Colombia’s former President Alvaro Uribe wasn’t even granted a grandiose exit from politics, the Supreme Court simply left him for dead.
The country’s most important politician and alleged fraudster could have gone out with a bang, being charged with being complicit in massacres, the murder of a human rights defender or even the foundation of a terrorist organization.
But of all the 84 criminal investigations against Uribe, the court placed inmate #1087985 under house arrest on fraud and bribery charges as if the former Medellin Cartel associate and key person of the country’s most bloodthirsty paramilitary group was a petty criminal.
Journalist Vicky Davila of weekly Semana and El Tiempo columnist Maria Isabel Rueda tried to resuscitate the former president on Sunday, announcing that “Uribe talks from his detention for the first time.”
The double interview felt like a funeral after Davila, who married int one of Colombia’s most notorious crime families, looked at the number of viewers and seemed to realize the interview was the last.
The interview began normal with Uribe accusing the court of being “politically biased” and the Semana columnist counting “we have 100,000 viewers.”
The interview couldn’t have ended more awkward, though. Not even after two hours of incoherent conspiracy theories either Rueda or Davila seemed to want to end their final moment with their favorite crime suspect.
“I recommend moringa,” said Uribe when asked for a cure against COVID-19. “if it doesn’t help it doesn’t hurt either,” the former president added.
Uribe’s quackery solutions against the pandemic that killed 15,000 Colombians to date seemed a hint that the interview wasn’t going to go anywhere.
“If there were one final word you would want to be remembered for, what would it be?” asked Davila.
“Straight-forward,” said Uribe before he was cut short while embarking on a tirade over Bogota Mayor Claudia Lopez.
Uribe wasn’t ready to utter his final words, but there was nothing more to say or do.
Estranged from his political allies and supported by only a few thousand hardcore followers, Uribe is politically dead, whether he accepts it or not.