President Petro is talking about a potential overhaul of Colombia’s constitution. Photos: WikiCommons.
Colombian president Gustavo Petro announced on Friday, March 15, that reform of Colombia’s institutions was necessary. He also said that a potential rewrite of the constitution should be considered. This has surprised many as it appeared to come out of the blue. Plus, there’s a big question mark over what he’s trying to achieve.
This week, he’s backtracked a bit from his initial position. That’s hardly surprising – in his penultimate presidential bid, he went as far as to carve in marble a pledge that he wouldn’t do exactly this. That was a different electoral campaign, of course, but it’s viewed by many as hypocritical.
President Petro says political system isn’t working
What Petro actually wants is unclear. He claims that the Colombian political system is not allowing him to govern, so it must be reformed to allow him to pass the laws he currently can’t. He used the phrase Constituent Assembly, which implies a rewrite of Colombia’s constitution, but he says he just wants to establish certain rights.
El proceso constituyente convocado no es ni para cambiar la constitución del 91 , ni para perpetuarme en el poder.
En las más de tres décadas que han oasado desde 1991, los poderes constituidos por el constituyente del 91, no han podido resolver varios problemas fundamentales… https://t.co/BRxPF3qrYZ
Petro’s position is sort of clarified in this tweet
He says he wants to guarantee the peace process that Santos began. He also argues he wants to apply the existing constitution – which he claims is not being applied and never has been. He seems to want to recover the original aims of Colombia’s constitution from 1991. So perhaps he’s pushing for a revolution to keep everything the same.
All of this stems from the recent trouble he’s been having with the Senate stymying his proposed reforms. His Pacto Historico coalition is the largest single party in the Senate but far from a majority. This means he’s had to seek compromise and alliances, and that’s made it hard to get things done.
Petro’s also been at pains to clarify that he’s not looking to follow the time-honoured Latin American tradition of trying to extend his time as President beyond the one-term limit. However, he’s also not fully closing that door, saying that he will respect whatever the people decide.
Back in 2005, the country passed a law to allow presidents to stand for a single re-election. It then had two recent double-term presidents: Álvaro Uribe and Juan Manuel Santos. However, in 2015, a further law was passed to strike that modification down and revert to the previous system.
Why Petro wants constitutional reform
Petro’s central idea is that the will of the people is being blocked by establishment wreckers. His opponents counter this by pointing out the need for strong checks and balances within the system. It’s worth remembering that only around a quarter of eligible voters chose Petro in the 2022 election.
There is no doubt that the political system of Colombia is at best unwieldy. In fact, obfuscation and confusion appear to be part of the design. Health reform, for example, has spent months going through the Houses and hasn’t even reached an open debate in the Senate because it’s sunk in a special committee.
The current iteration of the constitution dates back to 1991, though it’s seen some changes since then. The ’91 constitution was the first to recognise Indigenous communities and also established a Constitutional Court. Colombia’s previous constitution stayed in place for over 100 years.
So, is this likely to happen?
It’s not impossible. The genie is out of the bottle, so people who hadn’t previously considered it may now be wondering if it’s a good idea. There may well be those who hadn’t thought this was even on the table and thus hadn’t been campaigning.
Public enthusiasm for political process remains generally extremely low. That’s largely due to the aforementioned opacity of the system. Sadly, few people really know or care what’s happening at any given point. A chance to stick one in the eye of establishment figures is rarely passed up in any country, though, so might see a larger turnout.
It certainly wouldn’t be an easy process. The ‘91 Constitution allows for further reform without stringent prerequisites, but it’s not clearly defined. Depending on the scale of changes proposed, there would be months of planning, studies and consultations. A constitutional assembly would need to be set up, possibly involving elections to the assembly.
After that, the politicians would all have to take a look at it, which could take months more. Finally, there would need to be a popular referendum with associated campaigning times and so on. Of course, this would all be different if we’re only talking about minor reforms. In case you hadn’t guessed it, that’s another aspect of Petro’s comments that isn’t clear.
What’s perhaps most notable is that this may well not go the way the president expects. Given the time scales needed, the bulk of the work and vote would happen under the following administration. That might well be the current opposition and not a friendly successor.
Opposition politician Germán Vargas Lleras has already come out swinging, saying he welcomes the idea of putting this to the people. His position is that there is no support for Petro and that his ailing administration will crash and burn in the court of public opinion.
1/6 Apoyemos la Constituyente de Petro no más chantajes, no más amenazas, que se convoque y derrotemoslo en su constituyente.
It’s worth noting that public opinion is a hard thing to judge and even harder to control. Many of Colombia’s recent law changes would have probably failed to pass referenda – from abortion law to LGBTQ rights. Don’t forget that the peace process referendum was rejected by the voters and eventually pushed through Congress instead. This may well go the same way.
All in all, Petro’s comments have unleashed a storm of comments, but it isn’t clear what he’s proposing. A whole new constitution would take a long time and may not achieve what he hopes. Other forms of constitutional reform might be more feasible. But given the problem he has in getting enough support to pass his current proposals, it’s hard to see how he’d get politicians (and the public) to support even bigger change.
Photo: Presidencia de la República del Ecuador, PDM-owner, via Wikimedia Commons
An attack on a TV station live on air made world headlines, but tension in Ecuador has been bubbling away for a while now. The young new president, Daniel Noboa, is looking to emulate the so far successful crackdown on crime by Nayib Bukele in El Salvador.
While Bukele’s ultra-strict approach to breaking the gangs has won him the contempt of international human rights’ organisations, it’s wildly popular with actual Salvadoreans who can finally walk the streets without fear. Last weekend he “pulverised” the opposition while emphatically winning re-election. (His words, not ours.)
Bukele: "Toda la oposición quedó pulverizada"
Nayib #Bukele volverá a presidir #ElSalvador durante otros cinco años y se convertirá en el primer gobernante en repetir mandato consecutivamente.
Noboa’s proposal for mega-prisons reflects skyrocketing crime in Ecuador. Just six years ago, the murder rate was a mere 5.7 per 100,000, lower than the global average, let alone the region. Today, it stands at 45 or even higher per 100,000. The big game changer was cocaine and its cartels.
This was also true in Mexico, where changing drug distribution routes caused the Jalisco New Generation armed group to grow quickly in both power and prestige. Mexico went from being relatively safe by Central American standards to having the world’s most violent cities (outside war zones).
However, this is only part of the puzzle. The real key factor is weak and unbothered states. Both Mexico under AMLO and Ecuador under Lenin Rojas simply ignored or downplayed the signs pointing to increased crime, allowing it to balloon. Once a country has shown that crime pays and no effective action will be taken, the problem snowballs, particularly when there are few other opportunities.
Ecuador added a percentage point to its murder rate for two years running, before starting to nearly double year on year. Crime cartels become more powerful. This made it harder to crack down and also encouraged new entrants, attracted by the lack of consequences.
At that point, drastic measures become necessary – enter Nayib Bukele. The self-styled ‘world’s coolest dictator’ has made the country functional and enjoys the adoration of his people. Even if it may not be sustainable in the long run to lock up 1% of the population, it’s no surprise that other regional leaders are considering copying his approach.
Where is Colombia now?
Well, first the ‘good’ news. Part of the reason for Ecuador’s descent into chaos is that said chaos was leaving Colombia. It’s also true that Colombia is starting from a much higher position in the homicide charts and that the country’s long-term crime rates have fallen, despite a recent uptick.
However, there are some similarities. As in Ecuador, crime is both creeping up and being normalised, while neither police nor military are taking any effective action. It’s starting to make waves in the news, especially in Bogotá. This is a pot that’s bubbling ever more on the back burner.
Kidnappings are back on the mainstream agenda and killings continue, especially in the countryside. Extortion is on the rise and there are more and more reports of brazen attacks within Bogotá and other urban cities, from public buses being held up to restaurants being invaded. Various organised crime groups such as the Tren de Aragua operate in the capital.
Colombia has a long history of not nipping things in the bud and then having to clean up a bigger mess, sadly. Recently, authorities scoffed at reports of fentanyl entering the country and beginning to circulate and insisted it was all a storm in a teacup. Unsurprisingly, it’s now becoming obvious that there is indeed a lot of fentanyl in the country and now we’re scrambling to react.
Or look at the Choco landslide in January, despite repeated warnings that such an event was possible. Cast your mind back to when Mocoa was hit by a similar disaster in 2017. Note how El Niño wasn’t prepared for, leading to spates of wildfires. These are tragedies not just foretold but telegraphed years or even decades in advance.
These problems are most visible when they hit the headlines in dramatic events such as storming a news station or a landslide annihilating a city. But they are set up much earlier. Acting before the situation is critical saves time, money, and lives in the long run. It also requires foresight, planning, and investment for the future.
Those three things are in sadly short supply though and the real fear is not that some big tragic event will hit the headlines but that simply nothing will be done. A failure to act now and get crime under at least some sort of control sows the seeds for surefire tragedy later. Unfortunately, no arm of the state seems in any way willing to act at the moment.
Worst of all, that failure to act with reasonable measures now means that unreasonable measures become more palatable to the general public. Levels of concern over violence and crime trump everything else for many voters and if the options are extreme crackdowns or nothing, many will take the former.
It’s business as usual in Bogotá and Colombia for 2024, with ongoing political back and forth, economic worries, and rumblings about corruption. Paz Total may or may not progress, though it’s unlikely to live up to such an ambitious name in such a short space of time. And there’s all kinds of sport, music, and culture to look forward to.
Petro might pass a reform
On the political stage, we have a president who promised a lot of change but has so far struggled to deliver much of it. Indeed, the big danger for President Petro is not that he will be too divisive or radical. The first is nothing new for Colombia and the second is why he was elected.
Rather, the danger is that he will simply be even more incompetent and ineffectual than previous heads of government. He needs a big, clear win, ideally before the halfway point of his presidency in August.
It’s entirely possible that one or another of Petro’s proposed reforms might go into law this year. Then again, they might simply collapse. It all depends on how willing the sides are to compromise. Health looks like it might be able to get through, though heavily modified.
If none of these changes or reforms get anywhere in 2024, patience may be in short supply for Petro from his base. If elected on a platform of cambio, it’s pretty much a necessity to get some change underway. Expect to see him proclaiming anything and everything as the wind of change.
Worrying economic indicators
Little is being said about the future of the economy, which is strange, as there are some worrying indicators. Construction, a large sector, is slowing alarmingly. Elsewhere, high oil prices are failing to bring up the GDP. Energy inflation is also slightly under the radar despite being sky-high.
On the other hand, generalised inflation is slowing down and the central bank has agreed to lower base interest rates. The minimum salary is likely to increase over inflation again, which is probably for the best. It’s hard to predict where the economy is going, but probably won’t be dramatic in either direction.
Ironically for Petro, getting his reforms through would likely damage the economy. One that he’s managed reasonably well so far. The political success he needs would probably lead to economic uncertainty, a difficult circle to square.
Corruption and scandal are generally political constants and Petro’s been no exception. It’s hard to guess what will pop up, but loose threads to keep an eye on include Arturo Char-manda and the Aída Merlano affair; Laura Sanabria and the not so naughty nanny; Benedetti; Nicolás ‘not really my son’ Petro; and of course the ever-present Uribe.
Finally, will we see protests returning to Bogotá? It’s been quiet for kicking on two years now as the rightwing opposition aren’t used to protesting and going out on the streets. Instead, the only large recent mobilisations have been by supporters of the government. That could change in 2024 and there might also be protests from disgruntled lefties wanting results.
Peace sells, but who’s buying?
Yes, Megadeth has two dates in the capital next year, but this is a reference to Paz Total, another cloud on the horizon. So far, that’s been chugging along as a nice feel-good slogan, but sooner or later it will have to be explained in detail. Worse still, it won’t even function as propaganda if the crime rate doesn’t come down and/or peace talks with either the FARC dissidents, ELN, or some of the bacrim (armed groups) don’t bear fruit.
The guerillas really should stop dragging their heels: Petro is by far and away their best shot at a friendly deal. Dawdle too long over negotiations and they may well find themselves sitting down at a table with a rebound right-winger in a couple more years. However, both the ELN and FARC EMC are erratic operators at best, so nothing is clear.
Negotiations with bacrim are even more precarious. For all the lack of discipline in the two guerilla groups, the armed gangs are far worse on that front. Worse yet, they don’t have even the cloak of political legitimacy. They are simply and purely criminal actors. Negotiating with them sets a worrying precedent.
Finally, day-to-day crime continues to be a big problem in Colombia, with around three murders a day in both Bogotá and Cali. They’re not even the worst offenders on a per-capita basis, either. Things might be better than in the 80s, but that’s a low bar. Not only that, but the figures are going in the wrong direction.
The generally upward crime line seems as though it will continue, with nothing really to suggest it might come down. The ELN has promised to stop kidnapping for money, so that’s good, but the main economic drivers of crime remain firmly in place.
Local politics for local people
Locally, we say goodbye to Claudia López and g’day to Galán. The incoming mayor has a lot on his plate, to say the least. It’s a tricky time to take over, as he will have all the joy of a city ripped apart for four years to build a Metro that someone else will open.
Crime is at the top of most people’s agendas and he’s promised to crack down. That’s all very nice and well, but easier said than done. He will need lots more coppers and it’s not clear where they will come from. Worse yet, the legal system is slow at the best of times and totally blocked right now. Plus, there are not enough jail cells to put criminals in.
His ideas are good, but high-tech surveillance costs money while better links with the general public require trust that’s in short supply. Low-hanging fruit is perhaps best found in a special unit for the TransMilenio. That’ll be high-visibility and popular, as petty crime and disorder are constant. Fare evasion is absolutely chronic. It might even claw money back through fines.
It’s unclear whether the city has enough money to implement Galan’s plans. Some of them are ambitious and potentially very costly, while others may require central government assistance. That may not be forthcoming, sadly. The reason? He may not have political support from the Palacio de Nariño.
The president has been playing silly buggers with Bogotá for a while over the Metro plans and retains ultimate control over the police, who are all national rather than local forces. He can also muck about with funding if he wants to.
Metro changes afoot?
One of the many unresolved issues in the Colombian political landscape is something that really should be cut and dried: the Bogotá Metro. Building work has already started for an overground system. The president has always favoured an underground Metro though, and is promising/threatening to make that happen. Watch this space.
Whatever happens, there will continue to be chaos on the streets. Important roads such as the 15 from 72 are already shut and will stay that way for years. Furthermore, deaths from traffic incidents shot up in 2023 and that is certain to continue. Motorbikes in particular are a menace to themselves and others – Galán needs to get on top of this fast.
At the end of the year, the city’s famed Ciclovía will hit 50 years since its first iterations and there will be celebrations all through the year to build up to that. Expect lots of cycling events and celebrations in the city, from ride-in theatres to art shows and mass rides.
El Niño is going to be a naughty boy
Get ready for things to be dry this year. El Niño was announced at the tail end of this year, but will really take hold in 2024. The climate event rolls around every few years and in this part of the world means hot and dry conditions. You might think that’s great for us in la nevera, but it’s problematic for a lot of the country.
Plants need water, after all. When the reservoirs run low, times are hard for campesinos. Hot weather also damages many crops, amplifying the problem as does hard, cracked earth. Livestock, too will have a heavier demand for water and the chances of wildfires will ramp up. You may see prices rise and controls on energy use, water use, or certain products.
There will likely be a heavy human toll too, especially in La Guajira. One of Colombia’s poorest departments, it already faces a growing malnutrition crisis. A lack of potable water will exacerbate this. Heat itself kills as well, and temperatures are likely to hit high thirties and low forties in large swathes of the country.
International affairs
To prove that lusting after other countries’ oil isn’t just for running dog capitalists, Nicolás Maduro has been sabre rattling with Guyana over their resource rich border territory. Petro has been largely friendly towards Caracas, but this will bring fresh tension. It’s unlikely to lead to a hot war, but that’s not something we want in the neighbourhood.
Elsewhere in the region, his incautious diplomacy has led to fractious relationships with a few leaders. Hopefully, that’ll get reined in a bit, especially with Argentina. It’s one thing to berk off El Salvador, but Argentina and Colombia have important links.
Expect Petro to get abroad somewhere between 25 and 30 times in any case and to give at least two bizarre rambling speeches that go viral on the internet after his media team rework it. He’s also likely to get around all 32 departments twice over.
Music, theatre, art, and more
The truly game-changing news is that Festival Estéreo Picnic is coming home to Parque Bolívar. This has been announced by both the incoming mayor Galán and the festival organisers, although details are not fully confirmed as yet. The headliners are though: Sam Smith, Blink-182, Feid, nu-metal cockroaches Limp Bizkit, and Placebo.
There will be another Festival Cordillera to celebrate vital Latin talent. This is fast becoming the hipster festival to be at in Bogotá. Rock al Parque has been in decline post-pandemic but will have plenty of clout, especially if the new mayor will put it back onto a sensible summer schedule.
As mentioned earlier, Megadeth are coming to la nevera in April (21st and 22nd). Fellow 80s metal legends Iron Maiden also sold out fast for their show in the cold November rain (no, that’s Guns N Roses – ed). Mon LaFerte is popping up from Chile, too (20th April) and her bookshop singing mate Juanes coming home from Miami in May (24th).
Karol G will bring her hit show Mañana Será Bonita to the capital at the start of April (5th and 6th). Her polar opposite musically and in personality, grumpy racist uncle Moz out of The Smiths will grace us with his presence and gladioli (10th Feb).
There’s also (deep breath) FilBo in April; FiTB in March; ExpoPet in August; ARTBO at the end of the year and ARTBO weekend in the spring; ExpoArtesanias in December; SOFA in October and much more besides, such as the coffee, chocolate, wine and cheese expos.
For art lovers, Open San Felipe will run every month and you’ll find all kinds of visual stimulation at the city’s big galleries. MAMBO, MAMU, and FUGA are always worth a look, while work is due to finish on re-modeling the Bronx – Bogotá’s new creative district.
On the stage, the aforementioned return of the Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro de Bogotá (FITB), a biennial citywide festival, takes precedence. The event in 2022 was controversial, with high prices and low visitor numbers. Hopefully, it will be a different story this time round.
Yet another Copa America
This one, the fifth in nine years, is an expanded version, with strong CONCACAF representation. Colombia is in a group with Brazil, Paraguay and ‘CONCACAF 6’. The matches are southwest USA, Texas, Arizona and California, with the last a likely decider against Brazil on July 2nd for top of the group.
Last time round, Luis Díaz was the breakout star of the tournament as Colombia went out on penalties in the semi-finals to eventual winners Argentina. Coach Nestor Lorenzo has the team playing well, so they may well arrive in good form for the first time in a few years. Having beaten Brazil last month, there will be no fear in the squad.
The women’s game continues to grow, with a league that will run from February to September with breaks for the men’s Copa America and the women’s U-20 World Cup. The latter is a big draw for the development of the game after a successful campaign Down Under last year.
Nairo Quintana may race at the top level of cycling again, having re-signed with Movistar. He’s generally considered long past his peak, but it’s a funny sport and we’ve seen plenty of late-career comebacks over the years. The team see him as co-leader in the Giro and to compete in the Vuelta. Anything could happen.
