#colombia protests

[janeways-coffees]

As much as I think that the protests at colombia and other schools are misguided and turning into bigotry, calling in the national fucking guard is not the right move. If a single bullet is fired, this will lend validity to their claims of oppression, which will lend "validity" to their antisemitic actions. Violence and police action are not the answer.

[zorelle]

Here's the conversation between Angela Davis and Francia Marquez, regarding racism, racialized state violence, the carceral state, the fight for prison abolition and others, uniting in conversation both the US and Colombia's experiences and possibilities in face of a future we're daring to dream.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Colombia’s protests are a product of its post-peace-deal reality

"The peace process has opened up a space for other concerns and for other political debates."

Jen Kirby at Vox: 

In Cali, a city in southwestern Colombia, protesters put up barricades across the city. A front line — la primera línea — sometimes guards these barricades with masks and helmets and shields.

Cali is the epicenter of the unrest that has convulsed Colombia for more than a month. A tax reform bill proposed by right-wing President Iván Duque sparked protests in late April, with thousands responding to a call from national labor unions to push against the measure.

The government defended the proposed tax increase as a much-needed measure to repair the economy after fallout from the coronavirus. Those who opposed the legislation saw it as putting another burden on middle-class and poorer families who are already in a precarious position, also because of the coronavirus.

Anger over the tax bill also became an outlet for pent-up grievances against Colombia’s economic structures and its political elite. “It only takes a spark where there’s a lot of discontent,” Muni Jensen, senior adviser with the Albright Stonebridge Group and a former Colombian diplomat, said.

Demonstrators, many of them young or from marginalized communities, are speaking out about structural inequality, poverty, land reform, health care, and lack of education and opportunity. Many of these pressures have existed in Colombia for years, but they deepened dramatically during the pandemic.

The people flooding the streets across Colombia have faced brutal crackdowns from police, fueling demonstrators’ rage and adding police brutality to their list of grievances. Human rights groups have alleged abuses such as indiscriminate beatings, killings, and sexual violence. Temblores, an organization that tracks police brutality in the country, has documented more than 3,700 cases of police violence as of May 31, 2021, as well as 45 deaths it said were caused by police. Colombia’s human rights ombudsman said at least 58 people have died during the protests so far.

“That just enraged people who are already enraged because of the situation, because of the government,” Laura Gamboa, assistant professor of political science at the University of Utah, said of the police crackdown. “What you see here is like this ball that is just going to grow and grow.”

Experts say there’s another, deeper dynamic also fueling the protests.

Columbia recently emerged from decades of internal armed conflict, the culmination of an imperfect and still not fully realized peace process. But this helped excise the civil war as the dominant political issue.

[...]

Colombia’s peace process gave the space for these protests to happen

In 2012, then-Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos began negotiations with the leftist guerrillas known as the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), or FARC, in an attempt to end a civil war that had gone on for more than 50 years. After four years of negotiations, the Colombian government and the FARC signed a peace deal under which the FARC demobilized and became a legitimate political party.

The peace process was far from perfect. The agreement faced public opposition, though it was finally approved in November 2016. The country’s current president, Iván Duque, ran (and won) on a platform of trying to weaken the deal, which he saw as going too easy on the guerrillas. Duque’s been trying to jam up the implementation of the deal ever since.

The peace deal did not solve all of Colombia’s problems, nor did it fully end the violence. But the civil war between the government and the FARC was Colombia’s central crisis. With the peace deal, that main cleavage consuming Colombia started to fade away, said Gamboa.

But all the other major problems stuck on the sidelines, especially socioeconomic issues, started to bubble up. Inequality, education, employment, social justice, racial inequities — all of it became much more salient.

[newsupdated]

Colombians count four more deaths as protesters mark a month of demonstrations

Colombians count four more deaths as protesters mark a month of demonstrations

Four people died in Colombia on Friday as tens of thousands of protesters marked a month of demonstrations across the country, while talks between the government and the national strike committee have stalled. In Cali, which has become an epicenter of the nationwide protests, Mayor Jorge Ospina confirmed three of the deaths. Local media reported the fourth death occurred on the road between Cali…

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[breaking-news-portal]

Colombia protests enter fourth week, demonstrators pledge to continue

Colombia protests enter fourth week, demonstrators pledge to continue

Bogota: Colombia`s wave of anti-government protests entered their fourth week on Wednesday (May 19), as unions, student groups and others turned out at marches to demand social change amid intermittent talks between the government and strike organizers. The protests have been marked by violence by both police and civilians. The attorney general`s office has confirmed 15 deaths connected to…

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