Bogotá, Colombia – Leftist presidential candidate Iván Cepeda challenged his opponents to a debate on Saturday after turning down previous proposals to face-off with his rivals.
“I challenge the far right, its two candidates – Senator Paloma Valencia and lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella – to a debate,” Cepeda told a crowd at a rally in Fusagasugá, a city near Bogotá.
His opponents responded by accepting the proposal, while also highlighting that they had been calling for a debate for months.
The possibility of a live face-off between candidates has been a recurring theme ahead of first-round presidential elections on May 31.
Shortly after beginning his candidacy last year, Cepeda dismissed the idea of participating in a debate: “I’m not going to take part in debates—let me make this clear from the outset—to exchange insults with other candidates, or to threaten one another, or to denigrate one another.”
Cepeda’s rivals have repeatedly criticized him for refusing to spar with them on the public stage, something they highlighted following the leftist candidate’s U-turn on Saturday.
“Allow me to correct you: you’re not issuing a challenge; you’re accepting the challenge you were invited to take up months ago,” said criminal defense attorney de la Espriella.
Valencia, the candidate for the Centro Democrático (Democratic Center) party, also seized the opportunity to pounce on Cepeda: “A few weeks ago, it was I who challenged Iván Cepeda several times to a face-to-face debate, yet you chose to hide away in the Senate with a controlled microphone.”
She suggested that Cepeda’s U-turn owes to a worsening performance in recent polls: “Now that the polls are tightening, you’re coming out of Fusagasugá with this challenge.”
Analysts agreed with Valencia’s suggestion, saying that Cepeda’s debate proposal is an attempt to inject life into a stagnating campaign.
“Cepeda has offered to debate because of his campaign’s inherent lack of momentum and general weakness. He is not captivating any new voters or finding a tangible way of changing the narrative in his favor,” Sergio Guzmán, Director at Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consultancy, told Latin America Reports.
Internal party polls reportedly show sluggish growth in Cepeda’s polling numbers since he became the official candidate for the Pacto Histórico (Historic Pact) in October.
Meanwhile, Valencia has been soaring in the polls following her victory in presidential primaries in March; Cepeda and de la Espriella did not partake.
But the debate is not without risk for Cepeda, according to Guzmán: “Cepeda runs the risk of having to go on the defensive of Petro and his administration.”
Others believe that Cepeda’s oratory style does not lend itself to the televised debate format.
“He has a much more academic tendency, which is not so typical in politics, let alone in modern politics,” noted Miguel Jaramillo Luján, a Colombian political strategist. In contrast, he noted that de la Espriella and Valencia have a more media-savvy communication style.
Nevertheless, the analyst told Latin America Reports that Cepeda’s debate style could give him the chance to woo crucial centrist voters: “I believe he can inspire confidence and credibility among his target audience and even among the centre, particularly when it comes to dispelling certain myths and lies that have been spread by the centre and the right.”
With the leading candidates agreeing to debate, the battle over the specifics – including moderators, questions, and location – begins.
