privileged insights

Yes to Life, No to the Mine - Si a la Vida No a la Mina

2011-06-06T10:33:00.000-07:00

(vea abajo por el español)
I wanted to write some poetry, I wanted to write some lyrical words, and what I seem to have written is anger and outrage manifested in these words. No apologies, just a heads up.

I walk through Belgrave, central London. It is a neighbourhood for the super rich, a neighbourhood build on the wealth of British colonialism and this wealth taken through a violent history of genocide, trickery and exploitation has never been returned.

Belgrave hits the human spirit hard. My eyes take in the white mansions and bullet proof 4x4's and the message that global wealth continues to be concentrated in central london. The tough lives of friends and unknown friends in Colombia and elsewhere are shaped by this power that resides in central London. I feel a combination of small, sick, angry and determined.

Thousands of miles away people are just waking up, excited and anxious. In a few hours time 12,000 people will be taking to the streets in the Colombian city of Ibague in the “Carnival for the Defense of Life”.

AngloGold Ashanti has been given the go ahead to open what will be – if we don't stop them – the largest opencast gold mine in South America. They are the third largest gold mining multinational in the world, and became so due to their history of getting rich by colonialsim in Africa. The city of London invests and profits from their mines.

From school kids to elderly people, 12,000 will fill the streets with a clear unequivocal united view “We want water, we want to live, Anglo Gold Ashanti leave this country in peace.”

Six hours earlier we are shouting the same words in the heart of the beast of capitalism. “We want water, we want to live, Anglo Gold Ashanti leave Colombia in peace.” Words break the silence of the fake peace of London. Words stretch across time and space, united in our sense of horror of what peoples lands would become if the mine goes ahead.

People are opposed to the mine as it will cause destruction to their environment – water, biodiversity, land - on which their lives in the region depend. The Colombia Solidarity Campaign have just published a great report "the Quest for El Dorado in Cajamarca".

A friend on the London demo had just returned from the Lake district and the reality of what La Colosa opencast gold mine means is made real by imagining gold being found in our beautiful lake district. Mountains removed to dig it out, huge slag heaps and contamination of Liverpool's and Manchesters water supplies with cianide. Would this be acceptable? Would Mancurians be expected to suffer so that others could profit? Is it that it is not in some peoples land but it is ok in someone elses?

Our silence on these questions could be their death toll. Silence is complicity in murder. And i don't use these words lightly. Pause. Stop, please consider them a moment.

Please consider this for a moment.

In Colombia 24,000,000 hectares of land are under threat of being mined.


Protected areas and mining requests

The area in red is equivalent to the size of the UK.

I personally struggle to believe this, it seems beyond comprehension. I don't want to believe this. but it is fact. My words seem pathetically insignificant yet my totally necessary.

Where will people live? What will they eat? What air will they breathe? What will they drink?

Much of the investment that is driving this mining boom comes from London and the money made from this mining will flow back in to the city of London.

Meanwhile the poor and landless on our own island are being told to accept the privatisation of what little common resources we have left, such as libraries and the NHS, because the country is skint. This morning at work I was told that I have to cut an elderly disabled womans morning visit by a carer by half because there is a crisis and "we need to save money". This is a lie. It is a lie with brutal consequences for people. We are being told we need to save money so that those with capital can take even more.

Colombians are being told they need to accept the privatisation of their gold. We are being told we need to accept the privatisation of our health care system.

A torrent of justifications are thrown at us, creating an ideology that convinces us that the only option is the privatisation of our common resources. It is not the only options.

12,000 Colombians showed us it is not the only option. People came out on the street on Ibague on Friday shouting "Yes to life, no to the mine".

Lets join them with our own twist relevent to our situation.

"yes to life, no to the mining of our NHS and welfare system for private profit."

Si a la Vida, No a la Mina

Quería escribir algo de poesía, quería escribir algunas palabras lírica, y lo que me parece que he escrito es la ira y la indignación manifiestada en estas palabras.

Camino por Belgrave en el centro de Londres. Es un barrio de los súper ricos, un barrio construido por la riqueza del colonialismo británico, una riqueza tomada a través de una historia violenta de genocidio, el engaño y la explotación. Es una riqueza que nunca ha sido devuelto.

Belgrave golpea duro el espiritu de humanidad . A mis ojos observan las mansiones blancas y 4x4 blindados y la mensaje visual de que la riqueza del mundo sigue concentrada en el centro de Londres. La vida dura de las amigos y muchos compañeras en Colombia y en otros lugares se forman por este poder que reside en el centro de Londres. Me siento una combinación de ser pequeños, enojados y decididos.

Miles de kilómetros de distancia la gente está despertando, emocionados y ansiosos. En pocas horas 12.000 personas se tomarán a las calles en la ciudad colombiana de Ibagué en el "Carnaval para la Defensa de la Vida".

AngloGold Ashanti ha dado luz verde para abrir lo que será - si no se lo impidamos - la mina a cielo abierto de oro más grande de América del Sur. Se trata de la tercera mas grande multinacional de de oro en el mundo, y fue así debido a su historia de hacerse rico por el colonialismo en África. El centro financiero de Londres invierte y saca las ganancias de sus minas.

Desde niños a personas mayores, 12.000 se llenarán a las calles con una perspectiva unida "Queremos agua, queremos vivir, Anglo Gold Ashanti salir de este país en paz."

Seis horas antes, estamos gritando las mismas palabras en el corazón de la bestia del capitalismo. "Queremos agua, queremos vivir, Anglo Gold Ashanti salir de Colombia en paz." Las palabras rompen el silencio de la falsa paz de Londres. Las palabras se extienden a través del tiempo y el espacio, unidos en nuestra sensación de horror de lo que pasaría al territorio de Cajamarca si la mina sigue adelante.

Las personas se oponen a la mina, ya que causará la destrucción de su medio ambiente - el agua, la biodiversidad, la tierra - en el que la vida en la región dependen. La Campaña de Solidaridad con Colombia acaba de publicar un informe "la búsqueda de El Dorado en Cajamarca".

Un amigo en la demostración de Londres acababa de regresar de la región de los Lagos en el norte de Inglaterra y la realidad de lo que La Colosa significaría se haga mas real imaginando si el oro se encuentra en nuestro region de lagos tan hermoso . Montañas destruidas para cavar, enormes montones de escoria y la contaminación con Cianide del agua de las ciudades de Liverpool y de Manchester ¿Sería esto aceptable? La gente de Manchester se debe sufrir para que unos pocos podrían beneficiarse? ¿Es que no esta bien en algunos pueblos de la tierra, pero está bien en otros? Será eso una postura racista?

Nuestro silencio sobre estas cuestiones podría costar la vida de gente. El silencio es complicidad en el asesinato. Y yo no uso estas palabras a la ligera. Pausa. Pare, por favor considere por un momento.

Por favor, considere esto por un momento.
En Colombia 24 millones de hectáreas de tierra están bajo amenaza de ser extraído.

El área en rojo es equivalente al tamaño del Reino Unido.

Personalmente me cuestra trabajo creer esto, parece más allá de la comprensión. No quiero creer que sea la verdad. pero es un hecho. Mis palabras parecen patéticamente insignificantes sin embargo totalmente necesario.

¿Dónde vivirá la gente? ¿Qué van a comer? ¿Qué aire respirarán? ¿Qué van a tomar?

Gran parte de la inversión que está impulsando este boom de la minería viene de Londres y el dinero obtenido de esta minera fluirá de nuevo a la zona financiero de Londres.

Mientras tanto, los pobres y los sin tierra en nuestra propia isla se les dice a aceptar la privatización de los recursos colectivos que nos queda, como las bibliotecas y el servicio nacional de salud. Dicen que el país está sin ni un peso.

Esta mañana en mi trabajo me dijeron que tengo que cortar el apoyo por una anciana discapacidatada a la mitad debido a que hay una crisis y "tenemos que ahorrar dinero". Esto es una mentira. Es una mentira brutal con consecuencias para muchas personas. Se nos está diciendo que tenemos que ahorrar dinero para que los que tienen el capital puede tener incluso más.
A los Colombianos se les dice que tienen que aceptar la privatización de su oro. Se nos está diciendo que tenemos que aceptar la privatización de nuestro sistema de salud.

Add caption

Un torrente de justificaciones se lanzan a nosotros, la creación de una ideología que nos convence de que la única opción es la privatización de nuestros recursos comunes. No es la única opción.

12.000 colombianos nos mostró que no es la única opción. La gente salió a la calle en Ibagué el viernes y gritaron "Sí a la vida, no a la mina".

Unamonos con nuestro propio toque pertinentes a nuestra situación.

"Sí a la vida, no a la minería de nuestro sistema de salud ni el sistema de bienestar social por el beneficio privado".

altruism while ignoring our own oppressions

2011-05-28T05:31:00.000-07:00

Joyce is a shortish women with piercing blues eyes. She pulls up a seat next to me at the meeting in the working mens social club. I read her clothes and accent, working class. We are here to talk about how to fight back to prevent the rich from taking the little that remains of peoples means of survival. We begin to get to know each other with hushed conversations reflecting on what the bigger group is talking about.

We are talking about the divide between rich and poor on this island. She focuses her reflection, not on material wealth, but on relationships across class and how we get divided by them. She says with clarity “I wouldn't like to be rich because then the poor wouldn't like me”. A desire to live in a classless society because only then can we relate to each other as humans.

She was here, not because of herself “I am doing ok, I have a roof and my pension, I am getting by, but I came here to support my friends” pointing to two people she had came in with. She echos a sentiment I heard often in Colombia. Young women at a workshop in La Vega, Catatumbo, tell us how they are ok and they want to help the people less well off than them.

What is this pattern of people choosing to play down their own oppressions, to think they are ok and to be altruistic all about?

The altruism is uplifting. Rather than “charity which hands down from above” what both Joyce and the Catatumbero women seems like an “altruism that reaches across with solidarity and empathy”, as equals.

Playing down their own oppressions is to accept daily reality as it is, it is to not risk anything for fear of disappointment, it is to fear hope itself.

To name oppression is to dream of changing it. I ask the question against.

What is this pattern of us choosing to play down our own oppressions, to think we are ok and to be altruistic all about?

She goes on to tell me that she works as a cleaner a few hours a day. It is not worth the money she is paid but she enjoys doing it. She likes making the place clean. It gets her out the house. Again she does not question the shit wages which you can barely survive off for doing such an important job but rather she focuses on taking pride in what she does. Amelia, from Ciudad Bolivar, Colombia said the same. While society fails to value the cleaning work that her and Joyce and millions of other women do around the world through mass exploitation, on an individual level they strive to live with dignity by valuing it for themselves.

She shows me how I too have also been trying to create meaning and value, to be satisfied withh the work I have been doing in Health and Social Care at the council. I get why we do this. But valueing what we do each day seems to easily turn in to being satisfied with how things are.

I hope that young women in Colombia while valueing their role of keeping their family home clean can demand respect for the work they do and continue to push the boundaries of what their social role is. I hope that Joyce while valuing her cleaning work can demand respect from society for the work she does, which would be minimally reflected in better wages, and can have the opportunity to get out of the house to do other fun things.

I hope I can value my skills assessing elderly and disabled peoples personal care needs and set up the care and support they need to have a dignified life while dreaming of being able to do this in a work place where my work is not so tightly controlled and monitored, and where I am not pressured to “save money”, words if more truthful would say “save money for the rich”. I am dreaming of us demanding that peoples needs must shape social services budgets, not the other way round.

* names are changed as I did not ask if I could write about them.

Construyendo territorio al regar la huerta de frutillas comunitaria

2011-03-25T12:31:00.000-07:00

Tuve la hora del almuerzo para escapar de la oficina donde hago un trabajo mas o menos interesante y por lo menos con utilidad social y volver a oler la auto-gestión en vez del gris jerarcico de la alcaldía. Monté la bicicleta y fui subiendo aún mas la loma en el sur de la ciudad de Bristol. Hartcliffe y Withywood son como la Ciudad Bolivar de las ciudades de los paises advanced capitalist; barrios con altos niveles del desempleo y falta de oportunidades.

Paso una seria de tiendas, la mitad desocupadas y abandonadas, la otra mitad consiste de un local que vienda alcohol, una tienda de comida rapida y un bar. No hay negocios locales que vende las cosas que se necesita en la casa como hay en Ciudad Bolivar. El ordenamiento territorial impulsado por los poderosos consiste en grandes centros comerciales donde hay que tener un carro para llegar y hacer el mercado por que el transporte publico es carisimo y poco regular; y donde todo la plata que la gente relativament pobre gasta va para grandes cadenas de tiendas. No hay economia local, pues solo en las drogas me imagino, pero tampoco la plata de eso queda en el barrio.

Bajo otro calle, piedras grandes bloquearon el final, colocados para que los jovenes no pueden jugar en su motos en el monte. Pues el razon es para que no se destruyan las matas pero a la vez es otra regla autoritario para controlar la vida y para que los jovenes tienen menos opciones gratis de que hacer. Pues, el vandalismo queda una de las opciones viables para lxs jovenes.

La vista desde la huerta de frutillas

Subo un sendero y llego a las huertas. Es un lote grandote, medio parte es cultivado por varios vecinos quienes tienen sembrados cultivos de papa, zanahoria, frijoles entre otras cosas. El otro parte es abandonado y las matas de mora lo han invadido. Pero hoy hay otro invasión. Un grupo de gente quienes ya tienen una huerta comunitaria mas abajo lo estan ocupando y recuperando para hacer un huerta de frutillas

Al llegar les veo sudando en el trabajo de Minga para hacer huecos profundos en la tierra densa de arcilla, se meten arboles de manzanas, peras, cereza y castaños y un compañero compromete a regarlos. El tiene como cincuenta años y su padre trabajaba la tierra cuando era joven. A pesar de que hay una desconexión masiva a la tierra en este pais que se manifiesta en un desconocimiento de los cultivos, de la alimentación, en donde vienen todos los productos que consumimos, a pesar de eso me da alegria seguir encontrando gente popular con historia de cultivar enn las ciudades. No es facíl. Una compañera me cuenta que acá hay que hacer las cosas como tres veces, los primeros dos veces los jovenes lo destruyan pero la tercera vez no les da la ganas y te dejan en paz.

Estes barrios populares fueron construidos en los sesentas como parte de la politica estatal de destruir los barrios populares antiguos. En mi región de nacimiento los politicos del partido laborista también tenían interes (en el inglés de dice los dedos en la torta – hay un expresión parecido en español?) en empresas de viviendas y ganarons mucha plata en la construción de los nuevos barrios. Desalojaron a mucha gente y los dispersaron a casas por toda la ciudad, destruyendo el tejido social y en muchos casos las 'nuevas' casas no eran de mejor condición. Las estrategias para lograr el desplazamiento de comunidades toman muchas formas pero como siempre los interés por las ganancias los motivan. Estos 'nuevos' barrios como Hartcliffe sufren de ser una comunidad sin comunidad, es decir mucha gente viven juntos pero con muy poco tejido social y con un construción colectivo del territorio muy debíl.

Han llegado proyectos del alcaldial como proyectos para jovenes pero no ofrecen ningun espacio para hablar del por que sus vidas son así, promuevan la confianza y auto-estima para poder encontrar trabajo sin nombrar los limites a la confianza cuando desempleo es politica estatal. De lo que me han contado la gente de allá tienen poco confianza en la gente que llegan de fuera para ayudar. Tienen razon ser sospechoso.

Productos de la huerta comunitaria

Grupo de acción por el salud y el ambiente de Hartcliffe (www.hheag.org.uk en inglés) es una de las pocas organisaciones populares allá. Quiero conocer la gente de allá y conocer mas de su localidad y las formas en que la gente se relacionan. Puede ser que no hay organisación formal pero hay apoyo mutuo en la cotidianidad?

Raúl Zibechi en su libro sobre movimientos sociales como fuerza anti-estatal describe que no era tanto las organisaciones conformadas antes de las mobilisaciones quienes formaron la columna de las mobilisaciones en El Alto, Bolivia sino las relaciones cotidianas entre familias, amigos y vecinos que respondieron a las circumstancias y las nuevas posibilidades en el contexto de un levantamineto y lograron actuar y formar el movimiento en el sentido de verbo. Y parece que tambíen en Bristol sirve una huerta comunitaria para fortalacer los lazos solidarios entre la gente y para construir territorio.

Que nuestra movimiento sea una advertencia a cualquier regimen brutal

2011-02-26T14:49:00.000-08:00

Desde acá hemos mirado el levantamiento en Egipto con admiración y emoción. Quieren presentar el levantamieno como algo de los arabes, de los musulmanos, para tratar de contener su impacto y inspiración. Pero sabemos que es un levantamiento contra la opresión y como dicen las letras de esta canción ..."Que nuestra movimiento sea una advertencia a cualquier regimen brutal."

Dedico a todxs mis companerxs en colombia

Mi tradución rapida:

Puedes tomar el latido de mi corazon pero no puedes llevar mi alma
Todxs seramos libre

Revolución no es un acto
Es un hecho real
Un idea que quema hasta que se vuelve mas negro que negro
La portadora de la verdad una nueva era como el fondo de tu capuche
El verdadero terror quien te asustará sin llevar una pistola
Por los barreras un portadero y luego extiende como malaria
Hundirnor sin temor de oppression
Cada lagrima es una arma
Cuando dios lo escuca es una bendicion
Cada tirano conectedo a aggression violent es destinado a morir.

Puedes tomar el latido de mi corazon pero no puedes llevar mi alma
Todxs seramos libre
Si te detienen queda callado un aprendizaje sabio
Libertad es la expression mas alto de vida en el presente
Y por eso los disturbios mundiales extienden un mensaje justificado
Como dios mandó los incendios del paraiso
Levantamiento, basta no mas lagrimas lxs jovenes corriendo
Cuando la gente tiene el poder los dictaduras va huyendo
Solo queremos vivir como seres humanos
Cuando protestamos en paz la policia nos disparan
Mirar la pantalla, lo puedes ver
Que nuestra movimiento sea una advertencia a cualquier regimen brutal

Puedes tomar el latido de mi corazon pero no puedes llevar mi alma
Todxs seramos libre

Es una equación sencila, es scientifico
Ponga el poder en la gente, su liberación
y aun si quita algo hay multiplicación
repression genera resistencia y eso es nuestra situacion
soy un expert en explotación, maestro de miseria del guetto
un milagro de esclavitud modern
el incendio a las balas y bombas y los mentirosos
los sapos la contrainsurgentes locos
Nos matan lxs guerrillerxs pero no pueden matar la revolución
llevan bazuca a nuestra communidad riendose
Pero no me parece gracioso los que ganan la plata
Nos quieren ver mal educado
Ven como nunca nos rendimos y no saben como lo hacemos
ni somos una cucaracha, somos el escarabajo en las ruinas
lo puedes escuchar en nuestra muscia
es Resistencia parte de nuestra experiencia
Lo puedes llamar el experimento en libertad
lo escuchas pero lo sientes?
unéte o temerlo
pero lo quiero una vez en la vida
punto

mi lucha y tu lucha: empatia y autencidad

2011-02-08T08:31:00.000-08:00

Me despierto con dolores por mucho del cuerpo, otro turno se acabó, miles de libras recogido y yo salgo con el salario minimo despues de otra jornada exploitada en un restaurante de lujo en el centro de mi ciudad.

Una compañera tenía que exigir un descanso para comer algo durante su jornada de diez horas. Se lo dieron como si fuera un favor especial que debiéramos recibir con agradecimiento en vez de darnoslo por ser un humano y no una maquina. Adémas, a pesar de ser un restaurante y se botan mucha comida no nos dan comida para no gastar las ganacias, así nos toca salir a comprar algo y comerla en el camino al volver al trabajo. La compañera, a quien conozco desde solo dos semanas, volvió con un sandwich para mi, muy solidaria ella. Conversamos con los otras empleados quienes nos miraron criticamente por exigir el descanso pero luego aceptaron que aun que se han acostumbrado no significa que sea justo. Los actos pequeños de agitatación son necesarios, tanto para mantener mi propia dignidad como para despertar la gente a no seguir siendo maltratando.

Le pregunté a otro compañero de trabajo si recibieran un bono por haber hecho jornadas muy intensas durante la runup a la navidad. "No,....pero tuvimos una buena fiesta de navidad" fue la respuesta verbal. Los expresiones de su cuerpo me mostraron tristeza, resignación y luego un esfuerzo a mirar lo positivo de la situación. Es como si no se atreviera a pensar que merezcara mas, tiene como mucha gente la idea de que uno puedo sobrevivir la exploitación si no te imagines algo distinto. En vez de soñar y pensar en algo mas justo por ti mismo y la gente alrededor, aceptas las migas que los jefes los echan. Al recurrir a lo que mucha gente en Colombia me han enseñado de lo que es vivir con dignidad, le planteé algo distinto, sembrando unas semillas de resistencia.

Cual es la diferencia entre luchar en este contexto, en la cual siento la exploitacion tambien en mi cuerpo y en el contexto de Colombia donde lucho pero las opresiones en la mayoria se sientan en forma empatica, es decir me duelo por que te duele, pero no lo vivo tan vida?

Aca es mas autentica, nace de mi propia respuesta a ser estampada diarimente daily por el trabajo tanto en los musculos de mi cuerpo como en los ritmos de pensamientos. Puedo relacionarme como iguales con las compas del restaurante. Si propongo algo, sufro las consecuencias y vivire las ganancias (medida mas en dignidad propia que en libras). ya estoy sonando de un parito para que nos den las propinas.....

Alla, en los espacios de procesos populares estoy luchando no tanto por mi liberacion sino por la liberacion de otras aunque reconozco los lazos humanos. A pesar de querer estar en la mitad de los esfuerzos de organisarnos, no soy la nosotrxs. Alla con ustedes en Ciudad Bolivar hay un limite al papel que puedo jugar. las propuestas deben nacer de ustedes como respuesta a sus situaciones compartidas agradientes y como parte de la busqueda de hacer sus vidas mas hermosas y menos dolorosas. Es su lucha! pero claro, con solidaridad muy cerca.

La tetera: una tactica de la policia de Inglaterra en contra los movimientos sociales

2011-01-13T01:58:00.000-08:00

El lugar de luchar cambia, las formas de opresión cambian, pero la necesidad de luchar para liberarnos no cambia.

Estoy en la marcha con un grupo de amigos, formamos un hermoso grupo de afinidad donde nos cuidamos uno al otro. Me siento fuerte, empoderada, rodeada por gente con quien hemos caminado las calles mucho. La marcha es en contra los nuevas leyes del gobierno britanicó que aumentan la matricula a las universidades a $27,000 pesos colombiano por año! Si los salarios son mas altos acá pero la gente de la clase trabajador acá tan poco tienen este cantidad de plata. Este precio hace la univesidad aún mas privado y menos asequible a la mayoria de lxs jovenes. Y lxs jovenes estan molestos, bastantes.

La marcha va por una calle principal cuando vemos más camionetas de la policia llegando. Las con experiencia sabemos que quieren bloquear el camino de la march y acoralarla en una tacticá de acá que se llama “kettle”. Un kettle es una tetera literalmente, en la practica nos rodean por una cerca solída de policia con sus batones por horas. Si no respondemos rapidó lo lograrán y allá estaríamos hasta que nos morimos del frio o nos rebellamos y tratamos de salir a la fuerza y nos golpean.

La marcha no tiene camino fijo ni organisadores ni voceros. en vez de enfocar la marcha en la llegada a un lugar simbolico se enfoca la marcha en construir poder entre la gente que marchen. en vez de la participacion pasiva comun en las marchas de aca todas participan activamente en decidiendo por donde vamos en el camino experimentando con la democracia directa. Es fundamental que experimentemos con otros formas de democracia como miramos la farsa de democracia de los partidos politicos que dicen una cosa para ser elegidos y luego hace el contrario. Tenemos un gobierno de coalicíon, una de los partidos ganaron puestos diciendo que iban a estar en contra el aumento de las matriculas. Menos que un año despues hacen el contrario.

Al ver las camiones llegando, la gente gritan propuestas de que hacer, se escuchan contra propuestas. La policia bajan de sus camionetas (hasta ahora no se mueva por moto como en Colombia) y gente con astucia muestran propuestas concretas. Corren para pasar antes de que hagan un muro inpenetrable. Lo demás siguen, animada por la idea. Este capacidad para responder rapidó y autonomá (sin que nadie te manda a hacer algo) a la situación que se desarolla nos permita sacar mucha ventaja a la policia.

