Third lap the podcast with Alejandro Gaviría and Ricardo Silva Romero, a podcast of
the locutorio arroba el locutorio. I want to call myself this new phenomenon,
the phenomenon rene Guita I already know where the thing is going. Yes,
because there he was invited to be part of the institution and he said no
next time, next time. And now we' re already thinking about the
next one we won' t have retired. Yeah, yeah, but we
' re gonna have to recruit Gita, because he' s the next Petro
wants to make a next one. I was on the bench thirty- three
years the wire this to get in what you think. It is a new
attempt by an Assembly, because I was just thinking that only a new constituent
can want someone who does not believe that the State was able to reform itself?
And someone who doesn' t think the state was able to reform is
that it hasn' t followed the news. Hi, Ricardo Hi, Alejandro.
We meet again, in person, and I would like us to talk
a little first, like the Constitution of the year in nine hundred and ninety
- one, about our ideas and after their reforms to land on the constituent.
Yeah, that' s great. But I' d like to start
with the anecdotary. Where were you in two years of ninety- one,
now that thirty- three years were fulfilled? In this month of July,
I was leaving school, going out to school and had some information in favor,
because my mom has always had a partner who is like her sister,
who is Maria Teresa Garcés have always had her office together and the whole thing,
and Maria Teresa was the era and my mom helped her in the office
of her office. Then we followed day to day. What was happening was
really fascinating and exciting and as a mover, there are press releases on the
day the Constitution was proclaimed and the Constitution of nine hundred and eighty- eight
hundred and eighty- six was declared dead. There are anecdotes of Mary Theresa
correcting the last commas and points in time. There are the chronicles of it,
therefore, resolving the last doubts of the almost editorial language. I think
I remember very well reading that Gabriel García Márquez had something to do with the
final edition. I also think he got her to read. He was able
to read and also put some comas and perhaps through María Mercedes Carranza, who
was one of the four women. There were only four of them. There
' s Bella and I forget the fourth one, Maria Teresa Garcés. The
idea Bella, María Mercedes Carranza and Errán has been changing and I have not
evaluated it exhaustively or in detail, but I think it is well drafted.
Me. Yeah. I think, yes, I think it' s a
rich thing that' s always come to my attention when I was an official,
especially about the poor drafting of the rules and laws in Colombia. Yeah,
and I think it' s been deteriorating. Yes, of course one
could compare some of the new articles of the Constitution with the original ones and
we will probably find a worse wording. It' s a phenomenon of these
times. Blindness to bad writing, people easily send out pointless emails, without
things. I don' t know why, because they' ve been allowing
that, that, that license. I was just teased from Bogotá, had
finished my civil engineering career and was studying economics at the University of the Andes
and from there as a student with curiosity. I remember well that day,
the fourth of July of a thousand nine hundred and ninety- one, the
day of proclamation. I do not know how to call it, Yes,
a programming began and I remember a phrase in that context, spoken by a
teacher or by someone who seemed very beautiful to me and I have repeated since
then that that Constitution was a democratic response to a challenge of democracy, as
if Colombia, our country, had responded with more democracy. Yes, the
challenges to democracy. I remember my mom Maria Theresa good. The people of
that generation were young and the feeling that it was a gesture of young people
and there were good people in that constituent, there were people who represented the
past, no doubt, but I find it interesting. The young people were
there, they were totally there, they were born of an exact youth initiative.
There was even some discomfort among the great jurists who said no how they
will touch the Constitution of one thousand eight hundred and eighty- six. This
is a Constitution of one thousand eight hundred eighty- six was about one hundred
pages, this was about three hundred said. This is a tedious thing.
Those things as well as to contemplate every right in a constitution. It was
like a conservative vocation to have a small constitution that would say generalities and from
there, legislate. But this was quite the opposite. It was kind of
a novel in the sense that worked more for inclusion than anything else. It
is missing to put this in, that vocation to put things in and into
that Constitution. I was also witnesses as an economist of another conservative bit that
came today the former Colombian jurists, not economists, and I remember reading an
article by some of these economists, because they were my professors at that time
that showed how the number of articles of constitutions in the countries was associated with
less growth, that is, the more articles had a Constitution, an absurd
thing, a little bit, and a correlation of the so many that can
be made clear later, Ricardo, time passes, the years do not come.