Bullfighting won’t take place in the 2024 season, but may yet do so the following year. At least for now there’ll be no more revelling in animal torture down at the Plaza de Toros. With ever-dwindling support for the ‘cultural’ practice, its days are likely numbered one way or the other. There’ll also be no Tigre, as Falcao has turned down Millos, citing crime in Colombia.
The El Salado massacre has been described as one of the bloodiest and most atrocious of Colombia’s conflict. For four days in February 2000, 450 paramilitaries held the small town hostage. The members of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) tortured and raped the town’s inhabitants, killing at least 60 locals. According to the Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica, many of the 7,000 people who lived there have never returned.
El Salado has become a focal point for peace initiatives, such as the recent workshop held there by the Ministry of Education. However, those activities take place against a backdrop of violence. Rural peace remains elusive, at both a national and local level.
Peace education workshop
Last week, senior officials from the Ministry of Education (MoE) held a three-day peace education workshop and event of historical memory at the site of the El Salado massacre. Educators from Ibagué, Medellin and Valledupar also attended.
The event included artistic and cultural presentations, as well as discussions with social leader and documentary-maker, Soraya Bayuelo. Importantly, attendees met with victims of the 2000 massacre. The workshop represents an ongoing commitment to peace education and the continuation of a transnational peace project between Colombia and Japan.
In 2019, Colombian educators joined a three-week training programme in Okinawa, Japan. The Colombian MoE and the Japan International Cooperation Agency sought to strengthen abilities for peace education, memory and reconciliation. Four years later, the peace education projects conceived in Okinawa were reviewed at El Salado and new plans laid.
Peace education is under-resourced
The Ministry of Education’s recent workshop in El Salado is a powerful representation of the progress made towards peace in Colombia. But, under the surface, peace and peace education are falling short.
In spite of the 2016 peace agreement, armed groups continue to terrorise rural populations. As a 2021 report from the human rights advocacy group WOLA put it, “Implementing the accord has gone more poorly than anticipated, and opportunities to break the cycle of violence are evaporating.”
The Kroc Institute found as of November 2022, 51% of the 578 commitments had not yet been initiated or were at a minimum state of implementation. Peace education, like other commitments of the peace agreement, is incomplete and under-resourced. A source at the MoE told The Bogotá Post, that allocated funds are distributed by population, benefiting larger cities while leaving rural communities – most affected by the conflict – without. Further still, according to University of Manchester research, no assessment of the effectiveness of peace education has ever been undertaken by the MoE.
The state of peace education lends credence to the charge that peace implementation is in crisis in Colombia. Those gaps are increasingly evident in the Montes de María, where El Salado is located. The region straddles the northern departments of Sucre and Bolivar in northern Colombia. Both departments have – and continue to – suffer high levels of violence.
The Colombian ombudsman has issued several warnings about the heavy presence of armed groups in the region. The demobilisation of the FARC left a power vacuum that has been filled by armed gangs in various parts of the country. Montes de María has historic value to these groups as it is a place where they can cultivate and traffic drugs. With the traffickers, the violence follows.
It isn’t easy to build peace, especially in areas where coca cultivation is so entrenched. It involves establishing a state presence, building infrastructure, as well as reconciliation and education activities. The government has historically been more concerned with disarmament than with implementing structural reforms that might address the socio-economic and political problems that lie at the heart of the violence.
There’s no clearer evidence of this than the Kroc Institute’s analysis of the implementation of the peace agreement. The completion of rural reform commitments made in the agreement stands at an underwhelming 21%, in comparison to a 70% completion or partial completion of commitments around implementation, verification, and endorsement. The failure to materialise reforms leaves rural communities overlooked by the government and vulnerable to violence.
To teach a peace education that contextualises the causes of violence without addressing the material conditions of its citizens makes peace education in Colombia at best, paradoxical, and at worst, insincere. How can peace be effectively taught while violence thrives?
Chimamanda Ngochie Adichie says, “Own what you like and own it without apologising”
Photo: Ángela Forero-Aponte
Books may have been replaced by travel brochures, comics, or even home decor in Corferias. But the wonderful thing about FILBo is that the words linger long after the festival has ended. And Chimamanda Ngochie Adichie’s talk on roots, race, language, feminism, history, and grief is still with me. Not only is the talk still available online, but the joy of books is that they are always available.
How not to write about such an important visitor? Dubbed one of the most important talks of this year’s FILBo, it was fascinating to see Claudia Morales, Director of the Book Fair of the Colombian Coffee Region sit down with Adichie. For those not familiar with the author, Adichie is a renowned Nigerian writer of both fiction and essays, who first achieved fame with her novel Purple Hibiscus (2003). Her work has been translated into more than 30 languages and has won important prizes such as the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, the Orange Prize, and the US Book Critics Circle Award. Her work revolves around race, feminism, and the danger of a single story (a most famous TED Talk as well).
Morales started the conversation by asking Adichie about the dangers of having one single story, and how these affect a person, and society in general. The author, jokingly, responded, “It’s all written in the book, I think.” Chimamanda, if you’ll allow me to call her by her first name, used humour to break the ice, and continued to lighten the mood throughout.
She found it important to explain how this idea came about; she was invited to a TED talk in 2001. At the time, she did not have much of an idea about what these TED talks were about, but in researching for her talk she realised most Africans who had been invited ended up talking about how they would help build a school or wells in different communities. She had not really built anything so she didn’t know what her talk would revolve around. She decided to talk about what she was interested in – and what she knew. This brought her to the thought that as a Nigerian, “We cannot talk about a person in a single account, as that limits our ability to imagine the other person, to empathise with others, as we end up seeing them in a very narrow way, and that’s what makes it more difficult for us to understand the world.”
Adichie continued to expand on her answer by recalling something Colombian Vice President, Francia Márquez, said at the opening of this year’s FILBo. She said Vice President Márquez said she would soon travel on an official visit to Africa, and that the Colombian press had described said visit as a safari. Adichie said this is a perfect example of a single story, and also an example of how people are not granted the dignity they deserve. “One cannot narrow Africa down to a safari, this is 2023,” said the author. On this point, she concluded we should change the narrative with curiosity and humility; we live in a world where people find it difficult to say they’ve been wrong and to admit they’ve failed.
Chimamanda Ngochie Adichie speaks to Claudia Morales at FILBo 2023. Photo: Ángela Forero-Aponte
Adichie: I’m a happy Nigerian feminist
The talk continued on to feminism. She recounted how a journalist at one of her book presentations once told her, “Feminists are women who are unhappy because they can’t find husbands.” Said journalist also warned her she shouldn’t label herself as a feminist. Adichie responded to him in this very gracious way: “I’m a happy Nigerian feminist, who does not hate men, who loves wearing lipstick and who wears heels, not for men’s sake, but for my own.”
That, and other reflections, have led Adichie to consider what messages we send children around these topics. Western feminism has been documented for much longer. She thinks women in the West, particularly those not in the working class, had to stay at home. For her, they were asked to be pretty and denied the right to vote. So when the feminist movement started to grow, it was only logical that its defenders started rejecting any importance previously given to physical appearance, as this is precisely what had kept women in chains.
She believes young movements tend and need to be extreme – there is no space for nuances. But she also thinks feminism is now at that stage when we can be more honest about our appearance. There have been women who’ve been told they cannot be considered feminists if they wear make-up. The premise being that everything that a woman does, she does it for a man’s sake. She says it’s also not feminist to limit a woman’s demeanour. Women should wear make-up and heels if it is their wish. “Own what you like and own it without apologising” she concluded.
It doesn’t help that many – if not all – women are judged nowadays for their appearance. She mentioned that her father once told her she looked like a clown when she was wearing a very stylish dress. Social networks need to take some of the blame here, many young girls are ashamed of their bodies and suffer from depression as a result. There are young girls who worry about having hip dips, a totally natural feature. In Chimamanda’s words, these are idiotic words spread thanks to the internet that undermine girls from a very young age. She reflected on this, saying girls should be taught about what they can do with their bodies – practising sports, for example – rather than how their bodies look.
There is also this idea that girls, women, need to apologise for taking up space in this world; it is time we teach them they should not apologise. Check out her TED talk “We should all be feminists,” and her work Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions for more.
In terms of feminism in Nigeria, she said women in Nigeria are very innovative, really strong. It is common to see women in powerful positions in her country. For example, four banks in Nigeria are led by women. Banking and the oil industries are some of the strongest fields. However, in the political arena, women are still sidelined. In Nigeria, political parties have a female wing, which, in Adichie’s words, is worrying, because being on the female wing of the party does not grant access to women to the main room. This is the room where decision-making takes place. So there is participation, yes, but from an auxiliary wing so-to-speak, a sort of exclusion, which is not labelled as such.
Words sometimes understate the weight of grief
Chimamanda Adichie also talked about her grief after her parents’ death – a few months apart – and the importance of the language we use. She said people use words that try to politely accompany those who are in mourning, but points out that these words can neglect the importance of that grief. She could not see the point of words/phrases like “his disappearance” or “he’s resting in peace now,” or “we should celebrate his life and the moments you two spent together.” As well-intentioned as those words can be, she argues they offer little comfort when you’ve lost someone. Her latest work, Notes on Grief, examines that.
The conversation went on for the good part of two hours. Interestingly, when talking about race, she mentioned she became black when she went to live in the United States. It was the first time she realised such a difference existed. She said that Nigerians are known for somehow being arrogant. That made it all the more infuriating to be considered inferior in the United States. Regarding this issue, she says we must be willing to have conversations about uncomfortable topics. However, such uncomfortable conversations, of course, have to be based on some ground rules. She closed by saying she doesn’t believe in performing niceness; life is too short so there should be no time for regrets. For full access to her talk at FILBo, you can click on the following Youtube link on the Feria del Libro Bogotá Channel.
La Montaña aims to give demobilised fighters economic opportunities in the face of government let-downs.
Display of La Montaña products in la Casa la Roja. Photo: Poppy Askham
Deep in the hills of northern Antioquia, a co-operative of former guerrilla fighters is stitching together a new reality – quite literally. Following the signing of the peace treaty in 2016, the group swapped guns for sewing machines. Since then, their brand, La Montaña, has gained traction in Colombia and abroad.
The process of reintegration for many former FARC fighters has not been easy. As a Crisis Group report on the fifth anniversary of the peace agreement explains, “Setbacks to reforms, former guerrillas’ stigmatisation and the murders of hundreds of ex-FARC discredit the 2016 peace deal in the countryside.”
Many ex-combatants have created their own businesses as part of the transition, with projects as diverse as brewing craft beer and making dolls. Tourism-wise, former guerillas have turned their hands to guiding, running bird-watching, hiking, and river rafting excursions.
La Montaña is just one of more than 4,200 of proyectos productivos in Colombia. Its 24 staff manufacture backpacks, clothes, hammocks, and money belts in the name of peace.
Sewing for survival
“We started thinking about alternatives for survival”, explains Guillermo León Chanci, a former FARC commander and one of the founders of La Montaña. “We thought, if sewing served for war, why doesn’t [it] serve for peace?”
I meet Chanci, or as he was known during the conflict, ‘Leónidas’, in la Casa la Roja on Calle 45, a cultural centre run by ex-FARC members and a key stockist of La Montaña products. He is on a flying visit to Bogotá from La Plancha, an AETCR (Antiguo Territorial Space for Training and Reincorporation) in the municipality of Anorí, which is currently home to around 155 ex-combatants and their families.
During the conflict, La Plancha served as a base for the 36th Front of the FARC. Fed up with ill-fitting and inadequate uniforms, theguerillasset up a workshop on the site to create their own supplies. So when it came to considering new ways of supporting the community, it seemed natural to convert these wartime survival skills into the tools of peacetime prosperity.
At first, the residents of La Plancha were just creating items for residents of neighbouring communities, but seeing a potential business opportunity, the community invested COP$8 million of government funding into the project. It has now expanded to include a honey business and a women-led line of plant-based skin products.
La Montaña has become so successful they supply stores in Medellín and Bogotá and even have European buyers. “We reimbursed the contribution the government put in and from there, we are advancing. We’ve managed to achieve commercial status,” Chanci tells us, pride radiating in every syllable. “About three months ago, we sent 100 bags to Spain.”
Tourists often visit Anorí and the workers of La Montaña. Chanci hopes the products they buy and take back to their home countries can act as adverts for the changes communities like La Plancha are trying to bring to the country and in doing so create yet more economic opportunities.
La Montaña backpack. Photo: Steve Hide
Broken promises
Whilst projects like La Montaña have helped transform the future for demobilised fighters, the community has faced significant challenges according to Chanci.
He first moved to Anori in 2014 to help to carry out peace education there, but from the off encountered issues. “It was difficult: Firstly because [we were] uprooting a custom, a culture that we had had and adapting ourselves to another,” he explains. “But it was more difficult when we started to discover the government’s lack of willingness to fulfil the [peace] treaty.”
Rural reform and redistribution of land constitute the first point of the 2016 peace deal and the government committed to improving land access and reducing rural poverty and food insecurity. The terms of the treaty set out that the state is expected to allocate up to three million hectares of land to landless campesinos and those with limited access. However, a 2022 study by Colombia’s attorney general found that just 16% of this land allocation had been completed. The state has also fallen short on targets to formalise land rights and on development goals in recent years.
The slowness of the government to apportion land has been particularly problematic for members of demobilised communities and their ability to carry out proyectos productivos. The original ETCRs were created as a temporary measure as part of the peace process, but seven years later many communities are still living in semi-permanent settlements and waiting for new land.
When the legal provision for the ETCRS expired in 2019, Duque’s government announced that some of the settlements would become permanent, but others would be relocated. At the time La Plancha was not designated for relocation, but this was later changed and the ex-guerrilleros have been waiting for years to be relocated.
“The housing and the construction and the structure aren’t adequate because the camp zones were for six months”, Guillermo explains in reference to living conditions at La Plancha. “The community is willing to relocate the ETCR to somewhere where housing can be built, because we cannot build housing here.” The ETCR has 19 lodgings, a sick-bay, library and football pitch, but lacks an aqueduct and connectivity.
In February 2022 the government allocated 100 hectares of land to proyectos productivos in Antioquia. Over half this land is located in the municipality of Anorí. According to the head of the Agency for Reincorporation and Normalisation, Andrés Felipe Stapper Segrera, preliminary studies were started to determine the feasibility of moving La Plancha to the newly acquired land, but more than a year on the community is yet to be relcoated.
“The slowness affects us because we cannot create our proyectos de vida,” Chanci adds, explaining that in order to create new lives demobilised FARC members require “decent housing and land to work and support [their] projects.”
Fresh government, fresh hope
For Chanci, the premiership of Petro after years of right-wing governments, offers hope that the years of government lethargy will finally come to an end. “For us, it was a joy,” he explains, recollecting the election of the former M-19 member’s election as President last year. “However many difficulties we have, we can overcome them with this government.”
According to Chanci, they are already seeing progress. “With Petro’s government we have advanced with point one, Petro is apportioning land to the campesino, but we are also advancing with the implementation of the PDETs (Planes de Desarrollo con Enfoque Territorial)”.
“We are thinking about sitting and discussing once again the topic of substitution of [illegal] crops, […] we’re discussing the topic of housing for signatories of the peace agreement.”
In October last year, Petro’s government signed an agreement to facilitate the purchase of 3 million hectares of land in order to fulfil the requirements for land distribution under the 2016 agreement. His administration has also made progress on the issue of formalising land rights.
Bogota Post contributor Steve Hide sporting a La Montaña backpack.
A lifelong battle
Despite the progress being made, Chanci is pragmatic in his expectations for the current government. “We know that we can’t achieve all the goals we have with Petro, if we want to advance, four years isn’t going to be enough,” he said.
Chanci knows better than most that change takes time – he first became involved with left-wing movements at the age of 12, joining the Colombian Communist party before eventually being swept up in the optimism of the Union Patriotica (UP) in 1984. The UP promised land reform, nationalisation of key natural resources and a new economic model for the country. But hope soon turned to despair as the government, military and paramilitary groups systematically wiped out the UP, killing at least 6,000 people, including two presidential candidates, five congressmen and 109 councillors.
It was this violence and the despair it created that drove Chanci and many others to join the FARC. “We didn’t know any other route except the armed option and we went to the guerrilla because there was no other route, because the flags that we were defending, those of the Colombian Communist Party and the Unión Patriótica, were snatched away,” he said.
But now the political route is back on the table. Combined with the opportunities provided by proyectos productivos like La Montaña, it means there are other avenues for progress for these communities.
If Colombia can create a “durable peace” through the full implementation of the 2016 treaty and in doing so build trust in the international community sufficiently to expand the potential of tourism, the future is bright according to Chanci. After all: “Colombia in peace? You never have to go to a European nation, this is paradise.”
La Montaña products can be bought in La Trocha and La Casa La Roja in Bogotá or online.
In addition to backpacks and clothing, La Plancha’s community also produces honey and plant-based skincare and hygiene items.
Barriers to abortion in Colombia were among the issues highlighted on Women’s Day in Bogotá earlier this year. Photo: Poppy Askham
Campaigners say there’s a lot of work to do before abortion becomes truly accessible in Colombia.
On February 21, 2022, Colombia’s constitutional court made the landmark decision to overhaul the country’s reproductive rights legislation. In one fell swoop, the nation became the country with the most progressive abortion laws in Latin America.
The court decriminalised abortion, regardless of circumstance, for the first 24 weeks of pregnancy. Beyond that point, the right is limited to victims of rape or incest and cases in which the life of the pregnant person or child are in danger.
Despite the fervour of the Latin American pro-choice campaigners, Colombia’s liberal gestational limit is a regional outlier. Even its most progressive ally in the reproductive rights revolution, Argentina, can only boast on-request abortion access until the 14th week.
Campaigners greeted the court ruling with euphoria. However, while the law is extremely progressive on paper, in practice it is a different matter. Now that the dust has settled, campaigners say there are still huge institutional and cultural barriers for women seeking to exercise their newly won reproductive rights.
Causa Justa, the movement responsible for the legal challenge that resulted in the liberalisation of abortion access, are tracking the reality of the implementation. Earlier this year, it released a report taking stock of the successes and shortcomings of the past year. Two affiliated organisations – legal and informational support provider La Mesa and reproductive health clinic Oriéntame – pooled their data to piece together a picture of a legal groundshift that is yet to be fully borne out in social change.
We spoke to María Isabel Niño, a legal advisor for La Mesa, to discuss the barriers to abortion that are yet to be overcome. “We identified that the barriers to access that existed before the ruling still persisted during the course of this year,” she said.
An information void
Despite the intense media focus on abortion in recent years, one of the biggest challenges facing feminist campaigners is a persistent public knowledge deficit when it comes to reproductive rights.
La Mesa provides legal advice and practical information to people seeking an abortion. It recorded an almost 50% increase in the number of people seeking information in February 2022-23 compared to the year prior.
This increase can partly be put down to the influence of media coverage of the constitutional court’s decision. But María explains it also points to an underlying issue. “It’s certain that this could indicate that women are not obtaining this information from the health system and therefore have to search for it elsewhere”, she tells us. “[La Mesa] obviously can help contribute to the dissemination of this decision but it is the Colombian state through its organisations that is obliged to promote it.”
