Bogota: Gustavo Petro on Sunday took the oath of office as Colombia’s first-ever leftist president, before a crowd of hundreds of thousands at his inauguration in Bogota.
The 62-year-old former guerrilla and onetime mayor takes over from the deeply unpopular Ivan Duque, with plans for profound reforms in a country beset by economic inequality and drug violence.
Petro’s hard-fought victory in June elections brought Colombia, long ruled by a conservative elite, into an expanding left-wing fold in Latin America.
“I swear to God and promise the people that I will faithfully enforce the constitution and the laws of Colombia,” said Petro in his oath of office.
At a ceremony in Bogota on the eve of his inauguration, Petro said his government, which should enjoy support from a left-leaning majority in Congress, would aim to “bring to Colombia what it has not had for centuries, which is tranquility and peace.”
“Here begins a government that will fight for environmental justice,” he added.