Now we were talking about maybe we' d want to write some kind
of books about a life, not about one of the thousand we could have
had. We' ve had one and that one I' ve had led
me to relate to the Constitution in various ways. A very intense one was
with a development of the Constitution, already of the Constitutional Court of Carlos Gaviri,
in the year nineteen hundred and ninety- seven, on the right to
die in dignity. Yeah, I mentioned all this because I had a conversation
last week with a New Ortimes reporter who asked me a tough question. It
made me wonder why Colombia, in the developing world, has been the country
that made the most rapid progress on this complex issue of the right to dignified
death, Utanasia. That' s a very good question. There was Belgium,
there was Holland and there was Colombia. She came to say why in
Colombia, Holland, which, as we said, is a good pioneer,
pioneer of many issues of dying with dignity. And the only answer that I
could give without having analyzed this issue exhaustively was the Constitution, the Constitutional Court,
that first Constitutional Court that marked a course Carlos Gabría, liberal and progressive,
and that liberalism that was born there, that was in turn a trigger,
a cultural change, that transformed our country into a single one. Today,
reviewing the time of July 4, time the edition of the time of
that July 4, nine hundred and ninety- one. It is impressive that
one does feel that a country is starting and if a purely liberal transformation has
been achieved and it is even shocking to read it is very strong with what
was coming and the images that are in that edition. It' sÁlvaro
Gómez and Navarro and Serpa and Humberto de la Calle, all these people,
you realize. I think you realize at the time that it was extraordinary what
was going on. But seeing that newspaper, thirty- three years later,
one says this is perhaps the most important thing that has happened in our recent
history, that capacity to transform itself from the state itself, which is sometimes
not noticed. The State itself was able to remove itself and that and to
leave the space to such a liberal Constitutional Court in a country that, like
the Constitution of eighty- six, was very tied, not only to Catholicism,
perhaps but rather to Catholic fanaticism. He was more fanatical than clerical Catholics.
Speaking of the liberal issue, I also found myself in life even if
a study with the judgement of ninety- four, also of Carlos Gabría,
on the minimum dose, which was a first sample of that liberal Colombia that
had been born with the Constitution, was criticized at the time by President Gabría
himself, who would later be a great advocate of a different anti- drug
policy part of the Global Commission on these issues and that opened a way in
Latin America and that still generates very large tensions and polemics in our country.
We could say that it has not been fully implemented, that there is still
a harassment of a young man who is out there with a world of marijuana
and ristras. But it was also the birth of that liberal idea. I
Ricardo, it is difficult to take stock of why, beyond the institutional issue,
well that happened to the country, I believe that the homicide rate decreased
substantially for many reasons, not just the Constitution. If you look at this
20th century, the first todecas, the Colombian economy has grown faster than any
other Latin American economy. Poverty fell from fifty percent to less than a third
of inflation became systematically one- digit. There are unfulfilled promises. One of
them is decentralization. Right, politics may have changed me a lot. I
think one could make a more or less reasonable case of saying that in Colombia
and more corruption today because there is also more state. Yes, right,
the Constitution is accused of being neoliberal, but that is a contradictory means,
because the size of the State increased. Yes, there is some sort of
idea in the Constitution that the private sector can participate in the provision of public
service its social services. He feels one more and more difficult to say that
that is either neoliberal. Thirty years after the state' s regulation of private
participation sounds neo- liberal, the state does not cease to participate in everything
and, moreover, it was growing. Health coverage rose from 30 percent to
100 percent. Public spending on education has grown substantially. The coverage of public
higher education more than doubled. Then I do not know and have a vocation,
the Constitution and that constituent Assembly of the ninety- one that one can
verify in the composition of the Group in the Assembly, of the composition of
the Assembly, which is that the whole world was really there, that is,
there was the Liberal Party and there was the National Salvation Movement ofÁlvaro
Gómez, that is, the Preserved Urism ofÁlvaro Gómez. There was the
19th month Democratic Alliance, which began with that name Democratic Alliance. Then followed
the Conservative Social Party, which was perhaps the most reluctant side to change the
Constitution of eighty- six, but then there was also the UP was alive
to Bella, was in the Christian Union, was the Indigenous Association. In
short, yes, there was a clear political university and it is noted in
that constituent, that is, in that Constitution that they also put us all
to learn at the end of the College, as we were already, in
the end they put us to read it in a whole year, in a
class and one did realize that they had not destroyed anything, that is,
they had respected the branches of power, the balance, because republican, and
at the same time, what they had included the populations, the different Colombians,
to the rights all this way of the Constitutional Court and the defense of
rights and guardianship the bunk as it materializes their rights and returns it to truth.
Yeah, well, it' s a very purpose. I don'
t know if the 21st century can be said to be freeing the bodies of
the State, that is, that every body has rights, and that'
s an advanced one. That is why, of course, the question about
Belgium, Holland and Colombia makes a lot of sense and then came the ruling
that emerges from there, this new liberal Colombia, about voluntary termination of pregnancy
and what has happened as Colombia from there, since the Constitution, with the
Constitutional Court, being the protagonist of cultural change, playing a very important role.
