Government officials withdraw from Negotiations with ASCAMCAT
17.02.10
By Eva Lewis
Negotiations between government officials and the Catatumbo Farmers Association (
ASCAMCAT) crumbled this month when the government withdrew from the negotiations process. The break came during the second Peoples Hearing, held on December 3rd through 5th in Teorama, Norte de Santander, where farmers from all over the Catatumbo met with local, departmental and national officials to address the myriad social problems plaguing the region.
ASCAMCAT has made clear that they will continue with the remaining People’s Hearings scheduled to take place in the different municipalities of the Catatumbo region, with or without government participation.
This is not the first disappointment suffered by the farmers of Catatumbo. The Catatumbo region of Colombia has always been an area rich in natural resources and therefore also a prime victim of the ongoing armed conflict that plagues the country. The exploitation of the oil wells which cover the landscape of Catatumbo has fueled the presence of armed groups and has been viewed by many as a primary reason for the incursion of the paramilitary death squads in the early 2000’s who left more than 11,200 rural residents dead, 600 disappeared and 100,000 displaced from their homes. Today mining companies are exploring new horizons such as Coal, and violations of human rights and murders of community leaders continue to plague communities.
Margarita Sa Silva, gobernadora de Cucuta firmando los acuerdos que después incumplió.
In addition, the lack of economic inversion in the region has led many farmers to turn to the cultivation of Coca crops as the only means of subsistence. In 2001 the national government began a fumigation campaign, with the internationally prohibited chemical Glyphosate, to eliminate coca from the region and in March of 2009 the national army began manual eradication of the crops. In response to the humanitarian crisis that this created and the dire situation of human rights in the area,
ASCAMCAT established a humanitarian refugee camp in order to put pressure upon the national government, to respond to the needs of Catatumbo’s rural population.
On August 29th,
ASCAMCAT achieved a political victory when the governor of the department of Norte de Santander, William Villamizar, went to the humanitarian camp, recognizing its legitimacy and promising to participate in a negotiation process with the farmers to be known as the Round Table of Dialogue and Agreement (
MIA). It was there agreed that government officials and
ASCAMCAT would all participate in a series of People’s Hearings or Public negotiations, one to be held every month in a different municipality of the region. The government agreed to finance these hearings as well as to approve the financial rubrics for ASCAMCAT’s development plan, to create a technical committee to promote the creation of a Farmers Reserve Zone (a jointly owned, legally protected territory for farmer’s of the region) as well as to provide emergency food aid to all the farmers whose life line was being destroyed by the fumigations and eradications. These agreements were signed by the governor and the secretary of government of Norte de Santander, five local mayors, six ombudsman, a representative of the catholic church, the vice-presidents office, and the Center for Coordination of Integral Development of the Presidents office, among others.
As of the first Hearing, which took place in the village of La Quina, in the municipality of San Calixto, on November 5th through 7th, the only promise not just on paper was the realization of that hearing. Juan Carlos Quintero, General Coordinator of
ASCAMCAT, said that the Farmers Association had entered into talks with the government “Because the Catatumbo has always been socially abandoned by the government. The governor even said so on the 29th of August in the refugee camp, he said that they have a social debt to the inhabitants of Catatumbo, I believe that is why we wanted to have this dialogue with them, to try, even though this has been a government infiltrated by paramilitarism, try at least in some minimal agreements to advance in Catatumbo.” Yet from the beginning of the process, it was as difficult as ever to make advances.
The first agreement besides the hearings that the department’s government made an effort to complete, was the delivery of the humanitarian aid. The promise had been to deliver 2,000,000 pesos of food aid, but in La Quina this was reduced to a promise of 1,000,000 pesos. Thereafter, some emergency food aid was delivered to the Refugee camp and the village La Angalia. Each food bag, worth approximately 12,000 pesos, contained a bottle of oil, a small brick of sugar, a small bag of rice and a small bag of lentils. According to
ASCAMCAT, by the time that the aid arrived many families had already been forced to leave the region, displaced due to the fumigations. Therefore, those families that arrived in the Refugee Camp to reclaim their food aid were able to take home 5 food bags each; however they wrote a statement expressing their displeasure at the amount of food that had been sent.
In La Angalia the families refused outright to accept the aid. Some of them had spent more than 12,000 pesos just to get to the village, and many had walked or ridden mules 3 or 4 hours, sacrificing an entire day of work in order to wait for the food. In the Catatumbo country side many families have 6 or 7 members if not more, and the farmers were outraged that this supposed humanitarian aid would hardly feed their families for more than a day.
In the People’s hearing of Teorama this was the first issue to be discussed. Leaders of
ASCAMCAT and the Farmers who had gone to receive the aid expressed their outrage and discontent, expressing that the government’s promise had not been sufficiently kept. The atmosphere in the hearing was tense. While the farmers made impassioned speeches, Maria Margarita de Silva, the secretary of government for Norte de Santander and representative of the Departmental government, left continuously to speak on her cell phone, presumably trying to figure out if she could guarantee more aid. The tension mounted as Olga Quintero, general secretary of
ASCAMCAT and Ms. de Silva publicly argued about whose turn it was to speak. The assembly took a break for lunch and when the people had all returned, Margarita de Silva read a statement announcing her withdrawal from the negotiations process.
