse is that of security to foster foreign investment and economic growth. By those accounts, he has succeeded so far. Colombia’s highways are much safer now than they were six years ago, and macro-economic growth has only gone up since Uribe took office.

But it is the similarities between the two that should be noted. If anything unites them, it is their slow but certain erosion of their nations’ democratic institutions. Both Chávez and Uribe have a long-term plan for their own countries—one that includes them. Chávez has spelled it out before in several occasions. He will remain in office to "guide" the people through his reforms until "2031 and beyond". He has also worked on it non-stop. This week, the president created a Central Command to promote a constitutional change that will be put to a referendum vote in December. The changes—which are expected to be approved by the legislature dominated by Chávez supporters—include a clause to allow for indefinite presidential re-election. The current Constitution, already amended by Chávez in 1999, only allowed presidents to serve for two consecutive six-year terms. 

Uribe’s path has been less explicit but, again, no less ambitious. During his first term in office, lawmakers close to Uribe pushed a constitutional reform bill to allow for presidential re-election. Politicians from different allegiances also founded the Party of the U (the U implicitly stands for Uribe), and gave birth to a strong pro-Uribe movement that supported the president’s quest for a second term. Riding a high wave of popularity that he maintains even today, Uribe won his second four-year mandate in May 2006 with 62.2 per cent of the vote.

This week, the Party of the U decided to promote a second Uribe re-election. Its secretary-general, Luis Guillermo Giraldo, announced that the party will start collecting signatures to call for a referendum in 2009, in which Colombians would be asked whether they want a third Uribe mandate. If the answer is "Yes", the president would contest the ballot again in the 2010 election. Uribe claims he has no intention of serving a third term—but he said the same about a second one before 2006.

Both presidents’ self-promotion to remain in office has affected democratic institutions in Venezuela and Colombia alike. In Venezuela, opposition parties denounce that the current conditions are unsuitable to contest the president or his Fifth Republic Movement (MVR) in fair elections. In the 2005 legislative ballot, three opposition parties—Democratic Action (AD), the Social Christian Party (Copei) and Project Venezuela (Proven)—pulled out of the contest accusing the country’s electoral body of favouring pro-government candidates. The boycott benefited only Chávez, whose supporters easily secured a majority in the National Assembly. Those lawmakers have helped the president tighten his grip over the country’s political and judiciary branches.

Colombia has seen a series of constitutional tweaks that have slowly given more power to the executive office. But Uribe’s negative influence over the independent branches of power has also provoked a public battle—fought in the airwaves. Colombian journalists call it the "train clash" between Uribe and the Supreme Court of Justice. The core of the fight lies in that the country’s highest judicial instance has disagreed with parts of the government’s proposals to give special treatment to illegal paramilitary chiefs that have adhered to a national program of demobilization of radical right-wing groups. Uribe and several judges have fought publicly, as recently as this week, directly and indirectly, through radio station appearances, televised interviews and open letters. The squabbles have deeply personal undertones. The tension between the judiciary and executive branches also stems from the fact that several pro-Uribe lawmakers are under investigation for their alleged proximity to paramilitary death squads.

In Colombia, many political leaders—including the main figures of Colombia’s left-to-centre Democratic Alternative Pole (PDA)—express their admiration for Chávez. In Venezuela, on the other hand, the anti-Chávez former ruling elite identifies with Uribe and his strong anti-left discourse. Ironically, many Uribe critics see Chávez as the president they would like to have, while anti-Chávez activists are envious of Colombians under the hand of Uribe. If they only looked closer, many would see the two are more alike than they would like to acknowledge. And, sadly, this is not necessarily a good thing.

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