ROdolfo Hernández ran for the Presidency, reached the second round with Gustavo Petro and several considered him the only one who could beat him. Two years later, their situation is very different. A court has just confirmed his six-year sentence, which he will serve at home due to a terminal illness, due to his involvement in the Vitalogic scandal. From almost reaching the Casa de Nariño he came to political ostracism.
According to the criteria of
Until eight years ago, Hernández was not a relevant figure in the Santander electoral landscape. His name was more associated with the department’s business community, specifically construction. He was recognized as the owner of Constructora HG, a company that became famous in the metropolitan area of Bucaramanga because it granted mortgage loans to its clients with just their ID.
His first steps in politics
During his time as a builder he was not far from politics. In the 90s, he was elected several times as councilor of Piedecuesta, a municipality neighboring Bucaramanga.. However, he had himself elected and then left his seat in the hands of his substitute – a figure already eliminated from the Colombian system -, Alexander Humberto Díaz. This caused his first clashes with the Attorney General’s Office, an entity that today has him off the cards. In 1994 he was sanctioned by the Santander representation of the control body on the grounds that he had contracts with the Piedecuesta mayor’s office and at the same time was a councilor of this municipality. Although he defended himself with the argument that the seat belonged to his substitute, his excuses were not accepted.
His first failed attempt at politics was succeeded by a business success that led him to be one of the main donors to the Liberal Party in the capital of the department. The red party dominated the scene in the city. Of the 11 mayors who have been elected by popular vote since 1989, eight were from this group and several of them had donations from Hernández, that was experiencing the construction boom, often mentioned in supposed cases of land dumping but never proven.
Rodolfo Hernández – Vitalogic audience
Photo:X Rodolfo Hernandez
Around 2011, he was especially determined to advance the liberal candidacy of Luis Francisco Bohórquez, for whom he was even godfather at his marriage. Although this aspiration won, Hernández and Bohórquez soon broke off relations. Among the various theses of distancing, the one put forward by the first was the corruption scandals in that administration, such as that of the ‘Manantial de Amor’ church.
Supposedly these irregularities not only damaged the friendship between these two, but also led Rodolfo Hernández to run for mayor of Bucaramanga for the 2015 elections. His campaign was far from typical political proselytism.
Everything was limited to meetings in the penthouse of one of the buildings he built in the Cabecera neighborhood. He invited small groups to present his government plan, “Ethics, Logic and Aesthetics”, in which he spoke of the categorical imperative and other Kantian postulates. This was devised by one of his brothers, a philosopher by profession.
His victory was surprising, which removed liberalism from the Bumanguesa mayor’s office to this day. His government had divided opinions. Several highlighted the work he had to clean up the city’s finances and the works he did in the lowest-income areas. EITHEROthers point to the lack of major civil works – which characterized their predecessors – and the various scandals.
His self-confident character made him news on several occasions. In 2018, he made national news headlines because it was recorded how he hit a councilman, John Claro, because he questioned him about the Vitalogic scandal, an alleged case of corruption in a garbage contract. Both the blow to the lobbyist and the contract issue led to sanctions from the Attorney General’s Office, two of the three that led the CNE to revoke his candidacy.
Hernández did not finish his term, due to a suspension by the Attorney General’s Office, due to alleged participation in politics, he resigned in September 2019. He took the opportunity to campaign head-on for Juan Carlos Cárdenas, current mayor of Bucaramanga and with whom he also broke up shortly after coming to power.
Presidential candidate
In 2021 he announced that he was running for the Presidency. Those close to Rodolfo Hernández assured that his intention was to run a “long campaign” for the 2023 regional elections and the governorship of Santander. However, his proselytizing on social networks and his focus on ‘holyness’ caused a boom that put him in the second round. There he was defeated by the current president, Gustavo Petro.
President-elect Gustavo Petro meets for the first time with Rodolfo Hernández after the elections.
Photo:Gustavo Petro Campaign
Contrary to his initial strategy, his presidential aspiration worked against him. In Santander the thesis became common that he “gave the elections to Gustavo Petro” and Nor did he like that he had resigned his seat in the Senate due to opposition status to run for governor.
Even so, he appeared as the great favorite for these elections. Even members of the Green Alliance confirmed to this newspaper that Carlos Ramón González tried to make the link for Hernández to be “Petro’s” in the department. In the end it was not possible.
Endorsed by his own party, the League of Anti-Corruption Rulers, the polls put him first in voting intentions. He was not even affected by the diagnosis of colon cancer, known in June. The only thing that stopped his aspiration was the sanction of the CNE, which indicated that he could not aspire because he had three disciplinary sanctions that disqualified him. Still he had a considerable vote. The final blow was the condemnation issued on April 15 for the Vitalogic scandal. This Thursday the amount of the penalty was known.
JUAN SEBASTIÁN LOMBO DELGADO – POLITICAL EDITORIAL