Notably, young people aged 12 to 19 made up 31% of all information requests in 2022-23. For Maria, this comes partly from the expansion of the right to abortion to people of all ages, but is also evidence of an issue within the education system. “They don’t talk about sexual and reproductive rights in schools nor in universities; there is no integral sexual education and therefore they have to search for information outside their schools via the internet or from women’s organisations like La Mesa,” she said.
This information void leaves pregnant women vulnerable to misinformation and malpractice. María points out that in many cases health professionals are applying a “restrictive interpretation” of the court’s decision. She says it doesn’t reflect what the court said, but that patients often lack the knowledge to recognise or challenge this violation of their rights.
“We know that in practice many health professionals demand that a woman have authorization from her parents,” she said. Other common practices include asking how many children a patient has already, enquiring about their civil status or insisting on a psychological assessment. Lines of questioning like these can deter and stigmatise pregnant people or in worst-case scenarios, may even be used to illegally deny access to an abortion.
Women’s Day protests in Bogotá 2023. Photo: Poppy Askham
Healthcare system failings
Another concerning issue is a serious lack of resources. “There are hospitals and clinics in Colombia that don’t have the medication to carry out an abortion,” María tells us. Surgical instruments and trained personnel are also often in short supply. This can result in delays or denials for those seeking abortions, which can have grave knock-on effects. Some may be forced to travel long distances or opt for unsafe forms of abortion or even be deterred from the procedure altogether.
The lack of trained personnel points to a deeper issue. Many universities in Colombia reportedly do not provide medical students with sufficient reproductive health training.
A 2018 study by Causa Justa analysed four of Bogotá’s principal university medical faculties. Researchers found that the majority of these faculties provided minimal education about sexual and reproductive rights. What’s more, in several institutions there were gaps in students’ knowledge about the surgical procedures and medications required to carry out an abortion.
Although the study’s dataset was limited to the capital, María warns this could be the case countrywide. This lack of education ensures that prejudices and stigma will persist within the healthcare system and, according to her, may contribute to rates of conscientious objection and the perpetuation of barriers to abortion.
“Obviously they don’t teach them due to social issues, due to stigma” María explains. “The Minister of Education has a huge challenge.”
Abuse of conscientious objection
Under Colombian law, medical professionals have the right to object to personally carrying out an abortion for ethical, religious or personal reasons. “The decision that the constitutional court took did not impact or eliminate or change the rules for the right to conscientious objection,” María clarifies.
Crucially objections must be submitted in writing and must not pose a barrier for someone seeking an abortion from a specific healthcare provider. If a health professional objects to carrying out an abortion, they must immediately refer patients to another staff member who can carry out the procedure.
Unfortunately, in reality, this legal requirement is too often not being fulfilled – as, María explains, in many cases “it is used in an incorrect or an unconstitutional manner.”
“We’ve found cases, for example, university clinics, where they claim they are institutional conscientious objectors, this is to say everyone in the clinic is a conscientious objector […] this is totally prohibited.” Every clinic must legally have a member of staff who is willing to carry out an abortion, but it appears this rule is not always enforced.
In other cases, Causa Justa have found that staff have been pressured to register as conscientious objectors by more senior members of staff. Once again this issue points to an institutional problem of stigma towards abortion within the health service.
The severity of barriers to abortion is significantly heightened for vulnerable people, particularly those with irregular migrant status.
Causa Justa observed in a 2022 study that many migrants lacked knowledge about their reproductive rights while living in Colombia. A lot of migrants are from countries with more repressive abortion laws. In Venezuela for example, the country with the biggest flow of migration into Colombia, abortion is punishable by up to two years in prison. Not only does this mean the weight of stigma may be heavier, but also that some migrants wrongly assume the same rules apply in Colombia.
Some migrants may fear they could be subjected to detention or deportation if they come forward. “Lack of knowledge, stigma, the illegality of abortion in their country and their irregular migratory status are the perfect context to fear being the object of criminal sanctions,” the report outlined. These concerns can be exacerbated by cases of doctors asking migrants for proof of migration documentation, a request that is not mandated.
This is exacerbated by poor healthcare access in several parts of the country. Causa Justa highlighted Cundinamarca, Nariño and Norte de Santander as areas where high migrant populations coincided with scarce healthcare provision. In many cases people asking for abortions are sent to other departments, often as far as Bogotá.
Economic and social vulnerability can make this a significant impediment for women seeking abortion. La Mesa recorded the case of a 37-year-old woman in Cúcuta, North Santander. She went ahead with an unwanted pregnancy because she could not find childcare for her young daughter whilst she attended the clinic she’d been referred to in Bogotá.
Similar issues also exist within rural communities, where higher rates of poverty paired with poorer health care availability have historically contributed to raised levels of teenage pregnancy. Social stigma may also prove more severe in these settings. Sexual health educators have even reported incidents of “threats and censorship” when attempting to work with communities in regions like El Chocó and Urabá.
What is being done to remove barriers to abortion in Colombia?
For Causa Justa, La Mesa and María herself there are two main tasks now: ensuring the “effective implementation of the sentences” and the “social depenalization of abortion.”
The Minister for Health took a step towards realising the first goal, bringing forward a resolution in January this year to try and eliminate some of the institutional barriers to abortion. It clearly set out the constitutional standards and technical rules regarding abortion provisions, including:
Abortion should be treated as an “essential” and “urgent” healthcare service which should be provided immediately or in rare and justified cases, delayed up to a maximum of five days from the initial request for an intervention.
The 24-week gestational limit on abortion refers to the date a patient requested an abortion, not the date on which a health service is able to carry it out.
Adolescents and children have the right to decide to have an abortion without requiring permission from a parent or guardian.
Migrants have the right to free abortion care within the Colombian healthcare system regardless of their immigrant status.
Healthcare professionals are prohibited from providing misleading information, referring patients to counselling or requesting third-party permission e.g. from a spouse or parent.
There have also been key regional advances. For example, Bogotá’s alcaldía created a mesa técnica to ensure the implementation of the court ruling in the district. In Cali, the regional health secretary has put pressure on health services to remove barriers to abortion and special efforts have also been made to target problems facing migrants in Norte de Santander.
However, it remains to be seen if the introduction of yet more legislation and resolutions will translate into practical change. Campaigners have yet to see a concerted effort from government officials to tackle the challenges of social stigma and lack of knowledge. As long as these intertwined issues exist, people seeking abortions will continue to be vulnerable to medical malpractice and violations of their reproductive rights.
Causa Justa is clear, great progress has been made, but there is still work to be done before, in the words of María, the right to an abortion becomes “a reality for all women […] not just a historic ruling that remains on paper.”
Mancuso appears before the JEP this week in video testimony from his jail in Atlanta, USA.
Colombia’s peace courts heard testimony this week from feared paramilitary leader Salvatore Mancuso.
“You’ve been invited to the finca for Sunday lunch,” a friend told me in Montería, a small sweltering city at the heart of Colombia’s coastal cattle country.
It’s a common enough invitation in a region where many middle-class people have a small farm with cattle, chicken, plantain and yams.
But this invitation came with a catch. This was Salvatore Mancuso’s farm, the military chief of the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, or AUC, as they wrote their initials, frequently in blood painted on the adobe walls of the trashed houses of their victims, those lying nearby with their hands tied behind their backs and their head caved in with hammers.
Also to attend was Carlos Castaño, the AUC’s ultimate jefe, a ranting right-wing demagogue from a cartel family who had somehow melded Colombia’s disperse paramilitary groups – with considerable state assistance – into a cohesive counterforce to left-wing guerrillas.
That was back in 2002.
The autodefensa moniker was off mark. Yes, sometimes they did battle guerrillas such the FARC and ELN. But more often, they tortured and killed campesinos eking a living in Córdoba’s tropical savannas.
And over time their activities extended far beyond the Atlantic coast. Abetted by state military logistics and air transport, Mancuso’s paras sowed terror all over rural Colombia. They constructed crematoriums to incinerate 500 people in Norte de Santander, and hung 30 civilian suspects alive from meat-hooks in an abattoir in Mapiripán, Guaviare, before disembowelling them with chainsaws.
Chainsaws and chopped noggins became the calling cards for the AUC – locals referred to them simply as mochecabezas, or “head-cutters.”
I turned down the lunch invite, I had other plans.
Seeing Mancuso pop up on TV screens this week brought back this memory and many more. The former AUC leader is currently jailed in Atlanta, USA, but testified by video-link to the Colombian peace courts.
This is the old warrior’s last throw of the dice to see if his crimes can be fitted into the framework ofLa Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz (JEP) which could bring him benefits. He is in legal limbo right now, still imprisoned on drug charges, but facing justice for many more crimes.
Fittingly, the four-day JEP hearings were held in Monteria, Córdoba, where Mancuso was born to an Italian immigrant father and a local mother. Two decades ago he was hated, loved, and feared in equal measure in the city.
A legend is born
For rich cattle farmers constantly extorted by rag-tag guerrillas, the engineer-farmer was a legendary leader who fought back and wasn’t scared to blood himself in battle.
According to local folklore, Triple Zero (as Mancuso was known) was the fantasma who could lead moonlight raids to outwit the wily guerrillas, then pop up smartly dressed in Montería high society or win a medal at the Sunday shooting competition.
In the veredas of Cordobá – where everyone swaps stories, but few read newspapers – even his haters were agog with his exploits. These include piloting a helicopter to rescue his boss, Castaño, from a FARC ambush close to their farm base in Tierralta, in the jungles of the Nudo Paramillo.
It was during those years, from 2000 to 2004, that I walked or rode mules over the same trails as Mancuso, into the Nudo Paramillo, or by canoe to the indigenous villages of the Rio Alto Sinú, or the ghost towns of the Rio Verde where Mancuso’s men had lined up a dozen local traders – accusing them of selling goods to the FARC – and put a bullet in each one’s head.
Some of the worst peasant massacres happened further north, in towns close to the canyons of the Montes de Maria – temporary forts for FARC, ELN and ERP guerrillas. Some were erased off the map in events that saw 350 villagers murdered in 45 attacks in just three years.
It was after one of those, in El Salado, that I saw the letters AUC scrawled in blood on the walls of abandoned houses. The once-bustling town was stripped bare to its door-frames, part of a hardware booty taken by the large paramilitary force (450 heavily armed men and women) to resell or use on their own farms.
The El Salado massacre was marked by its medieval brutality, a three-day drunken festival of torture, rape and killings of 60 innocent townsfolk to a vallenato soundtrack. People were murdered for owning a car or having a leg of beef in their house, while the Colombian army stood guard and Mancuso flew in by helicopter to survey the damage.
The details are Dantean: Pregnant women impaled with sticks. Old people forced to dance, then beaten to death. Body parts cut from living victims.
Last year, in a separate testimony Mancuso addressed some 400 survivors of El Salado, again by video-link: “Today, sorry for all the damage I have caused you, I am responsible for the tragedy you and your families and loved ones suffered. Sorry from the depths of my heart, a thousand times sorry…”
A health brigade in El Salado in 2003, the community started to return to their ghost town after the AUC massacre in 2000.
Key question for the Peace Courts: Can such crimes ever be forgiven? And should they?
It’s a question central to the current peace process, and instructive to any future ones. As Colombia’s cycles of conflict roll on, and today’s perpetrators – the direct descendants of the AUC and FARC – commit their own atrocities, they would be wise to heed the words of my Yorkshire granny: “Truth will out.”
But is it the whole truth? That’s a key question for the JEP during their public cross-examination of Mancuso this week.
The man himself has softened over the years, now resembling a Costeño Santa Claus with jowls and a white beard and seems at ease recounting his side of the story. But it’s not entirely clear what’s driving Mancuso. Legal benefits? Genuine contrition?
Or is he out for revenge on his former political masters?
Mancuso demobilised along with the AUC in 2006 but was suddenly extradited to a US jail two years later after his too-public comments on links between the AUC, the military, and the then Álvaro Uribe government.
The paramilitary peace process, started in 2004, mostly served to cut visible links between the AUC and political-military chiefs. That the para leaders might actually repent – and point the finger at their former puppet-masters – was never part of the deal. And who knows where the truth trail might lead since Colombia’s US backers were also in the know.
To everyone’s surprise – and anger from victims’ groups needing answers for the killed and disappeared in Colombia – the Uribe government spirited 14 AUC leaders to US jails on “drugs charges.” As if sending drugs to the US is so much more of a crime than killing thousands of Colombians…
But now Mancuso’s back, with a vengeance, and – maybe – naming names.
Of course, it’s not new that the AUC worked in lockstep with Colombia’s military and politicians. It’s the “who, what, where, when” that the JEP wants to hear. And how it might help victims. One of the key questions – literally – is, “Where are the bodies buried?”
What have we learned so far?
According to his testimony this week, the AUC backed various former presidential candidates (call it bet spreading) such as Horacio Serpa, Andrés Pastrana, and Álvaro Uribe. Furthermore, Uribe, said Mancuso, had orchestrated the removal of security guards from a local politician so the AUC could kill him.
Pastrana and Uribe hit back this week on Twitter. Pastrana labelled Mancuso a “cowardly killer.” Uribe also used the word coward and threatened legal action.
Le exijo al cobarde asesino Mancuso que muestre hoy mismo siquiera una prueba de apoyos o infiltración de dineros del narco terrorismo paramilitar en mi campaña presidencial. De no hacerlo, pierde, aquí y allá, todos los beneficios que le concede la justicia especial.
— Andrés Pastrana A (@AndresPastrana_) May 15, 2023
Further information from Mancuso – but again not completely new – was on the tight links between Colombia’s state intelligence service (DAS) and the AUC. The para chief described his own role as la bisagra – “the hinge” – between the state military and the paramilitaries.
Mancuso’s testimony also highlighted the close logistic support that the Colombian state military gave the AUC, in the form of weapons, transport, and monthly multi-million payments from drinks companies like Postobon and Bavaria.
He also said there was also tactical support from the Colombian military. The local army and marines were purposefully distracted to investigate “missing cows” by local rancher-politicians, even as the AUC raped and strangled women in El Salado. Then, when they were “alerted,” state forces held back for three days so the paramilitaries could finish the job.
These joint operations happened at a national level, admitted Mancuso: “Everywhere we operated, it was done in the same way,” he told the JEP magistrates. “Between all of us, we called each other ‘cousins’ because we were one family. We were allies in a fight against the internal enemy: the guerrillas.”
But this noble “band of brothers” narrative – united to fight an insurrection – wears thin when you consider the horrific AUC attacks against civilians and non-combatants, such as in El Salado. The list of victims is endless.
Killing a comedian
Under tutelage of DAS, the AUC murdered dozens of university lecturers and professors signalled as being “left-wing”, as well as the comedian Jaime Garzon, among many others. In fact, the DAS chiefs, as well as financially supporting the paramilitaries, would hand over intelligence files and “kill lists.”
“DAS handed over privileged information to the paramilitaries, which allowed them to persecute those they considered an obstacle to their military, social, economic, and political objectives,” Mancuso explained.
This policy led to hundreds of deaths of innocent persons whose work took them close to conflict areas, such as Mario Calderón and Elsa Alvarado who were gunned down with state complicity in their flat in Chapinero, Bogotá in 1997.
Both were NGO workers visiting the Sumapaz region south of Bogotá where guerrillas also roamed, and had been stopped by an army patrol – and their names and addresses taken – the week before their deaths.
And according to the former AUC chief this week, DAS had also declared Gustavo Petro and Álvaro Leyva (the current president and chancellor) as “military targets.”
“That inclination to the left labelled people as subversive,” explained Mancuso.
But politics wasn’t enough; this week Mancuso also recognised AUC involvement in the state military “falsos positivos” practices. He said paramilitaries would supply the army with the corpses of innocents that the Army passed off as guerrillas so troops could get bonuses.
“They handed us lists and then we hit houses and killed those who we later claimed to be guerrillas,” Mancuso said.
Two warnings – and one death
Eventually, the AUC spread their deadly nets to trap anyone perceived as a threat. This included the gruesome murders of state investigators, some from the CTI, Cuerpo Técnico de Investigaciones, sent to investigate paramilitary activities. We now know that some state technocrats tipped off the AUC to murder their own colleagues.
Then came Limpieza Social (social cleaning), an intersection of small-town conservatism, control by cocaine cartels, frustrated cattle ranchers and Catholicism. The AUC could kill you for your lifestyle.
Mancuso told this week how the paramilitaries targeted people because of their gender identity or for using drugs. Any non-conformist activity – such as young people’s tattoos and body art – was at risk, all part of the AUC strategy to exercise control over a cowed population.
Usually, people were warned twice before being killed once. This, at least in Monteria, was the AUC code, when I lived there in 2001: “You wear a belly button ring? Get out of town.” “Shave off your beard. Or get out of town. Or die.” Bought a nice Che Guevara T-shirt? “Leave or die.”
I once got “warned” for playing Led Zeppelin on my stereo. “We recommend not to play unapproved music” came a message via a colleague. Even salsa was frowned upon, and bars opted for non-stop accordion music even while the paramilitaries were harbouring fugitive vallenato legend Diomedes Díaz (he was accused of murdering his girlfriend).
The songs sung in Monteria this week were from the AUC’s victims. Along with poems, paintings and some video interludes, a small sample of the multitude of AUC victims were heard at the JEP – but only briefly as time was reserved mostly for Mancuso’s interrogation and testimony.
The final word, though, and perhaps the most impacting, came from Aura Camargo. Her video address to Mancuso (who looked sad and attentive during the presentation) went directly to the heart of conflict.
Montería, in Córdoba, Colombia, epicentre for the AUC and where the JEP held their hearings with Salvatore Mancuso this week.
Who gave the orders?
More than the killings – Camargo lost several close family members – was the AUC’s destruction of the rich fabric of cultural, economic, and social life in the region; widespread rape and sexual abuse – Camargo herself was a victim – and the breakdown of family bonds.
“Mister Mancuso, what did we do to deserve this war which broke our communities?” she asked.
Now is the time, she said, to unmask the powerful political and business interests behind the land grabs and monoculture – and destruction of local agriculture – that underpinned the paramilitary project. A war nominally against insurgents by waged against the campo and the campesinos.
For Camargo, and many other victims, the twist in the tale is that their former nemesis, Salvatore Mancuso, is now their hope. But only if he is allowed to continue under the JEP and tell the full story. We should know within two months.
“There is no future without truth. We need to know who gave the orders?” said Camargo. Maybe, at last, Colombia will find out.
Oral tradition and Indigenous mythology take centre stage in the final week of FILBo 2023.
Photo: Poppy Askham
Just as the crowd are preparing to file out of the auditorium, Mary Grueso hurls herself into a rousing recitation of her poem ‘La muñeca negra’. The performance is an unexpected gift, occasioned by the request of a fan in the front row and the audience is thrilled.
Grueso’s voice pitches with alternating waves of frustration, melancholia, nostalgia and rage as she relates her childhood experience as a member of an under-represented community, but not a syllable is lost amidst the emotion.
