Colombia: Thousands of demonstrators peacefully demonstrated against Iván Duque’s government | The National Unemployment Commission presented to Congress ten reform projects to respond to the “serious social crisis”

Thousands of people demonstrated again this Tuesday in Colombia against the government of President Iván Duque on the same day that a new legislature was installed in Congress. Until then, the National Unemployment Commission was carrying out ten reform projects to respond to the “serious social crisis” that crosses the country. Young people and social organizations gathered in the main parks and squares of their cities with batucadas, flags and banners on a day which also coincided with Colombia’s Independence Day.

Protesters have varied demands including police reform and a more united state to cope with the economic devastation of the pandemic, which has raised poverty of 37 percent to 42 percent of the Colombian population. President Iván Duque delivered his annual speech to Congress acknowledging that the country owes a “historic debt” to the poorest, and deployed thousands of police to secure control of Bogotá, the country’s capital.

Peaceful demonstrations

the National Unemployment Commission, the main organizer of the protests that the country has known since April 28 and which lasted two months, announced that he was resuming the protests on Tuesday “for demand from the national government and its majorities in Congress a response to the serious humanitarian, social, economic and political crisis we are going through“.

Thousands of people gathered in different parts of Bogotá and marched with chants, dances and upside down Colombian flags towards the central square of Bolívar, but law enforcement blocked the way to Congress and the presidential seat . The unemployment committee also scheduled a large demonstration which began at ten in the morning in the Bogotá National Park, where the rock group Aterciopelados also performed.

Protesters also took to the streets of Cali town, the epicenter of the protests that began on April 28, and in neighborhoods like Siloam, they raised flags to demand respect for human rights, life and rights. of the dignity of Colombians. In Popayán, capital of the troubled department of Cauca, a group of indigenous protesters gathered who, to the beat of the chirimía, an oboe-like wind instrument, shouted “Revolution, we will fight! “, while asking for the protection of their territories and the safety of social leaders.

Music also marked the mobilizations in the city of Medellin, where thousands of people gathered to support the national strike as the youth of the “front line”, who usually face the police, they sang to the police: “The bullets you shot will come back”.

Ten reform projects

But the unemployment commission He was not only present in the streets of Colombia. Following the failure of dialogue with the government during the massive demonstrations in recent months, delivered to Congress on Tuesday ten legislative initiatives supported by what they call in Colombia the “alternative bench”, made up of the left and center-left opposition.

To this end, they have raised a basic income of a monthly minimum wage for one year for 7.5 million households, free and universal public higher education, strengthening of the public health network, support for the economic recovery of SMEs and the agricultural sector and actions against gender violence, among other proposals. The unemployment commission also asked the government for “security guarantees” for the demonstrators.

Take back the initiative

The Duque government He also took advantage of these 35 days of “truce” to seek to regain political initiative in the country: announced the entry into Congress of two costly bills, an anti-vandalism law and a new tax reform. The Ministries of Justice, Interior and Defense worked on the first of the initiatives on three axes: determining new criminal offenses, toughening penalties and differentiating action against vandalism from the protection of peaceful demonstrations.

As for tax reform, it is precisely an initiative in this regard that triggered the start of the strike, and although the government later removed it from Congress, the list of social demands had already changed and the mobilisations have become daily, in large part due to the repression of the police force.

Now The Duque government introduced a new bill, which it called the Social Investment Project, which empowers the president to merge parts of the state and eliminate others, and plans to raise $ 3.9 billion. dollars.. In this version, the government has abandoned the most controversial points of the original proposal, such as the increase in VAT on certain products and the base of Colombians who pay income tax.

A year after the handover and with an unpopularity of 76%, Duque inaugurated the new legislature on Tuesday morning. “We hear the voices in the streets and they should fuel the debate, but history calls on you to be the spokespersons for a country in the midst of transformation,” Duque told Congress at the installation ceremony.

“We know and understand that there are historic debts to settle, that there are a lot of frustrations that we feel as a societyBut the solution is to be found by working as a team, ”said the right-wing president, who stressed that Colombian society must be clear that protests must always be peaceful:“ Blockades are not roadblocks; they are cut alive, they do not claim any rights, they only claim the ambition of the agitators who want to profit from the chaos “.

Tuesday’s protests were peaceful, albeit in an atmosphere fraught with complaints from the government about infiltration by armed groups., a formula Duque usually resorts to whenever new manifestations are called. More than 60 people have been killed and thousands injured since the protests began on April 28., according to the Ombudsman’s Office and civil authorities.

With a press conference from the City of Buenos Aires, the International Solidarity and Human Rights Observation Mission composed of representatives of various Argentine organizations presented the final report of his trip to Colombia. They pointed out that the Colombian state considered “its defenseless civilian population as an internal enemy and unleashed on them a repressive violence typical of a warlike confrontation”.