El Tiempo (Colombia)

El Tiempo
TypeDaily newspaper
FormatBroadsheet
Owner(s)Luis Carlos Sarmiento Angulo
Founder(s)Alfonso Villegas Restrepo
PublisherCasa Editorial El Tiempo S.A.
Editor-in-chiefAndrés Mompotes
Founded30 January 1911 (1911-01-30)
Political alignmentLiberal conservatism
Centre-right
LanguageSpanish
HeadquartersBogotá, D.C., Colombia
Circulation1,137,483 Daily readers
1,921,571 Sunday readers (2012)[1]
ISSN0121-9987
OCLC number28894254
Websitewww.eltiempo.com
First Edition of El Tiempo using its now traditional logo, published on May 1st, 1917. The first edition of the newspaper was published 6 years before, in 1911.

El Tiempo (English: "Time" or "The Times") is a nationally distributed broadsheet daily newspaper in Colombia launched on January 30, 1911. As of 2019, El Tiempo had the highest circulation in Colombia with an average daily weekday of 1,137,483 readers, rising to 1,921,571 readers for the Sunday edition.[1]

From 1913 to 2007, El Tiempo's main shareholders were members of the Santos family. Several also participated in Colombian politics: Eduardo Santos Montejo was President of Colombia from 1938 to 1942. Francisco Santos Calderón served as Vice-President (2002–2010). And Juan Manuel Santos as Defense Minister (2006–2009) during Álvaro Uribe's administration; Juan Manuel was elected president of Colombia in 2010 and served in that position until 2018.[2]

In 2007, Spanish Grupo Planeta acquired 55% of the Casa Editorial El Tiempo media group, including the newspaper and its associated TV channel Citytv Bogotá.[3] In 2012, businessman Luis Carlos Sarmiento Angulo bought the shares of Planeta, the Santos family and other small shareholders, becoming the only owner of the newspaper.[4][5] El Tiempo is considered a newspaper of record for Colombia.[6][7]

History

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The newspaper was founded in 1911 by Alfonso Villegas Restrepo. In 1913 it was purchased by his brother-in-law, Eduardo Santos Montejo. From then until 2007, El Tiempo's main shareholders were members of the Santos family, as part of the media conglomerate Casa Editorial El Tiempo. In 2007, the Spanish Grupo Planeta obtained majority ownership of the daily, but in 2012 sold majority ownership to Luis Carlos Sarmiento Angulo who now owns 86% of El Tiempo.

Between 2001 and 2008, when El Espectador was published as a weekly newspaper, El Tiempo was Colombia's only national daily newspaper.

El Tiempo is considered a newspaper of record for Colombia.[6][7]

Distribution

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El Tiempo is published in six regional editions:

  • Bogotá
  • Caribe (Barranquilla, Cartagena, Santa Marta, Sincelejo, Riohacha and Valledupar)
  • Medellín
  • Café (Pereira, Manizales, Armenia)
  • Cali (Cali, Popayán, Pasto)
  • Region, for the remainder of the country.

On Sundays there are special sections. For about 3 years it published every Sunday a special section with a weekly selection of articles from The New York Times, translated into Spanish and using the same pictures. This section was dropped in January 2008 and since August 2008 it has been published by rival newspaper El Espectador.

El Tiempo is part of Grupo de Diarios América (America Newspaper Group), an organization of eleven leading newspapers from eleven Latin American countries.

El Tiempo Building

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El Tiempo Building in 2024

The El Tiempo building is located on the southeastern corner of Carrera Séptima and Avenida Jiménez in Bogotá, Colombia. It was designed by architect Bruno Violi and inaugurated in 1961 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the newspaper. It housed the offices of the television channel Citytv until April 9, 2008, when it moved to Av. 26 #68B - 70. Since 2020, it belongs to the University of the Rosary.

In 2021 the building was purchased by the Universidad del Rosario.[8]

The building has an L-shaped floor plan. Its facade is divided into three parts, with the lowest section housing the entrance lobby. The second section is the main one, featuring a large surface area with rectangular openings for the windows and vertical and horizontal elements made of Bogotá stone. The third and final section contained a sunroom, which was later converted into office space.

References

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  1. ^ a b "Estudio revela que El Tiempo cuenta con más lectores diarios" [Studies show that El Tiempo has the highest daily readers]. El Tiempo (in Spanish). Bogotá. 2012-05-12. ISSN 0121-9987. OCLC 28894254. Retrieved 2012-06-04.
  2. ^ McDermott, Jeremy (2010-08-04). "How President Alvaro Uribe changed Colombia". BBC News. Retrieved 2017-08-04.
  3. ^ Committee to Protect Journalists. Attacks on the Press in 2007 - Colombia, February 2008
  4. ^ Semana (2012-04-19). "Sarmiento Angulo oficializa compra de El Tiempo". Semana (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 2017-10-03. Retrieved 2021-04-26.
  5. ^ El Tiempo, Casa Editorial. "Sarmiento Angulo es dueño de la totalidad de EL TIEMPO". Portafolio.co (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 2017-10-03. Retrieved 2021-04-26.
  6. ^ a b Rathbone, John Paul (3 June 2013). "The history and politics of Colombian media". Financial Times. Retrieved 6 May 2022. Luis Carlos Sarmiento, who has a $14bn fortune, according to Forbes, in 2012 bought El Tiempo, Colombia's largest-circulation daily and the newspaper of record.
  7. ^ a b "Terror of the Black Hand (Part 1)". The Irish Times. 9 March 2001. Retrieved 6 May 2022. On January 19th in Bogota, the city section of El Tiempo, Colombia's newspaper of record, ran a report which sent shivers through most urban readers.
  8. ^ "Universidad del Rosario adquirió el edificio El Tiempo ubicado en el centro de Bogotá" (in Spanish). Editorial La República. 30 January 2020. Retrieved 26 June 2024.
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