COLOMBIA ׀ POLITICS

Gustavo Petro lost yet another key member of his team yesterday as Fernando Rey, head of the Transmilenio, the city's public transport system, joined the long list of politicians to desert the Mayor of Bogotá just seven months into his four year term.

Rumours are circulating that the Progressives, Petro's political party, are making succession plans, actively seeking an alternative to their faltering leader.  

As Petro recovers at home following a second operation in as many months on a serious brain injury, and as the Mayor's closest allies one by one jump ship, the nation is beginning to wonder whether anyone is governing Bogotá.

Communists FARC sympathisers were this week kicked out of Colombia's main opposition party, the  Democratic Pole (PDA) by leader Clara López.

Using the news that the Communist Party are to join forces with Piedad Córdoba's controversial Marcha Patriótica which is accused of being the political front for the guerrilla group, López has acted swiftly to purge extremists and to halt the Polo's drift to the far-left. 

Communist Party Leader, Carlos Lozano has of course reacted with indignation, labelling López's moves 'illegal'. But after a disastrous month for the left in which it has lost the support of large sections of society following its public support for Hugo Chávez's re-election in Venezuela, and for appearing to side with indigenous groups over the army during the attacks in Cauca, López might just have saved her party from obliteration.

This is my piece published today on Colombia Reports to mark the second anniversary of the start of Juan Manuel Santos' presidency. CR is the best English language website for news on Colombia. 

Leading FARC terrorist Fabián Ramírez, thought to have been killed in an air raid in 2010, reappeared in public yesterday through a video broadcast by Caracol Television in which he appeared to offer Juan Manuel Santos' government a way out of Colombia's civil war. 

During an interview with British journalist Karl Penhaul, Ramírez, the second in command of the Marxist guerrilla group's 'Southern Bloc', is seen arguing for an 'agreement (between the government and the FARC) to end the war'. Peace, he says, should be sought through dialogue and negotiation. Is he fooling anyone?