Now, Ricardo, many of these things paradoxically have been called into question
and that role that we are highlighting from the Constitution. Now that you'
re talking, I want to call this new phenomenon, the Renéiguito phenomenon,
I know where the thing is going. Yes, because there you were invited
to become part of the Constitution and he said no next time, next time
and now we' re already thinking about the next time. Nochina was able
to stay, as she retired. Yeah, yeah, but we' re
gonna have to recruit Gita, because he' s President Petro wants to make
an next one. He was on the bench thirty- three years. It
is ready such a calm to enter what you think of this new attempt of
an assembly because I was just thinking that it can only want a new constituent.
Anyone who doesn' t think the state was able to reform itself?
And one who does not believe that the State was able to reform itself is
that it has not followed the news and it is particularly admirable that the State
has been able to come out of the Constitution of 1 880 eighty- six
to that of 1 9, one, which is a very fundamental reform,
after it has been able to incorporate into it the Peace Agreement of 2 1
16, which is indeed the State reviewing itself. It just gives us a
truth commission that did a great job. It seems to me that what the
Truth Commission compiled is extraordinary what they did. If you read those reports,
you can' t believe it, fact that' s given us the gep
that you haven' t done, but reveal everything that happened on the part
of the state, everything you achieved, violence, justice, yes, transitional
justice, gave it to us, gave us the missing search unit. If
that' s the state revealing what it did to us. And that is
of value, of an importance that should be recognized, as when President Petro
mentions the seven points. It mentions, for example, the guarantee of rights,
which has not been fully given. One understands how a reform of the
Constitution, where these rights exist, where there are already other laws, for
example, health, is going to be implemented, because in order to be
fulfilled it is a process of construction, of the capacity of the State,
of fiscal strengthening, of the same State that does not simply go through a
constitutional reform, that is to say already constitutionally. We have this issue resolved.
Now come the different challenges. If he doesn' t come, it
' s not the case. There are two recard issues where someone could raise
their hand, for example Juan Fernando Cristo, and say, there are two
issues where the Colombian Node State has not been able to reform itself, which
are justice and politics. What do you think of that? I think it
is. I think it' s true, but it' s hard for
me to think that the road is a constituent. It seems to me that
there have been many attempts at reform of justice and political reform, always failed
and sabotaged, full of micos that at the last minute make back the things
that, in fact, was the origin of the Constitution, of the ninety
- one, a profound attempt at constitutional reform that failed in Congress and that
prompted the student movement that ended in the Assembly of nine hundred and ninety-
one. But, at the same time, it seems to me that there
is no sense in calling for a constituent from power, from the Presidency of
the Republic. It seems to me that if society is not asking for it
or demanding it for that it is mediating it. I think they talk.
She' s disconnected from that subject. It is disconnected from that issue and
is clear what it wants, which are very punctual things. Basically, let
the politicians leave them alone in the first place and let the Government, that
the Government, that which is accurate, that allows them to live in dignity,
that opens up the possibilities for dignified lives, then it seems to me
that this is not the case, does not have the context that is needed
for this. This is why people are having this suspicion that the constituent seems
more like a political strategy, a reform aimed at guaranteeing greater dignity and better
living conditions and better well- being for the general population. If the proposal
does not come from the political circumstances, but from the circumstances of the President,
what the new Minister of the Interior is saying now is that the constituent
is only an instrument, that what is the national concern and that if it
emerges from the national agreement that it needs a constituent, then that is the
way. Or that there may be constitutional reforms, assembly twigs, prostituters or
legal ones. I don' t know what you were doing. It must
be acknowledged to the Minister Christ that he has been speaking of federalism. Long
time ago, that' s something you said. The Constitution of the 1990s,
not the provision complied with, did not achieve centralization crime. Centralization has
been worse and worse. But Ricardo, I have to say it myself and
I don' t want to become an obsessive critic. We have had a
total recentralization and the decentralization I would say as an economist is that discretionary spending,
not all spending, because some that is not discretionary, that will simply
pay the payroll, has been accumulating in the national government. Yeah, that
' s right. And that accumulation, that recentralization, has been greater in
the Petro Government than in another Government. There is no doubt that a Constitution
is being proposed to advance centralization, when the Government is recentralizing in its actions.
Those are the contradictions that seem to me to be very problematic. That
' s why it doesn' t make sense, and that' s why
you' re talking gibberish. Christ, for he comes with that idea from
before being in the Ministry. So your central theme has been that federalization or
that federalism, then. But of course it comes here to try to do
politics in the best sense of expression, which is to join wills, convince
and make agreements. As long as it seems that the government does not want
to do that, then it is as always that some liberal enters the government
seems to be working. On the other hand, we were now talking about
how one can, does not have a life and can have many. That
' s what Gustavo Petro' s book called A Life Many Lives. Yes,
yes, in that book he describes himself as author of the Constitution of
nine hundred and ninety- one. It' s amazing in his biography.
