Blades of Grass

As Colombia prepared to inaugurate a new President last week, political tension combined with winter weather to make the capital city of Bogota cold and clammy. The state of siege under which the Conservatives had elected their presidential candidate, Laureano Gomez, was still very much in force.

Where two months' ago military policemen had patrolled the streets in pairs, they now marched in groups of four, with two of them holding their cocked Mausers under their arms, barrels level, ready to shoot. To reinforce the brown-uniformed "chocolate soldiers," hordes of plainclothesmen roamed the streets. Just in case any bogotanos did not get the idea, the army had held maneuvers in Bogota last month, and had "taken the city" in 40 minutes.

Whisky & Calm. Colombia's Liberals, still claiming that Gomez' election was illegal, talked and gestured but did nothing. Ex-President Alfonso Lopez and ex-Candidate Dario Echandia merely left Bogota for the inauguration weekend. Liberal newspapers ignored all news of the inauguration, of President Perez and President-elect Gomez.

The Liberal majority in Congress, pledged to convene on the constitutional date of July 20, had bowed to a decree by Conservative President Ospina Perez forbidding the meeting but granting the Congressmen's usual 600-peso monthly allowance. Some of the Liberals did meet--in the Hotel Granada Rose Room. Sneered El Sigh's columnist, Julio Abril: "They deliberated over a bottle of Vat 69, taking the matter not only with great calm but also with soda."

Despite martial law and political stalemate, the killings which characterized Gomez' election campaign had not ended. Bragged one police lieutenant: "We're killing a thousand a week in the country. We figure we've got 15,000 to go." In Bogota particularly, murders, rapes and other violence by the police seemed to be increasing.

Aspirin & Peace. After 40 years of behind-the-scenes politicking, usually as a member of the out-of-power faction, clever Laureano Gomez, 61, took his inauguration in full stride. He pledged non-violent democratic government, but claimed that the state of siege was still necessary to preserve peace. Said he: "We'll give the patient aspirin as long as the fever continues." The Liberals, Gomez said, "won't recognize me. I respect their point of view. For them I am not President, so naturally I cannot appoint them [to my government]."

This week, with the Liberal judges conspicuously absent, bulky, cold-eyed Laureano Gomez was sworn in before nine of the 16 members of the Supreme Court. In his inauguration speech, in the Salon Eliptico of the Capitol, Gomez praised U.S. action in Korea, and promised Colombians reconstruction of their country "on firm and austere bases." The ending of his speech was apt: "We men are only blades of grass in the hands of God. May His omnipotent hand save Colombia."

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