Angelino Garzón

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Angelino Garzón (born in Buga, Valle del Cauca in 1950) is a Colombian journalist and politician, former union leader and former Governor of Valle del Cauca Department (january 2004 - december 2007).

He has been a union leader for many labor union and in many positions among these General Secretary of the Central Union of Workers (Spanish: Central Unitaria de Trabajadores, CUT) between 1981 and 1990. He later ran for congressman and was elected to become part of the Constituent Assembly of Colombia that created the Colombian Constitution of 1991. He also served as Vice President of the Patriotic Union Party and the member of the 19th of April Movement.

During the government of President Andres Pastrana Garzon was appointed as minister of the Minsitry of Work and Social Security from 2000 until 2002. He was one of the ministers of Pastrana's administration with a popular positive image. After serving as minister he was proposed runningn for president but he declined. Garzon then participated as member of the facilitating Commission for the Humanitarian Accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia guerrilla group (FARC).

He then renounced to the commission to postulate his name for Governor of Valle del Cauca Department. He was elected in 2003 with 60.69% of the votes and wining over Carlos Holmes Trujillo and Carlos José Holguín, this last candidate son of former senator Carlos Holguín Sardi.

During his administration as Governor of Valle del Cauca in 2006, he was crtisized for a conflict that surged between a CISA S.A. Constructing Consortium in charge of widening and repairing the highway Cali-Candelaria but which was never started and CISA S.A. sued the Valle del Cauca Department. Garzon and his cabinet called for a hunger strike to press for the courts for an outcome favorable for the department.

In June 2007 Garzon accompanied President Álvaro Uribe Vélez as part of the presidential delegation that traveled to Washington DC pursuing the approval by the United States Congress of the Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement between Colombia and the United States. Senador Jorge Enrique Robledo of the Alternative Democratic Pole party and one of the most crtics of the trade agreement criticized Garzon and mentioned that Garzon had never been part of the Alternative Democratic Pole party nor he had been affiliated to the parties that formed the alliance Independent Democratic Pole or Democratic Alternative^[1]