Carolina Navia

Arriving in the department of Cauca (Colombia) means surrounding yourself with imposing mountains, moors and sea, it is a place of resistance and transformation. The capital of the department reflects the cultural diversity of the peasant, Afro and indigenous communities, who have fought tirelessly for the recognition and guarantee of their rights. As the Caucano poet and singer-songwriter Javier Mamián sings: “I sang my name is Cauca and the slaves came out. Then, I understood that our song always, always, always has the rhythm of the defeated peoples, but NO today, today we will dance this song.”

And it is like that. These people have suffered the attacks of exclusion, inequality and armed conflict, but they still retain hope. Even though a friend, at some gathering, told me how depressive it is to be Colombian these days. He says this because violence does not rest in this territory.

But, arriving in Cauca and getting to know the work of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC) up close filled me with hope and strength, it reminded me first-hand of the just and ancestral struggles of a people of ancient warriors, who are seeds to harvest the peace that is so needed. However, the region suffers from the reconfiguration of the new actors that emerged after the signing of the Peace Agreement between the government of Juan Manuel Santos and the FARC in 2016, an issue that was aggravated by the lack of implementation of key points of said agreement. Agreement. Today there is a silent massacre in the rural areas of Cauca. According to Indepaz (2022), this scenario left 31 social leaders murdered and 14 massacres during 2021.

One of the murdered leaders was Majora Sandra Liliana Peña, governor of the Laguna Siberia reservation. Sandra was a mother, sister, leader, indigenous, tireless woman in the fight to defend the territory that her ancestors recovered. Her path of resistance led her to promote actions to eradicate crops for illicit use in the territories that make up the CRIC, an organization of which she was a part. After a series of threats that tried to silence her fight, she was violently murdered. Perhaps, the armed actors thought that his death would stop the campaign against crops for illicit use. However, the indigenous communities have lost so much that they lost their fear: the actions continued with more strength and conviction. This is how the Minga was reactivated inwards, one of the strategies of the CRIC’s policy of nonviolent resistance against the presence of armed actors in their territories. From the youngest to the oldest, the entire community participates in this comprehensive campaign.

The Inward Minga is composed of different axes that define the resistance actions that will be developed. The diagnosis of the problem of the presence of armed actors and their illicit economies has directed the main actions towards the eradication of illicit crops, strengthening of their own economies and cultural roots. This strategy is the articulation of different actions of economic non-cooperation, aimed at preventing the use and co-option of the territory and of the community members in the illicit economies of armed actors.

For this reason, it is necessary to strengthen our own to resist the attacks of external actors. This became the main objective of the eleven towns that make up the CRIC. Stronger and more confident in taking action, the indigenous communities went out to manually eradicate illicit crops found in their territories. These decisions are not agreed solely by the councilors or authorities of the CRIC, but are raised from the assemblies where the voice and decision of its members is recognized, where everyone is one: elders, women, men, youth, indigenous guard. This reinforces the sense of community unity and protection. Young people follow in the footsteps of their elders, learning to walk in community.

These actions of non-economic cooperation in the face of the illicit economies proposed by the armed actors cut the production chain of crops for illicit use in the area, since they prevent the use of the territory of the indigenous reservations and the co-option of community members, either to swell their ranks or for the cultivation of coca and marijuana. This panorama has exposed the members of the CRIC to the repression of these criminal structures. The end of 2021 and the beginning of 2022 was marked by more than one murder a week. This discouraging panorama did not limit the strength and conviction of the CRIC members. I remember that the community members were completely sure that when a member died, the fight had to continue, since there were even more reasons to resist. The murders, massacres, forced recruitment, instead of sowing fear, reaffirmed the resistance campaign. This made the young people decide to leave the ranks of armed groups and return to their communities.

The state abandonment and the lack of implementation of the Comprehensive National Plan for the Substitution of Illicit Crops (PNIS) in the area produced economic precariousness, which sometimes caused the community members to have a rapprochement with illicit economies. However, the CRIC is aware of the needs of its members. For this reason, it has been decided to promote the generation of our own economies to guarantee food security and job vacancies for the population. These economies have been conceived from cultural identity, ensuring the continuity of a harmonious relationship with Mother Earth, a legacy of their ancestors, but also to strengthen the cleaning Mingas or manual eradication days, to ensure the non-intervention of armed actors. in their territories.

In this way, many families full of conviction and hope do not abandon ancestral practices such as cultivating their own gardens, bartering to meet their food needs, but their children also make their way into new training spaces, attending the Intercultural Autonomous University Indigenous (one of the achievements of the CRIC), to join economic initiatives such as companies or community stores. Almost swimming against the current, economic initiatives for organic coffee, coca leaf derivatives, and dairy products, among others, have been consolidated. This fight to generate opportunities and fulfill dreams also seeks to reclaim being indigenous, from its ancestral practices and elements, such as the sense of community.

In the municipality of Morales in the north of Cauca, just one hour from the capital of the department, an armed confrontation took place in which members of the indigenous community were trapped for a couple of hours in a residential property. In the midst of the echo of the bullets the community members sang:

Indians who with courage and strength in their hearts

For justice and survival, today they wield the batons

They are friends of peace, they go forward with courage

And they raise their sticks, with pride and without fear

Forward comrades, ready to resist

Defend our rights, even if we have to die

Guard! force!

For my race, for my land

How much strength, hope and conviction. The CRIC, as an organizational platform for struggle, is an example of dignity and resistance. Its members, forgotten by the State and by some sectors of society, fight a frontal and courageous battle. They seek nonviolent methods and actions that, through creativity, allow armed actors to be kept at their limits to protect their territories and customs. Without fear of defending the territory from illicit crops, without fear of building alternatives to illicit economies and ensuring the continuity of the legacy of their ancestors to generate changes that transform society and build a different tomorrow.

They have achieved what the State has not been able to: stop the savage incursion of criminal structures. But how much more blood will they have to shed? When will the State look south? When will peace come?

Carolina Navia is a Colombian activist. Lawyer from the University of Cauca. Master in International Relations from Flacso Ecuador.

Translated by Damian Vasquez Kuliunas