nstead, Juan Manuel Santos, the government-backed candidate of the U Party, handily outdistanced all contenders. He defeated his nearest rival, Green Party candidate Antanus Mockus, by 25 points and almost succeeded in avoiding the June 20 runoff.
What accounts for the rout?
After all, the country had been widely believed to be suffering from a measure of ``Uribe fatigue.'' Although Alvaro Uribe, Colombia's two-term president, remains personally popular -- his approval ratings are around 70 percent -- many thought that the cumulative effect of a series of scandals and endless political battles and tensions would leave a weary electorate bent on change and that Mockus, the former Bogotá mayor who shrewdly advertised himself as post-Uribe, not anti-Uribe, would benefit from such a mood shift.
The shift was real, and explained Mockus' remarkable political surge in recent months. In the end, however, neither Mockus's appeal nor the public's desire for change was enough to trump the allegiance Colombian voters felt towards Uribe, who was widely credited with bringing the country back from the brink of collapse and creating a widespread sense of greater security.
Uribe's tireless, take-charge style and military pressure managed to put the FARC rebels on the defensive. His government's deals with paramilitary forces, while seriously questioned, also kept the worst abuses in check. Security gains -- homicides and kidnappings dropped sharply -- were accompanied by economic progress. Psychologically, the country moved from despair to hope -- no mean feat.
On Sunday, Uribe was amply rewarded. Santos, who had served as Uribe's defense minister and had resources and party machinery behind him, not only came out on top, but together with the other two political parties that had been part of Uribe's coalition -- Radical Change and Conservative -- marshaled almost two-thirds of the total vote. (In 2002, Uribe got 53 percent of vote, and 62 percent in 2006.)
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