Para mi, es un ejemplo precioso y un metaforo al camino hacia nuestra propia liberación. Sin jefes orquestrando el movimiento de la gente, le gente mueven por su propia rabia y deseos sea en una marcha o en nuestra organisación. Si, compartamos experiencias del pasado y construyamos teorias desde nuestras observaciones, pero solo nosotras mismos quienes viven el presente deciden el que hacer en el presente. Ofrezco mis observaciones y ideas de acá como un aporte para el trabajo organisativo de ustedes allá.

Mas tarde ganaron la policia :( Unos de nosotras lo vimos venir pero la muchidumbre tenía un velocidad y no logramos cambiarla a tiempo. Rodearon todo la gente con una cerca de policia. Allá los detuvieron por 4 horas. En otras protestas en Diciembre era por 8 horas. No puedes salir para orinar, comprar comida, ir a una cita. No hay legislación que permite que te retengan sin detenerte formalmente. Es un secuestro masivo y siempre salen impunes.

Hasta ahora no se usa los gases lacrimogenos en mi tierra. Pero si te hacen morir de aburrimiento, orinarte o perder tu trabajo por llegar retarde. A veces la gente explotan con rabia y frustración por la situacíon y estás atrapado entre un conflicto.

Con este tactica quieren disuadirte de manifestar. Marco, un anarquista colombiano escribío algo que me parece cierto:

“uno deduce ....que si acá nos matan de manera menos higiénica… a punta de bala o motosierra, allá, en Europa, los mecanismos de represión son más tecnificados y asépticos y el control social juega un factor decisivo en ese aspecto.” ver articulo

La tetera es un mecanismo de control de protesta, entre otras. Tanto como en Colombia se usa la sistema de justicia para dar condenas severas a lxs que opongan las politicas violentas del Estado. Un joven quien participó en la ocupación de la sede del partido de los Conservadores (el gobierno actual) fue condenada a 2 años de carcel por tirar un extinguidor del techo sin causar daño a nadie mientras que 2 años despues del asasinato de Ian Tomlinson por la policia aún no hay ningun condena.

Otro mecanismo de control es el uso de la policia secreto. Fue revelado que un compañero, alguien de confianza politica de acá quien participó en movilisaciones sociales y ambientales, es tombo. Da una sensación de nausea pero por lo menos nos confirma que nuestras ideas y practicas de solidaridad, de acción directa y de la horizontalidad son una amenaza a los elites de este pais. Así nuestras actos acá son actos continua de solidaridad con ustedes. El mismo supragobierno económico que quiere encarcelar nuestras vidas acá para callarnos es la misma esctructura que hace la guerra a ustedes. Pero también es el misma deseo humano que nos motiva en cualquier rincon del mundo a liberar nuestra espiritu de la sumisión y levantar la cabeza con orgullo y luchar.

An ecological experiment with bamboo and pop bottles

2010-08-24T17:04:00.000-07:00

“Please carry us” shouted the women to the bus driver that went slowly past us heading up the dusty unpaved road. The laughter filled the air even as it looked like the driver wasn't going to let us on but then he signalled us to climb on through the back door. The ten of us piled on, amidst “god bless you” and numerous jokes about how he would be a good husband. Solidarity on the normal buses is ever present and they always let you travel for less than the official price and sometimes when near the end of the line, they let you ride for free.... all ten of us.

Meanwhile the Transmillenium bus system, the multimillion dollar transport system never lets you on for less than the official price, imposing an altogether different culture of 'rights for those who can pay'. Several students have been run over and killed this year alone as they didn't have the money to pass through the barriers so instead tried to jump through the bus access doors. Students poured out of colleges on mass blocking the bus routes and demanding that a student price be introduced so that the city's poor students don't have to choose between eating, transport or risking their life. The response was the riot police but the political space seems to have been created for the debate.

Back to our day out. We scrambled excitedly out of the bus at the end of the line and headed toward the plot of land. It is a plot right on the edge of the city, you only see fields and trees and most importantly you only breathe clean air, high up in the mountains above the smog level.

Wilson, a young lad from the organisation “Jovenes Proponen” -Youth Propose – from Ciudad Bolivar explains the project to us. “We want to have a place where young people can come and learn new skills, choose a different route in life to joining gangs and learn about the relationship between humans and our environment and how this capitalist way of building is destroying our environment, our home”

They are building a education centre out of guadua, clay mixed with horse shit and plastic bottles filled with plastic bags. Seven thousand plastic bottles roughly. The women from Paraiso got excited and inspired “so many of us had to work so hard to buy the bricks for our house, they are so expensive. If only we had known about another way to build.....”. They offered immediately, only to happy to help, to collect bottles to contribute to the project,

Local neighbours have been inspired by the project and have got involved, coming down to help with work in their free time. They proudly tell us how they have planted peas, potatos, peppers and lettuces and about their irrigation system, again using plastic bottles. In return the women from Paraiso introduced themselves and shared their thoughs:

“I like to be nosy and find out what is happening in other places, but not to be nosy for the sake of it but to learn new things. I am very happy to be here today” says Elvira

“For me it is very important that people are building again with bamboo and clay. That's how they build in my region. And it is a great idea to use the rubbish from this city so we don't have to exploit more natural resources” says Carmen

“It brings back memories being here, where I come from we used bamboo a lot. We used it to carry water in, and I use to hide avocados inside them” says Gratiniano. I didn't find out quite who he hid the avocados from.

Maria presents the women's project “We are a smallish but solid and determined group of women from Paraiso who want to organise ourselves so that we don't keep being exploited. We have a small allotment where we have strawberries and peas and arachacha planted and also we have a wormery so that we can make good compost from our waste products. If you wanted to come and visit us one day it would be good. So we can continue sharing experiences of how to produce food. Also it would be wonderful if we could come here and begin to cultivate some of the unused land around this plot.”

The land around the plot belongs to either Victor Caranza or Forrero Fetequa, we aren't sure which but we are sure that they are both part of Colombia's landowning class.

Colombia has one of the most unequal land distributions in the world, achieved through violent dispossession of the lands and wealth of first indigenous peoples and now also of peasant farmers and afro-colombian communities. At the end of 2009 there were up to 4.9 million internally displaced people (IDP) in Colombia, bringing it alongside Sudan as one of the two largest internal displacement situations in the world. In 2009 alone there was a reported 290,000 people displaced. This massive displacement has resulted in over 6 million hectares of productive land being abandoned by campesinos.

“The current Internal Displacement Situation situation has to be seen in the context of a historical movement of expansion by the land-owning elites, an agrarian and structural problem, complicated and compounded since the 1970s by drug-trafficking and the presence of large international corporations.” [1]

Using this land above the urbanised part of Ciudad Bolivar for growing food on would definately ease the problem of hunger but the land is earmarked as part of the Mining Industry Park, which will not ease problems of hunger.

As we walked back to El Paraiso the women commented to me how many of the houses, built from tin, plastic and wood, that we passed on our way home were not their a year ago. Signs of displaced peasant farmers trying to find a patch of land where no one will violently kick them off.

[1] Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre

http://www.internal-displacement.org/idmc/website/countries.nsf/%28httpEnvelopes%29/7994964F3955C802C125719200585B76?OpenDocument

Building Popular Power: CISCA's regional assembly Part 2

2010-08-23T17:03:00.000-07:00

My memory of assemblies are of day after day sat cross-legged
on school hall floors singing hymns from the Come and Praise hymn book and listening to fables and school news. Here in Latin America assemblies have a very different collective historical meaning.

Lets re-imagine the school assembly. Gone is the lifeless out of tune sound of childrens voices repeating kumbayah. Instead the space is alive with groups of teachers and students discussing the governments policy on education. Each group feeds back to the plenary and people listen eagerly for consensus from which school policy will be built. Others listen for unresolved questions and makes suggestions for how each class can work on exploring further the question so that for the next assembly the ideas will have been matured and advanced. This is the type of assembly I wish was in our collective memory.

As I try to bridge different cultures I will continue with the metaphor a little longer.... the Come and Praise hymn book where each song carried the same message of thanks to god is like the Colombian daily news which presents lots of different news but that all converges to the same idea: Democratic Security is good and necessary and anyone that opposes it is the enemy.

In CISCA's assembly the hymn book is replaced by presentations on topics related to the reality of the participants, the prayers replaced by group discussions, and the lecture by the head teacher replaced by large group discussions to make decisions and decide the ongoing strategy.

Some notes
No.1: National Current Situation

National, international and mafia capital mixed together in most investment projects. Free Trade Agreements with the EU and the US give more space for mafia profits to be “lost”. Huge accumulation of all three capital continues through three strategies:

Over-exploitation of workers achieved through violating human rights. For example the majority of those lucky enough to find work in the formal sector will only have work for three months and then can now legally sacked so that the company can avoid all social security costs Companies have saved 75% in labour costs.
Exploitation of Natural Resources and Peasant, Indigenous and Afro-Colombian Territories
Financial Speculation

Colombia has been condemned to fulfil three roles in the global economy.

Provider of fossil fuels
Provide non strategic primary agricultural materials (fruits, rubber, cocoa)
Transport Infrastructure so that global capital can circulate more quickly.

Santos, as the new president and part of Colombia's oligarchy, may decide to prioritise legal capital over mafia capital. Most worrying for the assembly of CISCA is his call for 'National Unity'.

“The so called National Unity is an effort to remove all oppostion from the map and build an empty consensus through the power of the media that gives him complete freedom to advance however he wants without debate or even justification” [1]

In groups people discussed how this would mean a continuation of the State strategy of criminalising oppostion and expressed worries that the next four or eight years would be the same if not worse than what they have already lived through under the ex-President Uribe.

“We are against the politics of the Santos government because they go against our Planes de Vida - our Community Development Plans” declared the assembly.

No.2: Mining in Colombia

“Mining is a reality and I am not going to oppose it” stated the new Environmental Minister. “Well at least we know we can count on no support there, then” said Aramides. While the Environment Ministry bans the Bari indigenous people from entering the national park within their reserve to collect wood in the name of conservation, they are not going to put any obstacles in the way of plans for a 20,000 hectare open cast coal mine in the same park. After listening to a presentation about the negative and supposed positive impacts of mining we returned to groups again to discuss what CISCA's position on mining should be.

“As peasant farmers we aren't trained to work in mines, the jobs will go to people from outside the region. We are skilled at getting a good crop. We should oppose the mine and increase food production to combat poverty.”

After much discussion, which began in 2007 and has been ongoing in CISCA's consultivas, the assembly reafirmed its commitment to oppose all extractive mining in its territory as part of the defense of their own community development plans.

No.3 Impacts of US Southern Command 2018 Strategy for Integrated Action

The USSOUTHCOM is implementing a military-civil strategy in 9 regions of Colombia, one of them being Catatumbo in order to win full territorial control. This included control of the economy, the physical area, the social organisations, the peoples mind. According to their Strategic Document 2018 “the region will not win the war against poverty increasing their participation in the reduced global agricultural sector. They should use their energy in producing more sophisticated exports.” This means that in Catatumbo the economic model that is already being imposed is production of non-basic food crops for export, such as palm, cocoa, tropical fruits. So where does the food come from? The so called unsophisticated exports, that is basic staples such as wheat, rice and maise, is now being exported to Colombia from.....the USA.

In practice, the doctrine of integrated action may mean that brigades of soliders begin to provide basic health cover or play the role of teachers in the region. Leaders expressed disgust that the USSOUTHCOM, with the full support of the Colombian State, is taking advantage of the overwhelming need for better health care and education to coopt and control the region through the use of government handouts, and is going against international humanitarian law to not involve the civilian population in the armed conflict.

In my group, men spoke about the hard work needed to convince their communities of the long term strategy behind these handouts which goes against the needs of the people in the region and to take a dignified position. They spoke about the need to not allow these programs to enter their communities in the first place. They reminded each other that it is the Colombian State that has a legal obligation to provide these human rights. The different groups later converged and there was a shared view in the assembly that they need to be more organised and mobilise to confront these programmes. Concrete proposals were put forward to reclaim community spaces such as schools, health centres from military occupation by marking them as 'peace spaces' (eg signs banning the entrance of arms, organising on mass to ask them to leave.) The need for this was marked by the (un)timely illegal arrival of the army to the assembly. They were politely but firmly asked to leave and reminded that we have the right to assembly without interference by the armed forces.

This is a just a snippet of the four days of discussion and decision making, a taste of a collective way to analyise what is going on and a way to come up with huge amounts of concrete actions to confront this (though I do fear they came up with way too many proposals and the collective decision making should have narrowed these down).

As we are leaving the assembly we hear news on the radio from the community of El Tarra, who are also particpating in the assembly. The army had been shot at in their barracks and in response, according to witnesses, they had shot at all young lads they found in the street at that moment, killing one and injuring three others. They had tried to place a gun by the side of the dead una joven aprendiendo como grabar
16 year old which caused indignation by those who saw and people
spontaenously rose up to oppose this injustice. Three army vehicles were burnt, the mayor's office and bank, and with sticks and stones the army was forced to retreat to their base admist shouts accusing them of murdering over 5000 people in the region.

Militry check point at entrance to El Tarra (2009)

While the assembly demanded the demilitrisation of the region and of civil life, the people of El Tarra were expressing with their bodies the urgent need to demilitrise their territory. And winning.

Thanks to J for the photos

[1] 'A dragon dressed as a dove', Editorial Periferia (in spanish)

Building Popular Power: CISCA`s Regional Assembly

2010-08-13T11:45:00.000-07:00

Part 1

As the bus bumped along the unpaved roads, recently eroded yet more by the ongoing rains, I ask Ismael to update me on the security situation in Catatumbo. “Since the elections in May things have been quiet, calm. What is really bad are the ongoing rains. There have been lots of floods, and many parts of the region have been cut off due to landslides blocking roads.” We hold our breath as we go slowly round a tight curve with half of the road fallen away - bendy buses might be the solution we joke!

We are making our way to the third assembly of CISCA – Committee for the Social Integration in Catatumbo, a peasant farmer grassroots organization which emerged in 2005 to rebuild the community organizations that were wiped out by more than 7 years of para-military occupation.
I delight to meet with old friends but notice the lack of some. “Many people from Asserrio haven´t come because two girls from the village drowned last week. There was a flood which swept away the houses. They haven´t found the bodies, disappeared” Miriam tells me matter of factly as is her way. “One was my half cousin, but I still wanted to come to the assembly. What can you do. Nothing. She is gone.”

Yet Miriam is a fighter, while we don´t make the connection in this moment, she knows there is much that can be done and is doing it. While the militrisation of this territory rich in natural resources and of geostrategic importance continues to kill, the lack of social development is also killing; roads, hunger, mal nutrition, curable health problems cause unnecessary deaths each day. CISCA´s community life plans are a concrete response to both these realities. They are about deciding together what social development means for us Catatumberos and then implementing concrete autonomous projects to begin this experiment in self-governance. Supporting Miriam as she blossoms into a young talented leader is a joy. She is beginning to take on the huge challenge of actively dreaming of a Catatumbo where deaths like that of her cousin are something of the past. She became involved in CISCA last August through some street theatre we put together as part of the pilgrimage to commemorate the 10 year anniversary of the worst massacres in Catatumbo.

The assembly began with a ritual. In groups we wrote down an injustice which prevents children from becoming community leaders. The messages “they don’t know the history of our country” “domestic violence” “fear because of all the violence that has happened to those who spoke out” “education which is technical and lies about the reality” were then ceremoniously burnt on the fire while positive messages were read out.

This was followed with stories about local indigenous resistance to colonization. Up to the 1930´s it was a sport for the white Americans who had arrived to exploit oil in Catatumbo to hunt the “savages” at the weekend. By savages they meant the Bari indigenous community. We heard how indigenous fought back. We heard how they fought back to defend their territory; bows and arrows against lead. Catatumberos are a mix of german, Spanish and Bari heritage yet colonial racist views of the indigenous as being inferior and the European as superior are still embedded strongly in people. These stories play such an important role in challenging this internalized racism. And Luis Antonio, a Bari leader present ended the evening with some important words “The histories that you have heard of persecution, displacement, and resistance is not what it was like. It is what it is like.”

Part 2 to follow. For now I am going to return to the group. I can hear the evening´s cultural activities and the clapping of many compañeras as local musicians, dancers and actors share their local cultures and traditions in opposition to mass produced homogenous entertainment.

The closure of a chapter and the start of a new one in Casanare

2010-06-28T19:05:00.000-07:00

Midday through writing this, I hear that my partner, the organisation he is part of (Solidarity Committee with Political Prisoners) and other compañeros from NGO's and social organisations in Cali have received death threats, the third against him in the last two months. Yet we both know that we must continue telling the stories of how people are trying to resist and build social organisations. All too often news from Colombia is a depressing list of threatened people and organisations. So here is the story of a weekend of weaving webs of hope, written while I chew my nails and my stomach churns.....

I arrive at Tauramena before sunrise and witnessed for the first time the huge gas flares. Just as the gas flares dominate the night sky with a bright orange glow, the oil industry dominates all aspects of life in Casanare. I had come to witness the closure of a chapter in the history of oil in Casanare and the start of a new one. It was a huge privilege to witness.

The previous evening, after five long months of negotiation and mobilizations, the Movement for the Dignity of Casanare signed an agreement with BP that includes action on basic labour, social and environmental issues. The agreement includes among other things a small but significant wage increase, investment in local roads, a commitment to finance a forum on the human rights situation in Casanare and an independent study in to the environmental impacts of the oil industry.

"Our lives are not for sale. BP supports the violence"

Previously, communities and workers have not been able to speak out against BP for fear of being targetted by the paramilitaries. This agreement is historical and important yet I noticed the lack of celebrations. Rather, people spoke about this just being the beginning.

“Firstly we need to ensure that BP sticks to the agreement and that the commitments are met. That is not going to be easy. Secondly, we need to build the Movement for the Dignity of Casanare and unite us much more. We could have achieved double, triple what we achieved if we were more united but BP used many dirty tactics to manipulate and turn people against us” Pacho tells me.

Pacho speaking during a community and workers assembly in March 2010

We head over to the school where today's workshop is going to take place: Exchanging Experiences on the Impacts of the Oil Industry. As I greet the people who have travelled from around Casanare, I recognise familiar faces from different documentaries that COSPACC, the NGO I am with, have made. I particularly remember one guy being filmed while harvesting crops from his farm beside the River Ariporo “I'm not leaving Casanare because of all this I have planted, yuca, plantain, maize. Here we live well.” he tells the camera with a big warm grin on his face. And in real life he is just the same. You would warm to him straight away.

We start the workshop with a great exercise which sparks sincere exchange and trust building: we form two concentric circles and pair up with the matching person. We are asked to introduce ourselves, where we are from, and share briefly with the other what is our experience of the oil industry in our municipal. We then return to the whole group and introduce our partner to everyone else, sharing what we have learnt.

We hear stories of how seismic exploration in Visinaca has left vital summer water sources with much less water and in some cases, with no water, cutting off the lifeblood to their farms, especially those that were fish farmers. Efforts at compensation have not been listened to.

We hear stories of how peasant farmers from Monterralo said no to seismic exploration only to later receive a copy of a decree which tells them they have no say or choice over the matter. It is going ahead. Miguel offers information which the authorities and companies would rather was not exchanged. He reminds them that the Colombian constitution states that 'Every person has the right to enjoy a healthy environment. The law will guarantee the community's participation in the decisions that may affect it.' The decree can be challenged he said.

We hear the story of how an U'wa indigenous leader was killed after refusing payment in exchange for allowing oil exploration in indigenous territory. Instead of being weakened, the U'wa people took the decision to not talk with the oil industry until there is a full investigation in to the murder of their leader. “Money is nothing, it will end. What is important is our territory, where we live, where we walk, where we get water from, what we leave for our children. The oil industry is a cancer destroying our mother earth. We must defend our territory”

Campesinos from Paz de Ariporo share their tactics for fighting against oil exploration in their municipality . He tells us proudly how they refuse to sign attendance records when meeting with the oil industry, wise to the dirty tactics of these records being used to tick consultation boxes. He tells us their strategy to avoid corruption in their leaders; the community chose four leaders who are prohibited from representing the community in meetings with the oil industry alone. They all must be present. They also took the decision to invite the U'wa people to unite with them despite different cultures and world views. They extend their invitation to unite to all present at this exchange. "If we don't all defend the water of the hills, these plains are nothing."

After lunch, we are taken to see these hills and its rivers, with the solidarity of a local bus driver who lends us his time and bus. We get off the bus by the River Cusiana and Don Alexander leads us down to the river to the place where the water inlet pipe siphons off thousands of litres of fresh water daily to be pumped in to the oil wells. "This water they take is lost forever" Juan David, who participated in the Tauramena environmental negotiations with BP tells us. "BP take it without paying anything and bury it underground, removing it from the water cycle for ever.

Don Alexander warns the others "when they wanted to build the water inlet pipe they arrived like a man who wants to conquest a women, they arrived with flowers and nice words. But just as a women doesn't know who the man really is until later, we didn't know what was behind the flowers until it was too late and the huge damage was done. They arrived with an army of machinery and rerouted the river in to a channel to fill the inlet pipe. We lost lots of land, 20 hectares. And they have never paid us for what we have lost, just as they have never paid for the water they have robbed."

After admiring all the beautiful creepy crawlies that kept jumping out at me, we headed back to the bus, an hour late and the solidarity of the driver wearing a little thinner. As we drove back to Tauramena, people sat with new compañeros and the bus was filled with the buzz of conversations, full of ideas about how to move forward with this new chapter. This new chapter in which these different local resistances to oil exploration and exploitation in Casanare begin once again to weave hope and strength together. This was something really exciting and genuine to celebrate. And the cool beers went down well that evening. Let us hope there are more small steps to continue celebrating in the coming months.

Acknowledging our Wealth amisdt the Poverty: A Step to Stop Pillage

2010-06-21T18:29:00.000-07:00

What wealth do you know about in your district, Ciudad Bolivar, we asked them. They looked at us surprised but curious. They are more use to naming Ciudad Bolivar's numerous problems, the poorest and largest district of Bogotá, the Capital of Colombia.

They responded naming air, the soil, land and water. Maria and I listened worriedly, it was as we had feared. The 30 women who came from various different neighbourhood groups did not know or acknowledge the huge amount of wealth there is in their district. The Environmental Forum had organised this tour around the district to explore what the impact of seeing this wealth with their very eyes would be, following the practice of Popular Education.

We boarded our bus and begin winding our way up the potholed roads, and as we gain more altitude the houses become more precarious and the barrios more controlled by paramilitaries.

We arrive at the first stop: Industrial Mining Park. Unluckily for the residents of Ciudad Bolivar they live on top of a enormous quantity of construction materials; sand, agregate, gravel and clay. After Holcim and Cemex rewrote part of the country's mining code, Colombia is now the only country in the world to allow open cast mining in urban areas.

The quarries have been condemned by numerous social organisations for the health impacts and the increased risk of landslides that they cause. The gravel pits, owned by Holcim and Cemex and following a 50km stretch of the River Tunjuelito, have destabilised the land and caused grave damage to the river ecosystem. Furthermore social organsiations that have spoke out against these megaprojects have suffered threats, assassinations and stigmatisation.

"We don't know where these materials are taken. Lots of trucks leave carrying the materials but we don't know where they take it, maybe for building works somewhere” comments Elmira.

Private companies extract the materials and sell them for the construction of Bogota, a city from which the residents of Ciudad Bolviar are excluded. “International capital is getting richer on our resources at the expense of us putting up with this shit situation; families without homes because of the mines and because of the huge inequality in Colombia, social control by paramilitaries to silence and weaken our grassroots organisations, hunger, bad health.....” says Maria angrily. The social and economic injustice is only too clear, and women receive the worst brunt of it, in their gendered role as carer of the entire family, highlighted by Carmen who described how she went without meals in order to buy her boy the medicines he needed.

Furthermore, the women were first excluded from influencing in the planning decisions around the operations of these mines, secondly they have been deceived in to believing that this wealth is not theirs and thirdly they have been kept in the dark around where the resources and profits from these resources end up. The tactics for preventing people from recognising their collective wealth are an essential part of the strategy to take these resources.

