Colombia is Latin America’s second country spending the most on defense

Colombia is the second country in Latin America with the second-highest public spending on defense, and even though the figure reached US$9.2 billion in 2020, according to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri), its effectiveness has caused unease among Colombians after the attack last September 2 in San Luis, Huila.

The attack last Friday, September 2, in the department of Huila marked a historic criminal event that has left Colombians stunned and shocked by the death of 7 police officers.

To date, around 43 police officers have been killed across the country following attacks and operations.

Colombia, in the words of Julian Arevalo, dean of economics at the Universidad Externado de Colombia, faces one of the most important security challenges associated with organized crime groups, drug traffickers, and other types of criminals, especially in the most affected regions where the presence of the State is weaker.

However, the strategy of the Government of Gustavo Petro is to increase the foot of force, as was demonstrated last August 31, 2022, in the meeting with Mayor Claudia Lopez, in the first security council.

This announcement “We are going to fulfill the objective of increasing the police force in Bogota. I have told the forces to take care less of the government and more of the citizens,” said Gustavo Petro.

The following day (September 1, 2022), the mayor informed us there would be 1,500 new uniformed officers in the capital to reinforce the police force,

“We appreciate the President’s decision to strengthen the intelligence capacity to dismantle gangs and combat major crimes such as money laundering. Likewise, the agreed increase in the force is maintained: 1,500 police officers this year and 1,500 in 2023″.

In Bogotá, there are 17,820 police officers in the city, and in the country, 167,290; that is, Bogota has 10% of the total police force.

However, the worrying thing about these data is that according to the UN, there should be 300 police officers for every 100,000 inhabitants; for every police officer, there are 448 inhabitants. Current data indicate only 222 police officers for every 100,000 inhabitants.

Now, of the 17,820 police officers in the capital, only 4,500 are on the streets, and around 12,000 are administrative, according to Citynoticias.

During Enrique Peñalosa’s administration, there were 3,000 new uniformed officers, 1,200 in February 2017 and 1,500 in April 2019.

With the administration of Claudia López, the foot force increased by 2,000 between August and December 2021, and with the new declarations, there will be 1,500 new uniformed personnel in the coming days. In total, 6,200 new uniformed personnel in the last five years.

Although this is encouraging news, from January to July in the capital, there have been 569 homicide cases; that is to say, every week in Bogotá, there are 18 cases reported.

According to the Secretary of the Mayor’s Office of Bogotá, Felipe Jimenez, “We do not have a magic formula; we have different strategies, social strategies, foot-force strategy. We must strengthen the police, intelligence, and justice; strengthen dialogue managers and video-surveillance cameras, and citizen networks. Our goal is to bring Bogotá down to one digit.

With information from Infobae