Nancy Patricia Gutiérrez Castañeda (born 16 October 1963) is a Colombian lawyer and politician. She served as

Senator of Colombia The Senate of the Republic of Colombia () is the upper house of the Congress of Colombia, with the lower house being the Chamber of Representatives of Colombia, Chamber of Representatives. The Senate has 108 members elected for concurrent (non ...

and Member of the

Chamber of Representatives of Colombia The Chamber of Representatives (Spanish: ''Cámara de Representantes'') is the lower house of the Congress of Colombia. It has 172 members elected to four-year terms. Electoral system According to the Colombian Constitution, the Chamber of ...

, having served in both chambers as president.

Career

Gutiérrez Castañeda, a lawyer from the Our Lady of the Rosary University, was first elected in 1988 as

mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...

of the

Municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

Agua de Dios Agua de Dios (, literally in ) is a municipality and town of Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The ...

, Cundinamarca, representing the political movement Colombia Always, a movement created within the

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. For example, while the political systems ...

. After finalizing her term in 1990 Gutiérrez Castañeda was appointed Regional Director of the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare (ICBF) in 1991. She later returned to the political arena when she supported Leonor Serrano for the Governorship of Cundinamarca in 1994. When Serrano was elected she appointed Gutiérrez Castañeda as Secretary of Environment in January 1995, and a year later as secretary general.

Representative

In 1997, she resigned from Serrano's administration to postulate herself for the

for the

legislative elections A general election is an electoral process to choose most or all members of a governing body at the same time. They are distinct from by-elections, which fill individual seats that have become vacant between general elections. General elections ...

of 1998. After a long deliberation process following the corruption scandal that resulted in the resignation of the President of the Chamber of Representatives, Armando Pomárico, Gutiérrez Castañeda was elected by the liberal majority coalition to finish Pomárico's term as President of the Chamber of the Representatives of Colombia, and became on March 30, 2000 the first woman to ever serve as President of the Chamber in the history of Colombia. Although her short presidency ended on July 20, 2000, she terminated the programs her predecessor was accused of, like foreign trips, gasoline allowances for the transportation of congress members, and the payroll discrepancies that so infuriated the public. In 2002 Gutiérrez Castañeda was re-elected representing the Colombia Always movement supporting once again Leonor Serrano who ran for a seat in the Senate. In 2004 Colombia Always left the Liberal coalition and joined the ranks of the

Radical Change Radical Change (, CR, stylised with a backwards "R") is a conservative liberal political party in Colombia. After the elections on 12 March 2006, the party became one of the most important in the new Congress, receiving 20 seats in the lower ho ...

. As a Representative, she was a member of the First Constitutional Commission, the Special Commission on Territorial Division, the Commission on Peace, and the Special Commission on Modernization.

Senator

For the

of 2006 Gutiérrez Castañeda was elected as

in representation of Radical Change. Radical Change had made a pact with the coalition of supporters of President

Álvaro Uribe Álvaro Uribe Vélez (born 4 July 1952) is a Colombian politician who served as the 31st President of Colombia from 7 August 2002 to 7 August 2010. Uribe started his political career in his home department of Antioquia Department, Antioquia. H ...

, giving the party the chance to preside the Senate. After an election in Congress against senators Rubén Darío Quintero, Arturo Char, and Miguel Pinedo, Gutiérrez Castañeda was elected President of the Senate of Colombia for the period that began on July 20, 2007.

Controversies

On April 18, 2008, the

Supreme Court of Colombia The Supreme Court of Justice of Colombia () in Bogotá is the highest judicial body in civil and penal matters and issues of criminal and civil procedure in Colombia. The court consists of twenty three judges, elected by the same institution i ...

ordered a preliminary investigation against Senator Gutiérrez while she was President of Congress for her apparent relation to armed right rebel groups in the

Colombian parapolitics scandal The Colombian parapolitics scandal (known as parapolítica in Spanish, a portmonteau of '' paramilitar'' and '' política'') refers to the Colombian congressional scandal in which several congressmen and other politicians have been indicted f ...

that shook the country, and led to the incarceration of various congressmen. The investigations connected Gutierrez with alias "El Pájaro", paramilitary of Cundinamarca, from where she is from Gutiérrez has denied the allegations and any relation with the rebels, citing her investigation as a plot against her. On 17 October 2011 the

Office of the Inspector General of Colombia The Office of the Inspector General of Colombia () is a Colombian independent public institution overseeing both the public conduct of those in authority or in charge of exercising a public office and the correct functioning of other governmen ...

officially dropped the case against Congresswoman Gutiérrez.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gutierrez, Nancy Patricia 1963 births Living people Del Rosario University alumni Members of the Chamber of Representatives of Colombia Presidents of the Chamber of Representatives of Colombia Presidents of the Senate of Colombia Colombia Always politicians Radical Change politicians Colombian Liberal Party politicians Ministers of the interior and justice of Colombia Women government ministers of Colombia Female interior ministers 20th-century Colombian women politicians 20th-century Colombian politicians 21st-century Colombian women politicians 21st-century Colombian politicians 20th-century Colombian lawyers 20th-century Colombian women lawyers