A similar situation happens in the United Kingdom where the elite landowners with the complicity of the British State have never revealed how much land they own so as to avoid demands for redistribution from the common folk. If we don't know and don't value the wealth we have, it is all too easy to take it without an outcry, such as what is happening with the Mining Park.

From the mines, we continued climbing the steep hill through densely populated barrios until suddenly we came out on to large extensions of open, barren land.
“Here there is so much land that we could work, we could plant and grow food for many people, lets take advantage and start producing” suggested enthusiastically a compañera. The estimated 46000 hectares of land belongs to a member of the Colombian elite who lives in Miami.

“While he is there in luxury we are here living in misery. Occupy y reclaim this land would be a good strategy. Land should be for those who work it... We would have to be very organised it to defend ourselves from the violent response by the state as it protects its interests. We know who they would send. All of this land is part of the Industrial Mining Pak which is why they don't let anyone squat this land. They are going to keep opening quarries and within 50 years this whole hillside will have been eaten away” replied Mario. Pointing to Paraiso, a barrio in the distance he continued “those of you live there are going to have serious problems soon. You are going to be in the middle of a quarry.”

The Paraiso compañeras fall quiet with thoughtful expressions. “These mines are wealth, but only for a few people, for everyone else they bring us social and environmental problems” concludes Luz Angela

The solemn moment is broken by Marisela enthusiastically pointing out a lake we are passing. “Look, look at the lake, would't it be amazing to be able to come here on Sundays." The lake is in fact the source of one of the many streams that flow down through Ciudad Bolivar, down through the quarries and into the River Tunjuelito. But the water up here is clear and clean.

With so much open green space near where they live, the women are frustrated that they do not have the freedom to enjoy the landscape, to rest and enjoy the peace and quiet, breathe clean air and forget the stresses of daily life. They do not have the freedom as the area is not very safe due to the paramilitary presence. The idea to organise a group outing is suggested.

We continue our tour, entering into land on which peasant farmers are cultivating. The women remark excitedly at all they see; corn, quinoa, peas, potatoes, cows and chickes, allotments and small farms with children playing in the fields. Many of them themselves are campesinas - peasant farmers - who have been displaced by either the armed conflict or the rural economic crisis.

We pass through the rural hamlet of Quiba and arrive at the village of Pasquilla, a campesino village within the City. We all notice the lack of cars and contamination as we eat our locally produced yoghurts in the main square. We watch the campesinos pass by wearing their traditional ruinas. “This is wealth too, that there are peasant farmers here using their knowledge of the land to produce food” observed Olivia.

Our next stop was the Doña Juana rubbish dump, the second largest open air rubbish dump in Latin America. The largest is in Sao Paolo, Brasil and communities there have formed organsiations to recycle the materials that arrive. Here 7500 tonnes of Bogotá's rubbish arrives daily and it is all dumped. They are dumping minerals and metals that are taken from communities at great environmental and social cost. Illogical but logical within a profit logic. Rubbish is big business, in Bogotá it is the most expensive public service. We discuss where the dump is wealth or a problem.

“It is a problem because it contaminates the water with leachates” says Isabel. “It is a problem because it contaminates the air. Beside this unbearable smell, it gives off lots of gases that cause health problems, such as rashs and lung problems” contributes Maria. “It is true but the gases could be uses domestically in the nearby communties” says Olivia. And despite the fact that we all have blocked our nose Amelia proposed that “it could be a source of work, we could organise ourselves and recycle here”

We arrive at the conclusion that like the quarries and gravel pits, the rubbish dump is “bad wealth because a few people profit while the rest suffer without any benefits.”

We leave the overpowering stench behind and move in to a new smell, that of mountain rain high in the clouds that surround the Regadera and Chisaca reservoirs.

The public water company provides all of the water for Ciudad Bogota from these two reservoirs. We shelter from the rain under a huge tree to reflect over the tour and the wealth we have found along the way, to laugh and to share our food.

“there was a total lack of knowledge of what wealth we have, we now know what our wealth is”

“we have a lot of wealth, we have seen and named it, we are not poor, we just don't benefit from it”

“we have allowed ourself to thing that this is not ours and so we haven't empowered ourselves to make demands”

“we have to organise ourself so that we can discuss, propose and make demands about the use of our wealth. But we need a lot of people, each one of us should go home and share what we have learnt with our children and our neighbours, those who it is safe to do so with.”

“Organising will bring us problems, it will but we have to do it, we have to value our territory”

“We have to work in community, educate ourselves and strengthen our womens networks so we can demand our rights are respected.”

As we wind our way home, the words of Mercedes Sosa accompanies us.... listen here

A conversation with marginalised women on the global politics of food

2010-05-24T07:03:00.000-07:00

The skyscrapers in the centre of Bogotá become smaller and smaller as our bus winds its way up through the marginalised neighbourhoods of the grand metropolis. These are the neighbourhoods where you will find resting during the day the men who are forced to walk the city at night sifting through the rich mans “rubbish” or the poor mans “recyclable materials”. These are the potholed and unpaved streets owned at night by gangs of young lads, who are used and manipulated by the paramilitaries who have overall contol.

We are heading to the neighbourhood at the very top of the hill, La Estrella, where we work with several groups of women and young people on urban agriculture projects.

The theme for the workshop today is food sovereignty and autonomy, particulary relevent considering the recent signing of the free trade agreement between Colombian and the European Union. We make sense of the terms necessary for then being able to analysise what the radio is saying; imports, exports, dependency, “free” trade, import tariffs.

“To be dependent is to be like a slave and have to beg for food.”

“We don't want to be dependent on other countries for food because we are rich in products and we should give the opportunities to our producers.”

"free trade sounds pretty but the reality in the global markets is different. The big producers have many benefits while the small producers have none."

We talk about the decision on milk imports. I ask them what they think about the argument on the news that the powdered milk imports will mean that milk prices will drop and more poor children will have better brain nuerons. Olviria replies “it is true, milk is quite expensive at 70p a litre, but it is better that we support our milk producers as there are many many familes that survive from selling milk and what will all their children do?" Cleo adds “What is in this powered milk? Who knows what they will add? Milk fresh from the cow is the best, the healthiest.”

This conversation, a practice of popular education, makes me later think about the baby milk scandel, the practice by multinationals of aggressivly promoting powdered milk as better than breast milk to health care practioners and new mothers around the world. As far as I know this has not affected Colombia. Women here breast feed.

With imported powered milk now allowed in to Colombia in much greater quantities will it be followed by this manipulative life endangering practice?

BP AGM: confronting power with solidarity

2010-04-19T09:45:00.000-07:00

We entered nerviously into the luxurious and modern Excel convention centre in London, but with all the wonderful people we have met and have worked with in Casanare giving us strength and a strong mandate; put pressure on BP to accept as legitimate the list of demands that the Movement for the Dignity of Casanare has presented to one of the world's most powerful multinational corporations.

It was an inmense stage that made clear their symbolic, economic and political power, as well as their huge egos. Their power is all too real; their decisions in Casanare have affected the lives of Casanare people through the intense militrisation and human rights violations which oil exploration brought to the region in the nineties.

It was to their home turf that we brought the voice of the Casanare people, who in spite of the 9000 people dead and in spite of fear, have risen up again and demanding dignity, the right to a trade union, respect for the environment they are dependent on, respect for life and better living conditions. We asked BP if they considered the demands of the communities to be legitimate considering BP has benefitted for 16 years from the oil that flows from this region.

They responded our question saying that they knew of some dialogue happening in Casanare, which is important, but it was not to do with BP. Considering that BP has been in negotiations and meetings with the Movement in Casanare for the past six weeks we pondered whether a lack of capacity to tell the truth is seen as a strength rather than a weakness when applying for a multimillion pound job with BP.

We took the microphone again, telling the audience that what BP said was not the case and that the problem was with BP. We also made clear that the chair's failure to recognise at the very least the legitimacy of communities to demand better environmental, social and labour conditions is very dangerous in the context of Casanare. Every time community organisation have raised their voices against BP, community leaders have been killed and the organisations destroyed. BP's public affirmation of the legitimacy of the right to protest would have been a minimum measure to prevent history repeating itself. They would not do so.

We also shared with the audience that only the night before BP had indeed responded to the list of demands presented by the communities saying that they not going to negotiate with them and furthermore they were going to sue them for slander. This is how a multimillion pound multinational corportation responds to communities asking for some dignity.

Later in the meeting George Poitras, a First nations Indigenous spokeperson, began his intervention about the impact of Tar Sands operation in his lands saying “When i heard my friend from Colombia speaking about what BP has done in his country, my heart bled. We hope that this won't be what their presence brings to our lands.”.

As we left the convention centre, friend on the outside shouted “Canada, Colombia, No Blood for Oil”. In the sunshine we gave a summary of what had happened inside. We were angry but not suprised by the manipulation and lack of answers inside, we were confident that our actions had served as a protecton mechanism for our friends back in Colombia and that BP knows the political costs are high for any future repression in Casanare, and we were excited by the solidarity between Colombians, British and Canadians. Solidarity is our own form of beautiful power, not over but between people, that will be crucial for the ongoing mobilisations in Casanare and for the communities in Canada.

Attempts to silence humanity with arrest of Indigenous Leader

2010-04-11T02:18:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Saturday 10^th April, Feliciano Valencia was captured by the Colombian Security Services (DAS) at Cali Airport. He is an indigenous leader and spokesperson for the Community and Social Minga of Resistance. Now he is in danger of also being yet one more Colombian political prisoner, adding to the 7500 already in Colombian prisons.

I had the joy of beginning to get to know Feliciano during the mobilisations of the Minga last October. His reflections and thoughts, shared with others in his role as spokesperson for the Minga have been hugely valued by thousands of indigenous, peasant farmers, afro-Colombians, students and displaced people. He has a special quality of being able to listen to all these different oppressed peoples and then speak across these differences, finding commonality in their different histories of oppression and struggle.

“ Solidarity, autonomy, mutuality, integrity, reciprocity, these values among others must be the essence of how together challenge this hegemonic model, this project of death. And we must learn together, from one another, at the same time as we keep walking the word in Minga.”

“The Minga is a process not an apparatus to use. The Minga has no owners, nor is anyone more important than others, there is a principle of equality.”

Feliciano speaking at a Minga event,July 2009

He has been detained by the DAS for kidnapping and personal damage for an event that happened in October 2008. Fourty thousand indigenous 40,000 indigenous marched in Minga from the south of Colombia to Bogotá, the Capital city inviting Colombians to build a new country based on equality with them. While still in indigenous territory, the indigenous guard discovered a member of the armed forces had infiltrated the march in order to gather intelligence and frame the indigenous march as having links with the guerrilla. He was detained with a rucksack containing camouflage clothes, radio equipment and explosive manuals.

The right of the indigenous people to their own law is recognised in the Colombian constitution and in international agreements. The indigenous authorities made the collective decision to give him 20 whips, which was carried out in the presence of the congregated community as well as the governments ombudsman, and human rights organisations.

Despite it being a community decision and carried out by the indigenous authorities, the Colombian government the arrest warrant was signed for both Feliciano and Aida Quilcué (another spokesperson for the Minga). This is a clear persecution against those who speak out against not just the government, but also against the neoliberal capitalist system imposed on Colombia by Europe and the USA.

“This minga was not organised to confront the government, not even to confront Uribe , he'll fall one day, the problem is the system, it is the model, here we must have clarity. The laws and policies come from the imperial countries.”

Feliciano Valencia, July 2009

Yet again the Colombian government wants to silence critical voices. And I'm sadly all too sure sure the mainstream media will be silent too. Their silence to date around the seven thousand social activists, people just like Feliciano, who are imprisoned within Colombians squalid prisons tragically highlights where their interests lie.

But yet again people refuse to be silenced. The Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC) has responded by calling for a permanent assembly in Popyan city centre, where Feliciano is being held, to reject this latest attack by the government against them. They plan to stay until he is released.

It is through uniting our voices and efforts that Feliciano Valencia and the thousands of other political prisoners in Colombia will be freed.

Dominga: an unknown victim of EU "free" trade agreement

2010-03-09T01:01:00.000-08:00

News is just coming out that in the EU “free” trade negotiatons with Colombia, the first victims are to be the small scale milk and cheese producers. The Andean price band, a system that stops the price going too low or too high, will be elimiated and Colombian milk will have to compete with subsidised milk arriving from Europe. This will have an effect on 450,000 milk producers

“Thousands of small milk producers, that are not able to access loans nor do they have leverage in high government, will suffer from an avanlanche of 5500 tonnes of powdered milk, 2310 tonnes in cheese and 1100 tonnes of other milk products those arrival in the country will increase by 10% annually until this vital part of the peasant economy disappears. Is this not about the human rights of thousands of peasant families?”[1]

Photo: Dominga leaving to take her cheese down to the main road, one hour away.

One of these families is that of Dominga, who I first met and wrote about in October 2008. I have been to stay with her several times since then. Darian is now living in the nearby small town where he can continue his studies. There is no secondary education in his hamlet. Cheese production pays for his transport, food and accomodation costs.

The last time I stayed with Dominga was in January. I told her about my good friend who has recently been sentenced for a year and a half after being found with two kilos of cocaine on him. He was doing the more risky job of carrying out the region as his two babies had rashes and he needed to buy medicines urgently.

She wasn't that sympathetic. “those lads in the

se coca areas just want easy money without having to do much work” I remember her saying. An interesting conversation around the kitchen table followed where we chatted about why we each thought that there had been a big increase in coca production in Catatumbo:

- paramilitaries imposing it as got 70% of their national revenue from cocaine in that one region

- twelve hour walks from many farms to just get to the road makes transporting yam or plantain very costly (you would need a lot of donkeys) for the price you would be able to sell it at while a kilo of cocaine in the rucksack is practically actually possible
- lack of State support for peasant farmer agriculture

Photo: Milking her cattle, the daily morning work.

I wonder if Dominga will remember this conversation as she hears news of this threat to her livelihood. Will she have to turn to coca looking for a way to get food on the table and an education for her kids as the neoliberal policies continue to destroy peasant farming?

[1] RECALCA (Colombian Action Network against Free Trade) http://www.recalca.org.co/

Riots in Villahermosa Prison

2010-03-04T02:25:00.000-08:00

We hear the news on the radio as we are breakfasting – one person dead, seven seriously injured and fires in some patios in the Villahermosa prison in Cali. I am with Walter who is part of the Committee for Political Prisoners (El Comité) and works with prisoners in this very jail around human rights issues.

Our morning plans quickly change. We pass by the office to check in with the rest of the team, share information and divide up tasks. We then jump in a taxi and head to Villahermosa, on route calling the United Nations, the International Red Cross and the Colombian Governments Human Rights Ombusdman to make sure they are aware of the situation and urge them to come to the prison.

Responding to emergencies is a consuming task; emotionally and physically, and one that diverts efforts from longer term work. Colombian human rights organisations have been responding to emergencies for too many years, and El Comité as one of the oldest HR organisations has a lot of experience.

Our taxi driver is told by another driver at a set of traffic lights that the road ahead is closed. He drops us at the police barricade and wishes us luck. The policeman lets us past and we head towards the prison gates where we find an angry mass of people, mainly women, shouting. Partners, mothers, sisters, and daughers are demanding more information. Photocopied lists of the injured and dead are passed around, groups swarming around each sheet. People respond angrily adament that there are more people dead and injured than this.

When two more of the infamous vehicles that collect corpses turn up the crowd gets angry and blocks the vehicles entrance to the prison demanding more information.

“How can they say there is just one dead person when there are now three of these vehicles. INPEC (National Prison Authorities) are lying to us. There are more people dead.”

“We heard prisoners in patio 9 shouting for help because there was more people injured. We have a right to know. We aren't saying our family members are saints but they deserve to be treated as human beings.”

Cries, sobs, shouts. The anxiety and tension is high. Walter attempts to mediate. He tries to ensure that the police don't use excessive force against people who have good reason to be anxious. And tries to get people to calm down and minimally trust the information that INPEC has given until an independent commission can enter to verify the facts.

The police pull out shields and begin to push people out of the way of the vehicle. Forces wins the day and the vehicle manages to enter. The gates are shut behind it and people crowd around Walter, desperate for someone, anyone, to be able to give them some news. He has no news to gives. Instead we begin to talk about the conditions in the prison and what might have sparked the situation.

The group of women around us speak about the general abuse that the prisoners have to endure at the hands of the guards and how it is impossible to report it as the situation would just get worse rather than better. They talked about how inedible food is used as a means of humiliation and degradation. I later found out that after previous complaints, tests were done on the food and evidence of excrement was detects. One women told me that there will be no food for the next three days as a form of collective punishment. The other women nodded their heads in agreement. We don't know the details behind the conflict and why at least one person is dead but we all agreed that the physical conditions in which the prisoners are forced to live plus the humiliation and lack of respect would cause a reaction in any human trying to keep a scrap of dignity. Just like the workers in Tauramena, a human spirit just cannot be kept down.

I really hope that there doesn't need to be a murder for BP to negotiate”

2010-02-20T20:39:00.000-08:00

Workers for BP in the department of Casanare, Colombia have been protesting, demanding that the oil multinational improves labour conditions, since 23 January.

“We earn $30,000 (£9), this is what we were paid in 2004. Everything has gone up in price. Our salary is the only thing that hasn't increased. After paying food and bills we are left with nothing in the pocket while BP earms millions from Casanare oil. Us poor people need respect too as we are humans, just the same as rich people. And a dignified salary is part of this respect.”

One week ago they were forced to take the decision to go on strike after BP cancelled yet another meeting to discuss the demands. They are tired of being made fun of and walked all over for twenty years.

On Monday 15^th February, the notorious Colombian riot police, ESMAD, arrived and without any warning they violently attacked the strikers and community members using tear gas, their batons and shields.

Wilson, a young local commited councillor, told me how ESMADs response to his efforts to calm the situation down through attempting dialogue, was to be pushed to the ground and giving a kicking. He is now being sued by ESMAD for supposedly attacking the police.

Five days later, with wounds visible on many present, worker and community leaders spend the day in a meeting with a delegation of government representatives. BP did not arrive despite promising to attend. The government representatives spent the morning listening to the grievances of the communities and workers who for the first time in 20 years of BP operating in the oil are speaking out clearly, saying enough, this situiation has to change.

“It is important to me that the salaries increase so that my kids can study and have a better life and future than what I have.” Community member and wife of worker accompanying the strike.

The government represenatives spent the afternoon trying to confince the workers to lift the strike so that the dialogue could continue calmly. The workers responded saying that they have shown good will repeatedly and BP has refused to listen to them, even refused to accept this as a labour conflict.

“We will lift the strike when BP sits down to negotiate with us and we reach a just agreement”

The workers, with their strong sense of belonging to the region, are demanding that BP discusses not just labour issues but also environmental and social investment issues. They are very worried by the contamination of the streams and rivers, and feel totally abused by the lack of social investment in the area by BP.

It is the first time that workers for the BP have managed to organise themselves in a union. In the late 1990’s, B.P. was exposed by the British media for complicity in human rights abuses. The company had contracted the 16th Brigade of the Colombian army to protect its oilfields, despite the Brigade’s dire human rights record, which includes murder, “disappearances”, torture, rape and the forced displacement of communities. B.P. also admitted to having employed the private security company Defence Systems Limited to provide counter-insurgency training to Colombian police and army units charged with the protection of B.P’s installations. This training was described as “lethal” by a DSL employee and included the surveillance and intimidation of peasant leaders who were mounting protests against BP’s ecological damage, denial of labour rights and lack of social.

“As is common in our country, the presence of these economic projects are accompanied by state violence and a strong paramilitary presence.” USO Urgent Action (USO is the national oil workers union)

In Casanare, a department with a population of around 500,000 habitants, there have been 9900 selected killings, and 2600 people disappeared between 2000 and 2007 according to COS-PACC, a human rights NGO.

“We would wake up wondering who would be killed today. Things aren't as bad now but there has already been people on motorbikes without license plates watching us for hours at the picket line. We are worried. I really hope that there doesn't need to be a murder for BP to negotiate” Dina, local community member.

The USO holds BP and the Colombian State responsible for any possible human rights violations and that could occur. The situation is also urgent as hundreds of workers have not received their salary for a month now.

They are asking for national and international support; both solidarity actions and actions to pressure the company to sit down and negotiate with the union.

The Colombia Solidarity Campaign have called for an emergency picket of the BP HQ, London, Friday 26th February. The workers assembly gave a big cheer when I passed on this news and one women took a copy of the email to go door to door showing people how people were supporting the strike and encouraging all in the village to support the strike too.

Please send letters of support to prensa@usofrenteobrero.org and a copy to espaciobristol@redcolombia.org

One Year Anniversary of Murder of Edwin Legarda by Colombian Army

2009-12-18T07:38:00.000-08:00

On December 16th 2008, Edwin Legarda, the husband of Colombian indigenous leader Aida Quilcue, was killed when the Colombian army ambushed Aida´s car that he was driving that morning. Aida Quilcue at that moment was the Chief Councilor for the Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC) and spokesperson for the Minga of Social and Community Resistance. The CRIC believe that the bullets were meant for her for the fierce criticism of the Uribe government.(1)

Photo: We demand justice for State Crimes.

On December 16th 2009 we traveled to the Totoro municipal, Cauca where the murder occurred to take part in an event to commemorate the anniversary of Edwin’s death.

After being repeatedly shot in 2008, Edwin managed to drive 3km´s, thus avoiding any tampering of his vehicle or person which could be then be later used to attempt to cover-up the extrajudicial killing by presenting him as a guerilla.

The Observatory of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law of the Colombia-Europe-United States Coordination Group (CCEEU) a coalition of nearly 200 human rights group from Colombia, Europe and the U.S. reported 1,492 non-combat killings by the Colombian army between July 2007 and June 2008. According to the CCEEU, in the majority of cases the state is responsible, due to direct action or tolerance. (2)

Photo: Dario Toto, an indigenous leader, shows us the place where he came across the vehicle with Edwins still just alive at this point

Aida said that if her husband had not bravely driven these 3kms whilst injured, the army would have managed to successfully carry out the false positive then the government would have been able to portray the indigenous movement and the Minga of Social and Communitarian Resistance (which Aida led in social mobilisations in October 2008) as a ‘terrorist organisations’.

The event, attended by Indigenous from across Cauca and other social organizations, began with a symbolic march along these three kilometers, down a dusty unpaved road, accompanied by the sound of sweet, soothing, soul filling Andean indigenous melodies.

As I walk, I look at faces of compañeros around me, listening to their voices and laughter and imagine what Edwin was like. Even though I had shared just two hours with Aida and her daughter, their warmth and humour had been striking, I imagine Edwin must have had a great sense of humour and a great heart.

It is important that the Colombian state´s war against the poor and social organisations does not become just a list of shocking figures.

We arrive at the place where the army had fired 106 bullets at Aida´s vehicle, piercing it 17 times, not knowing she was not in the passenger seat that day. The place is now marked by a memorial, around which we gathered to share music, dance and words.

The current Chief Councilor of the CRIC, Alcibiades Escué spoke about how the event was not only important to support the family, but also to continue denouncing the murder which was a direct attack on the entire movement to both the national and international community. Legarda’s killing took place just two weeks after the Minga of Social and Community Resistance had completed its historic march from Cauca to Bogota, one of the most important acts of collective resistance that the Colombian indigenous movement has carried out.

Legard´s killing is not an isolated attack against the CRIC and the Minga. The 16^th December 2009 was also the 18^th anniversary of the Nilo massacre, where 20 indigenous people from the Huellas-Caloto community, including five women and four children, were murdered as they met to discuss a struggle over land rights in the estate of El Nilo in northern Cauca. In 1998, President Ernesto Samper acknowledged the responsibility of state actors in the massacre, and on behalf of the Colombian state apologized to the families of the victims and to the Nasa community of Northern Cauca.(3)

The night before this significant and tragic anniversary for the Cauca indigenous movement, two men laid hidden under the beds of Escue´s children waiting until they had gone to sleep. They jumped out and tied up the two children, announced themselves as members of the “Aguilas Negras” paramilitary group and said this was a warning and then left.

On October 29th 2009, Marly Guamanga was murdered in the Damina area of Cerro Tijeras indigenous reserve, Suarez municipality, Cuaca department.

