Rafael Gusto Villana (Napoleon's World)

Raphael Gusto Villana (born October 17, 1922) is a retired Colombian politician, diplomat and academician. As one of the most prominent center-right politicians of an extremely left-wing era in Colombian politics, he engineered the non-confidence vote in 1983 that ousted the powerful Socialists from power and brought his own Republican Party to power for the remainder of the 1980's.

Villana served as President of Colombia between 1983 and 1990 as a reward for his tough stance on the Socialists and for ousting his predecessor in a dissolution of Congress. During his reign, the economy of Colombia fluctuated, but he oversaw the withdrawal of American forces from Colombia, aggressively broke the backs of powerful entrenched Colombian interests impeding the war effort, and launched a surprisingly ambitious counterattack against the sagging Brazilians in 1986 after a few years of tepid fighting. Villana is regarded as a national hero in Colombia for expediting the collapse of the Brazilian military dictatorship, especially as he did it with the Americans gone.

Despite his popularity in the wake of the 1987 victory over Brazil, the economic collapse of 1988, which had vast regional implications, soured public opinion of him and the Republicans barely survived local elections in 1990. He resigned on November 4th, 1990 to prepare his hand-picked successor for the 1992 general election. After resignation, he served as the Colombian Foreign Minister until his permanent retirement from politics in 1997.