New national strike in Colombia in front of a gov …

Thousands of Colombians returned to peaceful streets on Wednesday in the hope that the government would resume dialogue with the National Unemployment Committee. The bond between the two parties is weakened by official refusal to acknowledge police abuse during the demonstrations that erupted on April 28 against President Iván Duque. In Bogotá, Cali, Medellín and other parts of the country, protesters advanced demand more united policies in the face of the economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic and harshly punish young people. “A new day of national strike has been reached because the government has not really sat down to resolve the various national demands nor did he have the political will to accept viable proposals, ”he said during a dialogue with Page 12 Ivan Rengifo, member of the National Executive Committee of the Colombian Association of Student Representatives (Acrees).

The day called by the National Unemployment Committee where unions, social organizations, teachers, students, indigenous and peasant movements converge, precedes the new meeting that the government and the most visible front of the protest will hold this Thursday. The parties are trying to negotiate a way out of the crisis which has already led to the failure of Duque’s plan to raise taxes and the resignation of two ministers. This Wednesday Protesters also celebrated Congress’ withdrawal of the criticized healthcare reform bill, another of the Committee’s main demands. In 22 uninterrupted days of protests across the country, at least 43 people have died and more than 1,500 have been injured, according to the Ombudsman’s office.

The first protesters began to gather on Wednesday at various locations in Bogotá, especially in the national park, then walk to Plaza Bolívar, the center of political power in the country. In Medellin, capital of the department of Antioquia, the marches were also peaceful. There were only a few clashes between police and protesters in Buenaventura, the third most populous town in Cauca Department, where officers cracked down with tear gas and looting were reported.

In CaliAs the city that has suffered the most from state violence and riots, the protests went smoothly. Mayor Jorge Iván Ospina confirmed that Esmad’s police officers were not going to be present at the marches and that instead, social workers would attend. Ospina on Tuesday demanded the resignation of his entire cabinet because, as he said, “these are moments which demand real transformations and a renewal of confidence”. The mayor has long been in the eye of the Cali storm for his mismanagement of the coronavirus pandemic and because he organized an ostentatious virtual fair which brought together international salsa dancers and artists for whom it has invested more than three million dollars.

Faced with the failure of the last meetings, the National Unemployment Committee insists that President Iván Duque “explicitly condemn the abuses of the police force”, a step from which the president seems to be light years away. “So far, the negotiations do not offer the required guarantees: that there will be demilitarization at the national level and an end to the repression of peaceful demonstrations.“he explained Rengifo.

In the same line Jorge Luis López Ardila, member of the national executive of the National Agrarian Coordinator (CNA), stressed that these days of mobilization “were marked by a brutal attack by the state against the organized people” and that “the ball is now in the hands of the government”. Both the UN and various international NGOs have denounced the excesses of the Colombian authorities.

However, Duque hesitates to admit widespread repression and focuses on dismissing specific ‘cases’ of police abuse, while condemning “vandalism” and blocking roads and routes in which only he and his officials see “terrorist intentions”. The Secretary General of the Central Unitaria de Trabajadores de Colombia (CUT), Diogenes OrjuelaHe assured that even if the government “throws firecrackers” on the installation of the dialogue table, “we will attend as many meetings as necessary because the only way out of the situation is to speak and to negotiate”.

Free public higher education is one of the historic demands of the country’s student movements, and it is not ignored by the Unemployment Committee. “We ask the government to guarantee zero tuition fees, but that it is 100 percent and not like the last semester which only envisaged 12 percent, ”Rengifo explained in this regard.

For its part, Lopez Ardila highlighted by the peasant workers sector that the CNA comes “strongly promoting the need for comprehensive land reform”. Among the most urgent measures, the leader lists a “total rejection of the mining energy policy by fracturing and resumption of aerial spraying of glyphosate, the need to rethink the free trade agreements which bankrupted a large part of the country’s peasants and the dismantling of paramilitarism. “

While there are still several demands from the Unemployment Committee, protesters won yet another victory on Wednesday when Congress shelved the healthcare reform bill. The measure approved by the ruling party envisaged the regionalization of the health system and introduced changes in the provision of the service. The initiative was the subject of severe questions from the health unions, who attributed it to a privatization bias.

The coronavirus, which has plunged 42.5% of the population into poverty, weighs deeply on this social crisis. “For the government it is a joke that people are hungry, people do not come out to protest for sport, but it is really a disagreement and the government does not see that, it does not want the accept, “said Viviana Clemente. , a 41-year-old trader who left for a demonstration in Bogotá with his 15-year-old daughter. Amidst a tide of Colombian flags, Clemente held a banner that read: “The fight of a few is worth the future of all”.