ÓSCAR IVÁN ZULUAGA’S name was on the ballot, but it was his political mentor and the former president, Álvaro Uribe (pictured right), who pulled in the votes. A finance minister under Mr Uribe, Mr Zuluaga (pictured left) scored 29% in the first round of Colombia’s presidential election on May 25th, beating Juan Manuel Santos, the current president, by four percentage points. The two men will now face each other in a run-off on June 15th.

With his direct, folksy manner, Mr Uribe has dominated Colombian politics since he first won the presidency in 2002. After changing the constitution to allow his re-election, he won again in 2006. Barred from a third term, he backed Mr Santos, his former defence minister, in 2010, expecting his successor to continue his tough security policies, particularly against the FARC guerrillas.

In office, though, Mr Santos veered from Mr Uribe’s programme. He mended frazzled relations with Venezuela and Ecuador, undid some of Mr Uribe’s measures (such as tax breaks for mining and oil companies), and began peace talks with a weakened FARC. A furious Mr Uribe is now Mr Santos’s fiercest critic.

In a congressional election in March, Mr Uribe and 18 allies won Senate seats under the banner of a new party that at first bore his name, Uribe Centro Democrático (now known simply as Centro Democrático). Mr Zuluaga is running on the same party’s ticket. The former president is still wildly popular for taming the guerrillas, despite questions about his government’s human-rights record and scandals over phone-tapping. Mr Zuluaga has himself become entangled in an e-mail hacking controversy (he denies wrongdoing).

Since Mr Zuluaga’s profile was so low, Mr Uribe accompanied him at many campaign rallies. In the heat of the first-round campaign, Mr Santos accused Mr Zuluaga of being a “puppet” of Mr Uribe, which the candidate denied. But he has said he would maintain peace talks with the FARC only if it unilaterally declared a ceasefire, a condition that would probably end the negotiations. He also says he would reinstate many of Mr Uribe’s other security measures. “We will pick up your banners,” he said after the first round of voting, a message aimed at Mr Uribe.

For his part Mr Santos says the voters have a clear choice on June 15th, “between those who want an end to the war, and those who want a war without end”. Most of the 15.5% who voted for Marta Lucía Ramírez, a Conservative, will back Mr Zuluaga, while supporters of Clara López, who won 15.2% for a leftist party, are likely to back Mr Santos. His chances of a second term turn in part on his ability to galvanise an apathetic electorate to vote to keep the peace talks going. But for many Colombians the choice is not between Mr Santos and Mr Zuluaga, but between bringing Mr Uribe back to power, albeit behind the scenes, and keeping him out.