On November 11th 2009, Reinaldo Bomba was murdered in the Bella Vista area of Cerro Tijeras indigenous reserve.

On November 13th 2009, Nilson Campo was murdered and Egdio Huila was seriously injured in the Damian area of Cerro Tijeras indigenous reserve.(4)

This is part of a systematic persecution of not just indigenous, but also afro-colombian and farming communities, whose struggle to remain in their ancestral lands gets in the way of powerful economic interests.

“They have returned to search for what was left after the first plundering 517 years ago. They are motivated by economic interests and seek land, water, gold and other natural resources. Wealth that the “investor friendly” government, is handing over to the highest bidder.” (5)

Aida, trembling at moments yet remaing a dignified emotional composure, spoke about the need to continue speaking out against not just the murder of her husband and the displacement of indigenous community through violence but also to speak out against the multinationals and European and US governments that drive it.

On the same day, Jose Goyes, another indigenous leader, took part in the climate justice mobilisation in Copenhaguen and spoke about what was happening in Cauca, making the links between climate and social iisues

"In the area (Cauca) we have the Anglo Gold Ashanty gold company from South Africa, Union Fenosa from Spain, and Carton Company from Ireland and ... the Cosega company, which is a gold enterprise from Canada. These multinational companies are causing large displacement, threats and even massacres and death sentences to indigenous communities. In our territories the paramilitary groups are supporting the state policy and the multinational policy through the use of violence. Cosega resource from Canada have a large interest in the area and the paramilitary groups have supported their political wish by threathening most of the indigenous leaders that are resisting the exploitation." (6)

Yet despite this huge powerful real threat against their human rights, primarily the very right to life, people continue to laugh, love and organise to resist this genocide against their cultures. This day was both profoundly sad, especially while watching Edwin´s daughter perform a dance in memory of her dad, yet at the same time it was a celebration of life, with shared food, song, laughter and ritual.

Photo: Banner " They can cut off our wings but never our desire to fly"

(1) Assassination of the husband of Ms Aida Quilcue

(2) Colombia: UN confirms ‘systematic’ killings of civilians by soldiers

(3) Embattled Cauca: A New Wave of Violence and Indigenous Resistance, by Mario A. Murillo

(4) Three murdered in Cierro Tijeras Reserve, Cauca

(5) Instruments of War by ACIN

(6) Colombian paramilitaries assassinate indigenous leader in the name of Canadian multinationals

Where was the arrest warrant when the paramilitaries arrived?

2009-11-06T14:21:00.000-08:00

¿Donde fue el orden de captura cuando los paramilitares llegaron?

During an event for victims of paramilitary and state violence in Casanare, the intelligence services turned up with an arrest warrant. Arrests and legal processes are part of the state's strategy across the country to cause fear in people trying to organise to remember their victims and to demand justice.

This video shows clips of a speech made by Gloria Cuartas in response at this attempt to intimidate us. The key question she makes is: Where was the arrest warrant when the paramilitiaries with the support of the army and police arrived here, torturing, disappearing and massacring people eight years ago?

Durante un evento por victimas de violencia de los paramilitaries y el estado en Casanara, el CTI llegaron con un order de captura. Detenciones y procesos judiciales son parte de la estrategica del estado Colombia para generar miedo en los que buscan organisarse para recordar sus victimas y exijir justicia.

Este video muesta una intervencion por Gloria Cuartas en respuesta a este intento a intimidarnos. La pregunta clave que les hizo es: ¿Donde fue el orden de captura cuando los paramilitares llegaron con ustedes para torturar, disaparecer y masacrar a la gente?

Biviana's words - Palabras de Biviana

2009-11-06T13:47:00.000-08:00

(en español abajo)

I came to this event to support the people here and to bring attention to the fact that the government is doing things wrong. I don't support the government because they do what they want without the the need to think about the people that they affect on the way, walking all over the rights of people humans.

I imagined that there would be less people, I never expected that so many would arrive. I would have like to have had the opportunity to get to know people from other regions more, their customs and what they have lived through, here everyone has suffered.

I have learnt a lot here, there is much to learn and much to contribute to those people who have no idea, to people who say that this government is the best because of benefits that they may have received but who don't think about the violations that it has brought to many communities. A topic I didnt really have clear before is, that while yes i have suffered from the violence but i have never had the opportunity to understand the topic really well and understand the reality. We say that, over there, they have suffered violence but we have never worried much about why people have suffered violence. Sometimes we have to see things with our own eyes to believe it, sometimes we don't see what we don't want to see.

In my community, people haven't lived so much violence as like here in Recetor. They are forgotten about, they are topics that for fear have never been brought out in to the open, for fear that it might bring more violence. One can't say that this person died because it is certain that they will come and imprisonme, or take reprisals against friends and families.

I was scared, there were people that said to me that if you go on the pilgrimage it is really like that they will take reprisals agaisnt you. I am not scared here becuase there is many people that can help you in many things. So,....,no , and fear, you must leave it behind to be able to be to do what you want to do, to be able to be yourself, and to inform people who dont know.

I think it is important that people know becuase we are being tricked with...with practically, the government, the government says, or it goes out on the news, what is in their interest , we never hear about what is not in their interest, people never hear the truth about what is happeneing.

The two masses that we listened to were good. Sometimes religion lends itself for many things, to cover up things. I have no disagreement with the catholic religion but there are some things that i don't like. I have never been to a mass like this one, where they talk about politics, practically revolutionary, a mass where the father is not bothered by what the high church functionaries think, where he felt and spoke about the reality that people live.

About the presence of BP in the region,..., well,...I don't agree with that either. I don't agree because this oil megaproject has caused many violations against people. Instead of bringing benefits for the community what it has brought is more war, more unemployment, more hunger. These companies are taking land from campesinos and not giving them any other opportunities.

These businesses are supported by the government, why? Because they bring in lots of money for the government and they don't care what a campesino things, rather what is important to them is to get more money at the cost of people having to suffer.

In my daily life, oil production doesnt affect me that much, but with time it is going to affect all of us because it is damaging the land and i think that what this region needs is land for campesinos so they can work and get the resources that they need to survive.

I want to keep living here, search for opportunities to be able to survive, as long as I can, because you never know in what moment violence will return again and we will have to leave and look for other ways to survive.

Palabras de Biviana

Vine a este evento para apoyar a la gente y dar a conocer de que ellos (el gobierno) esta haciendolo mal hecho. No estoy de acuerdo con el gobierno por lo que buscan sus objectivos o logran lo que quieren sin necesidad de pensar a los personas que les va a afectar a hacer eso, pisoteando todo los derechos de los humanos.

Me imaginé poco gente, nunca esperé que llegaran muchisima gente. Me hubiera gustado la oportunidad a conocer la otra gente más, costumbres y lo que viven otras comunidades, a parte de que se vive acá, acá a todo el mundo ha sufrido este atropello.

He aprendido muchisimo aca, hay mucho para aprender y mucho para aportar a gente que no tiene ni idea, a gente que dicen que eq que esta gobierno es lo mejor por los beneficios que de pronto les han traido pero sin pensar en los tropellos que les ha traido a muchas comunidades.

Un tema que no tenía en esencia claro, que si, yo sufrí violenca, pero nunca tenía la oportunidad llegar al fondo de tema y conocer la realidad, nosotros, ah si por alla tiene o tenía violencia, pero nunca hemos preocupado el por que esta gente sufrío violencia,

a veces nosotros tenemos que ver para creer las cosas. Aveces no vemos mas allá de lo que queremos ver.

En mi comunidad, no se vivía tanto la violenca como acá en Recetor, estan olvidados, son temas que por temor, nunca ha sacado al flote por el temor que puede traer mas violencia. No se puede decir que esto persona murio por que seguro que viene y me va a llever preso, que van a tomar represalias con mi familia o con conocidas,

Tenía temor, hubo gente que me comente que si vas pa' allá seguro que te tome represarias. Temor no lo tengo en este moment pq hay mucha gente y que lo pueden apoyar a uno en muchas cosas. Entonces, ….no , y temor, hay que dejar lo atrás para poder hacer lo que uno quiere, para poder ser uno mismo, y dar a conocer lo que mucha gente no conoce.

Creo que es importante que gente conocza por que estamos engañados con.....con practicamente, el gobierno, el gobierno dice o pasa en loas noticas o todo eso , lo que les conviene, nunca pasa lo que no les conviene, nunca la gente se entere, que es la verdad que esta viviendo.

Estas misas eran cheveres. A veces la religion se presta por muchas cosas, se presta por tapar cosas. no estoy en ningun disacuerdo con la religon catolica pero hay cosas que en me gusta. Nunca había ido a una misa donde se han tratado el politico, practicamente revolucionaria, mas que todo es es, una misa donde no le importa lo piensa lo alto cargos en colombia, donde se siente y se dice la realidad que la gente vive,

De la presencia del BP, …..pues..... no estoy de acuerdo tampoco, no estoy de acuerdo por que al hacer un megaproyecto, el petroleo, ha traido muchas tropellas contras las personas, en vez de traer beneficios a la comunidad lo que esta traendo es mas guerra, mas desempleo, mas hambres. Por que son empresas de que, les estan quitando la tierra a los campesinos y no les esta dando otras oportunidades.

Pq ellos son una empresa que esta apoyado por el goberino, por que? por que traen mucha plata por el gobierno, y ellos no les importa lo que piensa un campesino, sino lo que les importa es conseguir dinero a costa de hacer sufrir mas gente.

En mi vida cotidiana el petroleo no me afecta tanto, pero con el tiempo nos va afectar todos pq esta deteriorando mucho la tierra y pienso que lo que necesita en este region es tierra por campesinos y poder trabajar y poder conseguir sus recursos para sobrevivir.

Quiero seguir viviendo en el campo, buscaré las oportunidades, poder sobrevivir, hasta cuando se puede no, pq pues uno no se saben en que momento vuelva la violenca, y tendremos que salir y buscar otra forma de sobrevivir

Minga in photos and music

2009-10-23T07:39:00.000-07:00

Day 6: Walking the word - decolonising solidarity

2009-10-17T12:30:00.000-07:00

It is the end of the beginning. The last day of an exhausting but amazing week of mobilisations. The closing act of the Peoples Pre-congress takes place in the central park in Cali, after another two hour march. An afro-colombia leader from Choco is given a special place in the closure to make visible the presence of afro-colombian communities in the Minga. Choco is the poorest region in Colombia.

"The only way to travel in Choco easily is by plane and we all know who planes are for. We travelled on foot, in canoes and in buses for several days, sleeping in difficult conditions and going without food to get here, to participate in Minga".

He tells us how the population of Quibdo, the main town in the region, has doubled from 40,000 to 80,000. Choqueños, mainly afrodescendents, have been forced to abandon their territories due to the violent imposition of megaprojects such as mining and palm oil .

"We know that alone we are not able to change things, we need to unite with indigenous, with campesinos, because in the end we are all living with the same difficulties and problems. This is why seven hundred of us have made the huge effort to be here in the Peoples Pre-congress".
Tears trickle out of me as I make links between this declaration of the Peoples Pre-congress and a difficult conversation I had last night.

Last night a friend challenges me to reflect on something I did. He challenged me to look at how I controlled the way in which we discusses a difficult conversation, racism within the Minga. With the bitter taste of irony in my mouth, I, with my full set of colonial priviliges, british, privilige to move wherever I want in the world, white, privilige to walk down the street and for people not to think I am going to mug them, set the terms for how we discussed racism that suited my needs, and not his. As we talk, his anger manifests itself as he goes over and over the two words he has written on a scrap of paper, ego britanico.

“I have seen this before many times. The arrogance and preponencia of british people to have their own way, the result of being from a country that has repeatedly colonised and dispossed other peoples throughout history to get its own way”.

His words challenge rather than shock or suprise me. I am grateful to this rare person who critiqued me to my face. I wonder how many people I meet share similar criticisms about my way of doing things but do not tell me. I wonder what this says about ongoing patterns of colonial power within my everyday relationships here. I breathe deeply as I look at my challenge of how to achieve the balance between being myself and being conscious and accountable to how my self has been shaped by my cultural-political-historical context.

Back in the park, we listen to a song by Mercedes Sosa, recently passed away, as the Peoples Precongress in Cali draws to a close in Cali's central park. The thousands of participants stand intently, some listening, some quietly singing alone. The compañeros who sings it, dedicates it to those compañeros no longer with us, including Mateo. As I listen to the beautiful melody, I imagine what he could have taught me. Mateo, a Swiss revolutionary, worked for ten years as part of the Red de Hermandad. He was killed last December in a road accident. Incredibly missed and rememberd within the social movements in Cauca and Valle I wish I had the opportunity to know how he worked to de-colonise himself.
After the song, two compañeros read the final declaration.

"Minga is a collective expression that revives hope, that strengthens resistance and walks the word in defence of dignity and in commitment to collective life. We are conscious of how the neoliberal strategy is strengthened in our territories through the handing over resources and selling of mother earth to international capital, thorugh the recomposition of of corruption and the legalising of crimes against Colombia´s sovereigny, and through impunity and the militrisation of civilian life."

I seek a place to be alone with my emotions of rage and sadness. The weight of being British, of having benefited from so much violence, of being surrounded in the park by so many people who suffer from this violence, overwhelms me. The weight of knowing that the British ego is alive and kicking and that it continues to play a crucial role within the UK in the justification of the violent looting of other peoples natural resources is overwhelming.

I feel a hand on my shoulder and look up to see the caring eyes of an indigenous leader who I have shared words with during the week. He has 5 bullet wounds from attempted assassination attempts and had his farm burnt down. He is now displaced, living between cities. During this week, he was always accompanied by four indigenous guards. He tells me that when he goes back to his community, it is obligatory for him that he travels with thirty indigenous guard, armed with just their bastions of resistance. He listens to my emotions, as the words of the final declaration sound in the background.

"Mingueros and Mingueras, we have gathered in this spaces filled with dreams and ideals and we leave with thoughts on how to legalise with significant popular legitimacy, with proposals on the path to peace, whose route is the word that overflows with solidarity, generosity and resistence."

My solidarity must begin and end with me, a white british folk, learning to notice my colonial mentalities and then taking responsibility for them.

For more thoughs about this work of decolonising solidarity visit decolonizingsolidarity.blogspot.com, the blog a beautiful wise friend.

To read the full closing declaration and the notes from the 5 tulpas that discussed the five points of the Agenda of the Minga check out this blog (in spanish only)

Day 4: Our Dignified Rage Walks the Word

2009-10-15T10:43:00.000-07:00

This is a translation of a newsletter being written by a communication collective in Cali during the mobilisations.

Opening of the Peoples Pre-congress

With the arrival of the last marches and delegations that are part of the Minga of Social and Community Resistance in the Southwest of Colombia as night came, the peoples pre-congress was opened. Thousands of people filled the area in front of the state and the passionate emotive hymn of the Indigenous Guard opened the evening’s activities. The verses of the national anthem were not sufficient to welcome the diversity of the participants and the crowd was quiet with the sound of whispered conversations.

One after another, voices of those who have been in the process of building the Minga and who, tired and angry, expressed and conveyed the dignity of the peoples who are tired of paying the consequences of the current political and economic model. The voices told us of their realities: the impact of the multinationals on their communities and regions, the game that the powerful play with the destiny of the communities, the permanent human rights violations, the impossibility to decide how their economical, environmental and cultural resources will be used, and the militarization in rural and urban areas…… the angry dignity created by these problems exploded in words through different expressions from the heart of the Mingueros. But the voices also told us about their processes, about the steps that they have taken to build another country “where we all fit”, and about the hope and strength of the peoples. After this collective recognition, of knowing who we are and where we come from, the party began with happiness and fraternity.

Organising the path

All the mingueros met in the afternoon in themed working groups to decide on the methodology that they will use in the working groups and the discussions in The Peoples Pre-congress in Cali; also they shared and defined the subthemes that arise from the 5 point agenda that has been created nationally in the Minga de Pensamiento and that will be crucial in organizing and advancing in the construction of some proposals and paths to keep walking the work towards The Peoples Congress. In the Sovereignty, Land and Territory working group, people spoke about: comprehensive agrarian reform, legalization and reclaiming land, privatization, megaprojects, environmental sovereignty and food sovereignty. In the War and Human Rights working groups they looked at how to build a Peace Agenda that looks at the political and social roots of the conflict and how to propose a political solution based on these roots, as well as demanding from the state the guarantee and application of all human rights.

Public Statement

The organizations who are participating in the Minga of Social and Community Resistance denounce to the national and international public opinion and to Colombian social and human rights organizations the attacks to which Mingueros in the department of Cauca have been subjected to. Today in the city of Popayan various people have been detained by the police. They are Omaira A Piamba from the Comitte for the Integration of Mestizo Colombia, ALEX LOPEZ a motorcycle taxi driver and Julio Quiñones who is involved in housing struggles in Popayán.
It is important to note that the people detained by the police were participating at the time in one of many peaceful activities that are happening in different cities in the country as part of the Minga of Social and Community Resistance.

Again the armed forces are brutally attacking the popular and social movement that has taken to the streets to make proposals and work for a better country for everybody.

We demand the immediate freedom of the compañeros detained in Popayan and that the fundamental right to participate in peaceful protest is respected.

We Have Grown

The heavy rains that arrived in the afternoon also brought the force of the campesino, afrodescendents and other social sectors to the Peoples Coliseum. Their arrival was emotional for all as they were greeted with enthusiastic clapping and happy cheering from those who had already arrived. These Mingueros have been walking from different parts of the country for more than a week; Chocó, the North and Central area Valle, Tolima and the coffee región. They entered the coliseum with rallying cries against the multinationals that invade their territories, against the government that persecutes, marginalices and assassinates them and about all shouting with happiness for the opportunities for creation of new possibilities through exchanges with others who are socially conscious with the hope of moving towards a popular uprising and the construction of a new Colombian, dreamed by many.

The Minga continues to nourish itself with people from different places, marchers from Popayán and Antioquia who arrived to join in the process of the Pre-Congress. We are many who are preparing for the congress in July 2010. We are not everyone. We hope to wake more consciousnesses, hearts, and wisdom to keep weaving the Minga of Social and Community Resistance.

Day 3: Building Popular Power in Minga

2009-10-14T07:27:00.000-07:00

It is nearly 9pm on Tuesday night in the grounds of the Coliseo in the city of Cali. People have rested after the 3 day of walking 15km and young indigeneous are now dancing in large circles in front of the stage. The music fades and Feliciano Valencia, spokesperson for La Minga speaks to the thousands that have gathered to listen to the proposals for tomorrows activities;

delegations to visit 5 places in the city to talk about what is Minga and to invite community organisations to walk the word

a caravan in the 40 chivas through the streets of Cali to make the Minga visible,

join teachers who are marching against labour conditions and have invited us to join.

begin thinking collectively about what the Congress of the People, planned for July 2010, actually is with important questions for consideration such as how are we going to legislate and what are the mechanisms and strategies we need so that the peoples laws are put into practice?

With the sheer quanity of people I have been curious to watch how decisions are made at this scale, how different forms of power are working and and how popular power is being built. What I watched was these proposals being created through a serious of meetings. Firstly the political commision of the Minga, which includes representatives of each social organisation involved in the Minga, met and came up with a proposal with Feliciano playing the role of listening, gathering all the opinions and presenting a synthesized proposal. This was then discussed and adapted by some 40 governers of the different Indigenous reservations. This was then presented to everyone. During the night, each community will have discussed it and as I write, another meeting is taking place to finalise the plans for today.

The sheer presence of indigenous from Cauca, through their impressive organisational capacity, is a challenge to the proposal of Minga to be inclusive to all. Yesterday, there was some serious errors such as the idea to start the pre-congress before the second smaller march arrives , yet once this was flagged up the idea was inmediately dropped. There is much to be learnt, and to get wrong and do better the next time, in terms of thinking about how to make proposals that are not based in sectorial thinking, but thinking of all.

Much has already been learnt. The 5 point agenda includes indigenous based proposals around territory and cultural, while also going much beyond and is incredibly inclusive. And as a friend says over a beer last night, "i think there is a distortion of the reality abroad of Colombia. They either thing that all resistence follows the same logic as the insurgency or that the problems in Colombia are all about defending the profits from the drug-trafficing trade. Here, what I think is important to say to people in your country is that we are here saying clearly there is another reality in which many Colombians are living and from this harsh violent reality, we are building a resistance based in the grassroots, and it is a resistance that is building serious proposals collectively to create another country. And the government are worried, the moment the indigenous invited other social organisations to recognise the commonality, they see a threat to their dictatureship"

In Popayan, two hours further south, mainly campesinos organisations held a campesino and popular assembly on Monday in preparation for the precongress in Cali. They declare " In our territories, we, communities and organisations will not allows policies and laws to be applied that are harmful to us, that have not consulted with us, that do not take into account the wellbeing of all and that are not participatory, coordinated or integral. Handing over territory to private hands will not be accepted and we will assert our rights to sovereignty, autonomy and independence to maintain the integrity of our lands."
And in the north of the country, social organisacions write "With happiness and vitality typical of the communities, but also with the hope to change the hard conditions that characterise their lives, the habitants of the Sur de Bolivar and the south of Cesar are "navegating the word" down the river Magdalena towards Cartagena.

"The message that we want to spread nationally and internationally is clear, free mother earth and our territories from the proposals, policies and projects of death with proposals where life and happiness, are the foundations of the people as they build with dignity a free and self-determined future, it is the voice of the people in a country where death took control of the Great River Magdalena and the oblivion tried to occupy all the territory, leaving hope with none.

We are a people who have declared our resistance, faced with a violent and injust state, that acts through the dispossesion of land, natural resources, memoria and identity. Faced with this tough situation, the proposals of life of the communities are representes in the sound of the drums, the flute, the accordion, the bagpipes, and the maracas . This is the sound of the resistance which does not permit us to forget our numerous leaders who have been disappeared and murdered, such as Alejandro Uribe, Edgar Martínez and Edgar Quiroga; it is the rhythm through which victims of state crime, students, women, indigenous, workers miners, afro-colombians, small scale farmers, unions and many more Colombians continue to meet and see their own struggles in the struggle of their brothers and sisters. The proposal of the Minga of Social and COmmunity resistance is needed by all of us. "

Day 2: Walking the Word in Cauca

2009-10-13T08:24:00.000-07:00

The temporary camp awakes before dawn, its numbers swelled by the constante stream of civas that through the night, piled high with people, food and firewood. As day comes, the huge black tarpaulins that were strung up during last nights rain to create sleeping shelters for entire communities are already being folded up. The level of organisation is phenomenal. A camp for with 20000 people has breakfasted, showered, packed away and ready to march again in just three hours.

As we prepare to leave, a group of 100 Indígeneous Guard go running past, evenly spaced out, young and old, men and women, each with their bastion adornded with red and green ribbons, the red blood of the earth and the green of nature.

I walk a while chatting with a young guardia. “I joined two years ago, in my community of 500 people, 45 are in the guardia. When the pólice or army come into our resguardias, we get together to go and find them and remind them of the indigenous laws that does not allow the armed forces in our communities. We tell them to leave".

After the husband of Aida Quilcué, Chief Councillour of the CRIC, the Regional Indigenous Council and a spokesperson for the Minga , was killed in an army ambush in December 2008, the quick arrival and response of the Indigenous Guard preventing evidence being destroyed.

The Guardia Indigena today are coordinating the safety of the marchers. Unfortunately a guardia bastion, symbol of indigenous resistance, trips over a young guardia and she crashes to the floor. We rush over but she gets up quickly, and without hesitation, continues, now hobbling, in her part of a human chain that goes from the head to the tail of the march, walking the line in the middle of the road to protect us from traffic.

We march squeezed in on one side by container lorries on route to Buenaventura port and on the other by sugar cane as far as the eye can see. The symbolism is intense. From this enclosing on all sides by an imposed economic development model has arisen the 5 point agenda of the Minga. Economic models that use violence to squeeze communities until they must displace because they have nowhere left to live. Broken agreements with the government that means social movements must look for other solutions, no longer believing that the Colombian state will ever act in benefit of the poor.

The march is tiring, our feet ache, stomachs empty, a temporary physical discomfort yet this reflects daily reality for the majority in Colombia. Yet the march is inspiring and exciting as we all know that in many other places in the country people are also walking the word in the streets this week, joining the dots.

