NEW CHALLENGE TO THE BOGOTA LEADERSHIP

IBAGUE, Colombia -- Normally, Guillermo Jaramillo, governor of a poor and
debt-ridden province, could expect to be ignored by Colombia's highly
centralized government in far off Bogota.

It has been this way since colonial times, with the capital, high in the
Andes, dictating policies as it sees fit, often regardless of the wishes of
local officials.

But these days, Mr. Jaramillo and five like-minded governors -- all from
southern provinces mired in civil conflict and where most of the country's
illicit drug crops are grown -- have not only attracted the attention of
Bogota but also angered entrenched politicians who frown on insolent
regional leaders.

The reason is that the governors, all of whom won office last October, have
organized into a formidable political bloc that has harshly criticized the
central government for everything from the handling of finances to the drug
war.

That has embarrassed officials in Bogota and highlighted the lack of
support in rural Colombia for an American-financed program that largely
relies on aerial defoliation to stamp out drug production.

Indeed, the governors have gone as far as Europe and Washington to
criticize the program, which has destroyed coca fields across southern
Colombia but displaced and alienated farmers.

The governors instead propose their own voluntary eradication program of
coca and heroin poppy fields, and have sought out foreign governments for
financing and technical expertise.

Most troubling to Bogota, some of the governors have expressed the desire
to hold their own talks with insurgencies that have been at war for years,
leftist rebels and right-wing paramilitaries. Some in Bogota, however, see
such a proposal as nothing short of treason, since peace negotiations are
held under the sole mandate of President Andres Pastrana.

"This is a threat against the Constitution and against the peace process,"
said Robert Camacho, a Bogota congressman.

"This is something that can jeopardize the country's well-being," added Mr.
Camacho, who in a recent speech said the governors' bloc is akin to a
secessionist movement. "It is about war and peace and too delicate for them
to do what they want."

Some Colombia experts say that the governors' efforts, while understandable
in a country whose rural regions have long been forgotten, could prove
damaging to the country as a whole.

The governors' movement, called the southern bloc, has stirred enough
concern that new life has been injected into proposed congressional
legislation that would sanction local officials who are seen as meddling in
the peace process. The bill was first proposed last fall, before the
governors took office.

"These governors are popularly elected, and they are realizing a program
contrary to their duties: dividing the state," said Fernando Giraldo, dean
of the political science department at the Javeriana University in Bogota.

Because of the southern bloc, said Mr. Giraldo, Colombia is "before the
international community displaying a fragmented voice, the president on one
side and the governors on the other."

In interviews, the governors said their goal is not to destabilize. Rather,
they said, the aim is simply to draw attention to their region's problems
and to obtain resources for regional public projects and agricultural
development programs seen as alternatives to defoliation.

If the aid comes from Bogota, so be it, the governors say; but they say
they will continue to appeal to foreign governments, too. The southern
bloc's proposals are still in the planning stages, and little financial
support has gone their way.

"What we want for the regions, for the provinces as well as the towns, is
the possibility to express ourselves," said Mr. Jaramillo, speaking in his
office overlooking a public square here in Ibague, the capital of the
province of Tolima. "That is why we've gone out to explain our ideas, and
present what we think is a bit different from the national government's
concepts."

The governors said that they supported Mr. Pastrana's peace efforts and
respected his authority when it came to negotiating, but they said they
wanted the particular concerns of their provinces to be aired by local
officials in those talks with the insurgencies.

The governors and other provincial officials also hinted, as many local
officials in Colombia do, that the government should open dialogue with
paramilitary groups, something Mr. Pastrana's government has refused.
Recently, in fact, Mr. Jaramillo met with the paramilitary leader, Carlos
Castano, and also paid a visit to the rebels.

"What we've said is we cannot sign a peace pact, but we can do a peace
process," said Floro Tunubala, the governor of Cauca. "And to do a peace
process means talking."

The southern bloc is a mixture of traditionalists and upstarts. They
include Parmenio Cuellar of Narino, a former senator and minister of
justice, and Mr. Jaramillo, a pediatric heart surgeon who has operated on
1,200 children.

The group also has the most unlikely governor in Colombia, Mr. Tunubala, a
Guambiano Indian who won office in a province well known for discrimination
and social inequality. Mr. Tunubala's political movement -- composed of
Indians, union leaders, poor farmers, intellectuals and others outside the
province's circle of power -- has already angered some people in Cauca and
prompted death threats.

The other governors, longtime local politicians, are from Huila and the two
provinces where most of Colombia's coca grows, Putumayo and Caqueta.

The governors acknowledge that local officials have more control since the
country's 1991 Constitution gave regional leaders more decision-making
powers and resources.

But revenue is still raised by the central government. The six provinces,
the size of Kansas and with a combined population of six million, also
remain desperately poor and rural in a largely urban country.

The region also contains three-quarters of the country's coca crops and
nearly all the poppy fields, employing 335,000 people in all.

The very fact that an alliance exists is "essentially a cry for help, a
collective petition for the government to do something," said Larry Birns,
a Colombia expert and director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in
Washington. "These are governors that, because they come from peripheral
states, have been neglected."

The issue that most unites the governors is their opposition to
defoliation, which they warn alienates their constituents without resolving
the problems that lead farmers to cultivate illegal crops.

Juan de Jesus Cardenas, governor of Huila, said regional leaders across the
south believed that defoliation would simply drive farmers to cultivate
coca and poppies in other regions.

"That is what has happened with defoliation of Putumayo, with the movement
of displaced people into Narino," said the governor, whose province serves
as a corridor for drugs and rebels.

The governors want to replace illicit crops by prodding farmers to
eradicate in exchange for subsidies and markets for their products. The
Colombian government, with American money and expertise, is running such a
program, but the governors said they were working to tailor their own
programs to meet the needs of farmers in their provinces.

"We need gradual eradication," said Mr. Tunubala. "We need to put in new
crops, and we need to look for markets nationally and internationally."

That was the reason for Mr. Jaramillo's recent trip to a mountainous
rebel-controlled region in southern Tolima. There, Mr. Jaramillo met with
farmers to urge them to participate in the eradication program financed by
the Americans. It was not easy. Most had felt ignored by a central
government they view as inept and unresponsive.

Several farmers, after meeting with Mr. Jaramillo, said they would not have
agreed to meet with or participate had it not been for the governor, whom
they view as independent from Bogota. Leftist rebels who showed up
uninvited -- and had the power to quash any government plan in the region
- -- allowed farmers to move forward in part because of Mr. Jaramillo's
involvement.

"He's from these lands," said one farmer, Ramiro Perez, 38, standing on a
steep mountain where he grows poppies. "We've seen him here. He has worked
hard to get here. Maybe that means good news."