It is a masterclass in the art of oral narration; a tradition passed down to Grueso from generations of Pacific coast cuentistas. It is also a perfect realisation of what she and two other writers have been invited to FILBo 2023 to discuss: the enduring power and relevance of Afro-Colombian and Indigenous literary traditions.
Grueso is a poet, storyteller and educator from Guapi, Cauca, celebrated in Colombia for her role in raising the profile of Afro-Colombian literary traditions. She is joined around the “fuego imaginario” in FILBo’s Raíces Sala by Ana Alcolea, a Spanish children’s writer who is well-known for works that draw on Latin-American myth and legend. Sitting between the two women is Colombian cultural ambassador Celso Román who has just released a book inspired by the folklore of Indigenous groups in the Amazons.
From the spoken to the written word
Oral storytelling has a long history, especially within Indigenous and Afro-Colombian cultures. Recognition of this heritage and the enduring importance of the spoken word proves a shared value that successfully unites the three very different writers on stage.
Grueso speaks of the cuentistas of her community growing up. Ramon recalls the legends told to him and his nine siblings by his mother and the myths he encountered through his work in Choco and Guijara. Alcolea tells of her first encounters with Latin American oral tradition through The Popol Vuh and the song-like poems of Pablo Neruda. None of the three can resist taking on the role of story-teller themselves, offering unprompted retellings of their favourite traditional tales throughout the hour-long discussion.
It is clear Grueso, a spoken-word artist herself, has the strongest emotional link with la oralidad. She describes it as a “fundamental” part of Afro-Colombian culture and also the means by which it has survived.
“Oral tradition has been [our] vertebral column”, she tells the audience. “We didn’t used to write, we didn’t know how to read, but oralidad has been our point of reference and through [it] we have protected our traditions that come from Africa.”
Far from seeing the written word as a threat to oral tradition, she sees it as an opportunity to preserve and protect the stories of her community. “We are moving from oralidad to writing because we didn’t have this possibility before,” she says. “We are not leaving oralidad behind, instead we have taken it into account, and we are making a bridge between oralidad and literature. Today we write many things, but we still have oralidad as our point of departure.”
This is a sentiment echoed by the other two panellists. Literature is not stagnant, it is ever evolving and the shifting dynamics between the written and spoken word are part of that process. “I have come to the conclusion that literature is alive,” Ramon reflects.
The power of representation
Whilst respect for oral tradition may be a shared trait among the trio, each have their personal reasonings. For Grueso, drawing on the influences of cuentistas from the Pacific coast and blending them with the contemporary experiences of community, allows her to offer the cultural representation she never experienced as a child.
“I started to write children’s literature because when I was studying the education system, the ministry for education didn’t take us into account,” Grueso says. “We were in the classroom, but we weren’t because nothing that related to us appeared there. It was an education that wasn’t pertinent to us.”
By using traditional Pacific coast literary forms like arrullos within her work as a storyteller and as a teacher, Grueso has found new ways to bring topics related to race into the classroom and promote greater appreciation of oral traditions and the communities they come from.
Storytelling is essentially human
Alcocea’s sees the incorporation of elements of Indigenous story-telling tradition in her children’s books as a way of tapping into the shared human experience. “What fascinates me greatly are the similarities that exist between Indigenous cultures and western cultures”, she explains. “There are perceptions of nature, of cosmology that match up because in all cases we’re talking about the essence of being human, attempting to explain the inexplicable”.
To illustrate her point she outlines four literary tropes common to cultures across Latin America and indeed the world:
Rain as a form of punishment for humanity
Metamorphoses of humans and animals
Weaving and tapestries as a form of female narrative
Dreams as a gateway between spiritual realms
Her recent mythology-inspired work, Por los caminos del sueño draws on the latter two of these universal themes, centring around a paralysed girl who enters a dream world each night through a portal in a mota-like tapestry on her wall.
When focusing on the theme of metamorphoses she expresses the idea that the trope reveals the truth that we “are related, we share mother earth, we make up a whole.” This could also be said of her interest in finding points of commonality between different cultures, by using her work to bring Indigenous mythologies to a wider community of readers and reflect on universal themes she is able to speak to the essential shared human experiences.
A natural tradition
Celso Román’s fascination in Indigenous story-telling comes from his work with communities in Choco, Guijara and the Amazons and his love for the environment. For him Indigenous literary traditions highlight a connection with nature that is needed now more than ever.
“There is a force in nature, a magical relationship with nature that unfortunately … we are losing,” he explains. He becomes more and more animated as he explains the reverence with which different Indigenous groups regard nature, for example launching into an explanation of how one community in the Amazon ask for forgiveness from a tree when they have to chop it down to make a canoe and grieve it for days afterwards.
He looks to Indigenous cultures and their continued veneration of nature as an example for all of humanity, and explains that this respect comes through in their literary traditions. His latest children’s book, El espíritu del páramo, centres around the dynamics between a European gold prospector and his local guide. He blends elements of Indigenous mythology with passionate descriptions of pumas, frailejones, spectacled bears and other Colombian plants and animals to encourage a similar respect for nature in his child readers.
Román is determined to uphold the legacy of Indigenous cultures and their relationship with the earth through his writing. As he puts it “We Colombians have an enormous cultural richness that we have to regain through literature and educational spaces”.
Fancy diving further into the rich world of Indigenous and Afro-Colombian literature? Here are two great places to start:
Territorios Narrados. A collection of books of stories and legends from Indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities created by the Ministry of National Education to promote the cultural conservation
FILBo has opened its doors once again, flooding the capital with literature. Whether you want to be entertained, engage in some serious thinking, or grab some Mexican snacks, there’s something for everybody.
The Colombian pavilion at FILBo 2023. Photo: Emma Newbery
For two weeks Bogotá’s annual Feria del Libro celebrates the written word in all its guises. You can find everything from heavy tomes to board books for babies in pavilion after pavilion at Corferias. FILBo 2023 takes place from 18 April to 2 May and Mexico is this year’s guest country. It’s the fair’s 35th edition and, for the first time, it also features a guest city – salsa capital Cali is first up and will be strutting its stuff.
It’s the third time Mexico has been the country of honour at FILBo. This year, the theme is “Raíces y encuentros: por un futuro de paz para nuestra América” (Roots and encounters: for a peaceful future in our America). One of the milestones being celebrated is the signing of the Treaty of Union, League and Perpetual Confederation between Mexico and Colombia, the first international agreement Mexico made as an independent country.
Expect to find lots of Mexican food stands at the fair, as well as music, talks with authors, and oodles of books. There’s also a tribute to Gabriel García Márquez, described in a press release as “the most Mexican Colombian of all.” That’s a polite way to describe the complicated relationship Gabo had with the country he was born in and the one he adopted as home.
Mexico is this year’s guest of honour at FILBo 2023. Photo: Emma Newbery
Getting the most out of FILBo 2023
FILBo got off to a great start with a powerful talk from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie who touched on many topics including history, mourning, and feminism amongst others. With over 500 guests from 30 different countries, there’s something for everybody. It’s a smorgasbord of talks and authors, with themes ranging from explorations of rock music and poetry to discussions about climate change, feminism, language, and indigenous literature to name but a few.
If you’re a graphic novel fan, head to the second floor of pavilion 8. There’s also lines of caricaturists above the Panamericana array in pavilion 1. Pavilions 11 to 16 at the back of the fair are packed with children’s literature. While Harry Potter fans will not be disappointed, it’s good to know that literature for young people reaches beyond Hogwarts as well.
If it’s your first time, here are a few tips:
Give yourself plenty of time to browse and mooch around the books. It can get a bit overwhelming, as there’s so much to see and choose from, so plan to stop for coffee and even a taco or two.
Plan your trip. I usually plan my FILBo days around one or two chats I really want to see and then check the program for other talks happening on the same day. Be prepared for long queues, both at the entrance and for individual talks. Get your ticket online in advance to save time.
Use the online information. It used to be fairly easy to get hold of a printed program each day at FILBo, but this year they were like gold dust. Instead, you’ll need to use the website and announcements at the event to find out what’s happening. If you’re searching for someone specific, the list of invited artists is ordered by first name, not last name.
Practical info
Ticket prices: COP$11,000, (Children COP$8,500)
Address: Corferias, Carrera 37 #24-67
Timings: Sunday to Thursday, 10am to 7pm. Friday, Saturday, and holiday, 10am to 8pm
Colombia’s largest volcano Nevado del Ruiz could be about to blow. We look back at a previous eruption that buried a town and 23,000 of its inhabitants.
Volcano Nevado del Ruiz is Colombia’s largest and currently active. Photo: Creative Commons
“Aren’t you scared of the fantasmas?” a friend in Bogotá comments when I mention my plan to visit the ruined town of Armero. “Most people don’t even drive the road through the ruins after sunset.”
But I’m drawn to the aftermath of one the world’s worst natural disasters within living memory. And I know that Armero is under Colombia’s collective skin like no other national tragedy (and there’ve been a few), particularly with its nemesis Nevado del Ruiz ready to erupt.
The snow-capped volcano towers over the Magdalena Valley and floats over Bogota’s western horizon on a clear day (to see it you’ll have to get up early to Monserrate to beat the smog) and is always active, though its recent rumbling have triggered an orange alert and captured daily newsfeeds.
So it helps to look back.
My guide in Armero, is Victor, a local villager who cycles to the ruins every day and offers his services to visitors. He was in his mother’s belly when the mudslide struck, but she made it to higher ground and was one of the first winched to safety by helicopter. This is just as well, as Victor turns out to be an excellent guide.
Victor our guide explains how the disaster unfolded. His mother was rescued from the ruins and mud. Photos: Steve Hide
Armero was Tolima state’s second-biggest town and the epicentre for booming rice and cotton farms, explains Victor when we meet at the small visitor centre and snack bar by the main road.
It was destroyed on November 13, 1985, when Nevado del Ruiz erupted sending a deadly mudslide of melted snow to crush the town below.
A town swallowed in mud
Ruiz had been rumbling for months but then started spewing ash, a sign of an eruption in progress. At 9.30 pm on that fateful day, super-heated lava started melting the ice cap of the 5,200 metre-mountain. The resulting lahar – destructive mudflow – crashed down the 45 kilometres of gullied riverbeds of the volcano’s sides.
At around 11.35 pm, this apocalyptic wall burst onto the fertile floodplain of the Lagunillas River. It struck the town when most people were at home in bed.
Why didn’t more people evacuate hours earlier when the volcano first erupted? It seems that relocating just a few hundred metres to higher ground could have taken people out of harm’s way. And experts had already sent maps showing that Armero was in the path of a likely lahar.
Victor takes a deep breath: We’ve arrived at the crux of the problem. “Most stayed because they didn’t believe it would ever happen,” he said.
Mixed messages
And behind that is a history of mixed messages, religious dogma and political football in the months leading up to the eruption. The town’s mayor (who died in the mud) had called out the threat but was branded a ‘scaremonger’ by Tolima’s governor.
Tolima was one of Colombia’s poorer and ‘hillbilly’ departments, often set against central government, and less favoured by Bogotá. Experts were more focused on the coffee city of Manizales to the east.
On the day of the eruption, protocols were in place to evacuate communities around the volcano, but Armero never got a clear message. At 7.30 pm – four hours after the ash-fall – the local Red Cross knocked on doors advising people to leave, but the town’s Catholic priest was also telling everyone to stay put in their houses (though he himself fled the town after a “bad feeling.”)
Meanwhile heavy rain dulled the noise of the eruption that might have triggered a more general flight.
Left behind, townsfolk “were confused and didn’t want to risk leaving their home just for rumours,” explains Victor.
As he talks, we meander along gravel paths through sunlit woodland. Under this idyll, in fact probably about two metres down (the depth of the mud that entombed the town) are the mangled remains of the once-vibrant community and its inhabitants.
The viscous lahar was like a grinding machine, destroying all in its path. Survivors were terribly injured and treated for gaping wounds. The few bodies of the dead that were recovered were horribly mutilated.
Lack of bodies also led to persistent rumours that surviving children were taken secretly from the disaster site and sold into adoption overseas. NGOs still keep a Red Book of Armero children, though until today no case has been proven (you can read more on the Red Book on my original blog here).
A slow rescue response
The rescue in the aftermath was slow. The disaster was only relayed to the world the next day by a crop plane pilot, and the metres-deep soft mud made moving around the site impossible in the first hours and many survivors of the initial lahar died of injuries.
The Colombian army was reluctant to deploy resources, and central government bureaucracy hampered civil rescue teams. Even basic implements – digging tools, water pumps – were in short supply.
Removing the massive blanket of solidified mud was impossible. As a result, many victims lie buried in what is now effectively a massive grave-site.
Ten years after the disaster some symbolic areas were cleared, and human remains reburied.
The town’s small plaza is one of the areas cleared in 1995. It’s like any other in Colombia, but now with trees and a broken cupola, all that’s left of the church, and an enormous cross and kneeling statue of the unmistakable form of Pope John Paul, who came to sanctify the land a year after the tragedy.
By the main road – which cuts through the site – are the skeletal walls of buildings that somehow remained standing, perhaps because they were on slightly higher ground. We wander into the ruined hospital – supposedly ground zero for ghosts – and spook some bats.
The ruined hospital: ground zero for ghosts. Photo: Steve HideWalking the ruins is both a fascinating and sad experience. Photo: Steve Hide
A tragedy of the trapped
Looking west, I can see the green flanks of Nevado del Ruiz, but its snowy crater is shrouded in clouds. We drive some kilometres up a road towards the mountain where we look back onto the whole Armero site and can see upwards to the steep wooded ravine that forms the Lagunilla River behind the town. From here it’s obvious that any liquid lahar would supercharge on the descent and blast straight at the town.
Omayra’s shrine has become a focus for pilgrims. Photo: Steve Hide
We head back to the ruins, cross back over the main road, and a few hundred metres through the forest to a clearing and tomb of Omayra Sánchez. After the mudslide hit, the 13-year-old girl was trapped up to her chin in slurry. Rescuers were unable to free her from the ruins of her house. She died after three agonising days, her eyeballs blackened by the toxins from the crush injuries she’d endured, surrounded by rescue workers who lacked the equipment to release her frail body.
While trapped she was filmed by news teams and her haunting image and soft voice was beamed to the world. She talked about finishing her school work. Asked her mother to pray for her rescue. Then she comforted her own rescuers and insisted they help others before her. This harrowing footage ensured that Omayra would forever be the symbol of Armero, crushed but selfless to the end.
Visiting Armero
We don’t recommend a visit to Armero while Nevado de Ruiz is on orange or red alert. But when the volcano calms down here’s how to get there:
Armero is six hours from Bogotá via Honda and Mariquita, or five hours via Vianí and Cambao (a beautiful though less-used road). A good access point and overnight stop is Mariquita, where you can find plenty of cheap hotels. From there you can get a taxi or local bus to the ruins, which are 30 kms along the main road to Ibague.
At the ruins, a small visitor centre shows films and photos of the town before and after the disaster and can provide a guide to take you around the ruins. Allow three hours for a visit. Payment is discretionary. There’s a contribution box at the visitor’s centre and most people give COP$20,000 to COP$50,000 to the guide depending on how much time they spend there. Bring repellent for the mosquitoes, a sun hat, and something to drink.
While St Patrick’s Day may mean green beer and four leaf clovers to many in Bogotá, the links between Ireland and Colombia go back to the founding of the country. Kieran Duffy is on hand to explain more.
Teusaquillo’s Parque Guernica pays tribute to General Daniel Florence O’Leary, an Irishman. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Parque Guernica in Teusaquillo is home to two memorials that might seem a little out of place in Colombia. The first is the large replica of Picasso’s famous painting from the Spanish Civil War which gives the park its name. The other, located right in front, at first looks like any other statue of Colombia’s heroes, until one learns the man’s name – General Daniel Florence O’Leary (Dónall Fínín Ó Laoghaire in Irish). It has a counterpart in Fitzgerald Park in his birthplace of Cork.
Like other Irish soldiers, he played a key role as Bolívar’s aide de camp in what was perhaps the most famous, but far from the only, historical link between Ireland and Colombia. According to the Irish embassy, “The connection between our countries began over 200 years ago, when over a thousand Irish volunteers travelled to Colombia to assist Simón Bolívar in the country’s fight for independence.”
During the 18th century, many Irish people migrated to Spain and its colonies, especially Catholics who were denied opportunities for advancement under British rule. While some rose to prominent positions – Ambrose Higgins became the governor of Chile – few arrived to what is now Colombia until the empire was already fracturing. In 1817, in desperate need of reinforcements, Simón Bolívar asked his agent in London, Luis López Mendez, to recruit volunteers for a British Legion.
Pamphlets and posters which promised generous payment in cash, food, and land convinced many men to sign up, almost half of whom were Irish. Some were veterans of the Napoleonic Wars who found themselves out of work with the end of the conflict in Europe, while others such as O’Leary were simply motivated by a sense of adventure.
In spite of such grand promises, many of the volunteers were soon disappointed. The journey to South America was often chaotic, with few rations on the ships. Upon arriving in Venezuela and finding further harsh conditions – tropical diseases and low pay – many deserted. Nevertheless, those who stayed proved a valuable addition to Bolívar’s ranks.
Many fought in the campaign to liberate Nueva Granada, most notably James Rooke, whose wounded arm was amputated after the Pantano de Vargas battle. He cried out “Viva la patria!”, to which the surgeon asked “Which country? Ireland or England?” “The one that will bury me,” replied Rooke. He died soon after and was indeed buried in Boyacá. There is a statue of him in Paipa, where the main square also bears his name.
More Irish recruits would later arrive in South America in 1819, forming two units known as the Hibernia Regiment and the Irish Legion. Neither, however, would prove as successful as the British Legion. The Hibernia Regiment briefly took Riohacha, but was soon driven out, and its founder, Thomas Eyre of Galway, was killed. The Irish Legion, founded by John Devereux who had fought in the Irish Rebellion of 1798, took the same city six months later, but many of the soldiers mutinied because of a lack of pay.
After this, Bolívar no longer recruited foreign soldiers, and many members of the legion left the continent. Nevertheless, some stayed on, and like the fellow Irishmen in the British Legion, fought in the wars of liberation in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. Some would go on to settle in the newly independent South American republics, including Bolivia and Ecuador.
In Colombia, many Irish soldiers remained loyal to Bolívar in the tumultuous years following independence, helping to put down a rebellion in Antioquia. Some would accompany him on his final journey to Santa Marta where he died. O’Leary, on the other hand, would go on to settle in Bogotá where he married and had nine children. He refused to burn Bolívar’s documents and spent much of his later life organising them for future historians. He is buried in the national pantheon in Caracas.
After Colombia´s establishment as an independent nation, there was little interaction between the two nations. Unlike Argentina, Colombia did not see a wave of Irish immigration in the late 19th century. One Irishman who did make his way to the country however, was Roger Casement, who was working as a British consul in Brazil.
He had previously won fame for exposing the massive human rights abuses in the Belgian Congo, and would do the same in South America. He travelled through the Amazon region, including to Putumayo, and reported on the enslavement of native people to work on rubber plantations. His efforts won him praise in Britain, but this was to be short lived.
