Bogotá,Colombia – Iván Name Vásquez has been elected president of the Congress of the Republic for the fourth and final legislative session of President Gustavo Petro‘s administration. Vásquez, who previously held the presidency during the 2019-2020 legislative year, assumes leadership amidst significant national division.
“I assume today the presidency of the Congress of the Republic in the midst of a national and severe national polarization that tends to threats on order, institutionality and life itself,” Vásquez stated in his inaugural address. He directly referenced the recent attack on Senator Miguel Ángel Uribe Turbay of the Democratic Center party.
Vásquez highlighted the absence of Uribe Turbay, noting, “In that chair that has the flag of Colombia, our partner Miguel Uribe turbay had to be sitting tonight, a compatriot, a human being and a colleague who pays today in an intensive care room, the price of having raised their voice to propose to Colombians a new leadership. That chair that keeps silent today is a silence that at the same time causes us noise in the soul and in consciousness and then enlivens pain for everything that happens to us as a nation.”
The new leadership of the Senate’s Board of Directors will feature two women. Senator Ana Paola Agudelo of the Mira party secured the first vice presidency, winning out over Senator Antonio José Correa of the U party. The second vice presidency will be held by Senator Ana María Castañeda of the Radical Change party. Castañeda recently faced a year-long sanction from her party,including the loss of her vote,for abstaining from a party-line vote against a government popular consultation.
