A CALL TO THE COLOMBIAN PEOPLE – MINGA MAY 30 2016

( (Translated by Eunice Gibson, CSN Volunteer Translator)

Source : http://congresodelospueblos.org/ser-con-otros-vista/cumbre-agraria/item/884-minga-nacional-agraria-campesina-etnica-y-popular.html

FROM THE AGRARIAN SUMMITT )
STRUCTURAL AGRARIAN REFORM
FOR GOOD LIVING
AND A DECENT CITY

We are sowing Hope; we will reap our Country!

 

We are calling together the Colombian people to join in the GREAT NATIONAL GATHERING (Minga) “Sowing Hope; Reaping a Country”, and to take part in all of the peaceful mobilization activities that are coming up, so that we can express our disagreement with the current economic development model. That model does not fit the people’s dreams of achieving peace with social and environmental justice.
The governments of Juan Manuel Santos and his predecessors have been emphatic in expressing publicly that the country’s economic model is not negotiable, even though the citizens have made clear that they oppose it. The Colombian government goes ahead without listening or offering sustainable alternatives for long term solutions that would deal in a structural way with the economic, environmental and social crisis that is getting worse all over Colombia.

Today our call is to confront the dangerous extractive policies that are putting at risk our natural wealth, our national sovereignty, the physical and cultural survival of the rural communities, and the unity of the Colombian people.

This call also responds to the indifference and systematic repudiation by the government of the agreements reached after the Agrarian Strike and Indigenous Minga in 2013 and 2014, along with the days of indignation in 2015 and the lists of demands that were presented after the mobilizations on January 24 and March 17 of 2016. The government keeps on violating the orders of the Constitutional Court for the protection of the victims (Decision T-025) and putting off the complete reparation contemplated in Statute 1448/11.

A number of social sectors (victims, environmental, transportation workers, labor unions, women, teachers, urban and rural, among others) are in opposition to the government policies that are part of the Free Trade Agreements and are expressed in the National Development Plan (PND is the Spanish acronym.). Those policies have put the nation’s strategic resources, its publicly owned businesses, its energy resources, and its water on sale, and they have distributed the land unequally, increasing the benefits given to a few and excluding millions of citizens, campesinos, indigenous people, and Afro-Colombians from their legitimate rights.

We are also radically opposed to the citizen security law that violates democratic liberties, to the new police code and to the repressive activities carried out by ESMAD against the people’s righteous protests. We oppose the arbitrary arrests, persecution, harassment and murders of social leaders and defenders of human rights, as well as the new phase of paramilitarism that is a serious attack on social and popular organizations and puts at risk the achievement of a stable and lasting peace.

We repeat our support of the process of dialog with the FARC and with the ELN, because we are supporters of the negotiated end to the armed conflict, but in the same manner, we believe that we need agreed solutions to the social, political and economic conflict, so that we can have peace with social and environmental justice.

As a result, and for a fair and historic vindication, we urge the national government to protect the active, connected and decisive participation of the communities in the design and construction of Complete Agrarian Reform that will redistribute and democratize land ownership and re-orient the economic development model in harmony with our natural and cultural diversity.

We repeat our far-reaching call to every person and community in the countryside and in the cities, to express in one expression our voice of hope for a change in the country’s direction, toward a guarantee of a good life for present and future generations. Let’s put on our ruanas *and our hats, and pick up our chieftain’s sticks, and let’s go out and walk the talk on streets and highways, country and city, to demonstrate our commitment to the defense of our water, of our food, of our native seeds, of nature and of our cultural identity. We are fighting for our lives.

Walk with us:

Campesino, Ethnic and Popular Agrarian Summit
@CumbreAgrariaOf Haghstag: #MinaLedio/ #MingaNacional

“We Sow Hope and We Reap Our Country”
CAMPESINO, ETHNIC AND POPULAR AGRARIAN SUMMIT

National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC); Congress of the Peoples, National Agrarian Coordinator (CNA), Social and Agrarian Integration Committee (MIA), Joint National Labor and Agricultural Federation (FENSUAGRO), Agrarian Unity Committee (MUA), Marcha Patriótica, National Association of Areas Reserved for Campesinos (ANZORC), Popular Campesino Association (Asocamp), Coalition of Social Movements and Organizations of Colombia (COMOSOC), Movement for a Popular Constituent Assembly (MCP), National Campesino Association (ASONALCAM), Network of Afro-Colombian Communities (PCN), National Afro-Colombian Organization (ANAFRO).

National Center of Health, Environment and Work (Censat) Living Water Movement, Popular Resistance Movement, National Committee of Victims Belonging to Social Organizations, Coordination of Social and Political Organizations, National Unitary Command

*The Colombian word for ponchos

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Source :  http://trochandosinfronteras.info/colombia-por-que-parar

COLOMBIA: WHY ARE WE GOING ON STRIKE?

 

On May 30 a nationwide strike will begin in Colombia. It has been called together by several social sectors that are hoping in this way to express their disagreement with the political, social, and economic principles being implemented by the government.

In this way, campesinos, indigenous people, Afro-Colombians, workers, students, informal workers, and transportation workers, along with other sectors, have agreed to promote the cessation of work activities. The duration of the strike is indefinite.

The reasons for the strike

While the mass communication media are focusing on the case of the disappearance of Spanish columnist Salud Hernández or on the football championship that is coming up, in social media and alternative media we have distributed a large quantity of photos, audios and videos related to the nationwide strike. All of those demonstrate the motives and the causes of the dissatisfaction generated among the people by the precarious socio-economic situation in this county. The following are some of the reasons:

• We protest against the National Development Plan, because it opens the gates of this country to the transnationals; it worsens the concentration of land ownership; it increases the privatization of fundamental rights such as health and education; and it promotes the liquidation of public enterprises.
• We reject the violence generated by government entities and paramilitaries or para-governments, which continue to operate in the regions with the consent and sponsorship of public and private entities. Examples of that are the murders, kidnappings and threats against social and community leaders in various provinces of the country.
• We oppose the ZIDRES law that facilitates the conversion of campesinos into employees of big industrial agriculture and of transnational corporations.
• The strike is also based on the government’s abandonment of social investment. That has left roads and highways in terrible condition (the Sovereignty Highway, the Jungle Border, the Route of the Liberators). The network of public hospitals lacks sufficient resources and patients are dying while they wait for medical attention. There is a lack of access to quality public higher education.
• We are also complaining about the excessive militarization of the territories (both in the country and in the city). They are putting the civilian population at risk because their only intention is to provide security for the oil and mining companies.
Finally, the organizations that are promoting the protests have indicated that another reason for the strike is the government’s failure to carry out the agreements made with the Agrarian, Campesino, Ethnic and Popular Summit after the protests in 2013 and 2014.

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