Once a loyal British subject, Casement became an Irish nationalist and was hanged for his involvement in the failed Easter Rising of 1916. While the resulting Irish War of Independence of 1919-1921 regularly made headlines in Colombian newspapers, the two countries would not establish full diplomatic ties until 1999.
However, murkier connections were also being formed as the two nation’s violent conflicts became intertwined. Even as the Good Friday Agreement of 1998 brought an end to the Troubles in Northern Ireland, the close ties between Provisional IRA and the FARC-EP of Colombia came to light when three Irishmen were arrested at El Dorado airport in August 2001 and accused of training FARC members to make explosives.
They eventually fled the country and made their way to Ireland, but were convicted in absentia. Unable to be extradited under Irish law, in spite of repeated demands by Álvaro Uribe’s government, they also could not travel outside the territory of the Irish republic for fear that other nations might arrest them. In 2020, they received an amnesty as part of the peace process, but this was revoked last December because they had not fully cooperated with investigations. Once again, their situation remains uncertain.
Last year’s craic at the embassy was heightened by real Guinness and this wonderful pub owner visiting from Dublin
The shared experience of peacemaking has thankfully strengthened ties between the two nations. Ireland has continually backed efforts towards peace in Colombia and former Tánaiste (Deputy Prime Minister) Eamon Gilmore served as the European Union Special Envoy to the peace process. Numerous figures involved in peace talks in Ireland have visited the country in the last decade, such as Nobel peace prize winner David Trimble. Going the other way, Juan Manuel Santos received the Tipperary Peace Prize in 2018.
Diplomatic links between the two nations have also grown stronger in recent years. Michael D Higgins was the first Irish president to visit Colombia in 2017, accompanied by then Minister for Social Protection and current Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Leo Varadkar. Since then, embassies have been opened in Dublin and Bogotá, and one of the bigger foreign festivals in Colombia is an annual Saint Patrick’s Day parade in Usaquén.
Varadkar visited again last year for St Patrick’s, including a visit to La Roja brewery, founded by a Colombo-Irishman. According to the Irish embassy, the two countries “share a strong bilateral relationship… As we mark our national day, St Patrick’s Day, we celebrate the excellent relationship between our two nations, and look forward to deepening our bond in the years to come.”
Narco-subs are back in the news this week with the capture of two clandestine craft, one in the Colombian Pacific with two tons of cocaine – and two bodies – on board, and another found empty in an estuary by Spain’s Atlantic coast.
Low Profile Vessel used for smuggling intercepted in the Colombian Pacific this week. Photo: Colombian Navy.
Here’s a Q&A on the world of underwater smuggling.
Narco-subs sound fascinating, but are these proper submarines?
Most ‘narco-subs’ are actually boats, according to naval expert HI Sutton. On his website, he explains Colombian drug traffickers use ‘LPVs’, Low Profile Vessels, a kind of home-made stealth craft designed to float very low in the water making it invisible to radar.
The semi-submersible captured this week by the Colombian navy was 15 meters long and loaded with 2,600 kilos of cocaine, but powered by three large outboard motors which only work on the surface.
So not really ‘subs’ then?
Proper drug submarines do exist, but are much rarer – or harder to detect.
Some of these ‘FSVs’ (Fully Submersible Vessels) rely on a snorkel tube to bring air to the diesel motor, and have a conning tower, periscope and air conditioning, such as the Kevlar ‘super sub’ found close to the Ecuador-Colombia border in 2010.
Kevlar submarine found in the jungle close to the Ecuador-Colombia border. Photo. DEA
In 2020 an electric narco-sub with ten tonnes of batteries and room for six tonnes of cocaine was confiscated in Timbiquí, Cauca. But the most headline-grabbing narc submarine – and a proper big one at 46 meters – was found surprisingly far from the sea. Back in 2000, a police raid in Facatativá, a town close to Bogotá, discovered the steel sub.
It was being built in a nondescript warehouse with help from Russian technicians. If ever launched it could have dived to 100 meters and carried 200 tonnes of cocaine a distance of 2,500 kilometers.
One theory is that the double-skin steel hull, which would have been worth an estimated USD$10 million when complete, was destined to travel by road in three sections that could be bolted together somewhere by the coast.
A Russian link was later confirmed by revelations by Spanish smuggler Laureano Oubiña whose tell-all book recounted how former Soviet navy personnel brought technical expertise to narco-sub business in South America after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Facatativá Submarine, found in a warehouse high in the Andes in 2000. Photo: Military Humor
These narco-subs are nothing new then?
No, in fact they have been around in some form since at least the 1990s, though the early ones were so rare that US drug enforcement agencies nicknamed them ‘Bigfoot.’ The first vessel captured by US Coastguards in 2006 – codename Bigfoot Two – intensified a maritime game of cat-and-mouse that has since spread to Europe.
So, where can they travel?
Long thin LPVs with fast outboard motors tend to cover the Pacific route from Colombia to Central America. Caribbean routes are also used; in 2017 a narco-sub was captured off Texas.
Stubbier craft powered by diesel engines ply the route from Brazil to Europe, although some cargos are delivered to West Africa for land travel to Europe, and others diverted at sea to the US eastern coast.
Recent evidence suggests these transatlantic crossings are more frequent than commonly thought. The large LPV found abandoned this week in an estuary in Galicia, Spain is the third of its kind detected on that area of coastline.
And smuggler Laureano Oubiña claims that dozens of Latin American boats are resting on the seabed close to the Canary Islands having successfully transferred their cargos and crews to European boats.
Oubiña also claims that some narco-subs also travel 3,000 kilometers down the Amazon River even before embarking on their Atlantic voyage. They then rendezvous with Galician narco gangs who control Spain’s rocky coastline there.
El Che, the large LPV captured in Spain in 2019 after crossing the Atlantic. It is now in the Spanish Police Museum in Ávila, near Madrid. Photo: Guardia Civil
Crossing the Atlantic in a half-sunk boat can’t be fun….
Actually, it’s hell, according to research by Spanish journalist Javier Romero who wrote a detailed book – Operation Black Tide – on the 27-day, 5,600 kilometer trans-Atlantic voyage of Che, a 21-meter LPV sent from the Brazilian Amazon with three tonnes of Colombian cocaine in 2019.
The ill-fated voyage – Che weathered two mid-Atlantic storms and a near collision – took twice as long as planned and ended with the craft and crew captured off the Spanish coast of Galicia after a maritime hunt by law enforcement from four countries.
This odyssey has since been turned into a TV documentary and drama series detailing how the suffering crew was squeezed into a leaky cabin eating crackers and sardines and pooping in plastic bags. For some reason, narco-subs don’t have toilets.
Caramba! You’re sitting on US$100 million of cocaine, and you can’t take a proper dump?
It seems that way. Narco-subs vary in design from mechanical marvels to flimsy fiberglass go-fasts. Some have sophisticated equipment such as radios, radar, and geo-tracking. But all seem to lack basic plumbing.
Perhaps this is because most of these craft are designed for one-time use: they deliver their cargo to waiting boats close to the destination country and are then scuttled in deep water. Such is the profit from cocaine that a million-dollar craft is dispensable. But no baño.
Sounds uncomfortable. I can’t imagine any cartel kingpin behind the wheel…
Probably not. The fiberglass LPVs are constructed in remote jungle locations often on rivers in mangrove swamps on Colombia’s Pacific Coast, and then floated out to sea at night to be loaded with cargo.
Crew are local fishermen paid up to US$50,000 to navigate up to countries in Central America from where the cocaine can be more easily moved overland. The crew sometimes open valves to sink the boat if stopped by any navy or coast guard boats, hence destroying the evidence.
But then the captured narco-marineros are shackled in the holds of US Coast Guard ships – so-called ´Floating Guantanamos´ – sometimes for weeks since these ships spend months in the open ocean before returning to US jurisdiction.
It could be worse: the LPV captured this week off Colombia had two dead crew and two more very sick, it seems they had become overcome by fuel fumes below decks. And because these voyages are never registered, no-one knows for sure how narco-subs sink and how many crew die.
If there’s no room for a toilet, then even less chance of a liferaft. Perhaps for this reason local seamen call them ataúdes marinos; marine coffins.
Black Tide: the fictionalized account of the Che voyage on Amazon Prime.
Are many narco-subs captured? And how many deliver the goods?
At sea, the US Extended Border Program – with Coast Guard cutters and P3 radar planes way out in the Pacific Ocean – detects many more suspect vessels than can be boarded, highlighting the complexities of interdiction on the high seas.
Another headache for the Coast Guards is that drug gangs recruit local fishing fleets as watery lookouts, advising the drug gangs of approaching law enforcement. Fishing boats also offer logistic support such as fuel and food (and maybe the use of a toilet) to narco-subs in the high seas.
It’s also worth mentioning that FSVs – fully submersible narco vessels – have so far only been found on land. Not one has been caught at sea. Which begs the question: how many are out there?
Probably, though, traffickers prefer to use a shotgun strategy; send the mercancia with a variety of simpler stealth boats that can be built in batches in the jungle. If ten LPVs can each carry cocaine worth $80 million and only one gets caught… Well, do the math.
Where can I see a narco-sub?
There are a few places to see a narco-sub:
In the US, Bigfoot Two is on display at the Naval Air Station, Key West in Florida.
Colombia’s Pacific coast is the narco sub’s natural habitat, although we don’t advise anyone to go out in the mangrove swamps looking for them.
Meanwhile the Colombian Navy stores clandestine craft at their base in Bahia Malagá close to Buenaventura, just three hours by bus from Cali (then a boat ride). There is no guarantee they will allow you to see them, but no harm to ask.
Further down the coast is the navy base in Tumaco, another fertile area for LPVs: the Colombian military captured 33 just in the year 2019.
This means drug trafficking organizations will rely on narco vessels in the future. The big shift will probably be to unmanned vessels, perhaps similar to the drone boats or USV’s (Unmanned Service Vessels) deployed by Ukraine in the Black Sea. Already plans have been detected for a self-guided ‘narco torpedo’ which can attach itself with magnets to the hull of a larger ship for transport to Europe.
Sticking drugs to ships’ hulls is nothing new. But an automated drone drug torpedo – acting autonomously like a remora fish hitching a free ride with a shark – is something to keep Drug Enforcement Agents awake at night.
Our regular round-up of Colombia news that caught the world’s eye.
Pablo’s hippos: wild ones might be trapped and flown to India and Mexico.
Hippos on the move
Pablo Escobar’s escaped hippos are now facing capture and exile to India and Mexico, as reported by Voice of America and everyone else. Never out of the news for long, the massive mammals – 70 at the last count – went wild in the Magdalena River after their narco owner was killed in 1993 and were declared an invasive species. This latest plan proposes trapping them then flying them to zoos and parks willing to take them in, with Botswana, the Philippines and Ecuador also showing an interest.
Military admits female recruits
Colombia’s armed forces are now enlisting women in the ranks of combatants, with 1,296 joining up during February. The volunteer recruits have started basic training alongside male counterparts as part of the 200,000-strong military force. Women have previously signed up in admin and support roles but this is the first time in recent history they will join fighting units.
Release of oil workers
London’s BBC related the release of 88 police and oil workers detained by protestors at a petrol company compound in Caquetá. This followed a three-day standoff with campesinos and indigenous activists demanding better roads and schools in the area. Two people were killed – one a police officer – during the unrest.
Connecting Caracas
State airline SATENA has started its first international flights, from Bogotá to Caracas, according to Aviation Online, joining Venezuelan airline Turpial to connect the two capitals. Several other airlines have been granted rights to the route, including Avianca and Wingo, but are yet to schedule planes. Resumption of airlinks reflects a thaw in relations between the two neighbours. SATENA is also planning a Barranquilla-Caracas flight. Meanwhile much international media – and The Bogotá Post – reported on the demise of local airline Viva Air.
Slow boat to Colombia’s historic heart
From air to sea, and back to the Magdalena. Cruising company AmaWaterways announced plans to launch two riverboats to take travellers up Colombia’s colourful river in 2024, according to Travel Weekly. The luxury week-long tours will include the historic outposts of Mompox, Palenque, Magangué and the stilt-houses of Nueva Venecia and feature a gym and activities such as bird-watching. It remains to be seen if hippo-spotting will form part of the itinerary.
The colonial town of Mompox will feature in week-long river cruises of the Río Magdalena.
British traveller killed in Medellín
Sad news from Medellín of the suspected murder of a 34-year-old British visitor. Kyle MacKenzie was found with severe injuries in a ravine close to the city’s Cerro de Los Tres Cruces mountain path, but later died in hospital. He had been planning to stay several months in Colombia. Medellín investigators are following leads to the attackers.
Courting the Metaverse
A first for Colombia, and the world, was a legal case held entirely in the Metaverse with avatars – including a black-robed judge presiding over a virtual courtroom. The two-hour case, involving a trade union and police, “felt more real than a video call,” commented the (real) judge who promised to extend the trial.
Uncovering Maicao’s ´Middle East´
With its Moslem mayor, mosques, minarets, bustling markets and desert heat, the Guajira town of Maicao feels closer to Mecca than anywhere in Colombia. Al Jazeera has the latest on the ups and downs of a border town settled by migrants mostly from Lebanon, Syria and Palestine.
Thousands of passengers were stranded at airports this week after Viva Air grounded its flights.
Colombia’s beleaguered budget airline, Viva Air, grounded flights this week after months of uncertainty about its future. On Monday February 27, the airline announced it would suspend operations with immediate effect.
Thousands of passengers have been left stranded at airports both nationally and internationally. Flights were cancelled in Bogotá, Cartagena, Cali, Barranquilla, as well as Argentina, Perú and Brazil. Avianca and LatAm have stopped sales on some routes to accommodate passengers. Military planes have been dispatched to the Caribbean islands of San Andrés and Providencia.
#AtentosViajeros | ⚠️ @VivaAirCol reportó la cancelación de los siguientes vuelos, con origen en nuestro Aeropuerto, en la noche de este lunes 27 de febrero:
Viva Air blamed Aerocivil for the suspension of flights. It said the aviation authority had failed to make a decision about a potential merger with a “bigger and stronger group of airlines.” It didn’t directly name Avianca as it has in previous communications. In their own statement on the matter, Aerocivil asked Viva Air to guarantee the rights of its users and immediately find solutions for passengers. It also asked customers to “calm down.”
On February 10, Viva Air filed for a type of bankruptcy which essentially gave it 90 days to restructure its debts while continuing its operations. This process will continue in spite of the decision to halt operations. The challenge is that Viva Air needs cash. According to El País, it lost around 36 million US dollars in the first half of last year.
Yousef Alfuhigi on Unsplash
Why did Viva Air ground its flights?
Viva Air is one of a number of airlines that have had trouble regaining momentum after the pandemic. Just as travel restrictions were lifted and people had started to travel again, the industry was hit by fuel price hikes which put more pressure on an already struggling industry.
Viva Air and Avianca have made several attempts to merge their operations. An initial proposal, made in April last year, would have seen Avianca acquire its ailing competitor. The two companies then proposed a merger, which was also rejected due to competition concerns. Attempts to modify the proposal have not proved successful.
Most recently, Aerocivil registered other airlines – Wingo, Aerolíneas Argentinas, Ultra Air, LATAM Colombia, and JetSMART – as interested parties. According to the statement from Viva Air, this will slow the process and stop it from accessing the capital it needs to continue flying. Aerocivil said that it is part of normal procedure to open the process to third parties, as its responsibility is to find the best solution for the market, particularly passengers.
Will Viva Air start operations again?
Possibly. The trouble is that it’s impossible to know what will happen next. Viva Air argues that if its merger with Avianca goes ahead, it may be able to restart operations. But we don’t know how long it will take for Aerocivil to rule on the Avianca merger or what might happen with the offers from other airlines.
Unfortunately, it seems as if Viva Air customers are caught up in a spat between the airline and the authorities. Both sides blame the other, but it doesn’t really matter who is right – neither have provided passengers with information about how to get their money back or reorganize their flights.
I have a flight booked with Viva Air, what should I do?
Viva Air says that passengers should go to their website for more information. However, the website has no details on how to recoup your money or rebook your flight. In fact, the site is not working at all. You can also try calling on (604) 6044900. Unfortunately, you may not be able to get your money back, whatever the airline is saying.
If you’re due to fly before March 5, LATAM says it will take you at no extra cost as long as it has available seats. Passengers with flights in the coming days should contact LATAM for more information. Avianca has made a similar offer.
Hola, LATAM Airlines Colombia continuará reacomodando los pasajeros de Viva Air sin ningún costo para el pasajero siempre y cuando demuestre tener un ticket vigente con Viva. La medida se extenderá para los pasajeros con fecha de vuelo hasta el 5 de marzo. Saludos.
If you booked your flight using a credit card, talk to your credit card issuer to see if you can get your money back that way. Some credit cards offer travel insurance or other forms of protection, but every policy will be different. If you have travel insurance, check your policy to find out whether it covers airline bankruptcy and what protections you may have against cancelled flights. It is also worth registering a claim with the Superintendencia de Transporte.
Flight staff and other Viva employees are currently striking outside the El Dorado airport in Bogotá, so be aware of potential issues if you are flying, even if not with any of the airlines mentioned. There might also be significant disruption inside the airports.
We look at the rising phenomena of Colombians heading overseas
Colombians are heading out into the world in massive numbers this year. Photo: Sergio Trujillo
More than 547,000 Colombians left their home country without returning in 2022, a historic figure in recent history – the yearly average is well under 200,000 – which could be even higher when we factor in the probable 100,000 that sneaked out under the wire.
The Migracion Colombia data is speculative since it’s based on passport controls at entry and exit points, and it doesn’t disaggregate multiple journeys. But even allowing for glitches, the trend is alarming: in just twelve months one in 100 Colombians jumped ship, many of them under-40s from the productive workforce.
So why so many? It’s a burning question for pundits and politicos with few concrete answers – but plenty of theories. Here’s a few…
First up is ‘Petrophobia’, a reaction of many Colombians to anything seen as socialist, particularly in the form of current president Gustavo Petro. Left-right polarisation is understandable after decades of conflict with leftist guerrillas. But is it fair to blame Colombia’s recent swing to the left?
Any Petro effect “is very speculative,” migration expert William Mejía Ochoa told website La Silla Vacia this week: not everything can be explained by “panic at the new government”.
Covid bounce-back
Mejía sees the surge in 2022 as partly bounce-back from the Covid-19 pandemic when many life dreams were put on hold during travel shut-downs and visa droughts.
This theory makes sense when we consider that 2020 saw negative emigration – people stayed home because they had to – and the difficulties of traveling even after Colombian airports reopened in September 2020.
Even in 2021 the vaccination rules and forced quarantines scuppered many travel plans and piled on costs. Perhaps too, people felt obliged to stick close to their families with a continued fear of Covid-19.
By 2022 Covid-19 factors were falling away and the migration cork was out of the bottle.
Another fizz factor is the currency drop which leaves particularly younger people worrying for their economic future. The Colombian peso fell 20.9% in 2022, according to Reuters calculations, putting it among the world’s most devalued.