No, I don' t think I' ve stepped on him since we
say what that aspiration has. It is what seems a little contradictory and because
it has now been very hard in its trials and I think wrong about the
achievements of the Constitution, which for me are very big, are enormous.
That is now that we are constantly talking about uniting Colombia in relation to the
America Cup and with the slogans that they release on Twitter, that what is
the motto of the country, that the country is not a United States and
the country the country unites us the country I do not know, I thought
again a prayer that the country unites us. Now that you see that reviewing
the Assembly of nine hundred and ninety- one. It was a country,
then, capable of a country of irreconcilable, capable of writing a single constitution.
It' s a miracle and it' s the news of these last
fifty years. I believe the world is more complex and more polarized. Perhaps
social media has changed politics a lot. There is one example that I find
interesting Ricardo, which is that of Chile. Yeah, yeah, he had
a total constitution. In the other type, for example, of dictatorship,
he wanted to change, he wanted to get into a first process. He
failed one more second from the other side and failed. And that process did
not end up uniting the country, but dividing it further. And I believe
that reformist opportunities were lost in Chile, our country will continue with the current
Constitution, because after two constitutional proposals ple visited, none managed to represent and
unite Chile in its beautiful diversity. The country was polarized, divided and,
apart from this strong outcome, the constitutional process failed to channel hopes for a
new Constitution drafted for all. Totally. I think that should be studied very
carefully. It is an example of these times, because it is the constitutional
reform in time of the Twitter wineries and it did not go well. No,
because there' s always one group trying to prevail over the other and
we don' t have much are targets to think that in Colombia it'
s going to work. There wouldn' t be a way to get started.
I don' t think he' s gonna give up on what we
were saying. It' s not the historical context, it' s not
the political circumstances. The people aren' t asking. The people are asking
for it was a dignified life. That can be done from a government.
To dignify lives can be done. And nobody' s thinking in terms of
writing, of laws, that' s not what' s coming first,
it' s coming from above. And when it comes from above, because
it' s to start violent and then it' s very likely that Chile
will happen, which is the attempt of a group of people to prevail over
the others that never is ever achieved, it' s never entirely achieved in
a society, because it' s moderately democratic. It will be Richard that
a young man who is fleeing our podcast in the tro millennium sees that we
are nostalgic of the ninety- one. Yes, for it is thirty-
three years, for two old men clinging to their past and their history and
their life. Maybe so, maybe so. There' s something with little
capillary matter, no desire. You have to say things the way bald one
of us is. We' re not going to say which implants are in
your video plans. In my future there is no plan, but you can
think there is. It' s a nostalgia, but it' s the
nostalgia of history. I mean, I think that reviving the present knowing what
happened in the' 90s, which is what is an example for what we
want to do now. The constitutions, in my opinion, have that double
condition. I believe that they are also important because of tradition, so it
is accumulating and the stories that go there contain the same constitutional changes of debate,
of the jurisprudence of the Court. I think that must be fully respected.
There' s something you said before you started about the political parties,
then after the Constitution of' 90s. It has to do with that,
with the inability to maintain a certain tradition of those parties. His idea would
be his tradition, his history. They were not faithful even their own achievements
every time there was a political scandal in these thirty- three years, from
the process eight thousand to the political GS, the traditional parties broke apart,
in such a way that we well overcome the bipartisanism that was so violent at
some point in the 20th century inclusive as well and exclusive, but we did
not make it something better. Those parties did not reform themselves, nor were
they even proud of their legacy. These parties had achieved important things for Colombia
and were embarrassed and preferred to become radical change and U party and a thousand
more things that are no longer expensive and sometimes seem like BE football teams that
are trading with new politicians as good Come. Sometimes this season he' s
going to buy roy barriers to get in here and here we' re going
to pass Christ. That' s where he turned yes. There is no
structure and tradition there that is fulfilled Ricardo. I believe that thirty- three
years later we can say that we are proud children of that idea of the
Constitution. We have grown in our contact with politics, with political debates,
because we have both been involved in one way or another as a political tract.
They are there and it seems to us that this institutional history is rescueable
and must be respected in some way. I believe that I interpret this conversation
as a defense of that tradition and those achievements and its recent history of our
country fully in agreement. We' re still in the fight. Yes,
thank you. It' s clear we can all write. It is clear
that everyone, with luck and vocation, can devote himself to the craft of
writing. But lately I think we can' t just write, we should
write. Writing is the best therapy we have at hand welcome to fictionary an
audio course on how and why I wrote Take the audiocourse of fictional writing in
the locutorio com slash fictionario with Ricardo Silva Romero. Always pick a good time.
Always choose a good conversation. Third lap podcast. Subscribe now and listen
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