De la Espriella Tells Colombia the Money Is Gone
COLOMBIA · GOVERNMENT
Key Facts
- —Who was speaking Abelardo De la Espriella, a courtroom lawyer who became Colombia’s president five weeks ago.
- —What he did He took over the television channels on Sunday night to give his first full account of himself.
- —His message That the government before him spent the country to the edge of ruin.
- —The money Colombia plans to spend about US$159 billion next year. Close to half of it is borrowed.
- —The surprise He wants police allowed onto university campuses. Colombian universities have kept them out for generations.
- —The odd moment He said his government had made 17,147 arrests. His own office had published 18,750 that morning.
Five weeks into the job, the president told Colombians that the money is gone and the universities are out of control. Two of his claims came with arithmetic.
At eight on Sunday evening the Colombian channels handed over their airtime. A president thirty-six days into the job began to read.
The Case Against the Man Before Him
Abelardo De la Espriella built his career in courtrooms, defending clients few other lawyers would touch. He won the presidency in June.
On Sunday he prosecuted his predecessor. The fiscal crisis, he said, is not an accident and not the work of outside forces.
It is the exclusive responsibility of Gustavo Petro, he said, of his government, his squandering and his corruption. They made illegal decisions. They left Colombia on the edge of the abyss.
He promised to pursue without quarter those responsible, and those who lied about the figures. They looted the country, he said. They looted the treasury.
Twenty-Four Pesos in Every Hundred
The numbers behind the accusation are the plainest part of the speech.
Colombia intends to spend 634.9 trillion pesos next year, about US$159 billion. Of that, 281 trillion pesos, roughly US$70 billion, will be borrowed.
That is 44.2% of the budget funded by debt. Servicing the debt already in place costs 155.4 trillion pesos, some US$39 billion.
He reduced it to something anyone can hold. Of every hundred pesos the state spends, twenty-four go to interest and fourteen to building anything.
His answer is an austerity package of 17.4 trillion pesos, about US$4.4 billion. It comes from goods, services and investment he judges non-essential.
The opposition has formally demanded the right to reply.
The Campuses
The line that will outlast the speech came next, and it has nothing to do with money.
University autonomy, he said, does not mean autonomy in matters of public order. He would not allow public universities to remain sanctuaries of violence.
In Colombia that is close to breaking a taboo. Public campuses have been ground the police do not enter for decades.
The principle sits in Article 69 of the constitution and in a law passed in 1992. It survived the war years intact.
He announced a national protocol. It would let officers on during violence, during extraordinary disorder, or where dangerous materials are stored.
He signed nothing. No ministry has claimed it, no text has appeared and no date has been given.
The rectors answered within a day. Guillermo Murillo of Universidad del Valle said the violence happens outside the campuses, and that nobody is building explosives in his laboratories.
Ismael Peña runs Universidad Nacional, the largest public university in the country. Police entry has never produced results, he said.
He offered intelligence work and controlled access instead.
The constitutional lawyer Laura Espinosa Macías made a narrower point. A president cannot dismantle university autonomy with a protocol.
In Congress, Carol Borda welcomed the plan. Isabel Vera and Ana Erazo opposed it.
A Number That Moved Between Morning and Evening
The security section was meant to be the triumphant one. In thirty-six days, the president said, his forces had made 17,147 arrests.
That morning the presidency had pushed out its own security bulletin, and the president had promoted it himself. The bulletin counted 18,750 arrests since 7 August.
The firearms told the same story. The bulletin claimed 1,940 weapons seized and 1,746.5 hectares of coca cleared.
By the evening those had become 1,761 weapons and 1,506 hectares.
These are running totals since the day he took office, and running totals do not go down. Twelve hours apart, all three had.
El Tiempo printed 17,147 in one article and 17,014 in another. Semana settled for more than seventeen thousand.
The presidency has not said which figure it stands behind.
What Seventeen Thousand Arrests Looks Like
On its own, the figure sounds like a country being taken back street by street. Against how much arresting Colombia does in a month, it looks different.
Bogotá alone made 2,837 arrests in August, on the city’s own count, and 2,780 in May. The capital holds about a sixth of the population.
Scale that up and Colombia arrests seventeen to nineteen thousand people in a normal month. That is for every kind of crime.
Thirty-six days of ordinary policing produces the number he read out.
El Tiempo ran it as seventeen thousand captures against illegal armed groups. The armed groups do not have seventeen thousand members between them.
He also listed twenty-four gang leaders reached, nineteen captured and five killed. Their aliases mean something in the regions they came from: Tigre, Víctor, Ruso, Bonito, Águila, Naim.
The Ledger From the Earthquake
Three days into his presidency a magnitude 7.4 earthquake struck near San José del Palmar, in Chocó. It is the poorest department in Colombia, and fifteen departments felt it.
He told the country in August that 289 people had died. Reconstruction was costed at 30 trillion pesos, about US$7.5 billion, under a plan he named Plan Milagro.
Sunday’s figures were the small kind that matter to the people receiving them. Households in Quindío get 787,907 pesos a month, about US$198, for three months.
He counted 369 houses repaired, 160 finished flats in Quindío and 110 homes in Buga. More than 40 billion pesos in credit, about US$10 million, goes to 1,800 shopkeepers.
Those are packages for Quindío and Valle del Cauca. Chocó, where the earthquake struck, is being rebuilt under a separate and larger line.
Five Weeks In
Colombian presidents serve four years and cannot be re-elected. De la Espriella has spent five weeks burying his predecessor and burying the dead.
The fiscal argument he made on Sunday is the one he will be judged on. The figures behind it are public.
The universities protocol is the one that will be fought over, and it does not exist yet. The arrest count is the one his own office will have to explain.
The speech ran past nine. By Monday the rectors had answered and the opposition had demanded airtime.
On the two different arrest counts, the presidency said nothing at all.
More: Colombia news and analysis, every day from The Rio Times.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Abelardo De la Espriella?
A Colombian trial lawyer. He won the presidency in June 2026 and took office on 7 August, succeeding Gustavo Petro.
What did he announce about universities?
A protocol to allow police onto public campuses during violence or serious disorder. Nothing has been signed.
Why is that controversial?
Public universities have been closed to police for decades, under a constitutional principle of university autonomy.
What are the budget figures?
Colombia plans to spend 634.9 trillion pesos next year, about US$159 billion. Some 44.2% of it is borrowed.
How many arrests did he claim?
17,147 in his first thirty-six days. The presidency’s own bulletin that morning said 18,750.
What happened in the earthquake?
A magnitude 7.4 quake struck Chocó on 10 August 2026. The president put the death toll at 289.
Sources: Presidencia de Colombia, El Tiempo, El Espectador, La República, Semana, Pulzo, Alcaldía de Bogotá, Minuto30.
This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error · Editorial responsibility: Matthias Camenzind, Editor-in-Chief