COLOMBIA: Displaced People Evicted From
Protest Camp
By Helda
Martínez
BOGOTA (IPS) - Thousands of displaced
Colombians living in a protest camp in a
park in central Bogotá are the target of an
eviction plan by the local authorities, who
admit they are overwhelmed by the influx of
people fleeing violence in the countryside.
Riot police in heavy protective gear entered
the Tercer Milenio park at dawn on Thursday.
They encountered some resistance, but the
leaders of the displaced people kept things
calm, according to a local TV channel. The
mayor's office has given the campers five
days to move to government shelters.
These people, displaced from their homes by
the armed conflict, have been camping in
part of the Tercer Milenio park for the last
four months as a protest against the
authorities for not providing them with
assistance.
"They want to get us out of the park, but we
won't go, even when they send in the ESMAD
(riot police)," Miriam López, who left the
municipality of La Gabarra in the
northeastern department (province) of Norte
de Santander when her husband was killed
nine years ago, told IPS.
"The murderers gave us five minutes to leave
our homes," said López. "It was terrible.
That's why, until the government really
solves the situation, we're staying here."
López owned a cattle ranch in La Gabarra.
Like her, many displaced people had property
and were relatively well-off.
Now her home, shared with thousands of
others, is one-quarter of the Tercer Milenio
park, which has a total area of 16.5 square
kilometres. It is crowded with tents and
improvised shelters made of strips of wood
and plastic sheeting.
The protest camp area was fenced off with
posts, wire and heavy-duty canvas on Jul.
15, when the municipal government declared
it in quarantine.
The leaders of the displaced say rumours
about an outbreak of H1N1 influenza,
popularly known as swine flu, are part of
the strategy to evict them.
The authorities said they were concerned
about the safety of children in the camp
because of crimes allegedly committed there,
as well as health problems among the
displaced people.
The rape of a 14-year-old girl, allegedly by
a man who belongs to the displaced group,
was reported Tuesday. The Bogotá government
said the accused man had been arrested and
prosecuted, and the girl was in the care of
the governmental Colombian Institute for
Family Welfare (Instituto Colombiano de
Bienestar Familiar, ICBF).
A video was circulated Wednesday showing a
police conscript sexually abusing a
13-year-old girl in the camp, in the
presence of five other police who watched
and beat drums in accompaniment.
The video was filmed by one of the
participating police. They were all on guard
duty in the area occupied by the displaced
people.
In the light of this irrefutable evidence,
Bogotá Metropolitan Police commissioner
César Augusto Pinzón told a local radio
station he was "utterly shocked and shamed
by this inexcusable incident."
Bogotá Mayor Samuel Moreno and his Secretary
of Government Clara López held a meeting of
the city's Security Council on Wednesday to
seek solutions for the displaced people in
the park, estimated at 2,000 people by the
government and 5,000 by the leaders of the
displaced people themselves.
"Each time they fail to keep their promises,
more people join the peaceful protest," one
of them, Esteban, who preferred not to give
his surname for security reasons, told IPS.
Colombia, in the grip of civil war since
1964, is one of the countries with the
largest number of internally displaced
people in the world. In late 2008, the
government acknowledged there were over 2.8
million displaced people.
But the non-governmental Consultancy on
Human Rights and Displacement (CODHES)
estimates that 4.6 million people have been
driven from their homes by the violence
since the mid-1980s.
The authorities in Bogotá say the situation
is "too complex, and impossible to solve
without the mediation of the UNHCR" (the
Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees).
The city government decreed a health alert
in the park on Wednesday, and ordered the
immediate evacuation of persons with any
kind of illness to hospitals where they can
be treated and monitored, and also of
children under 14, in order to guarantee
respect for "their rights," the mayor said.
The children would be kept together with
their families and moved to shelters, López
said.
According to Moreno, there are 131 people
with symptoms of acute respiratory
illnesses, three who are HIV-positive, and
others with cancer, tuberculosis and other
ailments among the displaced group.
On Tuesday, the district under-secretary for
health, Manuel Villamizar, told IPS "thank
God, so far no H1N1 influenza has been
detected in this population." He said
rumours to the contrary had arisen from
misinterpretations by journalists.
But medical doctors at the Hospital Centro
Oriente diagnosed 150 illnesses affecting 40
percent of the displaced population camping
in the Tercer Milenio park.
"They (the doctors) examine us, but if we
need medicine it is only provided two or
three days later," a woman queuing for
medical attention told IPS.
Villamizar listed the common flu,
rheumatism, arthritis, arteriosclerosis and
cancer among the many illnesses diagnosed.
Those affected need to be removed to a
shelter "within the next few days," he said.
On Jul. 10 a newborn baby girl of the Emberá
Katío indigenous group died in Bogotá from
H1N1 influenza. She was with her mother and
60 others in a shelter in the centre of the
city.
"The lethality of the virus depends on
nutritional status. The children and the
families in general are living in extreme
poverty," Ati Quigua, an indigenous city
councillor for Bogotá, told the press.
The protest began four months ago, when 120
people peacefully occupied the colonial
church of San Francisco, in central Bogotá.
"We were removed from there with promises of
support by the Catholic Church," Esteban
said. "But the number of displaced people in
the protest tripled."
They moved then to Plaza Bolívar, the
political heart of the city, and remained
there for two months "amidst complete
indifference. Then they moved us to the
Tercer Milenio park, and now they want to
evict us again, providing no solution for
our situation," Esteban said.
Even if the official figure of 2,000
displaced people were correct, and "whether
or not there are cases of H1N1 flu, these
people are in an extremely vulnerable
situation, so the government should make
housing, food and support networks
available," Marco Romero, the head of CODHES,
told IPS.
The government should "offer solutions
instead of limiting their freedom," he
added.
Malnutrition is widespread in the group,
especially among children, pregnant women
and the elderly.
"Millions of poor indigenous, black and
campesino (small farmer) families, who have
been forced to leave their traditional
territories and come to the cities as
displaced people, are suffering from hunger
and malnutrition," said Quigua, the city
councillor.
What the government needs to do is create
the conditions for them "to be able to
return to their home territories, and for
the media to exercise moderation, and the
population to show solidarity, in order to
avoid any outbreak of discrimination"
against indigenous and displaced people, she
said.
The Colombian health authorities have
reported eight deaths from H1N1 influenza so
far, most of them in Bogotá.
Another two children have died, an
eight-year-old boy with Down's syndrome and
a history of pneumonia and respiratory
problems, and a 13-year-old girl, Karem
Tatiana Polo, in the slum neighbourhood of
Soacha south of Bogotá, the local health
secretary there, Freddy Pardo, told IPS.
In this impoverished district, which
receives the largest number of displaced
people in the country, "we decided, with the
power vested in us by the constitution, to
declare an alert a week ago, in an attempt
to limit the spread of the virus as much as
possible," Pardo said.
"We have also suspended all large public
events, and are carrying out a vigorous
awareness-raising campaign about the need to
prevent the illness, based on
recommendations by experts," he said.
The Presidential Agency for Social Action
and International Cooperation is responsible
for looking after displaced people in
Colombia.
In Kennedy, another poor area of Bogotá, 150
displaced protesters have been living on the
streets for the last three months. |
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