Campesinos from Choco are walking to Cali via Pereida talking about displacement about palm.

Small scale miners are heading to Cartagena down the River Magdalena taking about defense of the territory from multinationals that want to get control of the gold there.

Communities in Tolima against a huge open cast gold mine are talking about how this will destroy their livelihoods.

Communities along the river Sogamoso are in Minga, talking about the mega-dam that will destroy their communities.

Cartagena are in Minga, marching against hunger and will meet with those on route down the rvier Magdalena to build a common agenda.

And all are talking about the Agenda of the Peoples. How do we continue to work together to recognise what our different struggles have in common and create a different country. The conversations at the Pre-congresses on Wednesday and Thursday are going to be an important step in these conversations. Many social organisations still believe that the Minga is indigenous Feliciano Valencia, councillor of the CRIC says "we have to go beyond these particular identities that make each of us fight in our corner. I´m indigenous but an indigenous struggle is not going to change this country. This is a fight between the rich and the poor. And one day, we will win."

Day 1: Walking the Word in Cauca

2009-10-11T17:18:00.000-07:00

A flash of fork lightning cuts throught the dark brooding sky, as two thousand indigenous march with an spirit of confidence and dignity towards us. The red and green colours of CRIC, the Indigenous Council of Cauca, are held high on flags and low, tied around the neck. Daisy Juliana, part of the CRIC and with whom I shared a smile on the bus on the way to meet this first group of marching Mingueros, waits excitedly with us despite the thirty or so armed police near by.

In the 10 minutes that we waited by the side of the rural road, we had spotted one unmarked 4x4 parked up and a police man talking with civilians inside, two men on a motorbike that drove past three times, a private security guard alone on a bridge, an unmarked 4x4 parked on the hard shoulder and a police van that stopped. The presence of suspected paramilitaries is worrying yet all too normal in Colombia. Here paramilitaries groups, whose insitutional links with the Colombian state have been well documented, have used violence and the fear of violence to attack and destroy movements, such as the Minga of Social and Community Resistance, that want to create alternatives to the imposed Western economic “development” model.

As we are “walking the word” Daisy comes and finds me . “It is mainly young people here today, some elders will arrive tomorrow, but us young people are really motivated. We want to change things, we teach the kids, we still have hope that our future can be better” She greets a young lad who is hobbling “He always marches, him and his group from his village, their village is near mine, about 7 hours walk from here.” She pauses from talking to me to shout with others

“No to Uribes policy of democratic security....... No to multinationals in our lands taking our natural resources...... No to foreign military bases in Colombia”

The Minga was a proposal by the indigenous to other social sectors, to organise and come together around a common political agenda. The first steps have been taken with a year of hard work among campesinos, indigenous, students and community groups to dialogue around their individual issues, figure out what they have in common and work together to achieve changes that benefit all.

In the UK it would be like farmers and students coming together to talk about, for example, what privatisation of education and control of food prices by large supermarkets have in common, and from these commonalities coming up with political proposals and plans of action together to confront both. Like this, only with more social sectors involved and not just a vague distant dream of mine.

As we enter Villarica, people coming out of their houses to watch. The response by the mainly afrocolombian community varies from watching quitely from afar to clapping and cheering loudly to welcome the march. I assume most of the men are sugar cane cutters, as the village is in the green desert of Valle de Cauca. This work has been described as modern day slavery. There has been dialogue between the Minga and those sugar cane cutters well organised but they have not felt that they share a common agenda. It is tough work in tough conditions, but the spirit of Minga is to do this tough work. The idea is not to arrive with the solutions but through hard work to build them together. This week The Peoples Pre-Congress will take place in Cali, Cartagena and Bogota to continue doing this work, together.

It is a long ardous path ahead, to build a political proposal for the country that goes beyond regional and sectorial needs, to build a proposal that speaks to all Colombians. But at least they are on it. It is a path which we scarely know we need to walk in my homeland. A big sigh.

Thank you to the lovely family that thought nothing of letting me use a bedroom to write this article. Sharing and solidarity are so precious, beautiful and vital to resistance, to live with dignity.

Not the Climate for just Climate Justice Mobilisations in Colombia

2009-10-04T16:16:00.000-07:00

A sunny morning in Colombia in 2009 in a well posh conference hall in Bogóta, Colombian flag behind the podium and no coffee allowed in the room cos it might spoil the wooden floor. Presentations began. M, from COSPACC , nervously took to the stage to share his tales of the impacts of BP in Casanare with other campesinos and indigenous from around the country. The occasion is an event to spark dialogue about if climate justice should be included in the agendas of the social organisations and if so, how?

Christian Aid initiated and funded the event as the political agenda of Christian Aid in the UK says to CA here that we want you to be working on climate justice as this is what our members and funders want us to be supporting. And so colonial power relationships continues to exist in Colombia.

Do the grassroots organizations already have this agenda or do they, while recognising that the debate is being pushed from outside, see the necessity to include climate justice in their agendas?

Climate Justice is barely visible on the mobilisation agendas of the social movements. It isn’t surprising. 381,000 people were displaced in 2008 alone, both the aim and the result of violence in areas rich in fuentes de vida, (sources of life). 1,177 members of the armed forces are currently under investigation linked with cases of extrajudicial killings,

What does to mobilise mean, I am asked. Good question, in the UK to protest is culturally understood, but do we understand mobilise differently? Here's my take on it. To mobilise around climate change means to work over time with people to critically understand how the causes and impacts of climate change affect our lives, and from this, create proposals for how we might change this, and then to create space in society for these proposals to be heard and discussed, through workshops, assemblies, marches, occupations,......

Unfortunately, here there is a wealth of options of what to mobilize around: water, energy, displacement, hunger, militrisation, war, education, housing…….. I feel that among social organisations there is a shared view that mobilising around climate change would not be effective as the impacts in communities can feel less severe and less urgent than the immediate pressures of daily life in a country at war against its own people.

Yet to take action against climate change, do we have to mobilise around climate change?

The Asociación de Cabildos Gernaro Sanchez spoke about how as their glaciers disappear , those who control the glacier streams have the power to decide who gets the water. If the water sources moves to private hands, those who can pay will get the scarcer water. If in the hands of an organised community, all will get an equal share. How are struggles against water privatization a struggle for climate justice?

The Comité Prodefensa de Taganga spoke about how as sea levels rise and warming sea temperatures threatens fish populations, the fisherman in the pretty seaside village of Tagana, organise against intensive tourism which threatens to further damage the fragile ecosystem and thus their livelihoods.

As BP, Repsol, Oxy continue to export Colombian oil to the global North, the community of Sogamoso in Santander fight against a mega-dam that will not only force 900 campesinos to leave their farms, but also threatens food sovereignty as will affect the fish population, the staple protein in the region. Struggles for the right to territory and food sovereignty are struggles for climate justice,

Listening to the presentations, I saw a pattern of how direct impacts of climate change are exacerbating already ridiculously tough living conditions. A clear consensus at the event was that both are caused by an imposed model of development that communities have been struggling against for five hundred years in defense of life, land and sovereignty.

While European organisations goes crazy with the sense that Copenhagen is the last chance to save the world, Beru, an U´Wa Indigenous from Arauca calmly says “Copenhagen is not really important to us, we feel no urgency nor sense that this is the last chance, we have been living on the brink of genocide for 500 years, due to colonization that continues today.” Quite. Quite a different perspective than that of us panicking Europeans. And his sentiment was echoed around the room.

The whole history of Grassroots social organisations could be framed as taking action against climate change, if we understand the root causes of human caused climate change as capitalism that imposes itself through violence.

The Minga for Community and Social Resistance, a broad base coalition of campesinos, indigenous, workers and students that has collectively created a five point proposal for which they are trying to bring together different needs of different movements. El pueblo unido jamas será vencido rings through me. Economic model, defense of life, failed agreements, sovereignty, land and territory, and lastly, the peoples agenda.

I am excited by the potential for convergence, connections and solidarity between the global North movement against climate justice and the Minga. For me, it is clear that the Minga is mobilizing for climate justice yet within much more. And by being based in much more, there is much more potential to connect to the difficulties that people face in their daily lives

The Climate Justice Action network formed to coordinate action around Copenhagen has in its aims that it wants to amplify the voices of indigenous and people affected by climate change in the Global South. Those involved should listen hard and act in solidarity in these next few weeks, as the Minga mobilisations hits the streets.

One of the aim of Climate Camps is movement building. That should not be be limited to bringing more people in to act on climate change but rather expanding our understanding of what action on climate change means and linking across to other social grassroots movements.

biofuels and begging

2009-10-02T13:52:00.000-07:00

Here is a letter I have just wrote to Bristol City Council opposing a proposed biofuel powerstation near the city. I thought I would share it.

I wish to object to W4B’s planning application to build a 50 MW biofuel power station at Avonmouth Docks, which would burn 90,000 tonnes of vegetable oil every year.

I have been working in Colombia since September 2008 and see daily the impact of monocrops, such as palm oil, have both on people and the environment. Just two days ago I had a really intense sad experience that, above all, is what is motivating me to write to object to this biofuel plant. Waiting at the traffic lights on route to an event about Climate Justice here in Bogota, the captial of Colombia, an old man approached my taxi. He was dressed as smartly as he could, dark suit, a tie and a felt hat, but he didn't look like your average suited man., his clothes while clean and tightly ironed were old and shabby. And his old, sunweathered face, that makes guessing ages very difficult, showed such a sadness. He held a carefully handwritten sign in his hand, "Please help my family, god bless you. We are displaced from the Magdalena Medio”.

The Magdalena Medio is a low lying tropical region through which the river Magdalena flows. The relationship between paramilitarism and african palm is clear. In the Magdalena Medio the african palm expanded after the paramilitary takeover of the region. The paramilitary takeover of the region, through violence and the threat of violence, caused massive displacement, the result of which is thousands of old men like this begging at traffic lights. The fear of violence meant that opposition to palm oil projects has been small, and those who have opposed it live at risk.

In April 2009 I attended the funeral of Edgar Martinez, a farmer on the banks of the river Magdalena and community leader, who was killed after leaving a meeting with the mayor San Pablo. He strongly spoke out about the impacts of palm oil plantations on his farming community and opposed new palm plantations. The murder of Edgar is not an isolated case, but a systematic repression of those who try to oppose monocrops becuase of the damage to the environment, their culture and their livelihoods.

Palm from the Magdalena Medio is exported to Europe and the USA for both use in cosmetics, food and biofuels. Since the beginning of September, the network I work with has been accompanying a village which was violently evicted by riot police at the orders of a palm oil company which sells to the Body shop.
www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/13/body-shop-colombia-evictions

If the use of palm oil grows in Britain, people will continue to be violently evicted from their homes and forced to urban areas to beg at traffic lights.

Bristol City Council must consider the impacts of planning decisions, not only in Bristol but globally and take a lead in acting responsibily to protect lives wherever they may be. If this biofuels plant is granted planning permission, it is very likely that it will contribute to yet more violent displacement for Colombian people. Thus I ask you to reject this development.

If you feel motivated to write a letter and right now (as decision day is Tuesday) go to : biofuelswatch action page

In recent months Biofuel power plant applications have been rejected in Newport, Weymouth and London. Could Bristol be a fourth?

River Catatumbo - a river of dignity and memory

2009-09-13T21:26:00.000-07:00

Jacquelina's story - La Historia de Jacquelina

2009-08-27T06:35:00.000-07:00

El articulo en español aparece al final del texto de inglés.

Sifting through the mound of family's daily washing which all but covered the double bed Jacquelina aged 19 tells me how she doesn't want to get married yet. “Not until I have finished studying and trained in something....If things went badly what would I do, I couldn't leave if I didn't have my own job.”

She tells me about her dad as i edge on to the bed, slowly becoming visible as the clothes get stacked into eight piles, one for each family member. She was nine the day the paramilitaries arrived in La Gabarra and took control through the barrel of their guns. Hundreds were murdeded but her family stayed. Her dad a fisherman in the river Catatumbo. His life and livelihood the river.

His daily catch diversified from the fish the length of his arm, fish that fed his family. He took on the gruesome task of fishing parts of mutilated body out of the river. He would later bury the remnants of touch, smell, sound, sight, taste, spirit, along the banks of the river.

She is bored at school. A few years ago she had friends with whom she would play sport, organise fiestas and practice dances. Baseball is her favourite sport. But these girls all left school early, pregnant. She is the only one of the ground left and none of the others want to do anything fun. She goes to school, attends classes and comes home. Bored.

Her dad was taken by a group of paramilitaries one cloudless beautiful early morning. Her mother searched for him, for the shadow of him, from the hour of making the arepas to the hour of washing the kids after much play in the unpaved streets. As dusk passed her rapidly by, she found the courage to visit the paraco in charge in his office. Her mother, with dignity, asked if he knew why her husband had been disappeared. It hadn't been an order and the paraco was feeling generous that cloudless starfull evening. He ordered her husband, not yet a shadow, to be turned out on to the streets.

She loves physics and maths but struggles with chemistry. Snap. She has friend in the town council and is hopeful that once she finishes college she may be able to get a job there, starting at the bottom and working her way up, learning skills and earning a salary as she goes.

Aged 10 her and her mother found a dismembered body on the river bank. Arms, legs and head cut off, the chest wide opened. She describes me the details calmly, no big deal, as we sit resting in chairs outside in the front street, washing all folded and put away now.

She tells me how she bashed into someone earlier, a teenager from one of the delegations who have came on this Pilgrimage, the political – cultural -religous journey that brought 300 of us to La Gabarra. She tells me how embarrased she was but that the lad had responded with a lovely smile and made her laugh.

She was too young for her to be taken as a “girlfriend” by one of the paracos. “Lots of teenage girls had to be the girlfriend of one of them. They did horrible things to them. I don't want to think about it.”

Some of the teengage lads from CISCA walk past a few minutes later. In the dark street she thought it might be one of them. I call them over with the excuse of asking what time we are meeting for the final rehearsal before the perform their drama piece about displacement, death and life. I look at her and she shakes her head, not one of them. They move on.

She overhears a man in a shop that morning. He is angry with us. This is not a commemoration but a celebration of death. He spits the words out. She translates him. Anger, impotence for what happened. Impotence for what may happen again.

"In spite of the hard hits we endured, we can still smile."

She is really suprise that so many people have come to take part in this event to remember the 10th anniversary of the massacres in La Gabarra. “It's awesome that people have not forgotten what happened to us here. And others are happy too even though they didn't take part in the march this morning. They were waiting for the mass to begin. I saw a big group of people from the village in one corner. And they later went to the bridge and took part in the act there too, throwing flowers into the water. ”

She liked what the bishop had said in the mass. People that forget their histories run the risk of repeating it. Me too.

La historia de Jacqueline

Arreglando el montón de ropa para lavar de toda la familia que cubría la cama doble, Jacqueline, de 19 años, me cuenta que todavía no quiere casarse. “No hasta cuando haya terminado mis estudios y aprendido algo … Si las cosas van mal, ¿qué haría, no podría salir si no tuviera mi propio trabajo.”

Me cuenta de su padre en cuanto me acerco a la cama que poco a poco aparece debajo de ocho pilas de ropa, una para cada miembro de la familia. Ella tenía nueve años cuando los paramilitares llegaron a La Gabarra y tomaron el control a través de sus fusiles. Cientos fueron asesinados, pero su familia se quedó. Su padre, un pescador en el río Catatumbo. Su vida y su medio de vida fueron el río.

Entonces sus pescas cambiaron, ya no eran sólo el pescado del tamaño de un brazo, el pescado que alimentaba la familia. Asumió la espantosa tarea de pescar del río partes de cuerpos mutilados. Más tarde enterraría los restos de tacto, olor, sonido, vista, sabor, espíritu en las orillas.

Ella se aburre en la escuela. Hace algunos años tuvo amigas con quienes jugaba deportes, organizaba fiestas y practicaba bailes. Baseball es su deporte favorito. Pero las muchachas dejaron la escuela temprano, embarazadas. Ella es la única que queda y los otros no quieren hacer nada divertido. Ella va a la escuela, asiste a clases, y regresa a casa. Aburrida.

Una hermosa mañana despejada su padre fue llevado por un grupo de paramilitares. Su madre lo buscó, buscó su sombra, desde la hora de marcar las arepas hasta la hora de lavar a los niños luego de muchas horas de juego en las vías destapadas. A la hora de caer el sol juntó la valentía de buscar al paraco encargado en su oficina. Su madre, con dignidad, preguntó si él sabía por qué había desaparecido su marido. No era una orden, y el paraco se sintió generoso esa noche estrellada. Ordenó que soltaran a su marido, todavía no una sombra.

A ella le fascina la física y la matemática, pero lucha con la química. Tiene un amigo en el concejo y espera que cuando termine el colegio vaya a encontrar un trabajo allí, empezando desde abajo y escalando con su trabajo, aprendiendo habilidades y ganando un salario.

Cuando tenía diez años, ella y su madre encontraron un cuerpo desmembrado en la orilla. Brazos, piernas y la cabeza cortados, el pecho abierto. Tranquilamente me describe los detalles, no parece nada serio, nosotras descansando en sillas afuera sobre la calle, con la ropa doblada y ahora guardada.

Me cuenta cómo antes se tropezó con alguien, un joven de una de las delegaciones que vinieron para la Peregrinación, el viaje político-cultural-religioso que trajo a 300 de nosotros a La Gabarra. Me cuenta lo avergonzada que estuvo, pero que el joven respondió con una sonrisa hermosa y la hizo reír.

Ella era demasiado joven como para ser “novia” de un paraco. “Muchas jóvencitas tenían que ser novias de ellos. Hicieron cosas horribles con ellas. No quiero pensar en eso.”

Algunas de los jóvenes del CISCA pasan unos minutos más tarde. En la calles oscura ella piensa que tal vez es uno de ellos. Los llamo con el pretexto de preguntar por la hora en que quedamos para el último ensayo antes de la presentación de su obra de teatro sobre desplazamiento, vida y muerte. La miro y mueve su cabeza, no es uno de ellos. Siguen su camino.

En la mañana escucha a un hombre en una tienda. Está enfadado con nosotros. No es una conmemoración sino una celebración de la muerte. Escupe la palabra. Ella lo traduce. Rabia, impotencia por lo que pasó. Impotencia frente a lo que pueda ocurrir otra vez.

Está realmente sorprendida que tanta gente han venido a participar en ese evento para recordar el décimo aniversario de las masacres de La Gabarra. “Es bacano que la gente no ha olvidado lo que nos pasó acá. Y otros también están felices a pesar de que no participaron en la marcha esta mañana. Estaban en el polideportivo esperando a que empezara la misa. Vi un grupo grande de gente del pueblo en un rincon. Y luego se fueron al puente y participaron en el acto allí también, tirando flores al agua.”

Le gustó lo que dijo el obispo en la misa. Gente que olvida su historia corre el riesgo de repetirla. A mí me gustó también.

In your country, is there also war?

2009-08-24T15:23:00.000-07:00

Helicopters overhead, vallenato tunes reaching my ears from all direction, children squealing as they bathe together, the cluck of chickens searching for any sign of food in the bare yard, soldiers pass through the village, buying lunch, just an average day here. I go to use the toilet at 6am to find a solider showering there. His helmet on the wall where I wash my hands. I am in the municipal of El Tarra, one of the most heavily militarised municipals in the region, with an estimated one thousand soldiers present.

Two weeks ago the Colombian government gave the USA permission to use seven military bases for US soldiers from which they will carry out military operations both inside and outside of Colombia. The argument given for this unconstitutional agreement is anti-drugs and anti terrorism. In Catatumbo I have met young people with far smarter answers to these arguments than foreign military in their territory.

Yesterday I watched a group of children and young people prepare small sketches. One of the groups portrayed the paramilitary invasion in to their community ten years ago. As the armed men broken into the house shooting, the daughter feigning death, heard her parents being slaughtered. Filled with revenge she escaped and went to join the guerillas. Filled with bitterness, knowing the army had allowed the paramilitaries to carry out many massacres, she fought against the army. And yet in her improvisation, the desire for no more deaths overwhelmed her in a moment and she took out the white t-shirt, held it high above her head and cried out “why cant we just have peace, peace for my country?”

And in this piece she told me a simple reason for why many young people continue to join the guerrilla groups. One of many.

Another is the near impossibility to learn new skills, get good work. Fighting is one current option to get paid work: army, police, paramilitary, FARC, ELN. Another popular option is raspando, picking coca leaves to make cocaine.

Bullet Holes and Aguilas Negras Graffiti: Classroom occupied by the paramilitaries in 2002 in the village of Filo Gringo.

While in a shop the owner immediately started asking us if we knew of opportunities for his son to become a professional solder. His son had heard there was a shortage and wanted to train. Did we know of any veterinary courses that had programmes to support students from poor backgrounds. His nephew wanted to work with cattle. Did we know of a way to get on a mechanics course. Another nephew thought he could make a living if he got good qualifications.

We did not know.

If the Colombian government really wanted a anti-drugs policy they would know where these sons and nephews could get support to study. They would be trying to open doors for young people so they can follow dreams and not get drawn in to the conflict and coca.

They are not.

They are permitting a foreign army to become involved in the internal armed conflict thereby exacerbating the confrontation and diminishing the possibility of peace. They are giving military bases to the USA from which attacks could be launched on neighboring democratic and progressive governments. They are giving US soldiers full impunity for crimes that they may commit.

After the rehearsal, one of you teenage girls asked me:

“y en tu pais, hay guerra tambien?”

“in your country, is there war as well? ”

The following day a boy asked me:

"el conflicto alla, donde vives, es mas fuerte que aca o menos?"

"the conflict there, where you live, is it worse than here?"

Conflict is such a part of everyday life that kids assume that it is normal. Twisted brutal reality.

Yet it is staggeringly beautiful that while they improvised much conflict and murders in their sketches, that they also had the vision to improvise peace, performing the possible.

Written on 11th August

Planting among landmines

2009-07-15T12:16:00.000-07:00

Sitting on our friend's porch in Ocaña, with the mountains in the distance and the early morning sun warming my face, I felt happy to be back in Catatumbo. Yet this contentment was odd, considering that that same day we were heading to an area where the local population live with the daily fear of landmines. Just two weeks before a campesino had to have his left leg amputated after stepping on one.

I wondered, when told, what I could do constructively with this information. Several options came to mind: be worry and be nervous; forget I was ever told; or trust the people I am going with that the paths we will use will be safe. Yet what I thought about most when we were walking these paths was that I know that I would have a much much higher chance of getting a replacement limb (if I survived) than the dear friends from the region I was walking with. And that is fucked up. It hurts me thinking about it; that because of my passport I could get a new leg and they could get a new stick to help them walk. I struggled to think whether there was any value in sharing this reflection with my friends. I didn't. But is silence on an all to apparent privilege useful? Is it kinder to them not to speak the truth, not to remind them of what they already know. That the current global hierarchy based on passport/racialised identity/class puts them pretty low down. And so their right to health and consequently, their very right to life is deemed less important than mine.

Perhaps the question should have been, speak truth to who?

I ponder and I feel that the best option is what I am doing right now, speaking truth to you english speaking priviliged folk. England did not gain their/our/its wealth and fairly good free health care system from just the hard work of the english. Wealth was gained through several hundred years of colonialism, that continues today in the form of multinational corporations controlling and carrying away the wealth of the minerals that rest in the Andean mountains.

People from colonised countries deserve equal standards of health care as us english do.

I was told that the mines are left by both guerilla and army who combat in the area. The farm where we stayed is to become a model farm based on principles ; a seed bank to rescue traditional seeds of the region, many types of local chickens, pigs and cattle and a program to improve the quality of these local breeds. The owner, who has donated the land to this project, a step towards the vision of food sovereignty in the region, showed us where they want to turn some of the wooded areas into fields. Yet it is known that various armed actors use this as a route from one valley to another, and rumours have it that there may be mines, or there may not be.

The presence of land mines has grown as conflict between the army and the guerrilla has intensified. Control of this territory has geo-strategic importance as it borders Venezuela and is rich in oil, gold, coal and land suitable for growing palm. The pipeline carrying oil from Arauca to the Atlantic coast for export also runs through the mountainous region. Yet control of the territory is not just about destroying the guerrilla, for the Colombian state it is also about destroying the social organisations and fabric in the region so that people are left with no possibility of organising to ensure that development means development for and by those who live there, and not for foreign corporations who would control and benefit from the mega-projects.

