Our Monday Sociedad Media Now newsletter featuring Abelardo de la Espriella’s election victory in Colombia, and Cuba’s road away from socialism.
De la Espriella Wins Colombia — By 249,000 Votes. Left-Wing Cepeda Is Contesting
BOGOTÁ — Abelardo de la Espriella — the criminal defense lawyer from Barranquilla who campaigned from a bulletproof booth, called himself “El Tigre” — the Tiger — and received Donald Trump’s personal endorsement before winning Colombia’s June 21 presidential runoff with 12.9 million votes, the most in Colombian history, defeating Iván Cepeda by fewer than 250,000 votes in the narrowest margin in the country’s recent electoral history, as Cepeda announced challenges to 33,000 polling stations.
Outgoing President Gustavo Petro accuses Israel of hacking the election software without evidence, and a country that has moved decisively rightward placed its bet on a political outsider who has promised to bomb guerrilla camps, build mega prisons, and reset four years of adversarial relations with Washington before he is even sworn in on August 7.
Cuba Just Approved Its Most Sweeping Economic Reforms Since 1959 — And Called Them Socialism
HAVANA — Cuba’s National Assembly unanimously approves 176 economic reform measures in 24 hours last week — introducing private banks, market-based pricing, foreign ownership of state enterprises, multiple business ownership, and the elimination of the libreta ration system in place since 1962 — the most sweeping structural changes since the 1959 revolution, driven by 20-to-40-hour daily blackouts, a 6.5 percent GDP contraction forecast, and a U.S. fuel blockade that has pushed a government that spent 67 years calling the market incompatible with socialism to adopt market mechanisms as the only available instrument of the Revolution’s survival.
