More than 41 million Colombians will go to the polls this Sunday to decide the president who will lead the country for the next four years, in a race that closely resembles the 2022 electoral contest. The favorites are a left-wing candidate, a populist-right outsider, and a traditional-leaning conservative. According to all voting intention polls released this year, a second round will be necessary, scheduled for June 21, to decide the winner.
The studies show that philosopher and senator Iván Cepeda, from the center-left Historical Pact party (PH), is the favorite to lead the vote tally in the first round, with about 40% of the votes.
The second place is expected to go to the millionaire lawyer Abelardo Gabriel De la Espriella, of Defensores de la Patria, with around 30% of the preferences, according to the poll average.
In the past weeks, he has statistically pulled away from the voting intentions of the right-wing Senator Paloma Valencia, of the Centro Democrático, who is polling a little over 18%.
In 2022, the current president Gustavo Petro also reached the final stretch ahead of Rodolfo Hernández and Federico Gutiérrez, who represented the forces of the right.
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For the second round, there is a possibility that preferences could reverse, since some polls place De la Espriella, though by a narrow margin. There are studies, however, that maintain Cepeda’s favoritism, based on a recovery in approval of President Petro’s performance following recent measures linked to taxes and the job market.
But the lawyer Espriella, self-styled “El Tigre” and defender of conservative leaders such as Javier Milei (Argentina), Nayib Bukele (El Salvador) and Donald Trump (United States), has been running a campaign focused on family values and public safety, topics very important to a significant portion of society.
