NewsLatin AmericaDavid Racero: "We have to push until the change is irreversible"

David Racero: “We have to push until the change is irreversible”

The walls of the office are covered with oil portraits of past Speakers of the House of Representatives. Gentlemen in suits and ties who hide their alopecia, others showing off their straight hair, wide foreheads, thick noses, drooping eyelids, small ears or ears hidden in their hair, or white and straight teeth. Some good looking, others not so much. At a glance you can see the pattern: milky white men in their fifties or sixties. The one chosen by Gustavo Petro to command the hemicycle is the grandson of a black activist. In his presentation, he wore a suit of African fabrics made by an Afro-Colombian designer. David Racero, 35, had that day an air of the Prince of Zamunda. The painting of him, thus dressed, will hang next to that of a young woman who preceded him in office. Something is moving in Colombia.

Ask. The Petro government is not being very agile when it comes to presenting the reforms. That criticism was made by the president of Congress himself, Roy Barreras.

Response. At the time, when the senator said it, it was like that. But two weeks have already passed and we have the appropriate agenda to carry out the reforms that the president has requested. Between now and before December we are going to approve seven fundamental reforms. We are in good times.

P. Has Petro opened too many fronts at once?

R. His top priority is tax reform. All other reforms come later. We do not want to generate clouds that disturb the approval of the tax.

P. What are those clouds?

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R. The health reform or the pension reform, including the work reform. It was a political decision that they be processed next semester and not this one.

P. So as not to generate noise and wear down the government? The Minister of Education, Alejandro Gaviria, is opposed to the health one.

R. Health and pensions go hand in hand. The social security system is the heart of the neoliberal model that this government has set out to overcome. Of course, the interests are very high there.

David Racero next to the oil portraits of the previous presidents of the House of Representatives.John Philip Rubio

P. Are the majorities that Petro claimed to have in Congress still standing?

R. At this moment there is cohesion. The tax, since the minister [Jose Antonio] Ocampo files it, it has had substantial changes and that is due to the fact that there is a sincere opening to dialogue, with the government partners and with the economic sectors. It is a reform that has some red lines, of course.

P. Is that coalition uncritical or modifies the reforms?

R. The tax is already being modified. It touches to see what is modified of the final text. At some point it was said that the gasoline subsidy at the border was going to be completely removed and in the end it was not done. Another sensitive issue: the taxes that were going to be put on occasional income and dividends for shareholders. Right now in the law it is only 10%, we were going to increase it to 39. The OECD average is 25. For that discussion we are going to lower it to 20.

P. In some European countries it is taxed twice as much.

R. There is still a lot of ideological prejudice here. It is combined with the economic interest of some, who do not want to be affected by a very generous, excessively generous fiscal framework. It must be explained that strong states have progressive tax systems where natural persons are taxed higher than companies. In any case, we are going to make a significant advance.

P. Shouldn’t paying taxes be a patriotic thing?

R. Here it is the other way around. One can understand it, because there are people who believe that the money that is collected is not invested well or is stolen.

P. Petro has given political representation to parties that he himself has criticized, such as the conservative one.

R. The problem is not sitting at the table with someone you didn’t sit with before. The problem is forgetting where you come from and where you are going. We have sat down with those parties with a program, with which we won the elections. The traditional political class has understood that there is a deep desire for change and they, who are not fools, understand it. They know they change or they change them.

P. Excuse the insistence, isn’t the opposition given charges, what is called jam here? Petro was very critical of that when he was in opposition.

R. I see that it is to give responsibility to the other parties. In Spain, the PSOE gives portfolios to United We Can so that it assumes responsibilities within the Government and takes it forward. It involves sharing achievements and defeats. If someone enters into a dialogue with us, it is that they assume the change agenda.

Yolanda Castilla, grandmother of David Racero, was an activist for the black community in Colombia.
Yolanda Castilla, grandmother of David Racero, was an activist for the black community in Colombia.

P. But the PSOE does not give a portfolio to the PP, which is the right. Petro is with very contrary groups.

R. I give you the example of the Conservative Party. If we want to carry out the reform, we need the political party that best represents the landowners. Historically, it is the most counter-reformist party on land issues. If we want to do it peacefully, we need them.

P. Can paramilitarism resurface?

R. I really doubt it. Paramilitarism emerged with the support of the state. The state created it. And at this moment whoever directs it is not going to move a finger for that to happen. I do not see it. Besides, he is not going to take the land away from anyone. The president has been clear. For any land reform there are two paths: the violent or the peaceful path, with purchase and negotiation. And the second path is what we are doing.

P. What other resistance do you perceive to the Petro project?

R. The resistance will be determined by the degree of depth of the change. We’re going to run the fence as far as we can, push the story as far as we can. Those who do not want changes are a very small group. Today there is no opposition, there is no reference. The question is how committed is the country to an agenda of profound change?

P. And what do you think?

R. A true change is when you change the correlations of power. A lot of the left did that in Latin America, it created welfare conditions, it lifted people out of poverty, but it didn’t change the correlations of power forces. That is the real change, when oligarchic powers are exchanged for democratic powers. That remains to be seen in the country. That is not determined by Petro, it is determined by society. A great change is to break the oligopolies of the five, six, seven families that have governed this country and manage it economically. If we do that, we make irreversible change, which is what we dream of. That although a right-wing ruler arrives later, we have done the task so well that it is difficult for him to return.

P. How do you see the opposition?

R. She is looking for herself. And in that search they make mistakes. They have lost the country project. They don’t have one. They no longer know how to connect with people. In the campaign they had a candidate, Federico Gutierrez, who didn’t work out, he didn’t even go to the second round. The cost of losing is letting him set the agenda of the one who wins and in that Gustavo Petro is a monster. I don’t know how you’re going to translate that in the interview…

P. I am not going to do it. This is how it stays: In that Petro is a monster.

R. OK perfect. Petro knows how to place the agenda, he knows where he is going. He is not a ruler, he is a leader of the society. A leader. The opposition does not.

David Racero, in the corridors of the National Capitol.
David Racero, in the corridors of the National Capitol.John Philip Rubio

P. There has been dishonorable behavior by some members of the leftist pact led by Petro, such as that of this senator in Cartagena who insulted a police officer, Alex Flores…

R. Totally.

P. Or Piedad Cordoba, involved in many cases that have scared Petro himself. Why is there not a greater speed for them to assume responsibilities?

R. What most disappoints the citizen is political incoherence. That is punished. An organization that is elected with an idea of ​​change, renewal, cannot afford to be incoherent. Some of what has happened, with the cases you mention, is that mistakes have been made that have not been handled properly. The senator had to have assumed a much stronger political position than when he came out to say that he had not been chosen to set an example, but to make laws.

P. Well, you’re wrong.

R. Completely. The majority voter not only voted for our ideas but because he saw us as different leaders. If we make the mistake of being like them, the whole discourse falls apart.

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Source: EL PAIS

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