Behind the story
Visiting the Palace: What Colombia’s President Petro is ahead of Chancellor Scholz
© private / star
During his research into four rescued jungle children in the Amazon, ours came across star-Reporter got closer to his protagonists than he would have liked – and ended up in the National Palace. Why he still remembers this trip fondly.
Making-of – that’s the name of our new format on stern.de. We want to give you a personal look behind the scenes, tell us about our everyday journalistic life, what we experience during research and what motivates us in the editorial team. We’re starting a little series looking back at our moments in 2023.
It was the miracle of the year: After a plane crashed in the Amazon, four indigenous children survived alone for 40 days in the Colombian jungle.
Two weeks later, President Gustavo invited Petro to his residence in the capital Bogotá. He awarded medals to the heroes of the rescue, to soldiers, search parties, shamans – and the star was there, strangely enough.
And it happened like this: A few days earlier we had interviewed the commander of the historic rescue mission, General Pedro Sánchez. Because the sun was already setting on that Sunday afternoon, our photographer Jonas Wresch took a few portraits right at the beginning. The general really liked them. The iron gaze. The sharp edges. A national hero in uniform.
General Pedro Sanchez
© Jonas Wresch / star
Wresch is someone who can create a great portrait off the cuff. The general liked himself so much that he wanted the German photographer’s picture as his official profile photo.
From then on he spoke to us for hours about every detail of the search for the missing children, about his military maneuvers, his sophisticated tactics, but also about his desperation, his prayers and finally: the exuberant cheers, his tears of relief.
We were also able to interview his operations managers in detail in the following days and other soldiers in the barracks. And the father of the saved one Children and their uncle and aunt and grandparents and the shaman and the indigenous rescuers – at some point that happened star something like part of the family.
Something you don’t want to be as a journalist. Close – yes. Part of the family – no.
We didn’t have everything to thank for this one photo, but we did have a lot to thank for it – and probably also the access to the National Palace. President Petro gave a remarkable speech that day in the courtyard of his residence. He delivered it straight away, full of sophisticated sentences, full of poetry. He sounded like a national poet, like Gabriel García Márquez.
The president sounded like a national poet – and very different from Joe Biden or Olaf Scholz
I stood just a few meters away and imagined Joe Biden in such a moment – and quickly left it. Petro used the speech to tell the world what a big role indigenous trackers had in saving the children – and what a significant role they could play in preserving the Amazon and saving the climate and the survival of the planet. He sounded like a visionary. I imagined Olaf Scholz in such a moment – and quickly stopped.
Then Petro spoke of the magic and the spirits that helped in the search, he spoke of the spirituality in this very rational world and that even soldiers had followed the clues of the indigenous forest spirits in the jungle. He sounded like a shaman.
I had to think of Olaf Scholz and Joe Biden at the same time and asked myself why politicians always have to be so boring.
From reporter to “friend of the general”
The subsequent encounters in the presidential palace were moving. General Sánchez somewhat exuberantly introduced us to his wife as his German friends. Officers hugged native people. Ministers hugged farm boys. Soldiers and shamans remembered how they had saved the children together. Former enemies in this war-torn country were in each other’s arms.
And for a brief moment in this difficult year, one could have the impression: Everything will be okay with this world.