Colombia’s first Black ambassador has walked a winding path

Colombian Ambassador Luis Gilberto Murillo’s journey has placed him on the front row of history throughout his career.

He was in the Soviet Union for the fall of the Berlin Wall, back in Colombia for the adoption of the country’s 1991 constitution, in Washington for the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the election of Barack Obama as the first Black U.S. president, and once again in his home country for the historic 2016 peace agreement with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia.

In 2000, while serving as the elected governor of the impoverished department of Chocó, Murillo was stripped of his position by the country’s courts, kidnapped and later fled with his family in exile to Washington.

Last year, he came back to D.C., this time as Colombia’s first Black ambassador to the United States.

“This means there are signs of change with the new government,” Murillo told The Hill.

“Black, Afro-descendant, Raizal and Palenquera communities, as we call them, have been in a process of revindication that [at] one stage ended with the constitution in ’91, where we were finally recognized as an ethnic group with specific ethnic and territorial rights.”

That process, Murillo said, eventually opened the door for Black and native Colombians to seek positions of power.

And the country’s connections with the U.S. played a significant role in its racial and ethnic equity process.

“The United States has played a very important role … in walking with the Afro-descendant community to acquire a larger voice in Colombia,” Murillo said.

“The role of Congress especially, of congressional members, Democrats and Republicans alike, has been fundamental, and especially of some members of the Congressional Black Caucus.”

Murillo highlighted the influence in that process of Rep. Gregory Meeks (N.Y.), the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and also of former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

“I think we’re at a very interesting moment where the participation of the Afro-Colombian community has helped ingrain democracy in the country,” he said.

But Murillo’s rise in Colombia’s democracy has faced major speed bumps.

His political career began in the early 1990s with positions in former President César Gaviria’s government promoting sustainable development in Chocó, directing urban planning in Bogotá under former Mayor Antanas Mockus, and finally as a coalition candidate to become governor of Chocó in 1997.

Two years into the governorship, Murillo was stripped of his position by a court that found irregularities in his election, granting the governorship to his opponent, who the court said had beaten Murillo by 114 votes.

“The first time I left [the governorship] — in politics, that generates a lot of frustration because I would have liked to end my term, and I prepared to be a good governor,” he said.

“More frustration when I had to leave the country because of the extortion kidnapping. At the time, they used kidnapping to intimidate and force politicians to work for paramilitary groups.”

In the U.S. after his kidnapping, Murillo applied his sustainable development experience worldwide, working with the development banks Lutheran World Relief and the Phelps Stokes Fund while at times moonlighting as a bouncer at a bar.

“From here, I was able to develop some work related to Colombia and be exposed to global [conditions],” he said.

Murillo worked on development in conflict and disaster zones, including in the Philippines, Indonesia, Southeast Asia (after the 2012 tsunamis), Darfur, Nepal, Congo and Liberia.

“It gave me a more global perspective, but always thinking about Colombia, and that alleviates one’s frustration, but I was always frustrated that I hadn’t been able to do what I wanted, to contribute to my country,” said Murillo.

From work in Liberia, he said, he learned a valuable lesson for Colombia, which at the time was fighting an intractable, half-century-old civil war.

“It demonstrated to me that peace was possible. If they can sign peace, why can’t we in Colombia,” he asked.

And Murillo saw progress in countries with deep-rooted ethnic and religious strife, where in Colombia the core reasoning behind the war was a political offshoot of the Cold War.

“It makes no sense that we are murdering each other when the differences that led to those conflicts are not that deep,” he thought at the time.

Throughout his career, Murillo has navigated contradictions. He trained in the Soviet Union as an open pit mining engineer but used that training as a consultant on how to mine sustainably.

“It’s possible to do open pit mining and use restorative processes that leave ecosystems in apt conditions to follow a process of natural regeneration,” said Murillo, who served as Colombia’s minister of the environment under former President Juan Manuel Santos.

He landed that job partly as a result of his second removal from the governorship of Chocó, after he returned home from Washington in 2011.

That year, he won an election to return to the governorship, but in 2012, the courts invalidated his election win in connection to an accusation stemming from his 2001 work for the city of Bogotá.

Santos named Murillo’s replacement, and two years later, he named Murillo to lead a special economic development initiative for Colombia’s Pacific coast. Then, he called Murillo up to his cabinet in a 2016 shuffle.

Murillo said he’s dealt with the whiplash in part by relying on his experience in the Soviet Union and traveling in East Germany as the Cold War came to an end.

“I witnessed the Gorbachev era and the fall of the wall; I had passed through the wall many times, and that was a period of optimism throughout the world,” he said.

“Optimism that one can tear down walls and build bridges.”

After his run as minister, Murillo jumped into the 2022 presidential election — an unpredictable race that ultimately led to the election of President Gustavo Petro, the country’s first leftist leader.

Murillo first campaigned in favor of Sergio Fajardo, a centrist candidate, becoming Fajardo’s vice presidential nominee, and moved to support Petro in the second round after his ticket came in fourth in the first round.

Petro has faced criticism internally and externally, particularly over a controversial health care law that underpins his left-leaning agenda.

“The president is respectful of institutions,” said Murillo. “What people must understand is he was elected for — and what we were all seeking in the campaign — was change.”

“They did not elect him for everything to remain the same.”