Of course, devaluation – and resulting inflation – can also be linked to worldwide pressures and it’s early days to blame it all on the current resident of the Casa de Nariño. In fact, Colombia’s GNP increased by 7.5% in 2022, a regional best, though economic stagnation is widely predicted for 2023.
But here’s a thing: the plummeting peso is both a push and pull for people to leave.
The economic fear factor pushes people away. The low peso is a strong magnet to earn foreign currency and remissions are far more valuable when sent back home to benefit friends or family, according to Jorge Restrepo, professor of economics at the Javeriana University of Bogotá.
“Peso devaluation makes it very profitable to earn abroad compared to what a person with the same skills can earn in Colombia,” he told El País this week.
It makes sense for Colombians to migrate to countries with strong currencies, which seems to be the case according to migration guru William Mejía: USA and Spain are high in the list for 2022, along with Canada and Chile.
Perhaps surprisingly, Mexico receives most Colombian migrants, with 191,000 heading that way in 2022. It’s probable though that “many of those persons appear to be leaving for Mexico but are really going to the USA”, says Mejía.
Which brings us to the Biden factor: the recent expectation in Latin America that a Democratic government in Washington would open the borders to migrants. Hence decampment to Mexico.
But that hasn’t happened. In fact, the Biden government has toughened the rules in the last year. More than 18,000 Colombian border-crossers were detained at the border in 2022, many facing ‘express deportation’, automatic loss of any asylum rights and the triggering of a 10-year ban on even trying to apply through proper channels.
“The substantial increase in the emigration of young Colombians imposes an enormous loss of human capital and productive potential for the country,” concludes a leaked report by CERAC, a think tank reporting on the Migración Colombia figures which show 35% of emigrants are between 18 and 29 years of age, 23% in their thirties, and 19% are under 18.
Younger Colombians better fit the physical needs of available jobs abroad, and to some degree they have been replaced by the estimated 2.9 million Venezuelan migrants – often in the same age range – settling in recent years in Colombia.
But low wages and lack of opportunities in Colombia have also created a brain drain, even if professional migrants cannot follow their chosen career path overseas, as highlighted by a recent report of a Colombian psychologist earning four times more salary serving tacos in Miami than shrinking heads back home.
It all adds up to more reasons to leave. A recent Gallup poll found that 47% of Colombians surveyed wanted out, second only to Hondurans in Latin America.
Still, it remains to be seen if the 2022 data is an outlier or longer-term trend. It won’t just depend on the economy. Historically, the other big driver of emigration has been conflict, as seen in the embattled Pastrana presidency which culminated in 282,000 Colombians fleeing in 2000, a previous record.
An ambitious Total Peace Plan
All observers agree that the current exodus is based on perceptions of a poor economy. Can improving security counterbalance the financial factors and reverse the emigration trend?
It’s probable that the Petro government is banking on such a peace dividend, delivered through the ambitious but unclear Total Peace Plan.
It’s a tempting thought: upwardly mobile Colombians flocking back with dollars in their pockets ready to invest in their pacified home country.
At least for now, however, that doesn’t look likely. Although well-intentioned, the Total Peace Plan has so far only increased insecurity in many conflict areas of the country. Meanwhile illegal armed groups are expanding and recruiting, further limiting spaces for legitimate business and employment.
And if Total Peace flops, then the combined factors of conflict and economic crisis will doubly accelerate the exodus, in which case the legitimate question will arise: “Can the last person out please turn off the light?”.
Colombia’s hottest music event, Festival Estéreo Picnic, kicks off on March 23 with Billie Eilish, Drake and Chemical Brothers the headline acts. There’s plenty of local talent backing them up too…
A throw-back to 2016 when Alabama Shakes performed at Festival Estéreo Picnic. Photo: Andres Alvarado
March is fast approaching and that can only mean one thing for Bogotá’s music aficionados and party-lovers alike: the eagerly awaited return of Estéreo Picnic. Last year was a roaring post-pandemic success and this year promises to build on that, with an extra day added on Thursday.
The four-day bonanza is Colombia’s biggest festival, with organisers teaming up with other events in Latin America to bring in a host of international big-hitters to the region as well as a host of local stars. With 80 artists spanning almost every genre imaginable, from new wave classics to the latest in house and electro; there’s something for everyone.
Whether you’re a first-time picnicker or a seasoned veteran, we’re here to guide you through the mundo distinto of Estéreo Picnic. We’ll also have plenty of coverage of local bands before the festival kicks off so you know who to look out for.
The festivities kick off on Thursday 23rd March with staples of the international alt-rock scene: The 1975, Tame Impala and Wallows, that’s not to mention hyperpop sensations 100 gecs and the ultimate Y2K nostalgia band Blink-182. But it’s not just big extranjero names, don’t miss the opportunity to catch paisa electro trio Mr Bleat, rolo trap artist Ha$lopablito and local mega star Juliana.
Friday brings bigger crowds and even bigger names – we’re talking the likes of memelord extraordinaire Drake, Blondie, Fred again and Tove Lo. And of course a hearty dose of home-grown talent. We’ve got our eyes on Salt Cathedral, a duo that met at jazz school in New York but grew up in the same barrio in Bogotá and Tropicana Club, an indie-electro artist hailing from Cali.
Be sure not to use up all your energy on Friday because you’ll need plenty to dance the night away to the likes of The Chemical Brothers, Wu-Tang Clan and Gorgon City on Saturday. We’re also clearing our schedules to get to the front row for Bogotá-based trio La Perla, who mix the rhythms of the Caribbean with the sounds of the city and Elkin Robinson, a musician who also offers a taste of the Caribbean but this time with a folk spin.
Sunday, day of rest? Think again. There’s no way you’ll want to pass up the chance to see Billie Eilish and Lil Nas X take to the stage. Or if you fancy a more relaxed end to your weekend, don’t miss rising star Kali Uchis’ soft vocals and returning sensation La Ramona’s R&B-infused melodies.
The practicalities
Ok now we’ve got you hooked with the line-up, how do you get your hands on a precious ticket? If you’re based in Colombia head over to Entradas amarillas and if you’re overseas, use this link. Tickets are sold in stages and start at COP$647,000 for a single day, or COP$1,295,000 for three and COP$1,532,000 for the full festival. If you’re feeling fancy there’s also VIP options, promising exclusive areas and a fast-track queue, but a four-day ticket will set you back COP$3,181,000.
The festival is held at Campo de Golf Briceño 18, several kilometres outside the city meaning if you’re not prudent, transportation isn’t exactly a picnic. Getting there is easy enough – you can take the bus service provided, or hop a Transmi to Terminal, exit to the autopista and hail a bus going past Briceño. It’s cheaper, but slower and easy to make mistakes.
Coming home is trickier – the last thing you want is to be stranded without a taxi in sight at 3am. Your best bet is probably to take advantage of the pre-organised bus options. A round trip for three days will cost you COP$135,000, but it’s likely better than the alternatives. If you’re arranging a car pick up, there will be traffic jams around the area, but it calms down a few km down the road.
Something else to note is that, as in previous years, Estéreo Picnic is using a cashless bracelet system that you can preload before you go and top up onsite. It worked well last year, and even better at Festival Cordillera in November.
More details about all the ins and outs of this year’s festival can be found on the Estéreo Picnic website.
Also keep your eyes peeled on our socials for playlists, interviews and more.
Teusaquillo plays host to SakoAskoFest this weekend in a short-lived pop-up exhibition. We went to the launch to see why there’s so much buzz around this young Colombian artist.
Sako Asko’s brightly coloured but darkly comic art will be on display at Casa Calo this weekend. Art: Sako Asko
This weekend features a red hot opportunity to catch one of Colombia’s best young artists, Sako Asko. That’s his nome de arte, but his real name is Santiago Oliveros. He’s best-known for brightly coloured yet darkly comic observations on life. He says he wanted to put on a retrospective but “it ended up as a festival, SAKOASKOFEST.”
In a quiet corner of Teusaquillo, you’ll find the Juicy Juicy exhibition of Sako’s work at Casa Celo, a pop-up gallery in a large old Bogotá townhouse. He will be exhibiting again in Colombia later this year, and in Mexico and Europe too, but this is set to be the most intimate and fun of the events, with music and events alongside the art.
We toddled along to the gin-soaked launch party to speak to the artist himself about the exhibition. He’s gregarious and funny, with sharply intuitive eyes. We’ve spoken before, and he enquires after my dogs – his work may be dark, but he has a light soul. He tells me his NY resolutions are “to publish El Viajero and to live with more gratitude.”
Sako Asko is better described as a world in which we see Oliveros’ view of contemporary society and the pressures we live under. Garishly bright colours saturate hellish images of the worst parts of modern human culture. People sit zombified by the screens in front of them, with disconnection a running theme in his work.
We last spoke to Santiago in February 2020, just a month or so before the chaos of COVID-19 arrived in Colombia and turned everything upside down. He says that “the pandemic showed me that at any moment, without warning, many things can fall down. It gave me a sense of detachment and fluidity from my projects and goals.”
Since that point, however, he’s gone from strength to strength. It seems the distorted world of the pandemic perfectly fits his dystopian visions. In late 2022 he exhibited and toured in Europe. “In London particularly, I had a great connection with the people who came to the show. I think the English humour is dark and sarcastic, and of course my images have those ingredients too.”
Although Oliveros is best known for his bright, bold pop-art cartoons, he’s also featuring two other parts of his work: the Huracanes series of oil paintings and his mythology-inspired ink prints. Prints and series start from COP$80,000, although an original oil painting will go well into the millions. Pins and clothes using his images start from COP$30,000.
The Huracanes series features landscapes, often involving water and especially rivers. These are mostly in appropriately washed-out colours, evoking a strong sense of melancholy and despair – a drowning figure here and a flayed man there. Curiously, the rivers carry Indian names such as Ganges and Yamuna.
His ink prints, on the other hand, are vivid and stark. Clean lines delineate sharp, precise symbols leaning heavily on Norse-style imagery. There are warriors and wolves, each one a study in solitary pensiveness. Other inspirations seem to have arrived from Hinduism, connecting back to the Indian river names in Huracanes.
The exhibition is open from 6pm today, and from four in the afternoon next week. Saturday and Sunday start at 1pm and 10am respectively. There’s a band on for Friday night (9pm), and speed dating on Saturday night (7pm). On Sunday, you can take part in a drawing workshop with Santiago for COP$50,000. Register for that by messaging +57 314 2670375.
Sako Asko Fest runs until Feb 22 at Casa Celo, Carrera 16 #35-23. Free admission.
Petro wants to introduce dramatic changes to Colombia’s health system. Find out what he’s proposing and whether the cure is worse than the disease.
A health clinic in Amazonas department of Colombia: broken and understaffed. Photos: Steve Hide
After several tense months – and some twitter-baiting from the president himself – the Petro government has finally presented plans to reform Colombia’s health system. Congress will now debate radical proposals which could up-end decades of private-public partnership.
People are rightly nervous, even within Petro’s own cabinet. Can his plans revive the ailing body of health services? Or will medical meddling push the patient into rigor mortis?
Nothing is certain, but here’s what we know so far.
An end to the EPSs?
No-one loves their EPS, but we might miss them if Petro’s plan goes ahead.
Empresa Promotora de Salud are insurers that link patients to a network of health providers. They are also intermediaries for disbursement of government health funds, frequently caught in corruption scandals, or going broke overnight leaving their thousands of patients in limbo.
A central plank of Petro’s plan is to scrap the EPSs in their current form and return most of their functions to state entities. The private EPSs, “suck money out of the health system” he tweeted recently, going to the core of his argument that “health should not be a business.”
But in Colombia health has long been delivered through a for-profit health partnership between EPSs and public institutions that was launched in 1993 and lauded soon after as the “most fair in the world” by the World Health Organisation.
One innovation was pooling social security funds from salaried workers with government subsidies for the poor and unemployed. The goal was to get more people signed onto health insurance plans, and it worked with bells on. Since its inception, in thirty years enrolment shot up from 25% to over 95%.
Today that success is something of a mirage. Particularly in rural areas, where communities are signed onto health plans. EPSs frequently fail to deliver services leaving fragile public health clinics to pick up the pieces.
EPSs tend to cherry-pick busy urban areas where they work to maximise profits. They tend to focus on curative medicine – care packets to sell – rather than preventative health. There’s less profit in stopping people from getting sick.
And to boost profits EPSs run their own “premium” schemes which fast-track wealthy patients to gilded suites while the masses struggle with wait lists and automated phone centres. The longer the wait, the more incentive for people to join the premium plan – at least those that can afford it.
Health reform? Or a new model…
Despite these distortions, the larger EPS’s have managed insurance plans and networks of health providers for 30 years accruing vital expertise, particularly in risk management and auditing. And for most Colombians, they are the recognisable face of health care.
More to the point: how easily can they be replaced?
Scrapping the current system will result in “a great chaos” warned ACEMI this week, the Asociación Colombiana de Empresas de Medicina Integral which represents EPSs and their allied private health providers.
At a wider level, Petro has no plans to end private health. Wealthy Colombians can still access premier services. But the majority will shift from their EPSs to a public health body.
ACEMI’s worry – shared by some of Petro’s own cabinet – is how will that work. And when? Petro’s plan is thin on specifics. And how will Petro overcome that torpor characterises public entities in Colombia?
According to ACEMI, most Colombians “want to improve EPSs, but not to end them.” Petro´s proposals go beyond a simple reform, it claims: “What the Government is proposing is a new health model that would start from zero.” That’s a worry for anyone needing regular health care.
A pivot to primary health care
A possible future role for the EPS’s mooted by Health Minister Carolina Corcho is to manage a network of community clinics, or CAPS – Centros de Atención Prioritaria en Salud. Each would aim to cover 20,000 people, with doctors and nurses covering primary health, health promotion, and family planning.
The network would incorporate existing public clinics and hospitals but also 3,000 new facilities each fully staffed and managing outreach teams for remote and indigenous communities.
If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. First, there is the cost, COP$25 billion just for infrastructure, according to initial estimates presented by Corcho. Tellingly, the CAPS plan comes with a caveat: “assuming funds available,” which means all or nothing at all.
And EPS involvement in CAPS was a late U-turn from Petro following outcry over his plan to scrap them. But even that has failed to soothe public nerves, since their new incarnation will be so stripped down to be effectively “liquidated”, according to ACEMI.
Bringing it back to rural areas
Petro’s CAPS plan could have its biggest impact in rural areas where populations have dire access to health services. Around 800 of the country’s 1,112 municipalities rely on a run-down public clinic and 56 percent of rural areas have only ruins of health posts built in previous public health plans in the 1980s.
This is partly down to weak institutions, but also an economy of scale. Take the department of Guainía for example with a rural population of 10,000 people spread over 72,000 square kilometres – about the same size as Scotland. And all swamps and jungles and rivers. In fact, the only official road goes to the airport. Bringing health here is a challenge for any health system, and doubly difficult to turn a profit.
An abandoned village health post in the conflict zone of Nariño’s Pacific Coast.
The same can be said for departments like Amazonas, Chocó, La Guajira, Vichada, and Vaupés. All are huge territories with poor populations strung out over huge distances with hardly any transport systems and weak or non-existent health services.
These inequalities mean people dying. In Vichada, for example, infant mortality rates are 281 per 100,000, almost seven times the national average (42 deaths per 100,000).
Another feature of rural areas is reliance on air ambulances for critical cases, which in Amazon and the Eastern Llanos Plains invariably evacuate patients to Bogotá hospitals, assuming the community is lucky enough to have a serviceable airstrip.
That sounds good in theory – it means lives are saved. But once again it feeds a for-profit system cashing in on a nearly total lack of resolutive health services on the ground.
Other fixes to the health system
Health system problems don’t exist in isolation, and Colombia’s congress will be looking at complementary solutions while considering Petro’s reform plan. For example, finding ways to increase the rate of formal employment.
This matters because the original reforms of 1991 assumed a shift to salaried workers which contribute directly to health plans. But thirty years on most adults are still working informally – around 60%, according to the DANE. That figure has not shifted in a decade.
While some independent contractors also contribute to the health pot, many other informal workers are enrolled in the subsidised scheme meaning government still covers half the population for health care contributions. Getting workers in formal employment, or more independent workers contributing, will lower that burden.
Another perennial problem for Colombia is its weak public institutions, particularly in rural areas. It means they are more prone to funds lost to corruption, but also poor management and short-term planning. For example, hundreds of telemedicine kits have been donated to rural clinics in recent years by central government. The trouble is there are no plans for broadband internet to connect them.
Emergency air evacuation from the Amazon. Lack of local clinics means more cases are flown to Bogotá, further draining funds for preventative health.
Then there are also two large elephants in the room: cocaine and conflict. Coca-growing areas invariably fall outside the health net and armed groups routinely harass health workers, extort services and supplies, or even their salaries, or scare them away altogether.
Recognising these realities and developing strategies to deliver health in conflict zones – collaborations with NGOs and human rights groups for example – could improve access for stranded communities.
Health services can also be simplified to be more effective. Colombia’s restrictive practices mean only doctors can deliver babies. This may work in cities, but it’s hardly practical for vast rural areas with no MD in sight. Incorporating traditional midwives in the health plan could reduce infant mortality if handled correctly.
Can congress find a compromise?
It’s unlikely that Petro’s health plan will pass muster in its purest form. There is no popular clamour to scrap the EPS system in urban areas and Petro’s own team is worried radical change is a reform too far. And any sensible timeline for such a radical shift would take years longer than Petro’s current presidential term.
But behind the bluster is a real need to overhaul the system, particularly in rural areas. This goes hand in hand with other social reforms and the pressing need to tackle conflict and corruption.
Can Congress find a compromise solution that delivers fairer health without tearing down the house? That’s what Colombians are hoping for.
Both fans and critics of Petro’s programme of far-reaching reforms have organised mass mobilisations this week
Petro puts forward his master development plan. Photo: Departamento Nacional de Planeación
This week Colombia’s streets will once again play host to a series of mass protests. Both opponents and supporters of the President’s ‘national development plan’ are planning to come out in force as the controversial policy package starts its fraught progress through the parliamentary system.
Be prepared for two days of disruption. If you’re in a major city and need to move about, check social media for updates on where the protests are taking place. Many people are working from home today as there may be road closures and issues with the TransMilenio. Plus, as we’ve seen in the past, peaceful protests can quickly become not-so peaceful.
What are people protesting about?
On February 6, Petro presented his Plan de Desarrollo Nacional (PDN)to Congress and six days later the first of several days of demonstrations began. The development plan sets out Petro’s proposals on health, education, pensions, and more.
The army reserves kicked things off on Sunday (Feb. 12) by calling an “indefinite national strike” in response to the reforms. The day also saw protests in Medellín that took a swing at the local authorities as well as Petro and drewsupport from right-wing figures like former president Álvaro Uribe.
This was followed by a second day of unrest yesterday, this time organised by the several conservative groups and the truckers union. However, the focal points of the demonstration diary are the national mobilisations scheduled for today and tomorrow.
February 14: A “historic” day for Petro?
