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Criticizing the conventional political theory, this article demonstrates that the rise of multiparty electoral competition, rather than improving the quality of democracy, ended up worse because increase the risk of emergence of candidates linked with criminal agents of different type (drug traffickers, guerrillas, paramilitaries and parapoliticians). This shows how the low institutionalization of the party system at the regional level makes easier and less costly in political and judicial terms, the relationship between politicians and bandits. Finally, it revised a couple of theories suggesting the electoral success of criminalized candidates as a product of patronage, income, poverty and party affiliation. The results of a non-parametric statistical model indicated the predictive limits of such theories. However, the authors find out that “fiscal laziness" is significantly associated with the likelihood of electoral success of candidates who allied themselves with illegal agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]