The paramilitary occupation of the region from 1999 to 2005 destroyed Catatumbo's social organisations and community fabric; communities divided and dispersed, farms and crops abandoned, community shops burnt down by paracos, schools closed for lack of students, community leaders particularly targetted. Campesinos in Catatumbo have never doubted the institutional links between the paramilitaries violence and the Colombian States and slowly information is beginning to coming to light proving what they have always known: that the State and the paramilitaries worked together to terrorise local populations in order to develop the oil, coal and palm oil industry.

On Sunday 5th July, hours before catching the bus from Bogota to the region a friend sent me a link for an article from La Semana, a major weekly national magazine.

“The Army allowed the Paramilitaries into Catatumbo.

For the first time a high official publically admits how he participated in one the most bloody paramilitary invasions.

One of the first things that Llorente admitted was the way in which they paramilitaries arrived in Catatumbo. On 29th May 1999, in an unprecendented operation several lorries, carring 200 heavily armed paramilitaries, travelled from Córdoba across five departments to La Gabarra, Catatumbo without any obstacle. Two generals participated in the planning meeting and designed the strategy with Mancuso and Carlos Castaño [leaders of the AUC, national paramilitary group]. His witness statement coincides with those made by demobilised paramilitaries.” [1]

In the first year of the paramilitary incursion in Catatumbo more than 20000 people were displaced, an unknown number of people disappeared, and 800 official murders, the majority of which took place in massacres.

Living with fear of landmines is not a new fear for the Catatumberos.

Yet last week, dancing in Bogota with people from the region who had travelled for 24 hours for the launch of a Campaign for the Victims of Catatumbo, you would not easily spot fear in the room. Hidden deep in layers of resilience, dignity and survival, the victim of Catatumbo is more likely to be found laughing about Bogota people trying to drink boligancho or complaining it is an hour past dinner time and they still haven't eaten.

[1]www.semana.com/noticias-nacion/ejercito-abrio-catatumbo-paras/125852.aspx

The human price of coal mining

2009-05-26T08:26:00.000-07:00

Fifteen years ago Roche was a hub of rural activity in the municipal of Barranca, La Guajira, a dry arid region in the northeastern tip of Colombia. It was home to 500 families but 483 families have gone. In their place is a sea of red and white striped posts, marking out the plots of land that until recently contained the daily lives, cultures and family memories of the thousands of people who have been forced to leave their lives. The posts mark out the land that is now owned by Cerrejón, one of the largest opencast coal mines in the country.

To walk among these posts filled me with an intense feeling of sadness of lives being slowly suffocated as the mine creeps forward. To live among these posts, with the whines of mine machinery playing over the sound of the wildlife, appears to me like psychological torture for the remaining 17 families.

The majority of Roche’s residents, along with those of nearby villages Patilla, Chancleta and Tamaquito, lived off the fertile land by the banks of the River Rancheria. Life revolved around growing food crops both for themselves and on larger farms as hired hands, rearing cattle, hunting rabbit and goat, and fishing. The Roche residents who remain spoke to us of life now. The land has been poisoned by the coal dust and is no longer productive. The track down to the river from which they used to collect sand for making cement had a trench dug across it preventing vehicle access. Men have been detained by the police when fishing, told that Cerrejón now owns the river that runs past their village and thus illegal to fish in it. Men have been detained when hunting, for trespassing on what was once village lands but is now the private property of Cerrejón.

The local socio-economic system of the area is being obliterated, forcing people from the communties of Patilla, Chancleta, Roche and Tamaquito, an indigenous community, to leave in search of a source of food and income elsewhere. The highest levels of displacement in Roche came post 2001 when a nearby village, Tabaco, was razed to the ground by bulldozers protected by the Colombian armed forces.

“Tabaco pyschologically affected us and people began to sell up for whatever price the company was offering. Cerrejón took advantage of the fear to buy the land for next to nothing and people had to leave Roche, their community.” Resident of Roche

Former residents of Tabaco recently signed an agreement with the owners of Cerrejón, BHP Biliton, Anglo American and Xstrata in which they will be relocated and compensated. I was shown the payment slip for the compensation by a woman wanting answers I could not give. She could not understand how the compensation was for just $200,000 pesos (about £50). “Is this it? Is this our compensation after everything we suffered and 8 years of fighting for some justice? It is an insult.”

While there is an urgency for a solution, the communities are adamant that they deserve at the very least a dignified compensation for their physical and psychic losses, and to be relocated to a site of their choosing with a quality of life at least equal to what they had before the communities social fabric was unpicked.

“Every day we feel the contamination getting worse, we need solutions to this now. The good practice of the company would be to relocate the entire village in one go, instead they are doing it individually, and only with people born in the villages, and so dividing the communities.”

On Wednesday 20^th April, at the invitation of the communities of Roche, Chancleta, and Tamaquito, and under pressure by a visiting international delegation and Sintracarbon, the union representing Cerrejón workers, representatives of Cerrejón attended a meeting with around 150 people from the communities. More would have liked to have participated but health issues, which they connect to the mine’s presence, made this difficult.

The first issue on the agenda was about the resettlement process. Involuntary resettlement due to mining projects, according to the World Bank, should be done in coordination with the affected communities.

“First Cerreón has to work with us in making a list of what relocation involves, housing, productive projects, amenities. After this is done, they should consult around every one of these points. But they didn’t, their first error. Second error, which can be considered more serious, is that despite the company not doing this, they published on their webpage a completed plan for settlement and said that they had consulted with the communities of Roche, Chancleta and Patilla. What did the company want with this lie? Trick the community? the international community? the local governance? all of the above?“

Roche village leader, community meeting with Cerrejón, 20th May 2009

Other issues presented by the community were around the productive projects, health issues, and the behaviour of the company towards the communities. The final issue of the day was around independent advisors.

Community members had previously reflected that whereas Cerrejón has access to an expert team of advisors, the communities have nothing and as such are being manipulated and lied to by the company. For example, one member spoke about how they were invited to a meeting in the mine, where Cerrejón’s legal advisor told them that they did not need advisors, as the company would just negotiate directly with them. Recognising the near comicalness of being told this by a very advisor of Cerrejón, the communities of Roche, Tamaquito and Chancleta united and presented a proposal to Cerrejón. No more negotiations until they have independent advisors, paid for by the company. Cerrejón must give a yes or no by the 31^st May.

The following day we met with community members from Barranco, another village. They told us how representatives of Cerrejón are holding meetings and visiting families to talk about future relocation. What was interesting was how the people had been convinced so quickly that they had no other choice, but to go. They know though that they will have to fight for this to be in a dignified and just manner.

It appears to me that Cerrejón is willing to spend the money necessary on its well paid Corporate Social Responsibility and public relations team but not willing to spend the money necessary for a dignified and just relocation of the communities who live on top of the valuable coal.

What is the thinking, individually and institutionally, that justifies these decisions? The dangers of what a just relocation precedent would mean globally? Historical white racism that sees these communities as inferior and therefore not as deserving? And what thinking justifies extracting the coal out the ground at such an incredible speed that, according to Sintracarbon, in 30 years there will be no coal left, the mine will close and the dominant economy of the region will collapse?

Breaking Fear, Rompiendo Temor

2009-04-30T15:24:00.000-07:00

El articulo en español aparece al final del texto de inglés.

"We are tired of our own discourse, of others, of those who tell us a new society can only come with the eternal silence of the nameless bodies …. We choose the language of the art, we trust in its capacity to touch the most profound fibres of humans and that it will produce the arrival of the necessary words, cause us to question our images and social representations."

We transformed the plaza into a visual living memory of 800 victims. I saw before me, using the strength of my imagination, the lives that might have been, the pain of families and friends. I saw people take timid steps to look at their history, to walk slowly past the tombs reading the narrative, talking quietly with their companion.

I also saw products of fear. People walked past with their head down, or straight ahead, refusing to engage, scared of who might be watching. The organisers of the event spoke to me of peoples fear. Some spoke of fear as though it were some inherent quality in the characteristics of people in this region rather than a very human response to a policy of state terrorism.

Others compared themselves to other places where social movements have overcome fear and refused to be quiet. A new friend spoke to me about his frustration at watching the popular uprising in Greece in December unfold after the murder of just one person by the police and asks why not here? In 2008 alone 175 people were murdered by the army and then presented as guerrilla killed in combat, known as false positives a horrific crime against humanity.

Others speak of the proficiency of the Colombian oligarchy at producing fear and terror. The number of Colombians “disappeared” during Uribe’s first term exceeds the total number of Chileans that vanished during Pinochet’s entire 17-year military dictatorship. And the disappearances continue. In 2008 1015 people were disappeared, four times greater than in 2007. The country’s armed forces are suspects in more than 90% of these cases, according to the Prosecutor’s office.[1]

Everyone wants to know what will it take for people to overcome fear and just say enough.

Today was a simple act. It was inspired by Las Madres del Primero de Mayo who carried out symbolic non-violent actions to bring about public awareness. It was inspired by similar events that have taken place across Colombia in recent months.

Y~ was happily surprised by Sogamoso this day, by their willingness to stop, take time to look, to chat, to participate in the candlelit vigil at dusk. I had taken peoples reactions, stopping to look, as normal, but she had been skeptical during the two months of preparation that people would respond positively; that people would dare to respond. That they have will have deep reverberations in the people of Sogamoso.

Despite their worries, the organisers kept focused on organising the day. I re-realised something yesterday that helped me see why– the importance of outlets for our internal frustrations, pains, anger. A small space appeared for me and suddenly thoughts, frustrations and personal learnings gushed out of me, like water inside a mountain suddenly finding a crack in the rock and pouring out in to the light. The water, carrying the memory of those killed, has begun to flow out to the light, the weight of peoples emotions pushing it out. In Sogamoso they will be back in the plaza with the 800 bricks in July, September and November.

Last night while sat chatting around a fake gas log fire on the rooftop of a swanky bar the desire for peace came up. “What kind of peace do you want?” I asked, knowing how peace is thrown around with as little clarity as the supposedly objective word “development” is in the UK. The question was thrown back at me. Peace is people not having to live in silence and fear but being able to express their torment as they wish. Peace is people receiving answers to their question of why were their loved ones killed, so that the torment of the unknown may transform to grief and acceptance and with time and love, a peace inside.

To see a photo montage from the day click here

.............................................

Rompiendo Temor, Rompiendo unas Bloques

"Estamos cansados de los discursos, los de nosotros y los de otras y otros, de escuchar a quienes aseguran que una sociedad nueva sólo podrá surgir de la impunidad y del silencio eterno de los sepulcros sin nombre y sin dolientes...Hemos recurrido a los lenguajes del arte, pues confiamos en su capacidad para conmover las fibras más profundas de lo humano para convocar el surgimiento de la palablra vital y para interpelar nuestros imaginarios y representaciones sociales."

Transformamos la plaza en una memoria viva de ochocientos muertos. Ví ante mi, con el poder de la imaginacíon, las vidas que podrían haber existido, el dolor de las familias y amigos. Ví a personas dar pasos timidos para mirar su historia , pasaron por las tumbas, leyendo las narrativas y hablando en voz baja con sus compañeros.

Tambien ví el producto del temor. Personas que pasaron mirando hacia abajo o adelante, se negaron a observar los 800 bloques blancos, asustado de quien podría estar mirarandoles. Los y las organizadores de la jornada me hablaban del temor de la gente. Algunos hablaron de temor como si fuera una cualidad inherente en la caracteristicas de la gente de Boyaca en vez de una respuesta muy humana a la politica del terrorismo del estado.

Otros hicieron compararaciones a otros lugares donde hay movimientos sociales que han logrado superar el miedo, rechazando el silencio. Un nuevo amigo me habló de la frustración al ver desarollar el levantamiento en Grecia en Diciembre despues del asesinato de solo una persona en manos de la policia y pregunta por que no pasa esto acá? En tan solo 2008, 175 personas fueron asesinados por el ejercito y presentados como bajas en la “guerra contra el terrorismo”, un crimen de estado y de lesa humanidad.

Otras hablaron de la habilidad de la oligarquia colombiana en producir temor y terror. El numero de colombianos desaparecidos durante el primer mandato de Uribe supera el total de chilenos que desaparecieron durante los 17 años de la dictadura de Pinochet. Y las desapareciones aun continua. En 2008 fueron desaparecidos 1015 personas, cuatro veces mas que en 2007. Segun la fiscalía, las fuerzas publicas estan siendo investigados en mas que 90% de los casos.[1]

Todos quieren saber que se necesita para que la gente venza el miedo y diga basta.

Hoy fue un acto sencillo.

La gente de Sogamoso le inspiraban las madres del plaza de mayo en argentina que llevaron a cabo acciones no-violentas y simbolicas para generar opinion publica. Les inspiraba actos semejantes que han occurido a través de Colombia en los ultimos meses.

Una compañera fue soprendida por Sogamoso ese día, por la voluntad de la gente a parar y tomar el tiempo de mirar, conversar, participar encendiendo las velas al atardecer. Yo asumí que las reaciones de la gente era normales pero ella había sido esceptica durante las dos meses de preparacíon. Temió que no respondieran positivamente; que no se atrevieran a responder. El hecho de hacerlo, tendrá unas hondas de repercusíones en la gente de Sogamoso y de alrededor.

A pesar de las preocupaciones, los y las organizadores seguían enfocados en organizar la jornada. Volví a darme cuenta de algo ayer que me ayudó a ver por que seguíeron y por que seguimos: la importancía de canalizar nuestras frustraciones, dolores y rabías internas. Un espacio pequeño aparecío ante mi y de pronto pensamientos, frustraciones y aprendizajes personales me salieron a borbotones, como agua dentro de una montaña que encuentra una rendija en la roca y vierte a la luz. El agua, llevando las memorias de los asesinados, corre a la luz expulsado por el peso de los sentimientos de muchas personas. En Sogamoso volverán a la plaza con 800 bloques en Julio y Septiembre.

Anoche, mientas que charlabamos alredador de una chimenea de gas en la terraza de un bar lujoso, el deseo por la paz surgío en la conversacon. “Que tipo de paz quieres?” pregunté, conociendo que la palabra paz que se utilisa con tan poca claridad. Me devolvieron la pregunta. Paz es no tener que vivir en silencio y temor sino poder expresar el tormento sin restriciones. Paz es recibir respuestas a las pregunatas del por que se asesinó su ser querido, para que el tormento de estas preguntas se pase a la aceptacíon de la perdida, y con el tiempo y el amor, una paz interna.

Para ver un video de fotos del dia haga clic aca

[1] Segun Gary Leech, un periodista de EEUU. http://www.colombiajournal.org/colombia295.htm

Nourishing our processes

2009-04-15T14:37:00.000-07:00

He arrives just after dark in El Paso, exhausted from travelling for six hours. “On moto-taxi” I ask. “No, no, this was just the last hour from Asserío, the rest was walking” he replies. Despite time here I still forget that walking serious distances is a transport option, sometimes the only option.

We have a strong nice hug, I’m happy that we are going to be working and hanging out together again. Meeting and spending time with him at CISCA’s consultiva was a joy. We shared a very honest space; his openess and engagement with me quickly created a sincere communication between us. Recognition of who I am varies widely among the people I accompany. People acknowledge me, thank me, appreciate me but it is a me that at times I feel could be anyone, well, anyone with a white identity.

As O~ sits resting and drinking some home made equivalent of iron bru, I ask what he has been doing. Working on a finca comes the answer. Doing what I, ask without thinking. Raspando he quietly says. Doh, of course, picking coca leaves is a main source of casual work in the region. I tell him later I felt very stupid for my question. Thankfully he already knows me and laughs supportively with me.

Photo: Our hopes as young people.
More education and less work
More liberty and less violence
We were meeting for three days; 12 young people from the region, J~, an ally from a Bogota NGO and me. The aim was to look together at the problems they face as young people, their needs, wants and dreams, the organising spaces that already exist (or don’t in many cases) and based on this day long inquiry, devise a plan for the year. Bristol life felt like a continuous sequence of short term, high speed planning, with occasional bigger events requiering more time and planning. We knew why we were doing each action, we looked at the whole picture but I don feel we made thought out decision on how we wanted to use our limited resources of time, energy and money. This led, for me, to a lack of continuity and a lack of collective clarity as to how it all pieces together. The plan that they agreed on was a mixture of specific and general actions: agricultural projects, training in human rights, communications work, creating greater political spaces for young people, participating in the community councils and the highlight – a regional gathering of young Catatumberos.

I saw excitement, passion and drive in their voices. Their words have an authenticity, a normality and a good amount of humour (which I occasionally excitedly got) that is mostly lost in the older generation of leaders as they become moulded into a particular cultural style of meeting participation. The young people decided that they wanted active participation in their space and when it was not happening, wiggly hands (to show agreement) got introduced which they got well into.

I also saw moments of seriousness and concern in their faces. They talk briefly about the difficulties they will/may face: time, money, personal problems, problems from la guerrilla, obligatory recruitment in to army, paramilitary presence in the towns. O~ tells me he spent a fair bit of the 3 day meeting worrying about how he is going to earn enough to maintain his family and accomplish everything he wants to with CISCA. I spend a few hours later motivating and helping him to devise his own plan de trabajo so he stops wasting his energy stressing. I never imagined I’d momentarily I’d become a financial avisor while accompanying in Colombia, but it is in moments like these where I feel my ability to nourish their process with small details like this. This is my strength. With CISCA I spot my weakness, or less harshly, where I have the most to learn and least to contribute. CISCA are organising in Catatumbo to create and build Plans for Life, “for life, territory and integration” as the catchwords go; a project that has a long-term vision in which creation and resistance go hand in hand. It is not resistance for the sake of not wanting change; it is resistance so they can create the Catatumbo they desire, not what the rich desire.

In my motherland we are a way from collectively creating an integral vision for another Bristol, another South West and another Britain. While we are constantly visibilising and resisting facets of capitalism (climate change, war, no social housing, economic crisis…) the work is often not deeply integrated with those creating. Partially as those who are creating don’t often don’t get why we need to resist as part of this creation and write me off. Do you think it is an important goal that we try to entwine these two supposed opposites within a shared political coordinating space? Or impossible because of class backgrounds?

I feel hugely inspired (I am already lining up two months here in Europe’s summer) by how CISCA is creating a space where many different struggles, projects and visions in different parts are brought together and from this, they collectively are shaping a vision of life for the region. And this vision is ambitious, yet they are confident, proud and most of all serious when talkng about it.

Do we really have confident in ourselves when we talk about our ideas? Are we really serious that we are going to make this happen? Do we have clear what our ideas are? Are we thinking about how and what is needed to walk our words, as the indigenous and popular Minga says?

Important world matters: G20 and a child´s views

2009-04-02T19:38:00.000-07:00

“Today I really missed you as I thought of affinity and so I go with you in mind. I will be thinking of you and the people you have met as grounding force when I am on the streets.”

Email received Monday from a dear friend as she sets off to London for the G20 protests.

In La Casa de la Red we have been keeping up to date with the protests in London. I want to give a damming critique of how, irregardless of what outcome the G20 come up with, capitalism is crisis. I see it so painfully on the streets of Bogota everyday. 300 people arrive in Bogota every day, the majority fleeing the violence, the violence imposed to re order land use, to control it so it can be handed over to one of thousands of the multinationals. I see old men, old women, men with kids, young women always always politely begging with the utmost respect. I don´t know how they keep their spirit, faces ignoring them for days after days, invisibilising them, my face turning away. Yesterday I physically kicked out, frustration, powerlessness filled me.

The moral argument goes that this economic crisis is set to increase unemployment causing misery for faceless people (in Colombia unemployment due to increase this year from 40% to 60%) so governments must do something. Yet this is a blinkered take on it, (or I could say, a historically and politically decontextualised view, if I want to use a snippet of the language of experts so I am taking more seriously. I have been reading the Times to see what the elite/my parents are thinking about the G20. The Times, exempify a problem with the UK elite: the constant rational, pseduo scientific arguments that only with those with access to high levels of education can engage with

Arguments won before even made due to invisible privilige. Arguments then used as tools against those with visible non-privilige. I ´m not going to use my privilige today to read, intellectually think in order to engage with The Times articles about supposed benefits of the G20 decision on the twistedly-named ´developing´ countries . Nor let myself be made to feel shit by their supposed superiority of knowledge on important world matters. I have a story of importance. It is about a little girl called Lorelia.

I met Lorelia last week in the sierra of the sur de Bolivar. The adults were deep in working groups debating and fine-tuning the community standards (normas de coexistencia) that they are creating for their region. Once they have been approved by a general assembly the government must legally recognise them as autonomous community laws.

Lorelia had earlier won a game I had set a group of kids and her prize was some of the fruit salad that those of us struggling with rice and yuca three times had made. As we sat and ate together I asked if she knew what the adults were talking about, if she knew what normas were. I asked if she had any suggestions for what could change in her community to make life better for her and other children. She sure did. This seven year old told me about incidences; fights with broken bottles injuring kids, drunken drivers, rubbish being thrown everywhere (normal everywhere in Colombia but exciting to hear a kid criticising this culture), people being killed, and she easily translated these experiences into suggestions for changes. I created a political space for her within the assembly and she presented her contributions for the community standards. She was confident, articulate, awesome, inspiring.

There is a disturbing parallel between this story and government get togethers: marginalisation where both people and cultures deem certain people to be important and ignore the rest. Yet, everyone, irregardless of their education and ability to participate, has a right to participate in the shaping of policies that will affect their lives. Fortunately, Fedeagrominisbol, the Small scale miners federation, is progressive, that is they listen, learn and grow in their political processes. It was not a struggle to create a space for Lorelia and I´m confident that spaces for participation of children will grow.

With governments, marginality is a deeper rooted problem. With governments in the current period, marginalising of social organisations and the absolute centering of business is the norm. People protesting in London are creating a space in which a different philosophy can exist. Fedeagrominisbol are building a federation with the strength to defend their cultures, not a static culture, but one that is changed by the communities in ways like what I witnessed with las normas de convivencia, rather than changes made through state and para-state violence imposing a ´development´ model on them.

While Fedeagrominisbol cannot participate in the protests against the G20 and talking about people in London representing people from the Global South I hugely problematic, there is a misty familiar reflection across the pond.

At a time when my blog had begun to feel more like a habitual routine, I really feel a reaffirmation of my commitment to encouraging cross pollination of stories across borders and cultures. So more people may take strength in walking with others beside them. So Lorelia knows that up on the bleak sierra in the rains there are people elsewhere also taking responsibility and collectively figuring out ways to create and defend alternatives to this fucked up violent injust robot.

Coal mining: Conservation and Cocaine at hand to help.

2009-03-30T09:39:00.000-07:00

“I remember Trinidad lending me his wellies, as I turned up with totally inappropratie brand new white trainers. He was always taking care of people”

“I remember being in a meeting with him when the paras arrived outside. He kept everyone calm with his soothing words and composed response to the terrifying situation”

The four-day meeting opened with the warm sharing of memories of two members of CISCA, killed in 2005 and 2006. Re-knowing that every action and every word that we make is part of a process that stretches both back and forward is for me a beautiful part of CISCA, the Committee for the Social Integration of Catatumbo. Their aim, as a social organisation, is not just to respond to human rights violations nor in opposing the imposition of a huge open cast coal mine though they do both of these and more. Unlike so many seemingly single issue organisations that emerge and fade in the UK, their vision is none less than the audacious plan to rebuild the social fabric of Catatumbo and to live, as campesinos, on their lands with each other and nature in a deeply respectful and contented way, through their community based development plans, known as “Planes de Vidas” – Plans for Life.

The first paramilitary invasion of their territory in 1999, in El Tibu, left 800 people killed or disappeared and 20 thousand fled their homes. The AUC paramilitary occupation continued until late 2004, when the supposed demobilisation began. In August 2004 CISCA held their first gathering of associations with the necessary accompaniment of La red as paramilitaries were closeby. Faced wth juntas de accion communal (community action groups) in shreds, community shops destroyed, people with little hope, large displaced populations, staple food crops poisoned as part of the ‘war on drugs’, they set about the task of reconstructing the social fabric with a awe inspiring determination.

