With joy and commitment, Colombians exercised their right to vote on Monday, March 3 through Sunday, March 9, at the Colombian Consulate in San Francisco as part of the elections to Senate, House of Representatives and Andean Parliament in the South American country.
With 98.40 percent of votes counted and a total of 102 seats at stake for the Senate, the parties with the majority of votes were Partido de la U – of the current president Juan Manuel Santos Calderón, who won 21 seats–as well as Centro Democrático, led by former President Álvaro Uribe Vélez, winning 19 seats. The traditional parties Liberal and Conservador (Conservative), won 19 and 17 seats respectively.
For the 167 seats at stake in the House of Representatives, a recount is being undertaken, and the distribution of seats is not yet final. By press time, the parties with the majority of votes were, were in following order: Partido de la U, Liberal, Conservador (Conservative), Centro Democrático, and Cambio Radical.
The results point to former President Uribe as the big winner of the election with his newly created party, Centro Democrático. It is important to note that Uribe opposes the negotiations with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC, for its acronym in Spanish) that President Santos has been performing in the last year and a half.
The Consulate of Colombia in San Francisco serves a population of 48,000 in northern California, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Alaska and Hawaii – according to 2010 census data.
This is the first time that Colombians living abroad were able to vote for an entire week. The elections in San Francisco ran smoothly and a larger number of voters are expected for the presidential elections in May 2014 .