Origins
According to analysts, witnesses and internal FARC documents from the group's 1982 Seventh Guerrilla Conference, the FARC originally intended for the creation of a group of clandestine party cells to be its political branch for recruitment and ideological propaganda purposes, while simultaneously maintaining its armed strength intact, at least initially, as part of the "combination of all forms of struggle". In theory, as the FARC developed a new form of army structure (the "People's Army", Ejército del Pueblo or EP), it would eventually be able to surround the cities with its armed columns, making the support of urban cells and mass movements decisive in order to finally seize power.
When the negotiations with the Betancur administration began after a 1982 amnesty, a cease-fire was declared in October 1984. The cease-fire was initially respected by both parties, but the FARC as a whole did not demobilize or directly renounce to the armed struggle as a means of resolving Colombia's problems. The UP was founded in May 1985 and several prominent FARC members were among the party's original founders, as well as members of the Colombian Communist Party (PCC). The PCC initially attempted to question the FARC's preeminent role in the new party as a result of the guerrilla's own negotiations with the government, but it quickly decided to admit it as a fait accompli. Almost a decade later, towards the early 1990s, the PCC ended its affiliation with the FARC, and the FARC's current political structure has become a separate body, known as the Clandestine Colombian Communist Party.
During the 1980s, the UP's ideology was openly communist and marxist, but the main platform initially consisted of promoting itself as a legal and democratic alternative to the two main Colombian political parties, the Conservatives and the Liberals. UP campaigners usually focused on proposing and implementing solutions to the problems of poor communities, rather than relying solely on a strictly rigorous ideological work (though this was also done where applicable).
FARC ideological leader Jacobo Arenas, who originally played a central role in the Seventh Guerrilla Conference and in the peace talks with the Betancur government, was a leading figure during the party's inception and early development, being the UP's informal leader within FARC and initially was heavily expected to be its presidential candidate. He publicly resigned from his rumored presidential bid during the aftermath of the 1985 takeover of the Colombian Palace of Justice by the 19th of April Movement, allegedly because of a lack of guarantees, though he continued to be an influential player in FARC - UP relations for some time.
With the official resignation of Arenas, in November 1985, the UP internally elected Jaime Pardo as its presidential candidate.
In August 1986, the National Electoral Council recognized the UP as a political movement.
Read more about this topic: Patriotic Union (Colombia)
Famous quotes containing the word origins:
“The settlement of America had its origins in the unsettlement of Europe. America came into existence when the European was already so distant from the ancient ideas and ways of his birthplace that the whole span of the Atlantic did not widen the gulf.”
—Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)
“Compare the history of the novel to that of rock ‘n’ roll. Both started out a minority taste, became a mass taste, and then splintered into several subgenres. Both have been the typical cultural expressions of classes and epochs. Both started out aggressively fighting for their share of attention, novels attacking the drama, the tract, and the poem, rock attacking jazz and pop and rolling over classical music.”
—W. T. Lhamon, U.S. educator, critic. “Material Differences,” Deliberate Speed: The Origins of a Cultural Style in the American 1950s, Smithsonian (1990)
“Grown onto every inch of plate, except
Where the hinges let it move, were living things,
Barnacles, mussels, water weeds—and one
Blue bit of polished glass, glued there by time:
The origins of art.”
—Howard Moss (b. 1922)