They are a long way from their aim yet the culture of organising in juntas breathes on. Juntas began to re-organise themselves in associations on a municipality levels and these associations form part of CISCA, a space for regional coordination. Over the past five years they have encouraged more and more communities to rebuild the networks of solidarity economics, rebuild their cultural lives, rebuild their community organising where they can resolve local conflicts, confront corrupt mayors, repair their roads, demand that roads are paved so they are passable in the rainy season; to rebuild the possibilities and dreams of living a campesino culture that has been violently under attack.

My four days in the village of Maracaibo, with the guerilla and the army alternatively making their presence known, eating a combination of rice, yuca, grated cheese and eggs I learnt what I know; I want to breathe my life’s vocation, I want a coherent healthy rich life; I am in awe at the wisdom, humbleness, intelligence and kindness of the people I was with. I am envious of their culture that we are so far from having the capacity to build in the UK.

I love pouring over maps, exploring all the detail that is contained in the illustration; each colour, each different style of line gives me a piece of information with which I build up an image of a reality. This map, put together as different associations shared information with each other, tells of a new stage in history arriving to confront CISCA’s vision and plans for their region.

Conservation International Colombia have recently contacted several associations asking for help in conducting an investigation into the flora and fauna within the parque forestal (area above the dotted green line) related to a plan to change the perimeter of the forestry reserve. As long as the zona de interes minero (mining interest area) is within the forestry reserve it cannot be exploited. Conservation International are not telling the associations what their real motive is. So far, they have been giving conflicting information and trying to get agreement from one association by lying to them about supposed support they already have from another association.

Conservation International public line is that it is ‘real world fact’ that multinationals are going to mine and so best to work with them to preserve biodiversity. What they don’t mention is the role they have played in ensurng this supposed objective fact becomes true. They have been described as “the trojan horse of multinationals” undermining local resistance and alternative community based development plans in order to facilitate their corporate partners entry into rural areas.

The strategies used to get territorial control of natural resources in Catatumbo have been many:
o Paramilitary massacres were the most extensive and brutal in the two municipalities, Tarra and Tibu, where the potential mining area is located.
o The majority of fumigations and manual erradication in Catatumbo has occurred in the potential mining area.
o Detentions of campesinos for growing coca is predominantly in this area.
o And now a Multinational Conservation Corporation has arrived.

I asked why the government did not lift the forestry reserve immediately after the paramilitary violence, when the social organisations were their weakest and the habitants had fled from their lands. Why have they waited and now they have to find a way to displace the same people again in order to extract the coal reserves? I received varying answers; after the horrors that occurred in the area they did not expect people to later return to their lands; people did not leave the area, they hid deeper in the mountains; the quantity of human rights violations reported was very high and multinationals could not have entered in that period as it would have been obvious that they were benefiting from the massacres and colluding with paramilitaries.

So after a first wave of violent displacement, then returning to their homes and beginning to rebuild their lives the people in this area of Catatumbo are facing an uncertain future. The state needs them out. The imprisonment of campesinos for growing coca leaves the wife and children in a precarious situation and Cisca conjecture that families will then be forced off their land through necessity, bullying or physical force.

I knew that coca is used as a convenient pretext already, but our process of collectively piecing together this specific cold calculated horrific plan still made me swear heavily out loud in english.

Accompanying my penpal in Bogota

2009-03-06T15:14:00.000-08:00

An article i pulled together for indymedia. To see photos visit www.bristol.indymedia.org/article/689978

False Positives are State Crimes

“False positives”, recognised in International Law as extrajudicial killings, have been part of Colombian reality for more than twenty years. Civilians, normally peasant farmers or young people from the lowest income sectors of society, are killed under official orders and later presented as guerilla killed in combat in order to show them as deaths in the so-called “war against terrorism”. This allows the Colombian military to gain rewards or inflate the statistics of the war.

I am part of Espacio Bristol-Colombia's penpal protection plan [1] and yesterday I met my penpal and her husband for the first time. Their two sons were killed together while travelling to the nearest town to buy some more cattle by the army. A large number of extrajudicial killings in Casanare occur in municipalities where BP, a multinational oil company, has activities and are all carried out by the 16th Brigade, who have been historically contracted by BP.[2]

They made the difficult decision to leave their farm for 5 days and travel to Bogota to take part in yesterday’s assembly of victims of extrajudicial killings and the march this morning against false positives.

They are fearful of what may happen to them as other people who report state crimes have received threats or in worst case also been killed. Yet they are determined to remain brave and to keep some hope alive that they will find some justice one day. Today she handed me a letter that she had written with the help of her son which I have just read at home.

“Con mi familia he luchado en sobresalir adelante sin hacerle daño a nadie siempre haciendo el bien….Despues de que los mataron, noa ha dejado un vacio muy grande en mi familia, ya que tendremos que soportarlo hasta el fin de nuestra vida cotidiana”

“with my family, I have struggled to improve without doing any harm to anyone, always doing what is right…after they were killed, it has left us a large whole in our family since every day we have to endure the pain”

Three other people from Casanare participate in the mobilisation. They are family members of victims of state crimes and also penpals with Bristol residents.

The Coordination Colombia-Europe-United States and the Colombian Platform for Human Rights, has reported more than 1400 of these cases since 2002 when the the democratic security policy of President Uribe began. This odious practice was officially recognised in September 2008 when 19 young people were disappeared in Soacha, a poor neighbourhood of Bogotá, and then later found in mass graves in rural areas more than 500km away.

Colombia lives a bloody war. In the last 11 years there has been 3000 mass graves, more than 30000 disappeared, 4.2 million displaced and 23000 kidnapped, figures that shed light on the victims of this conflict.

The Network of Solidarity and Friendship (La Red de Hermandad) stands in solidarity with the victims of paramilitarism, para politica and State crimes.

We demand from the Colombian government:

The immediate end to the persecution and imprisonment of the members of social organisations, unions, human rights defenders, journalists, students, peasant farmers, indigenous and those who democratically oppose the government.

Truth, justice and reparation and no more repetition of crimes against human dignity.

We call on the national and international community to echo this demand and contribute to the construction of a true democratic society en Colombia, supported by peace, social justice and the comprehensive respect for human rights.

Extrajudicial killings are state crimes

Truth, justice and reparation for the victims of state terrorism in Colombia.

United to recover our memory for a Colombia that does not forget.

No more mass graves.
No more forced displacements.
No more kidnappings
No more state crimes
No more extrajudicial killings.
No more crimes against humanity.

[1] www.espacio.org.uk for an explanation on the penpal protection plan.

2] To learn more about the grave humanitarium crisis in Casanare and its relation to the oil industry:
Report of the International Solidarity Mission Roque Julio Torres Torres, Casanare, Colombia
http://www.espacio.org.uk/bp/Casanare%20Mission%202007%...t.pdf

BP in Casanare, by Cos-pacc
http://www.espacio.org.uk/documents/BPinCasanare.pdf

A Tourist in Colombia

2009-03-06T15:07:00.000-08:00

My quiteness comes from being on holiday with Y~ for a while, yet this has not caused quietness in my pondering mind. There is much I’d like to share about being read as a tourist. Primarily it is a much less enjoyable and priviliged experience than when I am with La Red.

I am seen as someone to make money from, understandably as my very ability to be in there home town comes from having money, and I refuse to accept the bullshit of travellers who claim they have no money to give, and negotiate down as much as they can just so they can stay travelling for longer – a privilige that the fuckers who are ripping us [white westeren tourists] off will never have.

I am much more visibly sexualised, that is I got a lot more sexual hassle walking down the streets, most of the time easy to ignore, but a few times I bit back and got an apology.

It made me really realise the beautiful privilige I have through doing my work, the wonderful insights I am invited in to see in people’s communities; accepted, trusted and seen as an ally.

It made me realise that I have very different criteria for what is a good place to go and relax and be on holiday than others. There is little chance of relaxing if gross injustice is staring me in the face as I am swinging in a hammock. And so begins my rant of Parque Tayrona, Colombia’s second most visited national park and apparentely as “must go place”. The moment Y~ and I arrived we wanted to get out of this artificial environement, created as a piece of propoganda for the Colombian government to show how they conserve the natural environment, run as a business by a paramilitary controlled company that charges extortionate prices for people to get it, thought very kindly lets the indigenous they kicked out come back for free on special sacred days.

We stayed the night and the following day opted for the 5hour walk out, stunning rock formations, trees, and a deserted inidigenous village – El Pueblito. On the display boards it says there was a population of # thousand until the Spanish arrived. No mentions of how many people were living there when the land became a national park. The village has no residents, the park ranger told me that people were not allowed to live in the park, and refused to answer directly my question of whether they were forced to leave. There was an indigenous man there, whose job it is, is to register all visitors in a book. I apologised for being complicit in the continued displacement of his peoples.

My very presence as a paying tourist, great for business, is what prevents his community living there. Maybe at some point the company and state will decide it is good for business to have indigenous living in pueblito and they will be allowed back but only if they play the role of nice cutey dressed traditional indigneous and certainly not as indigenous building their cultural practices and process like is happening in Cauca.

So I wouldn’t recommend Tayrona. Beauty is not just in the eye of the beholder, but also in the knowledge of the beholder.

I would recomment Bocachica, a fishing village on the Island of Tierradentro, Cartagena and Minca, a village in a coffee growing region in the hills behind Santa Marta were beautiful. Both with real, living, breathing, changing communities that are adding to their existing economies with small-scale tourism. Both with warm and kind people who proudly showed off their community to us, and wanted to chat and share opinions about our shared world and let Y~ and me see a glimpse of life for people in these places.

Historical victory

2009-01-25T07:29:00.000-08:00

After rejecting the proposal all was quiet for a few hours. I rested in one of the hammocks, brought my flute down to play a few tunes under the marquee, and felt worried for those who had driven the decision to reject the proposal. If they lost, how would they feel? But I had seen that it was only those at the negotiating table, tired after hours of debate, that wanted to accept the first proposal.

Those at the blockades were firm in their convictions. They set about upping the pressure by blockading more roads out of the village to stopp all subcontracted workers buses, not just those of the directly employed miners. More branches, chunks of iron anmd t-shirts were strung together to turn the buses around.

At midnight came the news. The union had proposed direct contracts for two years and the after another 8 hours of nerve wracking negotiations and meetings of our negotiating team Caves had accepted and signed the papers-

Everyone was over the moon with this situation. The long tired faces of the nogotiating team were now beaming, smiles which had disappeared under the stress.

They have job stability for two years. With just one year they would have just got started negotiating better working conditions when they would have had to return to fight for their jobs. With two years they are confident they can achieve a lot as a union. In the next few weeks they will begin negotiations around pay, health, shift timetable, the community.

The convictions, focus and positive attitude won them a historical victory in Colombia. 18000 sugar cane cutters were on strike for 2 months fighting for direct contracts and did not win what these guys have won in two days.

I am meant to be resting at the moments and been ordered to stop working so will write more reflectionsafter a few days rest but wanted to let my wonderful family know that I am safe and feel really priviliged to have been able to accompany these amazing people as they have stood firm and fought for what they know they deserve. I am already planning my return to La Loma.

We will win or we will lose but we wont accept the same

2009-01-22T09:11:00.000-08:00

this blog will make much more sense if you read ´Catering for the coal industry´first, and probably even more sense if i got some sleep.

The strike is about to kick off as my alarm wakes me at 2.30am yesterday morning after a week of preparations with repeated meetings at 6am, 4pm and 8pm so people from all three shifts can make it. The plan must be clandestine as Caves refuses to recognise the union and so they cannot go through the process of voting and then choosing a day. Lists were drawn up of trusted people and of people who will support the strike once it begins but have a loose tongue or who wont be convinced until it happens.

By 5am the employees of Caves had stopped production in the three Drummond kitchens that feed 2000 workers and administration every day. They blocked entrances and prevented buses leaving the village to take the workers to work. The unionised workers do not work without a hot meal. Quickly the gringos are demanding that Caves go to the negotiating table to resolve this as quickly as possible.

Around 10am two rich gringo toffs arrive in the village to chat with the women. Apparently the agreement between Drummond and Caves was that all employees would receive new contracts for three years with Caves. Amazing, just what they want. And all we have to do is stop the strike then this will be put in writing. “We do not eat words, we want that agreed and signed at the negotiating table” responds Lenis beautifully. The kind offer later becomes a thinly veiled threat. If you don’t agree to that verbal proposal then Drummond will end the contract with Caves and you will all be unemployed he tells us. Whether he really thought they would trust him or rather wanted to spread fear I’m unsure. Lenis, not in the slightest intimidated, sent him on his way with her cool collected words “to secure what we and our families deserve we will carry this to the ultimate consequence if we have to”

Advisors from Sinaltrainal arrived later in the afternoon and I was invited to come to the negotiating table. I worried that I would be perhaps, too frank. Having to listen to such insincere words in the morning got my blood boiling. The gringos accused the women of causing damage to the village and the region, which completely takes the piss when we are stood in a village with such poverty, with workers who earn pittance for working in dangerous conditions while Drummond makes $1.15billion a year. I set off to the mine with excitement, keen to learn how the dynamics of a negotiating table play out and to experience for myself what a 25000acre open cast coal mine looks like.

But nope, we were not allowed to enter the mine, nor was the food we had bought for the compañeros. I was hungry and started eating the food but with a bitterness in my mouth, knowing that I can eat in the village while those inside haven’t eaten all day. The negotiations go on until 2am; I’m unsure quite how they can debate for 8 hours when the demands aren’t complicated: direct contract with Caves for three years and an increase from the minimum salary.

I awake at 2.30am after 3 hours sleep to find out that Caves are offering direct contracts for one year, no increase in salary but recognition of the union which means they can negotiate over the coming year. We sleepily walk back into the centre, stopping for a quick coffee and enjoying the calm knowing that it is going to be another hectic day. Talk about this proposal continues as dawn arrives. Many of the women are unhappy. True that not being sacked but exactly the same working conditions is not something to celebrate or call a victory. I tell them that they have to make sure the negotiating team know how they feel, and if they want to continue fighting then they must tell people and not let the decision be made without their input.

At 5am a group decides they are going to block the road leaving the village to block the contractors’ buses. I accompany then yet we arrive to find 2 women already had the idea and the road is blocked. The new arrivals set about improving the blockade with branches, logs, concrete blocks while the contractors look on quietly: group of determined women saying with their bodies that we are not going to be treated like shit anymore and going to do all in our power to change this situation.

Discontent about the proposal on the table grows and the negotiating team is told not to sign anything without agreement from the three blockades. They arrived at the village a few hours ago, visibly exhausted after a night negotiating. Heated discussions in different groups began while a block of workers stayed sat under the shelter quietly. I urge the discussion I am present in to open this to everyone. After several efforts I succeed and we hold a spontaneous assembly. Marisela starts with an impassioned speech, no way is she moving until they win. Everyone present cheers and no one with a differing perspective is present. I step up to try and explain the different perspectives I have heard so that the compañeros can make a decision knowing the pros and cons of each.

The past two days feel a changing moment for me here in Colombia. For the first time I feel like the person I was in the UK. I have loved having these months to observe, listen, learn but it is fucking amazing to be able to get stuck in, spotting what needs doing and getting it done, chatting with people who look low, giving regular hugs to Lenis and ordering Polo to at least lay down for 5 minutes as he hasn’t slept in two days.

I´m unsure what I think is the right decision but crucial that the decision is made openly by those who are fighting with their bodies, so they do not feel let down by the union if the proposal was accepted without them nor bitter and angry if they lose their jobs.

An hour ago, they decided unanimously to reject the proposal and to endure the lack of sleep, lack of food, prospect of increased militrisation (8 riot vehicles are already parked in the village)lack of money for their families with the vision that they will win a better future for their families. They are well aware that with this decision they may lose everything, but then again they may just win……..

Catering for the coal industry

2009-01-21T09:53:00.000-08:00

Written on 19th January

The bus droppes me on the highway and a scootertaxi carries me into the centre of La Loma in the midday heat. Dust blows up from the unpaved road and enters into my eyes, behind my teeth, covers my clothes. 4km away is the entrance to the Drummond open cast coalmine, carving 25 million tons of coal out of the Cesar lanscape every year to feed hungry coal power stations in the US and Europe and to fill the pockets of the Drummond family in Alabama.

I am here spending three weeks with the union branch of Sinaltrainal. They want people outside of La Loma to hear of their inhumane, dangerous and humilliating working conditions within the kitchens at the mine. I have put together a report, link which you can read here.

I wanted to come here to listen and learn from people here who work within the global coal infrastructure that the climate change movement believes necessary to dismantle to prevent catastrophic climate change. James Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Space Institute, has said that ending emissions from coal "is 80% of the solution to the global warming crisis" as coal reserves are far more massive than those of other fossil fuels.

I have listened a lot. Their every day difficulties dominates their conversations and when I have ventured to speak about climate change I have a sense of why on earth would this be of importance to them. They have enough problems; health, lack of decent housing, clean water, insufficient food. The consequences of climate change seem similar to what they are living now. It is not particularly desirable to imagine that life may get tougher.

Does their struggles against exploitation at the Drummond coalmine represent action on climate change? No because they they do not have an analysis of the need to drastically reduce coal production? Yes because they recognise the impacts of the coal mine in their own environment; on the water levels, the wildlife in the region and life in the villages? A friend in the village told me that 9 years ago they went 11 months without rain, unknown in the history of the village.

For me action on climate change must be action to take control of coal production out of the hands of multinationals like Drummond. They only want to expand (they are aiming to increase production from 25million tonnes to 40 million tonnes) and open more mines (a nearby 55000 acre mine, double to size of La Loma mine, is due to open in February) to keep their profits growing.

‘Free market’ reforms enabled Drummond to have total control of coal production in La Loma. Wrestling it back again so production is under popular control will involve supporting unions who organises workers to fight against exploitation, will involve educational work to agitate the workers and communities to fight for more than just a small pay rise or a new paved road. How can it be ever be justified that so many live in poverty while just one US family rakes it in? It will involve the continuation of opposition to the free trade agreement with the USA through popular movements where people understand how their daily lives is connected to international trade.
And during this long process, there will be time to explore the impacts of burning all this coal on the very people whose wellbeing is already impacted as it comes out the ground.

A company that allows workers to be suspended for taking just a bottle of water, forbidden so as to keep costs low and profits high, is not realistically going to accept changes in the laws that reduce its production without a damm powerful fight. Solidarity from people concerned by climate change will be really helpful in this.

Chained inside an armoured vehicle

2008-12-20T09:32:00.000-08:00

Involved with direct action in the UK I am use to seeing security guards as obstacles and potential problems. I spent yesterday with a group of secuirty guards who spend their lives tranporting large quantities amounts of money around in armoured vehicles, dangerous work in Colombia. If they transported people around, solidarity would be more complicated.

A year ago Eyder and Carlos decided to join Sintrabrinks, the national union that organises workers Brinks de Colombia, an affiliate of Brinks Ltd, a global security company. Eyder joined after he was repeatedly refused permission to attend a court case. If he didn’t attend he would be arrested, if he attended he would be sacked. Employees’ work 13 out of every 14 days and sometimes they are denied this day off. Their working day varies from 12 – 15hours. Family time is a fleeting glimpse of a child sleeping, a wife tired but waiting up. Life is lived inside an armoured vehicle.

This vehicle becomes their home. Constantly refused permission to leave the vehicle to go to the toilet, a plastic bag becomes their bathroom. There is no flush, ventilation or door between the other two colleagues. The smell of urine and dirty money fills the vehicle where they sometimes must eat their lunch. Trying to maintain some dignity, they avoid drinking fluids. Dehydration follows.

Brinks de Colombia has a policy of switching routes, driver, security and money handler every day to reduce surveillance and the likelihood of a robbery. When Carlos and Eyder affiliated to Sintrabrinks, they were put together every day for the next three months on the same route. The risk of a union is a greater threat than being robbed for the Multinational.

On the 22nd April 2007 they were attacked by a group of men. Eyder told me how Carlos reacted bravely, doing his job to protect the company’s money, and prevented the loss of any money. However he was shot in the neck and lost movement in his arms and his legs. He has since regained some movement in his arms but is completely paralysed from the waist down. He received $240 in compensation from the company.

More recently, three employees Uberle Pungo, Eduar Vivas and Robinson Tamayo were suddenly sacked. Pungo was thinking about affiliating. Vivas and Tamayo had both just affiliated to Sintrabrinks. They told me how they were offered $5000 each if they withdrew their affiliation. They refused.

Most of Brink’s employees are ex-soldiers. In the army unionist means communist which means guerilla, the enemy. In Brinks a little more than a year ago, union was a dirty forbidden word. When Carlos and Eyder unionised and began to talk with their colleague’s, people stopped sitting with them in the cafeteria and were unreceptive. Today´s protest shows views have shifted - in the small windows of every vehicle that came in and out of the compound, we received smiling faces and thumbs up. “They now recognise that what we are demanding is fair and just. The company only cares about its economic wellbeing while our wellbeing is ignored” Eyder tells me.

Last Saturday Eyder was given a letter, telling his that he was not to return to work due to his ‘emotional state’. They will continue to pay him. Eyder is clear that this is an illegal political act. They are trying to isolate him.

Brinks reported that between 2005 and 2007 “overseas revenue grew by 38%, due largely to rapid growth in Latin America … driven by increased demand, lower service costs and increased margins”

Brinks is not worried about losing Eyder´s labour in the short term. They are worried about his gentle but clear words which have the power and wisdom to effect their profit margins. Their long-term aim is apparent; destroy any union activity.

“I don’t join the union as I see how they persecute you”.

The small union branch know that the workers support them but there is much fear. Eyder describes to me what he has found through joining the union. Despite the incessant descrimination, he feels calm. The anger and frustration at the total control his job has over his life is now channeled in to his organising work. He confided in me, when alone, that even though they don’t talk about it he knows that both Brinks and the Government have links with ‘dangerous people’ and that what he and the others are doing is risky. Yet he feels happier than he has for many years. He is not keeping his head down. He is demanding respect and decent working conditions for him and his colleagues.

Living with dignity. Worth much more than the risks.

……..

If you get bored of Christmas merrities and would like to send a letter to Brinks that would be very appreciated by the guys I met yesterday. They repeatedly thanked me for listening to them and offering to write about what I learnt.

For the moment they are fighting for the:
Reinstation of sacked workers and compensation for loss of earnings.
Respect for all employees’ rights to free association.

You can send emails to:

Corporate.relations@brinksinc.com

bgs.customerservice@brinksinc.com

brinksus@brinksinc.com

Please bcc in espaciobristol at redcolombia.org in so we can pass news on to them.

Dignity of Women - a women's space

2008-12-15T21:32:00.000-08:00

In August 2004 the Colombia army detained Raquel in Saravena, Arauca. In November 2006 she and Samuel were convicted of “rebellion”, a common strategy by the Colombian government against those who insist on contining to educate, organise and mobilise communities to defend their rights to life and territory against the big oil sponsored militrisation of their lands. Another response is to murder them. In the same 2004 military operation three trade unionists were shot at point blank range by the Colombian army.

In August 2007 she was released but is unable to live in Arauca. “They [the state] wouldn’t let me return. They would get rid of me again if I dared” she tells me. Yet last Tuesday we are on a bus together travelling to Saravena for the First Assembly of AMAR (Organisation ‘Awakening of Women in Arauca’) As the event unfolds I see what drives Raquel to return .
Raquel was an outspoken and active member of the Teachers Union of Arauca for the twenty years before her arrest. It is as a passionate educator that her contribution to this assembly is really important to the growth of this young organisation (just 2 years old – very young in Colombian terms).

She tells me that in the assembly there is a session for exchange of experiences and wants me to speak. I ask S~ what she sees as the difficulties to participation in AMAR. Answer: choices controlled by jealous (or insecure?) husbands; societal pressure to be a ‘good’ wife and ‘good’ mother (so stay at home to cook, clean and bring up the kids), a cycle of women being told they have nothing to contribute outside of the kitchen, never learning new skills and thus reinforcing the myth that they are of no use; those who do break the cycle have their contributions criticised and undervalued. Constant battles with self-esteem

For many women just getting permission to attend the assembly is a big deal. A tactic used is to be very attentive to their husbands in the run up so they can get a pass out. Tellingly, the women who live this reality do not tell me this. A two-day event, with underconfident women is very little (compared to two-days with confident trade unionists) for building trust across differences.

