A photo and the true story

By: Francisco Santos - 09/09/2025

President Gustavo Petro used all sorts of epithets against Miguel Uribe. He used his grandfather, the former liberal president Julio César Turbay, as an excuse to attack his grandson with all sorts of insults, which ultimately created the political conditions that led to his assassination. His hate-mongering narrative bears no resemblance to the reality of the real M-19, which bore no resemblance to what Petro is, what he says, and even less so how he acts.

For example, the photo accompanying this article. The mother of Carlos Pizarro, the then leader of the M-19, Margoth Leongómez de Pizarro, led a tribute to former President Turbay in late 1989 in gratitude for all his efforts as director of the Liberal Party, along with his daughter Diana Turbay, to support the peace process with the M-19. When I asked a former member of that organization who had given the order for that event in the Red Room of the Tequendama Hotel in Bogotá, he told me it was Carlos Pizarro himself.

The history of the M-19 and Turbay was very complex, and the antagonism between them was tremendous; they were total enemies. As soon as Turbay came to power, he issued the security statute, a harsh exceptional measure to confront terrorist organizations. The M-19, for its part, in its first two years of government stole weapons from the Northern Canton, took over the Dominican Republic embassy with 16 ambassadors—including the United States ambassador—and set up its first rural fronts in the south of the country, all with the help of Cuba. Turbay broke relations with that country in 1981.

Much violence has passed under that bridge, but that wasn't the most important thing. Petro obviously stood by the M-19 in the war and the violence, unlike much of the M-19 leadership, who firmly believe that the most important thing for the M-19 was peace. Many who know the background say that Petro was neither involved in the war nor in the peace of the M-19, and, moreover, that this is easily verifiable.

The latter doesn't matter either, because those who should understand what the M-19 truly was, and not what Petro invents every time he mentions it, are Pizarro's daughters, María José and María del Mar, and the democratic left that wants profound reforms in the country today views with great disappointment what Petro has done in these three years.

The peace of the M-19, and the tribute they pay to Turbay, are part of that organization's true legacy. They always focused on Colombia and on leaving violence behind to build a better country. Hatred wasn't their focus; more important was the swagger, or, as their historic leader, Jaime Bateman, said, the "national stew," which was an agreement between everyone, without exceptions, to build a different Colombia.

What's more, the country recognized them when they laid down their weapons and became the second-largest political force in the 1991 Constituent Assembly elections, with 992,000 votes. They won 19 of the 70 constituents who drafted the 1991 Constitution, and their tripartite leadership was shared by Horacio Serpa, Álvaro Gómez, and Antonio Navarro.

This story has other ingredients worth highlighting. In the 1990 elections, following the assassination of Carlos Pizarro, his replacement, Antonio Navarro Wolff, garnered 750,000 votes with almost no campaign and no budget, purely opinionated. An unprecedented electoral success. Even more so considering the history of this organization's origins, including the takeover of the Palace of Justice. Colombia was ready to forgive, and the M-19, without arrogance or hatred, but as part of the national stew, laid down its weapons and joined the civil society.

Just for comparison, after the peace process with the FARC in 2018, this organization garnered 52,000 votes. Yes, 52,000! The M-19, almost three decades earlier, obtained 952,000. Not to mention what happened four years later, when the FARC, with great effort, obtained 25,000 votes. The M-19 was never given a seat, as they were given to the FARC, which, it's worth saying, was of no use.

Every time Petro speaks or writes about the M-19, he lies or uses them to generate hatred. If Bateman was the proponent of the national stew, Petro is the exact opposite: he excludes and threatens those who don't share his views. It's sad for an organization that shaped two decades of Colombia to be left with such a terrible legacy.

However, a picture speaks louder than a thousand words. Hopefully, history will bear this out.

«The opinions published herein are the sole responsibility of its author».