‘The king of TikTok’, the controversial presidential candidate who is in third place in the election polls of a polarized Colombia

He calls himself ‘The King of Tiktok‘ and seems to have no problem making a meme of his image. Rodolfo Hernández, the controversial Colombian presidential candidate who has been rising in the polls a week before the first electoral round, maintains an atypical campaign based on social networks and confrontation, through the caricature of his opponents.

The creator of the independent movement League of Anticorruption Governors jumped from his popularity on the social networks – with videos of up to three million views – to the polls. In recent weeks, his candidacy increased seven percentage points and ranked third in the preference of the electorate, with 20.9%, after the right-wing Federico Gutiérrez, who has 27%, and the progressive Gustavo Petro, who leads the polls, with the 41% of the intention to vote.

Hernández, using the typical resources of viral publications, promises to fight against the corrupt and «solve the hunger of families». However, his opponents point to his past, when he was mayor of Bucaramanga (2016-2019), and remember that he was accused by the Prosecutor’s Office in the midst of a corruption scandal, explains journalist Nathali Gómez for RT .

Beyond his character of  «I am an old man but tasty» of TikTok, this 77-year-old businessman, who does not define himself as being a left wing or right wing politician, has more than 30 processes opened by the Attorney General’s Office, one of them for physical and verbal aggression against a councillor.

A walk through the social networks

‘The Colombian Donald Trump’, as he has also been named, affirms in the biography of his TikTok account that he is the “future president of Colombia”. There, he accumulates 418,000 followers and 3.5 million likes.

Among the more than one hundred videos he has uploaded, what stands out the most is the ridicule of opponents and incendiary statements about «politicking».

«I say to the thieving politicians: pray that I don’t win», he says in one of the most recent audiovisual pieces where he compares himself to Luis Carlos Galán, a liberal candidate assassinated in 1989 on the orders of the Medellín Cartel.

In another clip, he uses an editing resource to put his face on the character Forrest Gump, in the emblematic scene in which he runs across the United States. In the caption that accompanies the video, he states that he started the race for the presidency «practically alone» and that when looking back he is surprised to see Colombia running with him.

Hernández also talks about the legalization of marijuana; he has shown himself to be a man of authority while scolding a group of police officers during his term as mayor; he calls politicians «thieves and robbers» and says that he will not discriminate against the sexually diverse community. «This election is to resolve the hunger of families who have nothing», he asserts.

«I don’t keep things to myself», maintains the businessman who defines himself as «spontaneous» and «natural», despite the files that the Attorney General’s Office has opened precisely because of his verbal incontinence.

In his Twitter speech, where the language and content are adapted to that social network, the former mayor has said that he will donate his salary as president and that he will put the needs of the poorest above his privileges. «I don’t need money because I’ve already worked for it», says the person who will face trial for alleged corruption at the end of July.

The presidential candidate and the processes against him

Among the more than 30 processes that the Attorney General’s Office has opened on him, the slap he gave Councilman John Claro in 2018 stands out. Claro accused him of being corrupt. Two years later, in 2020, that same Office determined that since he was no longer mayor he should pay a sum equivalent to eight months of his salary, which corresponded to about 30,000 dollars, informed RCN.

Another pending matter is the accusation of the Prosecutor’s Office «for alleged irregularities detected in the conclusion of a contract» when he was mayor of Bucaramanga. Hernández would have given the go-ahead for the Bucaramanga Municipal Cleaning Company (Emab) to irregularly hire the Vitalogic company, in an action that would include his son. It is expected that on July 21, two days after the scheduled date for the second round of elections, the criminal trial against him will begin.

The candidate’s file of scandals, (Hernández has been branded impulsive and violent) is full of episodes of insults directed at his political opponents. In addition, there is an audio (the date of which is unknown) where he threatens a man saying he would shoot him, and for which he later apologized.

Prostitutes and Venezuelans

In 2019, the presidential candidate questioned whether Sergio Isnardo, a member of the Alternative Indigenous Social Movement (Mais), was independent and maintained that he had gone through all the political parties. «They have groped everything, that is, they have groped him more than what has groped a prostitute from Puerto Wilches [Santander], that the only thing that has not passed over her has been the railway».

In his ill-advised speeches, he several times referred to migrants in a derogatory manner. On one occasion, he assured that they were «purely poor people» whose massive presence caused the numbers of syphilis and HIV to increase.

Along the same lines, he maintained that “beggars, prostitutes and unemployed people arrive from Venezuela” and that the women of the neighboring country were “a factory for making children (who end up poor) «.

Among his public statements, which distance him from the independent position that has been forged on the social networks, is his declaration of having a «debt of gratitude» and appreciation for former right-wing president Álvaro Uribe, who supported him during the regional election campaign in which he was the winner, collects Publimetro.

What are his proposals as presidential candidate?

Hernández’s government plan contemplates very general proposals and more direct proposals on actions that he would take if he were to win.

The businessman talks about different aspects of Colombian reality. In the document he refers to «signing a New Social Contract»; to «progressively write off the debts of students with the Icetex [State entity that grants educational credits]); to «develop a census of addicts to hallucinogenic substances» and to «analyze a figure of Basic Income concentrating on a single family payment
all the existing subsidies».

Likewise, he promises to «attack gender inequality with an employment policy» and «launch a plan to reduce teenage pregnancies».

Among the points, what generates the most expectations is his commitment to reestablish relations with Venezuela, broken since 2019, as soon as he becomes president. With this decision, he seeks to reactivate commercial exchange and ask Caracas to «finance the sustainability of its population living in Colombia or its transit to another country».

In the text where he lays the foundations for his eventual presidential administration, he says that he will open a rapprochement process with the National Liberation Army (ELN), —with which the Government of Iván Duque broke relations in 2019, after an attack against a school of cadets—and that he will include this armed group in the Peace Agreement signed with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), through a legal remedy called an addendum, which includes additions to an existing document to avoid a «negotiation that implies endless conversations».

Among the other initiatives that he promises to carry out to reach the Casa de Nariño are:

– Encourage the creation of digital enterprises.
– Eliminate taxes on the acquisition of capital goods.
– ‘Zero impunity’ for corrupt politicians.
– Modernize military equipment.
– Guarantee the application of the Special Peace Jurisdiction (JEP).
– Review and purge the National Police.
– Completely transform the judicial apparatus, including a constitutional reform.
– Apply a VAT of 10%.