With signs reading 'Benedetti out', the Minister of the Interior is received in the plenary session of the House of Representatives

With banners of rejection. This is how Armando Benedetti, the new Minister of the Interior, was received in the Congress of the Republic after his entry into the Executive of President Gustavo Petro as head of the portfolio was confirmed.

Although his appointment had already been confirmed to EL TIEMPO by high-ranking sources at the Casa de Nariño, it was made official on the evening of Monday, February 24, when his resume was published on the website of the Presidency of the Republic.

Although President Petro has yet to take office, Benedetti made his first public appearance on Tuesday, February 25, when he arrived at the plenary session of the House of Representatives. He arrived at the chamber accompanied by the new director of Dapre, Angie Lizeth Rodríguez.

There, several congressmen took the opportunity to express their opposition to Benedetti's appointment. One of them was Jennifer Pedraza, representative to the House for Bogotá , who displayed a sign that read 'Out with Benedetti'.

On his X account, Pedraza explained his protest, stating that they will raise their voice against this appointment. "If Benedetti thinks he can walk around the House as if nothing happened, he is very wrong," he wrote.

And he added: "We will raise our voices as many times as necessary against what he represents: the putrid and sexist politics that Petro pretended to confront and which is now the style of his government."

Pedraza's sign was not the only one rejecting the new minister. Other signs used to protest against Benedetti's presence in the building read: 'Machismo does not govern us. Benedetti out.'

Representative Catherine Juvinao, for her part, announced that a group of women left the plenary to express their dissatisfaction. "We have no intention of sitting down with Mr. Benedetti for anything at all," she said.

In addition to the posters, there were other moments of tension in the plenary session due to the presence of the new official, as some congressmen denounced disorder during the discussion of the projects.

"I want to ask for respect for this plenary session. If there are progressive sectors that want to celebrate the arrival of the minister (Benedetti), that's up to them, but we also have to tell you, minister: if you want to contribute in any way, allow this plenary session to be in order," said representative Hernán Cadavid, of the Democratic Center.

Benedetti will take office as the fourth Minister of the Interior of President Petro's government. The portfolio was also headed by Alfonso Prada, Luis Fernando Velasco and Juan Fernando Cristo.

The new official, for his part, will assume his fifth position in Petro's Executive. He was Colombia's ambassador to Venezuela, head of the FAO diplomatic mission in Italy and advisor to the Presidency on legislative matters.

More recently he had been named chief of staff, an appointment that did not go down well with the so-called 'purebred' Petro supporters in the cabinet.

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