The young journalist spent the next eight months chained to a bed, not knowing if he would live or die. Finally, Escobar released him unharmed. After one of history's biggest manhunts, Escobar was killed in shootout in December 2, 1993. In 1997, Colombia's Nobel Prize winning writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez told Santos story in his book, "News of a Kidnapping," and the former hostage became famous.

On a damp Bogota evening last May, Santos, now the country's vice president, and I sat for an interview in his spacious office in Casa Narino, Colombia's equivalent of the White House. The Vice President became reflective in recalling that harrowing experience. "Being kidnapped changed my life," he said softly. "After my release, I didn't want to become a victim. So I got actively involved first hand and not just from behind the scenes in the political issues facing my country."

Santos formed two non governmental organizations (NGOs) that have assisted kidnapping victims and their families and promoted civil society resistance against kidnapping and terrorism. He has used his newspaper column in El Tiempo, Colombia's equivalent of the New York Times, to urge Colombians to become more aggressive in finding a peaceful solution to the country's problems. And then in 2002 he entered politics when presidential candidate Alvaro Uribe selected his as his running mate. When the ticket won in landslide, Santos became the second most powerful political figure in Colombia, a constitutional democracy with about 35 million people. While I waited for the interview to begin, the Vice President was a blur of energy as he moved quickly, papers in hand, among the offices in the Casa. Aides in dark business suits scurried after Santos who was dressed in brown suit pants and a pale green oxford shirt. Santos was not wearing a suit jacket and his tie hung loosely. He looked too young to be a vice president, but his intense, no-nonsense manner left no doubt who was in charge. It's another long day for the Vice President, his press assistant, Cristina Rodriguez, told The Daily Star, and she apologized for the fact that her boss was a half hour late for the interview. "I have never been afraid of hard work," said Santos when our interview began. "When I was studying at the university, I would spend countless hours in the library, reading and devouring information. A 14 or 16 hour day is normal for me." Francisco Santos was born into a family whose name in Colombia is synonymous with the media. The Santos family owns the El Tiempo newspaper, a television station and Intermedia, one of the country's largest publishers. He is the sixth child of a family that includes five brothers and two sisters. After graduating from the Colegio in 1979, he enrolled at the University of Kansas at Lawrence and then transferred to the University of Texas at Austin in 1981 where he studied journalism and Latin American studies. Santos did take time to get involved in the protests against U.S.'s Central American policy while at the University of Texas. "I was very much against U.S. policy, especially aid to El Salvador, and I attended many protests and meetings," he recalled. "I remember protesting Henry Kissinger's visit to the campus."

Upon graduating, Santos returned to Colombia to work for El Tiempo, the family newspaper. He started out as a reporter and by 1990 had worked his way up to executive editor. It was a pivotal and dangerous time in Colombian history. In 1984, Escobar and the Medellin cartel murdered Justice Minister Rodrigo Lara Bonilla, and President Virgilio Barco declared war on the gangsters, igniting a turbulent period of narco terrorism in which Escobar operated in Colombia in the 1980s and early 1990s much like al Zarqawi has done in Iraq today.

It was a difficult time to be a journalist, a situation that has not changed to this day. Between 1980 and 2000, at least 179 Colombian journalists were murdered doing their job. "I never practiced self censorship, and that's why I was targeted for kidnapping," Santos said. "Narco terrorists target journalists who speak truth to their power."

After his kidnapping, Santos spent a year at Harvard University as a Nieman fellow. In 1992, he returned to Colombia, where nothing had changed, as the grim statistics reveal. Annually, an average of 800 people were kidnapped and another 20,000 to 30,000 people murdered during the 1990s. Four years later, Santos organized Pais Libre (Free Nation), the organization to assist kidnapping victims and their families. Santos led marches and protests that culminated in a huge 1999 march involving millions of Colombians rallying under the banner of "No Mas" (No More).

"When we announced that we were going to march to publicize all the kidnappings, people said to me: 'You're crazy. Nobody marches in this country,'" Santos recalled. "But they did by the hundreds of thousands. It was a cry from the people of Colombia for change. They were saying: 'We need to stop the kidnappings and violence. We need to stop destroying the country.'" By the late 1990s, the country's guerrillas had become heavily involved in the country's drug trade and their power and arrogance grew. When they started to blow up the country's electrical utility towers, Santos helped start another campaign. "If the guerrillas wanted to turn off the country's lights, then we Colombians would show them we could do the job better," he explained. "We asked Colombians to turn out their lights in their homes, and four million Colombians did do that, defying the powerful guerrillas." By now, however, the crusading journalist had become a marked man. Santos learned from reliable sources that "Frente 21," a unit of Colombia's biggest guerrilla army, planned to kill him. Santos began to move carefully about Bogota, always accompanied by two bodyguards. In March 2000, Santos decided to visit his farm near Bogota. On the way, he stopped at his favorite restaurant located near the farm. "Some armed men are looking for you," the proprietor told Santos. He knew it was time to leave Colombia, for discretion is the better part of staying alive. Santos joined the many colleagues who had gone into exile in Spain. While in Spain, Santos worked as an assistant to the publisher of Madrid's El Pais newspaper. He sent a column to El Tiempo each week, while keeping a close eye on Colombian politics, especially the presidential campaign of candidate Alvaro Uribe whom he admired.

Santos wrote a letter to Uribe from exile telling him that he agreed with many of his campaign positions, especially his vow to get tough with the country's guerrillas and paramilitaries. Uribe contacted Santos and asked him if he could write some position papers for him about how to deal with the corruption and drug trafficking in Colombia. Santos agreed and then Uribe arranged a meeting in which he asked the journalist to run on his presidential ticket.

Santos viewed the offer as a chance to make a difference in Colombian politics, but the move didn't go over well with his family, which had always tried to distance itself from politics. In an editorial, El Tiempo criticized Santos, complaining that his decision to run would "discredit many years of effort to distance this daily from politics and partisan connections, and to be clearly independent of public and private power." During the election, guerrillas tried to assassinate Uribe three times, forcing the ticket to stop campaigning publicly. This didn't sit well with Santos. "I said forget it!" Santos recalled. "I campaigned out in the open and went all over the country. We won easily."

Relations between Santos and his family remain cool, but he does not regret his decision. "I'm serving my country and I really think our administration is making a difference," he said. "We have improved the security of the country more than the people thought we could. The economy is strong and we are giving the people hope for a better future, the first time that's happened in long time. Our popularity as shown in the polls is sky high." Traditionally, Colombian presidents have served just one term by law, but the country's constitution was recently amended so Uribe can serve another four-year term beginning in 2006. Does Francisco Santos one day want to run for the presidency? He answers with the passion that characterizes his style: "All I know is that we have to keep working hard to change this country. I'm 43..still young. I've a survivor. I feel blessed!"

Ron Chepesiuk (www.ronchepesiuk.com) is a Visiting Professor of Journalism at Chittagong University and a Research Associate with the National Defense College in Dhaka.