Gustavo Bolívar's #PPP: A Good Idea? / Multimedia Editor's Analysis

As we approach one of the most challenging electoral contests for our democracy, Gustavo Bolívar, a pre-candidate for the Historic Pact, has proposed transparency in digital political communication: that so-called "influencers" working for political campaigns should mark their paid posts with a hash symbol, #PPP (paid political advertising) .

Far from discussing politics in this space, I was powerfully drawn to the proposal, from the perspective of digital communication: amidst his resentment, Bolívar acknowledges that some of the "influencers" who worked with or for him in the past, today, serving other interests and resources, attacked him on social media without specifying that they would be doing so in the context of the 2026 electoral race.

Furthermore, Bolívar promises that his "influencers" will include the aforementioned #PPP hashtag in all their digital communications. And that's not a bad idea. It's profoundly evident that political communication in Colombia is completely dominated by opinion manipulation strategies disguised as "activism" and freedom of expression . Powerful and intricate digital structures operate under the concept of "influence bubbles," where there are tools, profiles, and roles dedicated to positioning messages, fake news, or attacks, depending on the request of the campaign, politician, or entity that hires them.

An account publishes a post, a headline; then, an army of bot (fake) accounts leverage the message to position it; then, real accounts with organic reach pick them up, and even large profiles (of important politicians and leaders) end up promoting them to amplify their audience impact to the nth power.

What Bolívar proposes would be a major first step toward controlling these structures, known in popular jargon as "warehouses," through which oceans of resources, money, technology, and advertising or paid content on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, etc., flow in the form of "organic activist content," without the National Electoral Council regulating them, as we in the media do.

The "influencers" and the collusion of social media, which are sly when it comes to taking responsibility, wield a high level of influence and power over the Colombian electorate . This will continue to grow. We are long overdue for them to be regulated, controlled, and sanctioned for their obvious feints aimed at manipulating public opinion. Let the #PPP be formalized.