Luis Carlos Galán

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Galán (left) with Justice Minister Rodrigo Lara Bonilla (1984)

Luis Carlos Galán Sarmiento (born September 29, 1943 in Bucaramanga , Santander , † August 18, 1989 in Soacha , Cundinamarca ) was a Colombian journalist and politician. He was murdered by the drug mafia.

Life

Luis Carlos was the third of twelve children. In 1949, after the assassination attempt on Jorge Eliécer Gaitán , the Galán family moved to Bogotá. First Galán attended the Colegio Americano in Bucaramanga , from 1952 the Colegio Antonio Nariño in Bogotá. As a teenager, Galán took part in the 1957 student protests against the regime of Gustavo Rojas Pinilla and was imprisoned for one night. Galán graduated from school with honors in 1960 and studied law and economics at the Pontifical University of Xaveriana in Bogotá. After graduating in 1965, he started working for the daily newspaper El Tiempo . In the same year, his premarital son Luis Alfonso Galán Corredor was born.

Galán was a confidante of the Liberal President Carlos Lleras Restrepo . His successor, Misael Pastrana Borrero , was appointed Minister of Education in 1970. In 1972 he was sent to Italy as ambassador .

From 1978 until his assassination in 1989 by Los Extraditables , an offshoot of the Medellín cartel , Galán was a senator . He was serving as a senator at a time when drug traffickers in Medellín were expanding their business internationally. Together with the then Justice Minister Rodrigo Lara Bonilla , Galán fought the Medellín cartel, whereupon Lara Bonilla was murdered in 1984. Despite this attack by the Medellin cartel, Galán continued his fight against the drug lords. On August 18, 1989, the presidential candidate Galán was shot dead on behalf of Pablo Escobar during a campaign speech in Soacha , Cundinamarca , and died the same day in a hospital in Bogotá. His party colleague and opponent Alberto Santofimio Botero had supported Pablo Escobar in his murder plan. In 2011, Santofimio was sentenced to 24 years in prison for complicity. At the time of his assassination, Galán had been clearly in the lead in the race for the presidency; instead, his campaign manager, César Gaviria, was elected.

After the murder of Galán, the Colombian government stepped up its fight against the drug lords in Medellín, together with the DEA, the Drug Enforcement Administration . This resulted in "Narcoterrorismo", in which the Medellín cartel terrified the country of Colombia for many years with brutal attacks. The battle with the Medellín cartel ended in 1993 with the death of Pablo Escobar. This later benefited the Cali Cartel , another association of Colombian drug lords in Cali.

Web links

Commons : Luis Carlos Galán  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ^ El hijo secreto de Luis Carlos Galan rompio su silencio . elespectador.com. Accessed March 21, 2017 (Spanish)
  2. ↑ A 30 años del asesinato de Luis Carlos Galán: el enfrentamiento con Pablo Escobar y un crimen que cambió la historia de Colombia infobae.com, from August 18, 2019 (es)
  3. ↑ El día que mataron a Galán, crónica triste de una tragedia anunciada elespectador.com, accessed on March 19, 2018 (Spanish)
  4. ↑ Luis Carlos Galán - Colombia's political hero . Reise-nach-kolumbien.de. Accessed April 9, 2017
  5. ↑ Ex-Justice Minister has to be arrested again . taz.de. Accessed April 9, 2017
personal data
SURNAME Galán, Luis Carlos
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Galán Sarmiento, Luis Carlos (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Colombian journalist and politician
DATE OF BIRTH September 29, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH Bucaramanga , Santander
DATE OF DEATH August 18, 1989
Place of death Soacha , Cundinamarca