I decide to share with them my community’s response to me being sexually harassed in Bristol. I had worries about doing this but decided to continue, and to also share the worries. I hoped they would contribute to building a space of truth and respect.

“I worry that what happened to me is so small that you will think why all the fuss. It is certain that far worse things happen to women in England and Colombia. But this does not cancel out the reaction that I had nor how it affected my daily life.”

I shared with them details of the harassment, how low level fear affected my and how it affected my confidence. I spoke about how if it wasn’t for the words and love of both informal and formal groups around me it would have been much harder; how my community took responsibility to hold him accountable for his behaviour.

“He wasn’t the enemy but every person has to take responsibility for the impact of their actions on others”.

This echoes the delicate path that AMAR are walking – holding men accountable for the violence within families yet clear that they are not the enemy. The women of AMAR wish to walk side by side with other social organisations, united against the violent policies of the government. It is already a hard task. They desire to build trust with men in the social organisations, showing them that that they are on the same side, build unity but just not ignore the shit the women have to put up with in their homes. Dignity for all, women and men.

“Alone, we are weak, our fears, insecurities overwhelm us. But together I had the strength and support to manage this situation. I see that AMAR can play a similar role for the women of Arauca. Creating a space where we can support each other, grow together, encourage each other, be gently critical without damaging our self-esteem. We must laugh together”

These were my honest words to these women. Speaking honestly with these women when I live such different experiences and priviliges is tough, it challenges me. I do not live surrounded by police, army, paramilitaries (who work alongside the army), and guerillas. When I share my perspective, shaped to encourage and support them, what accountability do I have to the suggestions I make? When I am told that to take action about an abusive neighbour is dangerous because you don’t know who they might be it reminds me how little I understand how this two decade long war over a land rich in oil weaves in to daily life. When I do not have to live with the daily consequences of my perspective what is my responsibility to the influence I may or may not have?

But as I spoke, nods, laughter and smiles held my hand and gave me a squeeze of reassurance. And it is these nods and smiles, not just to me, but to every woman who shared a part of herself, that makes AMAR such a powerful, exciting and necessary organisation. It is this womens’ space, where quiet women come alive with hidden energy and enthusiasm when we started talking about ideas for projects, where Sa~ shares an inspiring story of how she managed to help another women find her dignity and leave her violent husband, where we can dance together to end the meeting, that draws Raquel back in to the fabric of an Araucan social organisation. ”Having to live in Bogota and work on a computer all day as a continued prison, a form of pyschological torture.” Here she feels and acts with vibrancy I had not seen before. So despite the police monitoring of the house where we were sleeping, despite the nervous hands which shows what her face has the strength to hide, I imagine we will be back.

Where death lists become friends

2008-12-08T15:21:00.000-08:00

October 2004 and I am leaving a meeting of my university walking club. I am handed this flyer with a note attached “Coca-Cola: Crimes in Colombia. Speaking :Edgar Paez, Sinaltrainal, Colombia. 7.30pm” I decide to stay instead of going to the union bar. The effect of his words put me on a new path.

He spoke about how the policies of this multinational are destroying lives in Colombia – through sacking workers and rehiring them as temporary workers, through unemployment, through the bullet of a gun. This was news, fucked up news, which I had not read about in the papers.

Even more crucially this was news combined with a plan of action. These were not words about violence that submerged me with gloom, desperation. This was a violent reality being told to me but with a refusal to be silenced. Instead there was a request for support coming directly from those affected: organise institutional boycotts of Coca-Cola to show people what was happening in Colombia and to force Coke to sit down and negotiate with the union for integral reparation: to fully repair the emotional, material, cultural and social damage done – in the families affected, in the workplace, in the union and in the community. Restoring dignity weaves through all of these.

This was it, I was being asked to help, to use my privilege as a british student. Ever a pragmatist (very soon to be on the path to becoming a radical one at that) I responded with determination and naïve/focused positivism. Of course we could kick Coca-Cola out of our union. Of course it was the right course of actions. And as I read, questioned, doubted, reaffirmed, I consciously immersed myself more in the Campaign against Coca-Cola. As I analysed, looked at what was going on it became impossible for me not to realise that my earlier moments of doubts came from the twisting and hiding of facts by Coca-Cola and a few unions that opposed the boycott for various complex but shit reasons.

Fast forward through four years of personal/political/emotional/spiritual awakening/maturing /developing, through the difficult slump of the student campaign against coca-cola in the uk through a reawakening within the camp for climate action process and I now arrive here: at the week long national assembly of sinaltrainal. A past me is thrust into the present as my past actions are connected across time to now, as I connect with people I was working with but who I imagined through the three sinaltrainal members I worked with on speaker tours in the uk: edgar, juan and euripides.

Last night while thinking about what I would write in this post I had the urge to read through old sinaltrainal press releases where they have publicised and condemn the threats they have received. Why?

In my speech at the end of the assembly, before being cajoled into playing my flute in front of them all, I spoke of getting over fears. I was thinking about chats during the week with different guys about participation in the political process. Many ideas were shared about how to improve this but it hits me now.

Fear of life ending was never mentioned an unspoken

The focus of the assembly was decision making and not-to-bad internal politics

how will they fight against sackings that violate legal and constitutional rights,
how can they prepare themselves better for negotiations with companies,
how can they counteract the work Nestle is doing to get the wives to be against the union activities of their husbands?
how can they build their demands for direct contract rather than through one of a thousand subcontractors where rights are eroded ever quicker.
how to continue their grassroots support of the sugar cane cutters who have been politicised by their recent 2 month long strike
how will they respond as union to the economic ‘crisis’ (“as opposed to the systemic crisis in which we live permanently”) given than colombia has second highest external and internal debt in the world –meaning a shrinking economy will make it near impossible to make payments.

I enjoyed listening, observing the dynamics without having to take a position – it left my ideas space for much maneuver. But what I didn’t engage with was the depth of the bloody reality for the union, despite knowing the statistics of violence.

Appreciating this more fully now back in Bogota, I see clearly as to why just my very presence was so openly and warmly received, just to spend time with them, with warm, kind men (with varying splashes of sexism thrown in to keep me on my toes) was really appreciated.

I read through old emails. 22^nd November 2007: Jose de Jesus, a worker at a Nestle factory is killed…. in Dosquebradas. ... A* is from there. A* with whom we chatted about the internal union politics as we swam breaststroke side by side in the lunch break. He taught me how to play tejo – bit like french boules but with an angled board filled with clay that you have to get your disc to stick in to, he explained things when I got lost in the debates…. he has just been elected to the national committee of sinaltrainal.

I ask R~ if he took into account the security implications when he made the decision a few years to be on the National Committee. “No, I just saw things that needed doing and got on with them, found myself taking the initiative more and more in the union work and it seemed a natural next step to take part in the national organisation of the union. I take precautions like I only sharing my views with people who it is necessary to”

On Thursday night while a group of us were having a beer together in an outside bar they all noticed a guy sat on the table next to us. I didn’t spot him. I let relaxation set in as I made a judgement about what is and isn’t a safe space - based on limited experiences. Instead I noticed a family sat together in silence– women, boy and man - with 12 empty bottles of beer on the table. I felt sad for the emptiness that cloaked their space. R~ and I left to walk back to the holiday park after we could stand no more bad eighties rock that F~ insisted on putting on the duke box. When we got back, R~ got a call asking him to wake up the security and get them down to the plaza quick. The man in the bar and another had followed the group as they left the bar. Paramilitaries. They returned safely. Their jokes about the state of Colombia, about how ridiculous it is that they can’t go for a beer hundreds of miles away from where they do most of their union work attempted to dispel the the charged atmosphere.

I stayed with L~, the daughter of Santi, one of the guys involved, during all of this. She was shaken but not paniced. Seventeen years old and since the age of 11 a bodyguard has followed her father everywhere he goes. Later I catch her having a sneaky hidden kiss with one of the younger guys, all is well.

Twenty-two members of Sinaltrainal have been assassinated.

Reading the list of names makes me feel weak. Death threats are to people I have shared food or had a beer with, even played my flute for. Death threats may arrive for R ~ with whom I shared some beautiful spiritual intimate moments with this week

My soul is starting to root in Colombia.

Walking our words

2008-11-25T06:47:00.000-08:00

I have walked for two days. Thousands of indigenous have been walking since Octboer 11^th 2008. They are in ‘Minga’ and over the past 6 weeks more social organisations have joined in. The indigenous started from their ancestoral territories. I started from Soacha, a poor neighbourhood on the outskirts of Bogota where I glimpse the realities built by thousands of refugees who have struggled to arrive here with nothing but their lives.

The first day we walk for 30km across the city, arriving at the National Public University five hours later. Welcomed by hundreds of students, the surge of energy was immense. Underneath the bridge, the acoustics exploded and the noise made me tremble, a lump to my throat. Here was thousands of indigenous refusing to accept how a racist, hierarchical, authoritarian world treats them, refusing to accept the destruction of their lands and our earth.

With their call to do Minga they are the driving energy to build hope, new paths, new relationships across difference to build a strong social movement capable of social change. No apathy here, never a word of what's the point we can't change anything

“Minga is an ancient practice of the indigenous peoples of the Andes. It is a collective effort organised with the aim of achieving a common goal”.

“The essence of the Minga of Peoples is to go beyond the demands of each sector and to focus on a common political agenda; to have goals that go beyond the claims and demands of every sector. This is reflected in the five point proposal of this Minga”

The Vice-Chancellor first refused to let the Minga use the public university. Collective pressure changed that, reminding him that a public university if for everyone and is a place for debate. However when we entered the campus we found the doors to the buildings locked to us. For two nights now thousands of indigenous that have set up camp in the campus have had to sleep outside, despite lacking the clothes and blankets necessary to do this in chilly Bogota. Disgusting racism towards indigenous people is still the norm. I’m certain that if academics visting for conferences would not be forced to sleep on the grass.

“the Minga seeks to link and unite all people who are committed to a more far-reaching common agenda, than their own immediate objectives. In other words, it is not that all the people are mobilized so that indigenous achieve lands rights to which they are entitled. If this were the only result of this mobilization, the structural conditions that perpetuate the subjugation, oppression, impoverishment of peoples and of all life, would remain untouched. And in addition, the sectors supporting us could feel used.”

The concept of Minga makes me think of the ignorant English phrase rent-a-mob, people who turn up for many protests. It is used to devalue the actions of people who recognise their own problems in the problems of others. It has been used to devalue my actions of solidarity with those who are more affected by injustices than me.

It is Friday morning and Plaza de Che, the main square in the university, is buzzing with hundreds of different diverse groups painting last minute banners. I look for friends and with just two months in the country familiar faces warmly greet me.

The capacity of Colombian organisations to mobilise and go out to the streets despite years of violent oppression is utterly inspiring. We walk slowly together, through shopping streets, cheered on by suited people in their lunch break. A group of students from one of the many private universities stands clapping and then break into a run to join with us.

Arriving at the Plaza de Bolivar (Colombian Parliament Square) we find out that President Uribe has gone to Peru, unable to give any answers, unwilling to even want to. Rather he was in Lima to seal a Free Trade Agreement with Canada – totally contrary to the vision and needs of the popular movement.

"The Minga does not end here, it continues with its call to people, waking consciousnesses and unifying forces, sharing pain, walking the word forward without seeing borders and limits, with the hope of life that transcends all spaces, and we are each responsible to care for and create this creature that was born today..."

"Onward with the joining of efforts among Indigenous people, farmers, students, teachers, women, men, youth, African descendents, workers...!"

These were some of the words shared in the Plaza de Bolivar.

I wonder how we will make the idea and importance of Minga relevant to a farmer who had her husband killed by paramilitaries and is attempting to cope on the farm alone… to an afro/black man who is refused job after job cause he is black….to a teacher who is struggling to show the students that they have opportunities beyond joining the paras/army/guerillia while class sizes increases and no books arrive….to Liliana who wants to study to be a nurse but doesn’t have the money to do so….to an indigenous who has been forcibly removed from their land to make way for a huge coal port. How will we do the work of bringing these diverese people together, to build connections across these problems; war, violence, privatisation of education, ‘loot’ of natural resources, racism, sexism and more?

The Minga is an inspiring political process for change yet I don’t romanticise it. It will be incredibly tough, working together across issues and political difference but if we don’t – are we really building something that will bring about social justice and liberty in Colombia, in the UK?

Evolving rural life

2008-11-18T15:06:00.000-08:00

The boy Darien shies from me, hiding his face in Dominga’s embrace. “Why does she look different from us, mami? Why does she look a bit like a man, mami?” Doña Dominga answers “because people are different.” And yet hours later we are sharing animal noises, laughing at the different sounds a cockerel makes in our different languages. The following morning he leaves some plastic yellow flowers on top of my bag as he leaves for his school. If we could learn from children – to trust and love across difference so easily.

That evening when Damien returns from school we study together, sharing new words, how to shape our mouths, tongues so the syllables sound right. As he, the sharpest and quickest english student I have ever met, writes ‘I like sheep, you like cows, we like pigs,…’ the sun sets and we switch on the bare light bulb.

It took twenty men from the community seventy working days to bring light to their farms. After many years of pressure, the council provided the materials. This was in 2004.

It’s so easy to see people living without amenities (running water, electricity, gas, roads, schools) as a permanent state and not recognise the sheer amount of hard hard physical work that has gone in to getting what they do have, nor to know of their plans for improvements for the future. Their time scale due is different – growing food and getting the money to pay for the materials must come first (no buy now pay later offers for a new bathroom - but change comes. And rather than just ‘home improvement’ change, they also have an idea of community improvements. Their next task is to dig drainage for the road to prevent it eroding away in the rains.

Education and collective organising are crucial to improving their lives. As Dominga told me “with education comes the confidence and skills to confront those in power who would otherwise ignore us.” With collective organising comes the capacity to improve more than just their homes and gardens, but their schools, roads, health access.….

Raul and I were there to help build some basic shelters for making compost for all in the vereda. The land, while lush and green, is not too fertile. I helped the men with the building - they didn’t comment on me doing such work, they didn’t say much to me. Shy – perhaps unsure of this strange person like Damien on the first morning. But with age – insecurities around difference are deeper, and it was tough for me to break through.

With Dominga, it took time too but through conversations while milking cows, making cheese together and washing up, we shared intimate moments. With me, she spoke openly about how her brother and husband ignore her opinion, yet later say she was right in the first place. She tells me she has had very little education, “women don’t need an education as they are only going to cook and look after the house and children" she was told..... I ask her how she has continued learning, despite being denied formal education. “I started recently going to meetings and there I have learnt a lot. I don’t speak but I learn. Some of the women think it is odd that I go to meeting but I tell them that we are as much a part of this community as the men”.

Our farewell suprises and moves me – we embrace for what feels like hours. She cries and tells me she loves me. I hold her dear to me. What do I mean to this kind strong woman? Why was my stay of just two days and two nights a profound experience for her? I hope I can return and spend more time with her, to find answers to these questions. For now I can only imagine.....

....that to spend time with another person with whom she could talk more openly (my gender was crucial for this trust to be built so quickly) is something she rarely has the opportunity to do as her imposed responsibility in life has been in the kitchen. Certainly not to talk and share ideas with others outside of her family.

This relationship prepared me a little more for the next part of my trip – participating in a workshop with a group of rural women, some of whom asked COS-PACC (the org. i was accompanying) for support in creating a women’s organisation so that ‘we leave from the kitchen’.

We did a few activities, intended to help them understand and reflect on their own situation in their community, and to start thinking of possible responses to their dignostic. I have my own views on what I think is really good about the rural way of life and what is not. But what I liked about the workshop was that the women from COS-PACC asked questions, instead of judging or being opinionated.

What did surprise me was how unique and rare the space created is and that the idea of the women of the community coming together every few months to eat, laugh, talk together is a powerful act for them. We left it in their hands. We could support them but they had to decide what they wanted and make the next step. I hope I go back there, as will mean that even though they were mainly pretty shy, that they enjoyed and valued the space and want to continue meeting.

Daughters of Slaves

2008-11-03T17:05:00.001-08:00

“Colombia is built from the physical work of blacks, yet 150 years after the legal end of slavery we continue to work as slaves and live in the worst conditions.”

The Afro-colombian students and young people I met at their National Gathering are very aware that they are the luckier ones, able to get an education and leave poverty, while the vast majority continue live in terrible conditions. They want to change this. It was a full on, powerful, intense, priviliged, exciting experience to be in the presence of three hundred Colombian students as they conversed "how will we create a positive transformation in the lives of Colombia’s black population".

After being delayed twice due to threats from paramilitaries and guerilla groups, the event took place in Buenaventura. Four days of debates, analysis, heated discussion. Daily my mind got too full of new thoughts for me to think any more and my notebook crammed full of reflections. Dancing was a welcome respite at the end of long days where I quietly observed and pondered the debates.......

How to we break Eurocentric control over culture, education, economics? How do we decolonise our minds, our institutions? Is Afro-centrism a good response?

Should our political position reject both left and right wing positions as they are both Euro-centric concepts and have been historically racist? Or can we build alliances with the left, yet maintain our identity and challenge racism.

Is the indigenous struggle over land rights also our problem as Afro-Colombians? How is capitalism and racism connected? How can we demand reparation for the work our ancestors have done?

Is learning about pre-slavery african history important for us in our present situation? Does the term multiculturality mean we are respected but still not included? How about Interculturality?

Outside, taking a break, I met a group of young woman, whose dads’ have been on strike for over 7 weeks and I asked if they would share with me their perspectives. They told me their families’ stories, passing, tugging and sharing the words out between them. We sat all together on the concrete ground. I seated myself carefully so we can talk as equals. I don’t want to interview them, rather hope they take the space as their own, to tell their own story.

Lorenza, Liliana and Vanessa:

Our relationships with our dads are difficult. We rarely see them. They leave for the sugar cane plantations at 5am and get home between 8 and 10pm. At school we were sometimes asked to do projects about our dads but this was nearly impossible. It is only when they have accidents that we see them more. “My dad lost his sight in his right eye”, “my dad had an accident with his leg and couldn’t work for six months – he got sick pay for three months”, “my dad has problems with his lungs from the dust“.

Things are really hard at the moment and we are going hungry because our dads have been paid for over six weeks. But I think the strike is just. They work like slaves in the fields cutting the sugar cane all day under the heat of the sun. Also, they are given protective clothing and a machete twice a year, yet the clothing lasts a month and the machetes just two weeks before they have to change it.

“I work from 7.30am to 6pm, 5 days a week doing housework. I get paid $230000 a month (£70). On Saturday’s I go to college to study nursery education. This costs me $100 000 a month.”

“I don’t have a job. I help at home. Because of the strike I don’t any money to pay for transport, or to print applications so it is difficult to look for a job.

If they win the strike, I will go to college to study nursing. I really want to be a nurse.”

On Sunday’s we all take part in a group [which organised for them to take part in this event]. Here, among many things, we talk about how to improve the relationships with our dads. They are sometimes violent at home.

“If I have an opinion it doesn’t matter to him because I am a women. If I do something, it’s often wrong, yet for my brothers it’s all good. I confronted my dad recently telling him this. He accepted it and we are talking more about this now.”

Our dads worry that if we go out to dance, we will get pregnant, but we get sex education at school and have a higher-level education than them. They have to understand that they can learn from us, their daughters. If education was free there would’t be this violence in the home, nor this war happening. Some students miss sex education at school, as they have to go to work. If our dads received higher wages this wouldn’t happen. If they win the strike there will be less poverty and less women getting pregnant.

We want this, we want something better for ourselves, for our children.

A step towards re-building communities

2008-10-25T09:40:00.000-07:00

Two days travel there, two days in a remote community with 500 people from around the region and Venezuela and two days back again: all to take part in the 'First Social and Ecological Gathering of the Great River of Catatumbo'

Two thirds of the people in this stunning mountaion region were violently forced to leave their homes between 1998 and 2005. The population went from 900000 to 300000.

Now people are moving back, what else do you do if your livelihood is your farm? As one guy says ' you can't grow food in the city'.

The festival was a first step in re-energising the social organisations: giving them a show of our support in this remote corner and encouraging them to start rebuilding their community organisations.

My ideas are, perhaps, less clearly articulated with this audio blog but I hope my 'live' thoughts - recorded as the events unfolded - add something different to your perceptions of my experience. And it was very helpful for me to be able to unwind my mind to the dictaphone.

My racism that allows new futures for Gabo.

2008-10-12T10:23:00.000-07:00

Five days in the hot tropical city of Barranca Bermeja where spanish words are harder to catch - muffled by the constant whirl of fans hanging precariously above us. The smell of yet more roast chichen wafts from the Mac Pollo restaurant over the road yet different from Bogota - at 35degrees every breathe feels strained.

A pattern of breakfast, meetings, lunch, siesta, meetings, sitting around in the hotel reception, dinner, bed is quickly established . Nothing visibly powerful to do or see.

Gabriel's (Gabo) story - the warm, funny, dedicated man who I accompanied - assures me that my presence is powerful. Here is his story.

"We moved to Sur de Bolivar in 1971, when I was 21. Before that we lived in Calda but there was already many small scale farmers and not much land. We found land in an area that was not occupied and we settled there. We were looking for a place where we could have a better quality of life.

There were 10 families to begin with and many more people started arriving from different regions. By 1998 there was around 1000 people living in the community.

When our children started to grow up we built a school. We found teachers who had a high level of education that meant every child could get a good education. We also started building good paths, and later, roads (35km’s worth) around the community and to other villages.

A normal day for me was to work from 6am to 6pm. I grew yuca, plantain and rice. I also looked after the cows and pigs. This was my life, my passion, mi gusto. For me this proves that things that appear impossible can become real when we work communally.

Then the paramilitaries entered the region in February 1999, just one hours walks from my farm. Over the next few years we organised 8 marches - in the municiapl towns and the Capital of the region – demanding our rights were respected and that the paramilitaries leave the region. I was singled out as an organised and so had to leave the farm.

I stayed in the region until 2007, moving between different places, supported by different communities, with my wife and young daugher. At times we had to walk for 25 days in order to leave the region to report murders.

What I saw wasn’t fair, what was happening. They were killing the young people, old people. There was masacares all over the region. I was not going to work on the farm any more, instead dedicate myself to social work, building up people’s skills, organising.

When the paramilitaries were there I could hide but now the army have arrived I can’t hide in the region. One has to understand that within the army are the paramilitaries so the army does not mean you have security.

Before the arrival of the paramilitaries, the army already disappeared, tortured, killed. There was so many reports made about this that they had to change their strategy. And so the paramilitaries entered – they could do the brutal things.

What we now understand is that people were killed and disappeared because other interests appeared in the region, interests of multinationals.

They killed my son, they disappeared another. Brother of my wife was also disappeared. My son was killed on the 22 Sept 2002 in El Pairaiso, the army disappeared my second son in the middle of May 2005.

I’m not one to cry too much but everything that happens to you, your family or to your neighbour or friend, it reinforces your work. And you begin to understand who is the enemy.

The debate around the Law for Victims (that we went to on Thursday) to me is very dangerous as it supports impunity. It can’t ignore why we are victims, who benefitted from us becoming victims. The truth wil be when the state recognises that what has happened is a project of the state.

The land has to be taken away from the paramilitaries, from the multinationals and people can return to their territories. They must return my land, my house, and that they leave us in peace.

Those who are guilty must pay. But the guilty is not the person who shot, he is not the enemy, he probably didn’t know why, he was just ordered. Those who give the orders - they kill.

Now my wife and I live in the flat of my daughter in Bogota. We are looking for some land, as we are campesinos. I would like to live in the Sur de Bolivar but it is not possible. To go there I need to have accompaniment but this isn’t possible all the time so a bit of land near Bogota would be good."

The fact of my place of birth and my skin colour means that Gabo can return and work in his region. He knows that the political costs of disappearing him are raised higher with the presence of the likes of me.

I am strategically using racist structures - ones which make clear that my life as a white European is worth more than a brown Colombian. And as I do, I am complicit with racism. This is difficult. How do I ensure I don't reinforce a sense of European superiority over the Latin American's with the people I meet. Perhaps I can't - they will read my body as they choose. But I can think about how my behaviour, mannerisms, ideas, words might be interpreted by the people I am with, and with this I can try to walk a sensitive path.