Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, having been praised so much recently, is about to bring back Colombia to a time his fellow citizens had thought were over. As announced last Monday he is proposing to nominate former president Ernesto Samper Pizano (1994- 1998) as Ambassador to France.

Samper's period in office was marred from the beginning by the 5 million dollar funding he had received from the Cali cartel for his electoral campaign. Even today Samper is still viewed as an international pariah, and has not received a visa to enter the US.

No one knows what Uribe owes his predecessor, Samper that he should nominate him as Ambassador to Paris.

Some say that Samper is working towards a humanitarian agreement between hostages held by FARC and imprisoned rebels. And that his first objective would be the freeing of French - Colombian hostage, Ingrid Betancourt, kidnapped more than 4 years ago.

If that turns out to be true, it would be a disgrace that Uribe is trusting a man of whom Ingrid said, during the enquiry conducted in the Parliament:

"I want Samper to know what I think of him. He has betrayed Colombia (…) at a time when he could have been the President to save Colombia; he was in effect its Judas. That is why he is a disgrace, because he lied to us". Can we really believe that the man whom Ingrid believed a traitor is a suitable person to bring about her liberation?

Actually this deplorable incident is an almost exact repeat of what happened on 3 January 1998. That day without having officially confirmed it, President Ernesto Samper informed TV stations in Colombia that he intended to nominate former Defence Minister Guillermo Albert Mosquera as Ambassador to Madrid. Mosquera had already resigned 10 months previously - after having remained in office for 40 days- because it was discovered that in 1989, he had received from drug baron Justo Pastor Perafán 3000 dollars for his campaign. Mosquera maintained that he was unaware that Perafan was a drug trafficker but finally had to resign. When ABC revealed that the Colombian President wished to send a former minister, funded by narcotics trade, to Spain, Samper had to make a u -turn.

He has not learned from this since he has now convinced Uribe to nominate him as Ambassador - and his campaign funding did not involve 3000 dollars from a drug baron - but five million dollars from the Cali drug cartel!

The summary published by ABC on 7 January in the case of Gonzalez Mosquera is perfectly apt for what is happening currently: "Was there no one else in the entire country suitable for the job, whose nomination as ambassador would not damage the honour of Colombia?"