Taking to Twitter, the President called for a day of “great social dialogue” and invited supporters of his campaign for “change” to gather in the city centre. The demonstration is set to take place today from 2pm with Petro giving a speech from the balcony of the Casa de Nariño an hour afterwards.
Whilst it may seem a little unusual for a sitting president to encourage mass mobilisations, the move isn’t wholly surprising from Petro. His fondness for calling supporters to the street as mayor and large election rallies is one of the reasons critics have labelled him a “populist” leader.
Petro has been backed in his call for support by politicians like Susana Boreal who spoke of the demonstration as a chance to “defend the power of the people” and Martha Peralta Epieyú who described the reforms as a “true change”.
February 15: Postponed protests
Opponents of Petro’s reforms originally intended to voice their frustrations on February 14. However, the plan was postponed after the president announced a rival demonstration on the same day. The protests are now set to start at 10 am on February 15 in cities across the country.
Centro Democrático politicians Paloma Valencia, Miguel Polo Polo and María Fernanda Cabal have been some of the most vocal supporters of the protest. Valencia has claimed that the PDN will represent “the demolition of Colombian institutions”, whilst Cabal has focussed reforms to the health system that she claims put “the lives of Colombians at risk.”
And as if two days of mass mobilisation wasn’t enough disruption, the national taxi driver’s union has also called a strike on February 22 to put pressure on the government to ban rent-a-ride platforms like Uber and Cabify.
What is the Plan Nacional de Desarrollo?
Petro’s package of wide-ranging reforms hopes to radically change the country by 2026. The mammoth document starts by laying out his philosophical approach to social, environmental and economic change, before mapping out his proposals for COP$1.154 trillion of public investment over four years.
Education: Free higher education places for traditionally marginalised groups and improved internet and telecommunications access in rural areas.
Welfare support: A “zero hunger” programme providing greater food relief, easier access to social housing, tax reforms to graduate public service contributions, meaning those less well-off will contribute less.
Health: Restructuring of the financing model for health providers with the aim of improving access to quality care.
Total peace: Commitment to further peace negotiations with groups like the National Liberation Army and the Clan del Golfo and implementation of elements of the 2016 peace agreement with the FARC.
Environment: Creation of a national registry for the reduction of green house gas emissions, stimulus packages for carbon-neutral projects.
Agriculture: Support for small-scale farmers and co-operatives to obtain legal right to their lands, improved access to drinking water, measures to increase domestic food production and reduce food prices, creation of road infrastructure to allow rural communities to travel to markets.
The ambitious plan has unsurprisingly received backlash from conservative groups and politicians. Proposed reforms to the tax system and health financing structures have come under particularly heavy fire. The PND was also critiqued earlier this month by Bogotá mayor Claudia López for failing to reference the Bogota Metro amid tense disagreement over changes to the first line.
Congress now has until May 7 to discuss Petro’s master plan. These may be the first major protests of his presidential term, but as Congress analyses the controversial package over the coming months, they seem unlikely to be the last. Some of those planning to turn out this week calling for a “Paro Nacional 2023”, hinting at the potential for protests to snowball as they did in 2021 and 2019.
We’re happy to see more police on the streets, but we’d also like to see crime go down. When a city loses respect for the police, chaos can ensue.
The extra police presence in Bogotá is welcome, but it requires action to see crime go down. Photo: Oli Pritchard
I wrote last week about Claudia López and her new police initiative. There are certainly more bobbies on the beat, at least to my eye, so it’s a cautious thumbs-up for now. However, having more police on the street is one thing – their effectiveness quite another. With so few laws enforced in the capital, is it any wonder that so many complain of a crimewave?
Crime in Bogotá is a perennial concern and it’s fair to say that it sometimes feels as though many people in this fine city somewhat overstate the crime level. There’s an element of that, to be sure, but the numbers themselves are sobering indeed. According to recent data from the Secretaría Distrital de Seguridad, Convivencia y Justicia, there were a thousand murders last year and over 12,000 robberies a month. In short, there’s no shortage of crime.
At times the police are spurred into action, and sometimes they move quickly. Note the sterling work inside Colombia and overseas to arrest John Poulus, prime suspect in the Valentina Trespalacios case. Feminist groups have pointed out, though, that the long arm of the law is rarely as quick with less high-profile cases. If it can be done for one suspect, what stops it being done for others?
Neither is this restricted to dramatic cases – even the most basic of laws are rarely enforced. For example, it’s common to see police in my local pocket park. However, that park is still filled with dog shit and benighted by litter. Adults use and damage the children’s playground, others use the foliage for their own piss party. Dogs are rarely leashed and cars ignore road signs, both of which cause accidents. All of this in front of groups of police who wilfully ignore their own police code – even when asked to intervene.
You don’t have to look far to find a Colombian complaining about the inefficiency of the police, and many would say the only difference between them and The Simpsons’ Wiggum is that they tend to be munching on empanadas and not doughnuts. You’ve no doubt seen it yourself, a group of officers at a station as naughtiness unfolds around them. There’s little control from on high, it would seem, and plenty of corruption in the force.
Police code made little difference
Back in 2016 we were concerned about that new police code, thinking that it represented a great loss of liberty and handed unwarranted powers to the police. Worse still, many of the rules were seemingly draconian and the fines enormous – up to a whole minimum salary for relatively minor offences. Today, that outrage seems hopelessly naïve – the code is basically ignored completely.
At heart, this comes down to respect. A police force that cannot command respect is one that will be ignored. I’m constantly amazed at the laissez faire attitude of many coppers here, as I’m used to a constabulary that will front up and be proactive when rules are broken. It doesn’t have to be a big deal. It can be enough to just let someone know that they’re in the wrong and need to change course. After all, once you know you can take the piss out of coppers, why not go on the rob?
Colombian lawmakers love to create new laws and do so at a rate of knots. Few of these laws are enforced in any sensible way, though, so why bother making them? There’s an argument that the police can’t enforce laws as the courts are overwhelmed and the jails full anyway. That’s understandable, but those are problems that can and should be sorted out, not naturally occurring phenomena outside the remit of humanity.
The stalking nightmares behind this, of course, are vigilantism and populism. As we enter a local election cycle, what more effective platform to stand on than ‘tough on crime’? It’s worked for many – the ‘world’s most popular dictator’ is not far away in El Salvador and he enjoys sky-high approval ratings. Closer to home, it’s a card that Uribe himself played to great effect, leading to horrible consequences such as the falsos positivos. Uribista former defence minister Diego Molano has a shockingly casual attitude to the deaths of his enemies and he threw his hat into the mayoral candidate ring this week. Let’s hope we can get on top of crime in a measured, reasonable manner rather than sliding towards chaos.
As the president and mayor battle it out, the future of Bogotá’s long-awaited metro line is once again in doubt.
Petro has been pushing for an underground metro since he was mayor. Photo: Empresa Metro de Bogotá
The weary commuters of Bogotá have been promised a transport revolution for more than 80 years. It’s much needed. The capital was rated the sixth worst city for traffic in the world in the 2022 INRIX Global Traffic Report, costing residents an estimated 122 hours a year.
Mayor Claudia López entered the alcadía in January 2020 with a promise to solve the city’s transport woes. Now she warns that the project to construct the capital’s first metro line – which is already under construction – is under threat, blaming interference from President Petro.
As tensions rise between Casa de Nariño and the mayor’s office, we attempt to unravel the latest subway squabbles.
What is the current plan for Bogotá’s metro?
Work on Bogotá’s metro began in October, 2020 after a Chinese consortium was awarded the contract for the project’s construction and maintenance in 2019. According to López, 18% of the contracted work is already complete. She says that almost all the required properties have been bought and that work around Calle 72 is already underway.
Estimated completion date: 2028
Estimated cost: COP$12.9 trillion
Length: 23.9 kilometres stretching between Calle 78 with Caracas and Bosa (Portal de Américas)
Service: Empresa Metro Bogotá claims it will connect the north and south in just 27 minutes with 16 stops along the way, ten of which will be connected to the Transmilenio
The mayor is also pushing forward with plans for a second line in the north of the city. The project which, would be fully underground, would connect Calle 72 and Fontanar del Río. The alcadía hopes to award contracts this year and start work in 2025 with an estimated end date of 2032.
The controversy: Underground? Overground?
The Bogotá district government started the year by promising that residents would see more progress on the metro this year and announced that the line would be running by 2028. But the plans are now in turmoil because Petro believes there’s a better way. The key question: underground or overground.
The spat has been brewing since last year, when reports emerged that Petro had met with the Chinese consortium in charge of construction. According to El Tiempo, the consortium then drew up new potential plans that would allow at least part of the line to run underground. The construction team presented these proposals to Petro and López last week.
Work has already begun on Bogota’s first metro line. Photo: Alcadía de Bogotá
But there are cost and time issues, not to mention legal concerns about changing plans part way through. Taking the line underground could mean an extra spend of COP$8-17 trillion and delay the opening of the Bogotá metro until 2035.
López pointed out that the proposals could go against the terms of the project’s contract, potentially opening the alcaldíaand government up to legal threats. “It is the pockets of citizens that will end up paying for any sanction or demand for an arbitrary modification of a public contract,” she tweeted.
The Attorney General’s office echoed the mayor’s warnings, stating that the changes posed “serious risks” and could go against the principles of contractual planning. The office later scaled up its warnings, adding that the proposals could lead to “costs overruns.” It said, changes would not be within the “criteria of reasonableness, proportionality, necessity and technical justification” required.
How did we get here?
Ambitions for Bogotá’s first metro line didn’t start with López. It was first proposed by Mayor Carlos Sanz de Santamaria in 1942. A number of factors, primarily financial, meant that it wasn’t until the last decade that progress finally started.
During his stint as Bogotá’s mayor (2012 – 2015) President Petro spent much time drawing up proposals for an underground metro. In fact it was Petro who made an agreement with the then President Juan Manuel Santos that the national government would contribute 70% of the budget. But his term finished before he could realise his grand plans.
His successors, Enrique Peñalosa and López, both continued to push forward with the vision for Bogotá’s first metro line, but they favoured an overground model, much to the dismay of their predecessor.
Some think that the roots of Petro’s almost fanatical commitment to an underground metro lie in his adversarial relationship with Peñalosa and a desire to stick to his original plan. But Petro argues this is worth fighting for because it’s better for the city long term. According to El Colombiano, he thinks that putting the metro underground will minimize disruption to the traffic on the surface, and that an elevated metro lead to increased insecurity and have a negative impact on the areas underneath it. Whatever’s driving it, the president seems unlikely to back down.
So what now?
Despite legal warnings and heated Twitter exchanges, Petro is set on his underground ambitions. According to El Espectador, Transport Minister Guillermo Reyes said that if Claudia López didn’t accept the proposals, the government could stop financing for 70% of its other projects. Reyes was called to Congress this week to explain his comments – ones that the mayor labelled as “blackmail.”
Petro requested two legal opinions, one of which has already come back. He insists there are legal means for alterations to the plans despite the contract. The president says the work that’s been done on the metro so far is important, but construction hasn’t actually begun. He also organised two working groups to further analyse the possibilities of contract modification.
Hoy por hoy no se han entregado los estudios definitivos del metro elevado, no es cierto que se esten realizando obras directamente del metro.
Las obras complementarias que se realizan hoy son importantes, traslado de redes, patio taller, pero aun no empieza la construcción
While Petro and Reyes insist the government is fulfilling its obligations, Claudia López has expressed outrage that the capital’s metro plans are not part of the recently unveiled National Development Plan. She tweeted, “Extraordinary! It’s the first time the National Government does not include the Bogotá metro as a strategic project in its Development Plan!”
Insólito! Es la primera vez que el Gobierno Nacional no incluye el metro de Bogotá como proyecto estratégico en su Plan De Desarrollo! Concretando el chantaje Ministro? Van a parar el metro? A seguir dilatando las autorizaciones de crédito del metro subterráneo a Suba y Engativa? https://t.co/K2IBxbuiPZ
The President has also tweeted that he will push forward a scheduled trip to China to “seek options with the [Chinese] government in relation to the metro.”
López has responded to the President’s intrusions with a defiant “Metro ya!” and 32 councillors have written an open letter pleading with the President not to delay construction. However, only the coming weeks can tell what is truly in store for Avenida Caracas and the commuters of Bogotá.
Bogotá is having her first Día sin Carro of the year today, and it’s provoking strong feelings on all sides as usual.
With regular cars off the roads, bikes, TransMi and taxis take over. Photo: Oliver Pritchard
Twice a year, Bogotá bans personal car use for the vast majority of the city for the day. Today is the first of the 2023’s shutdowns, known as Día sin Carro y Moto. The dates aren’t fixed; the first usually falls around this time of year and the second in autumn, around September.
It’s a lot more extreme than the normal Sunday and holiday ciclovía schemes, as all regular cars are banned from all roads. Obvious exceptions exist for taxis, buses, emergency vehicles, and certain key workers such as doctors.
The policy is controversial to say the least. It has, rather predictably, led to much wailing and gnashing of teeth from a whole host of sectors. Of course, people who usually use their cars to commute are furious, but it’s worth remembering that they are by no means the majority of the city’s commuters.
We spoke to a man called Daniel at a Tembici bikehire station, who said, “I use [Tembici] every day to go up to 72; it’s very convenient. In fact I’m working from home today, but I cycled in with my wife to her work and back anyway because it’s such a nice day.”
I’ve lived through many car-free days in the last decade in Bogotá, and I’ve noticed a significant change post-pandemic. During the last Día sin Carro in September 2022, many businesses that could accommodate remote working simply asked employees to work from home and universities just cancelled many classes.
A lot of people didn’t even attempt to travel, despite the fact that most people don’t even use cars. This reflects the growing acceptance of remote and hybrid working in Colombia, and points to a possible future with fewer commuters. After all, Bogotá is a much nicer city if you don’t have to move around too much in it. Cities should be designed for people, not cars.
So what’s the point of all of this? Well, the reason is above – Bogotá is so much nicer without traffic jams, fumes, noise, delays and chaos. Bogotá might not be as bad as some Asian cities in terms of air pollution, but it’s certainly not a shining ecological star. Día sin carro reduces this significantly, according to the city’s environmental department. Commute times are laughably inefficient, which leads to a lot of wasted time, lowering productivity and quality of life.
The usually traffic-clogged Portal Norte is clear even at rush hour on Día sin Carro. Photo: Brendan Corrigan
So, what can you do?
If you’re out and about during Día sin Carro, you have several transport options.
Buses
Most people will be hopping on some type of bus, as indeed most commuters do every day. Whether it’s TransMilenio rapid bus transit, SITP buses in their rainbow of assorted colours or regular colectivos, they’re the transport lifeblood of la nevera.
There might be a bit more crowding than usual, but off-peak it’s unlikely to be too bad. Also, there are more buses in circulation today, and they don’t have anywhere near as much traffic to navigate. You might think that in the case of the TransMi that’s not an issue, but remember that cars often get stuck crossing TransMi lanes.
Bikes
Remember, you can always get on your bike in Bogotá. We’ve criticised the self-aggrandising capital mundial de bici posturing from the alcaldía before, but it’s still an excellent city (and country) to ride in. The bike lanes will be busier than normal, but there are plenty of them and they’re far less stressful than normal traffic. Do be careful though, as a truck driver has already killed a cyclist today.
No bike? No problem! Bogotá recently inaugurated the aforementioned bikeshare scheme with a Brazilian company called Tembici. They’re getting plenty of use, and the alcaldía has made a big push to get some of the damaged bikes repaired faster and back into the system for today. Having tried the bikes out, I can personally say they do the job just fine.
Daniel docks his Tembici rideshare bike – and he wasn’t even going to work! Photo: Oli PritchardWith the streets empty, there’s more space for those commuting via bus. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Taxis
You may have trouble moving about with rideshare apps, but the regular yellow taxis are most definitely buzzing about the city today. Hopefully, they’ll be on their best behaviour today and not taking advantage of the situation. Despite copping a lot of flak, rolo taxis aren’t nearly as bad as they’re often made out to be and have a big incentive to play nicely right now.
Walk!
It’s a blazing Bogotá day with fewer fumes in the air. Perfect conditions for a stroll in the sunshine. Most of the city is very flat and walkable, and you’re never far from a decent café to keep yourself from sunburn and rehydrate. Our top tip for a day like today is a limonada de coco!
Bogotá’s national museum offers the chance to clue up on all things hip-hop colombiano or simply indulge in some 90s nostalgia ahead of this year’s 25th anniversary of Hip-Hop al Parque.
Museo Nacional has a whole range of hip-hop related articles on display. Photo: Museo Nacional
The compelling rhythms and slang-ladden lyrics of paisas Alcolirykoz aren’t the traditional welcome visitors might expect on entrance into the Museo Nacional. Nor is it exactly the norm to stumble upon a fellow visitor tagging a wall in fluorescent pink marker without so much as a cursory glance from the attendant security guard.
But then Nación Hip-Hop:Colombia al Ritmo de una Cultura is far from the stuffy conservative fare one might expect from any other national history museum. Professional curators have teamed up with some of Colombian hip-hop’s biggest stars such as N.Hardem and La Etnnia, both of whom lit up Festival Cordillera last year, to transform the temporary exhibition hall into an energetic celebration of urban culture in Colombia.
Aiming to set the tone for its bicentennial year, the museum has pulled out all the stops, adopting a holistic approach that encompasses art, music, dance and fashion in order to plot the rise of hip-hop from a genre banished from commercial airwaves to an artform so respected that it has been the subject of three major exhibitions in Colombia in recent decades. Organisers have even gone so far as to arrange a host of free dance and music performances and workshops open to fans of all ages.
Whilst a commemoration of a culture that is less than a quarter of the museum’s age might seem an odd way to mark this major anniversary, the crowds of young exhibition-goers it attracts and the up-to-date curation both pay testament to the institution’s enduring relevance as an educational space and its desire to chronicle the popular history and culture of the nation as it unfurls.
2023 also marks a big year for hip-hop. Although things only really got going in Colombia in the mid-1980s, the genre first appeared on the world stage fifty years ago. This is also the 25th year of music-making for Bogotá’s Hip-Hop al Parque. By framing the Colombian hip-hop scene as a social movement as well as a cultural phenomenon, the exhibition loudly affirms its continuing purpose as a “voice for the voiceless” in the words of Zkirla, one of the artists to contribute to the curation.
The inclusion of protest placards and police riot shields from the 2021 protests, during which graffiti artists and rappers used their mediums to contribute to the mass demands for change, serve as a potent symbol that hip-hop is still as relevant as ever.
The exhibition offers novices a crash-course in hip-hop culture told through cassettes, denim jackets, spray-paint cans, and a carefully selected soundtrack, guiding visitors from the movement’s heavily US-influenced roots to the development of its uniquely Colombian sound, aesthetics and political undercurrent today.
The display opens with a dummy’s guide to the four central elements of hip-hop culture: breakdancing, djing, graffiti, and rapping, introducing key terminology like konke (dance floor) and b-girl/boy (breakdancer).
The exhibition then wends its way chronologically from the breakdance craze of the 1980s and initial debuts of Colombian rap, through to the troubled 1990s when rap artists were forced off the airwaves and lyrics became dominated by the big issues facing the country, such as conflict and drug-trafficking.