The statement cited the reason for withdrawal as being because of, “the attitude of distrust, aggressiveness and even rudeness of members of the
MIA for indicating that the government responses have been deceitful, fraudulent, untrue, and manipulative.” She added that if a humanitarian crisis did exist in the region, “One cannot ignore the fact that certain situations which affect the rights of the communities are the consequence of the existence of illegal crops.” As a personal note at the end of the statement she added, “I need people to respect the institutions. I, as a public functionary, cannot accept disrespect for the institutions, we have respected, we have come here, we have acted, we have opened our doors, we have done everything….but I really, with other institutions, do not agree with a process of aggressive violence towards the institutions.” As soon as she had finished speaking, Jose del Carmen Abril, the president of
ASCAMCAT, made a statement that the Association would continue with the process without government participation, and that nothing would deter the people’s will to continue demanding their rights. This statement was met with wild applause, a standing ovation and tears from many of the over 200 people present. With this, Ms. de Silva left the hearing, along with 3 Mayors, including Emilio Picon, the mayor of Convencíon, who had not been present during the morning’s discussion, and the representatives of the vice-presidents office, all of whom had signed the statement. They did not stay to listen as many other farmers stood to proclaim their will to continue in the process despite the withdrawal of government officials.
La governadora Margarita cuando se le recordó que no había cumplido con los compromisos firmados.
In the opinion of Juan Carlos Quintero the real reason that the government officials withdrew from the process, was not that given by Ms. de Silva but rather the fact that, “they realized that we are a true resistance process. They thought that we would let ourselves be absorbed by the modus operandi and politicking that they have always used in the region because they are a government in favor of the multinationals.” He added that, “The communities, no one in any moment raised their voice. There was only good language, never any obscene words….it was [Maria Margarita] who got upset in the roundtable. We only said the truth about what the communities felt.” He also explained that he believes this will only fortify the will of the farmers to continue fighting for their rights and that it will strengthen the process, although it will also make financing for ASCAMCAT’s proposals much more difficult.
ASCAMCAT had been planning to address the issue of mining as the central theme in the Teorama hearing, but the polemic of the emergency food aid sidetracked the discussion. The plan had been to ask the government representatives to sign statements ratifying claims they had made, in other forums with
ASCAMCAT, that they opposed the possibility of coal mining in Catatumbo; since publicly they had been cited by the press as supporting it. This issue however, never was breached. Juan Carlos stated that, “What surprised us most was that a dialogue as important as this should be broken over a bag of food. It wasn’t broken over political issues such as the Farmers Reserve Zone, the development plan nor the pilot crop substitution project, but rather the dialogue was broken over food.” He also said that
ASCAMCAT was ready and willing to continue the process with the government at any time and that the decision would be up to them to return to the discussion table. With or without them, the next hearing will continue as planned on January 28th through 30th in the town of La Gabarra.
The farmers who participated in the event in Teorama were also eager to express their willingness to continue in the process, even without the participation of the withdrawn officials. Elmer Sanchez, president of the village, El Suspiro, said, “sadly this dialogue was ended today, but we the farmers are not going to take even one step back. We will always continue forward and one day they will hear us!” He also added that, “We never thought that [Ms. de Silva] would be so rude to us….they have always lied to us…they have never fulfilled their promises …she was rude and she said that we were the rude ones…while really it is them who should be looking to dialogue with us, not us going to them.” Other farmers shared Elmer’s view of the hearing and the general sentiment among them seemed to be that although they were unhappy with Ms. de Silva’s attitude, they were content to have the space to express themselves and band together.
Those participants in the hearing from various national social organizations also expressed support for continuing the process. University student Paula Casas, who represents a national student organization called Colectivo Siembra, which works in solidarity with rural communities affected by the conflict, said that the government withdrawal was typical of what always happens in Colombia. “[It showed] how the government always isolates political processes, how they try to wash their hands and come up with the dumbest dirty tricks to leave and leave the people hanging…[but] we are happy because the farmers are united and all of the organizations here are also going to support them” she said. Marcela Castellanos of the Lawyers collective Luis Carlos Perez said that the hearings were, “spaces where the people realize a little bit what is the political will of their governors…so it is all winning because it is the exercise of the communities to demand their rights, independent of the secretary of governments attitudes.”
Directly as the hearing drew to a close, the National Army appeared suddenly out of the mountains, positioning themselves to walk just in front of the participants exiting the event. Many present interpreted this to be meant as a threat to those who had participated in the hearing. In Catatumbo this can be said to be the typical response of the state; when the civilian population asks for their human rights all they get are broken promises and threats from the National Army. Even so, the struggle continues.
