In 2018, Santiago de Cali was a winner of the Cities of Service Engaged Cities Award for its work with local citizen-led councils in the city. The award elevates city-led strategies that most successfully engage citizens to help create and implement solutions to pressing local problems. To combat a high level of violence, city leaders created local mesas, or councils, comprised of residents in 15 districts. The mesas launched a variety of community initiatives to build trust between neighbors, such as the rehabilitation of public parks and staging arts events, that helped lower conflict within the community.
Municipal Administrative Center (CAM)
Avenida 2 Norte #10
70. Santiago de Cali
Valle del Cauca
Colombia
01 8000 222 195
Mayor Alejandro Eder Garcés
Alejandro Eder Garcés, mayor of Cali 2024-2027, is from Cali, is 46 years old and is a public servant, expert in social development and conflict resolution.
He has always had the desire to help and work for the reconciliation of the city and the country. As part of his legacy, he was given by his father Henry Eder, former mayor of the city, who taught him that "no desire for revenge can be above the desire to see Colombia at peace."
Her mother has also been an example in protecting the rights of women, children and those most in need.
Alejandro Eder worked at the Colombian Agency for Reintegration from 2007 to 2014 and at the same time, he was the Policy and Strategy advisor in the reintegration process of ex-combatants in Colombia, making it more effective and sustainable. Then, from 2010 to 2014, he served as Senior Presidential Advisor for the Reintegration of Colombia and General Director of the Colombian Agency for Reintegration (ACR).
As leader of the ACR, Eder focused on developing a reintegration policy based on strengthening host communities, developing the psychological and emotional stability of ex-combatants, and ensuring the long-term sustainability of reintegration through education, vocational training, and private sector involvement. He also worked for five years (2009-2014) on the Colombian Peace Process, initially as a member of the team that secretly negotiated the Framework Agreement with the FARC in Havana, Cuba, and then as an alternate negotiator in the public phase of the process.
Eder subsequently worked from 2015 to 2018 as executive director of ProPacífico, a Cali-based, private, independent, non-profit organization that works for the social, economic, and environmental development of the Pacific Region of Colombia with the help of public and private actors.
Between 2020 and 2021, he worked as Director of the Recruited Childhood Project, a research project by the Colombian Institute of Political Sciences on the illicit recruitment of minors, which contributed to the Truth Commission report and to the JEP investigation of case 07.
Alejandro Eder studied International Relations and Philosophy at Hamilton College and earned a Master's degree at the School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) at Columbia University in New York. Before working with the Colombian government, he worked in Investment Banking and Finance in New York City and in Colombia.