Despite the difficulties of the decade, this era is presented as the golden age of hip-hop colombiano; the years that gave birth to the Hip-Hop al Parque festival and saw the release of some of the scene’s most acclaimed work including La Etnnia’s debut full album ‘El ataque del Metano’ and Gotas de Rap’s seminal ‘Rap Opera’.
After revelling in the glory of the mid-90s, the exhibition once again moves on to highlight the transition out of estudios caseros into high-tech studios and the emergence of the producer as a key figure of influence in the current music scene.
Whilst the exhibition offers a perfect entry point for the hip-hop illiterate, those more familiar with the specifics of the genre needn’t fear. Alongside a heavy dose of nostalgia, it also includes several thoughtful details sure to elevate the experience for even the most knowledgeable hip-hop connoisseurs.
One such notable detail is the attention given throughout the exhibition to female contributions to the movement. These are marked out by a small purple symbol, allowing greater appreciation of the role played by women in a scene that is often seen as male-dominated, integrating them subtly throughout, without making them a sideshow.
There are also effective efforts to capture the spirit of the movement within the management of the space – a huge dancefloor acts as the exhibition’s centre piece, inviting visitors to break out into spontaneous performance and curators have aimed to democratise the space. Recently the future of the exhibition’s graffiti wall, an increasingly common attraction in Colombian galleries, was placed in the hands of social media users who were asked whether it should be painted over to make way for fresh tags.
Perhaps the most striking thing about Nación Hip-Hop is its distinctly triumphant tone. Its signage at times slips into near religious reverence, a sentiment which seems reflected in the crowd it attracts. As you make your way around the exhibition, you’ll no doubt have to wind your way through eager selfie-snappers and earnest fans explaining the finer details of certain cassettes to their patient partners.
In fact, the exhibition has proved such a huge hit, drawing in 700 visitors daily and thousands at weekends, that the museum has decided to extend its run for another two months. Rather than a detraction, this evident popularity among spectators is itself part of the exhibition’s charm. There’s something deeply infectious about the joy evident in both its curation and reception.
Nación Hip-Hop is open Tuesday-Sunday 9:00-17:00 until 16th April. The exhibition is included in the price of a regular Museo Nacional ticket. It’s worth noting that museum pricing strategies have proved controversial in recent months. Recently a row developed over a new tariff system that differentiates between Colombian citizens and foreign tourists. The latter must pay USD$10 for adults, the former COP$6,000. It’s likely that residents of Colombia will be permitted to pay the peso price, as with national parks, but you may have to argue at the ticket booth.
There seem to be a lot more police out on the streets – but will it continue throughout 2023?
Has there been more police in the Bogotá streets recently? Photo: Oli Pritchard
Noticed anything different on the mean streets of Bogotá recently? There are a lot more uniformed coppers standing about, with more on the TransMilenio as well. We’re well into 2023 now, so let’s hope it’s a new year’s resolution that will stay in place. After all, safety is regularly cited as people’s top concern in Bogotá.
There are 18,000 uniformed police officers in the Bogotá section (Mebog), so there’s certainly plenty of them to put onto the streets. Mayor Claudia López, starting her final year in the Palacio Liévano, is concentrating her efforts on safety and security in the capital. At the same time as police are becoming more visible, she’s announced a Magnificent Seven strategy with seven focuses for combating crime.
The seven prongs are:
The TransMilenio
Gender-based crime
The Centre
Corabastos (in the west of the city)
Nightlife crime
Environmental crime
Cleanliness and waste
What all this means for most of our readers is that there will be dedicated police in every part of the city focusing on gender-based crimes. The centre and TransMi will have more police, as noted. Of course, we also suspect you may see more police in general as part of this. When asked, individual officers have said they’ve been told not to stay in stations. None were happy to go on the record, but it seems to tie in to the mayor’s security measures.
It’s not necessarily true that simply having lots of police wandering around reduces crime, but it is powerfully symbolic. Most people don’t like paying tax, but it’s nice to at least see it being spent in a visible way. And no one doubts the need for a police force, especially with crime at current levels. While perception is generally higher than actual crime levels, there’s certainly no shortage of crime here.
And make no mistake, those levels are high, very high and getting worse. Robberies especially are anecdotally often unreported, of course, but the most recent data from the Secretaría Distrital de Seguridad, Convivencia y Justicia put the number of reported robberies between January 2022 and November at over 122,000, a 25% increase on the same period last year. Murder and homicides are down, thankfully, but those numbers remain high too, with around a thousand annually. It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, but Bogotá is a high-crime city – even if it compares favourably to the likes of Medellín or Cali.
Does more police on the streets help?
It’s nice to have more coppers standing about, but are they actually doing anything? Well, that would require its own article to explain in detail, so you’ll get that answer next week. Certainly many Colombians will be at best suspicious of the productivity of most police officers, whether that’s entirely fair or not. And of course, there are problems, with many being fined and/or disciplined for corruption and illegal activity.
The extent of these police patrols is also unclear. In a notoriously divided city, there’s extra police in the centre for sure, plus improved presence in Chapinero and Usaquén. TransMilenio stations have noticeable groups of police too. Out in the suburbs, things are less clear. Suba and Kennedy lead the list for most dangerous localidades, after all.
Claudia López has had a rocky time controlling the police, but she appears to have finally got the extra uniforms she asked for. It’s worth noting the chain of command for those unfamiliar with Colombian policing. Unlike the UK or US, for example, the Colombian police are not independent at all, but directly controlled by ministers. The Ministry of Defense is in charge of policing, controversially, though the President of the Republic has ultimate responsibility.
And of course, we do now have a new president. Gustavo Petro promised wholesale changes to policing amongst his smorgasbord of proposals. It’s hard to know what’s a priority at this stage, but policing doesn’t seem super high on the list right now. He promised the abolition of the riot squad (ESMAD), but they still stalk the streets when protests are planned.
The police in Bogotá have, to be polite, a complicated relationship with the citizenry of the capital. In recent years there have been major clashes, and ESMAD are always controversial. The death of Dilan Cruz is very much in the minds of many when they think of the police. That’s similar across the country, too.
Still, when push comes to shove, most people in la nevera will call the police in an emergency, and the more openly visible they are, the easier that is to do. It’s also no bad thing to have at least an idea that our tax is going somewhere, and good to have at least some sort of visible deterrence. Having some police around is, after all, probably better than nothing.
Bogotá’s Festival Centro is back with a mix of free live music performances and events to brighten your January.
Festival Centro is back this year with lots of music from the capital and around.
Returning for its fourteenth year, Festival Centro brings an eclectic selection of 29 musical artists and groups from Colombia and abroad to five stages in the city’s centre. The celebrations officially got going yesterday with Paisa post punk posers Margarita Siempre Viva kicking things off in the Bronx. There’s plenty left in store this weekend, with dozens of events daily until Sunday 29th January.
Sticking true to the festival’s slogan “los sonidos de de la diferencia,” this year’s organisers have stitched together a stylistically and geographically diverse line-up. Revellers can sample electronic folk from Argentinian artist Nación Ekeko or take in Canadian-Colombian singer Lido Pimienta’s fusion of traditional sounds and electro-pop. Briela Ojeda thrilled at last year’s Estéreo Picnic and she’s back to light up the centre.
Alternatively, there’s Colombian national treasure, vallenato legend Alfredo Gutiérrez, horror-punk star Radamel and Chilean singer-songwriter Diego Lorenzini among many others.
If you fancy a side-helping of intellectual stimulation, the festival also offers a number of talks, including a celebration of Alfredo Gutiérrez and a discussion about safe and sustainable spaces for music within the city. And if that’s still not enough to entertain you this weekend, 25 restaurants, bars and cafes will be providing one-off discounts and promotions.
Performances will take place in Bronx Distrito Creativo, el Teatro Colon, el Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, City U y El Muelle de la FUGA. The full programme of free events and information about timings and locations can be found on the festival’s website.
The brutal murder of Valentina Trespalacios, a popular young DJ, has shocked Colombia.
Valentina Trespalacios was a popular DJ in the party scene in Bogotá. Photo: Facebook
The body of Valentina Trespalacios was found in a discarded suitcase in Fontibón on January 22. The murder of Trespalacios, a popular electronic music DJ, has sparked a national outcry, and media reports have been filled with details of her final hours.
Yesterday the primary suspect, John Poulos, was arrested in Panama before boarding a plane to Turkey. Trespalacios and Poulos had been romantically involved before her murder and his rapid exit from the country.
Today, the Fiscalía, Colombia’s state prosecutor, has issued an arrest warrant and extradition request for Poulos, an American citizen. According to El Tiempo’s initial reports from Panama, he claims he is innocent and blames the mafia. If he is found guilty of femicide, he could face up to 40 years in prison.
Who was Valentina Trespalacios?
Valentina Trespalacios was a 23-year-old DJ with a promising career ahead of her. A student at Universidad UNINPAHU, she had almost 16,000 followers on Instagram and had performed in clubs in Colombia as well as internationally.
“She was approximately four years into her DJ career,” her uncle, Carlos Trespalacios, told El Tiempo. “She had done very well, she had a very promising future, so much so that she hung out all over the country, in the best nightclubs. She also went to many parts of South America.”
Trespalacios was last seen clubbing near Parque 93 in Bogotá on Friday night. According to El Espectador, she got into a ride-share car at 3 am with John Poulos to continue to another club in another part of the city. Authorities have offered a $20 million peso reward for information that helps them who was responsible for her death.
Initial reports from the national forensics authority, Instituto Nacional de Medicina Legal, suggest Trespalacios died by strangulation. According to its report, she had been suffocated by rope and found bruises caused by a blunt object.
Last night crowds gathered at a candlelit vigil to protest the femicide of Valentina Trespalacios and all violence toward women. “We demand #JusticiaParaValentina Trespalacios, a young 23 year old DJ,” tweeted Feministas y Plebeyas.
Femicide in Colombia
While Colombia has passed some heavy legislation to tackle femicide and gender-related violence, it remains a serious issue, with state prosecutors branding it an “epidemic”. Sadly, impunity is high.
Introduced in 2015, the Rosa Elvira Cely law made femicide a specific crime, separate from homicide. The law was passed following the rape and murder of Rosa Elvira in the Parque Nacional.
According to the Observatorio Colombiano de Feminicidios, which tracks femicides in the country, there were 612 femicides in Colombia last year. The figure was down slightly on 2020 and 2021, but is an increase on the 574 femicides in 2019, before the pandemic.
The movement #NiUnaMenos has evolved across Latin America as a response to gender-based violence. The feminist movement has grown massively in recent years in the whole continent, and Colombia is no exception.
Photo: Freepik.es
Bogotá mayor Claudia López has introduced a number of measures to try to tackle violence against women. The capital’s first female mayor has tried to make women’s rights and protection a priority.
Most recently, the city strengthened its ‘Línea Púrpura’ – a free support service where women can access psychologists, social workers, lawyers, and nurses by phone or WhatsApp. This week, López also gave more support to women’s protection units in her policing announcement this week.
Unfortunately, cases like Trespalacios’s murder show that these crimes are an ongoing issue in both Bogotá and Colombia. There’s often a lot of attention in the days and weeks following a crime, but what matters is whether justice is eventually done. Colombia’s justice system has already failed too many women.
Make sure you understand the new rules, even if you’re a long term resident.
Visa process in Colombia is changing: Photo: Wikipedia
The visa process in Colombia has changed recently, making visas more stratified and providing a few more options, most notably for digital nomads. The initial teething problems, such as a shutdown period and some gremlins in the online system, are now mainly smoothed out.
Colombia still has three classes of visa: V, M, and R:
V (visitante) visas are for short term visitors to Colombia, including tourists from some countries
M (migrante) visas are for more long-term foreign people, often working towards residency
R (residente) visas are for long-term foreign residents in Colombia.
It’s worth remembering that few people enter Colombia on a tourist visa but what’s known as Permiso de Ingresar, which is visa-free entry. That’s handled by Migración Colombia rather than the Cancillería (essentially the Foreign Ministry).
Alan Gongora of Langon Colombia, the leading Colombian visa support company, spoke to us at the end of last year to go through some of the key changes. He’s sceptical that immigration policy is a high priority for the Petro government, saying “a lot of these rules are ad hoc and organic.” He points out that “a lot of what they’re trying to do all the time is professionalise the system. The more ways they have to check information, the more they’re in a position to be more professional. For example, a lot of these applications now require a criminal check.”
That’s not unusual in many other countries, of course, and neither is health checking, especially post-pandemic. Alan thinks this is more interesting, as “a lot of retirees are coming to Colombia, so [the Cancillería] are more and more focused on both regular and mental health issues. More and more we’re getting the question, ‘If I’m a foreigner and not in the best health, will I be denied?’ The next point is the greater focus on mental health. That’s something we’ve been seeing over the last six months or so.” He says it’s a public policy issue, as there have been issues with migrants who have military backgrounds. “It’ll be challenging to get a visa with serious health problems.”
He’s optimistic in the short term, saying that he suspects the bugs in the system will go away over the next six months or so. He explains that Colombia is still unsure as to where they are going long-term with immigration, but that investment isn’t a priority. “I have a feeling,” he says, “that early on they were trying to attract foreign investment and that was an enticement, but the market has matured enough that they don’t need to incentivise people to get foreign direct investment.”
He points out that there may be further changes due to inflation etc. “They’re focused on travel. They see tourism as one of the growth industries but they’re less focused on long term migrants. They’ve never seen themselves as a mecca for people coming and staying in Colombia, at least not traditionally.” He says that among thousands of applications every year, they only fail with around ten, which is pretty consistent over the years. That said, he also warns that people who didn’t fit into obvious categories before will have fear and fewer options as it professionalises. “If you don’t fit into a category it’s going to be really complicated,” he said.
“The one I think most people are going to be interested in,” says Alan, “is the focus on the Digital Nomad visa. Even though it’s only one visa category, that’s going to really change how migration happens in Colombia. It’s up to two years, it’s a V visa, which won’t get you residency, but it’s still a good way for someone to arrive and stay for a while.” As a new visa, it’s not clear how applications will work in practise, but Alan says it’s pretty broad and many people will qualify for it. “Very quickly, it will be one of the most popular visas,” he summarises.
Changes to investment visas, rentisa visa, and conjugal visas
Investment visas, on the other hand, were “one of two that were absolutely demoted. It’s no longer a residency visa,” he says. “The other is the rentista visa, which I call the trust fund babies visa. As long as you have some cash, you can stay and it was an M visa, could get you residency. No longer.” He connects this to the de-emphasis on direct investment and possibly a political angle.
Conjugal visas have also changed. “Before you could get married, have a civil or religious ceremony and you could get a marriage visa. Or you could just get a unión libre, a common law marriage, and they were treated just the same. The first option is months of paperwork and notarising, the union libre you just need a passport. So the vast majority of marriage visas were unión libre. Not any more.” Now, unión libre holders have to wait a year before applying for a marriage visa. It will still be an M visa, but it will only be a year long anyway. Full marriages remain the same as before.
Residency visas have seen some changes too, with some backdating. All residency visas, regardless of date of issue and including old permanent residency, are now considered to be contemporary R visas. That means holders must apply for a traspaso every five years, just as if they had been issued an R visa recently. There’s a two-year window for old visa holders, so you have some breathing space. However, be careful not to get caught out. It might be wise to think about doing the traspaso in 2023 to get it out of the way. Of course, cédulas need to be updated accordingly as well.
If you need a new visa and want to get started on an application, you need to go to the Cancellería website and follow the instructions there. It’s bilingual and relatively self-explanatory, but a few tips: set aside plenty of time, disable adblockers on your browser and make sure that your images are small-sized, using an online tool if necessary. If you have unusual circumstances or find the process tricky, talk to Langon Colombia or other visa experts for further advice. Alan’s top recommendation for visa applications? “Patience,” he jokes, “lots of patience. But also be very clear as to what you want to do in Colombia. The activity you want to do will determine your visa strategy.”
Here’s how one NGO is helping communities in La Guajira make and sell mochilas.
Mochila sales can make a difference to communities in La Guajira. Photos: ABACO (Asociación de bancos de alimentos de Colombia)
According to DANE data, over half La Guajira’s inhabitants are lacking in basic needs, making it is one of the poorest areas in Colombia. There are no easy solutions, but one project that is helping to support the community is the production and sale of Wayuu mochilas.
We spoke to Juan Carlos Buitrago, head of ABACO (Association of Food Banks of Colombia), about his organisation’s participation in Banco de Hilos – a project trying to commercialise the Wayúu artisan trade and improve the quality of life in the region.
Banco de Hilos was conceived while filming a documentary in La Guajira called Los paisajes del hambre. “We saw a family in a very critical situation and the family related to us how a person arrived, left them some threads and in the morning returned to collect the backpack and paid the family barely a thousand pesos,” Juan Carlos explains.
A simple search online is enough to see hundreds of bags being sold online, some upwards of £100. What’s harder to find is substantial information on how much these bags are being bought for from the Wayúu weavers and how much money companies are making from their sale. Some may not even be made in Colombia, never mind La Guajira.
Photos: ABACO (Asociación de bancos de alimentos de Colombia)Photos: ABACO (Asociación de bancos de alimentos de Colombia)
Arid climate and corruption present significant challenges
Mobilising mochila sales is only one part of Banco de Hilos’s operations in the area. They also do traditional charity work with the Wayúu; feeding children, weighing them, giving out medicine, and community building. However, they are also focusing on rejuvenating the artisanal trade of the Wayúu mochilas in order to increase the communities income and quality of life. Juan Carlos calls it “a comprehensive project.”
“We are striving to get the bags made more beautiful and of better quality so that they sell more and generate a higher income,” Juan Carlos tells me. The process seems simple and transparent. Banco de Hilos pays the Wayúu weaver a fair price for the mochila, alongside donating a food packet and a new set of threads.
However, external factors have made ABACO’s work challenging, whether that’s reducing hunger or developing the mochila project.
Juan Carlos believes hunger in the region has multiple causes. The first is poverty and an increasingly arid climate. La Guajira struggles with high levels of drought and traditional methods of water conservation in the Wayúu’s reservoirs or jagüeyes is becoming unsustainable. The second reason, Juan Carlos explains, is that the communities are spread across a large area, which makes access to food and health care even more challenging. He later recalls that transportation of food and medical packets was one of the biggest difficulties ABACO faced in the area. Finally, Juan Carlos cites corruption – the public resources and projects the region needs simply aren’t arriving there.
With the Constitutional Court saying that 4,770 Wayúu children dying of malnutrition between 2008 and 2016, these claims of corruption are serious. The Court also said that corruption got in the way of solving a number of issues, such as access to water and health services, estimating billions of pesos have disappeared. According to Human Rights Watch, over 900 cases are being investigated, but these cases seldom get anywhere due to limited numbers of investigators and prosecutors.
Banco de Hilo’s work in La Guajira
Despite these difficulties, Banco de Hilos has experienced many successes. “We aren’t only delivering food to the region…we’re conducting productive projects.” says Juan Carlos. From building solar lamps to commercialising their trade, ABACO along with Banco de Hilos has been working holistically with the community. “We aren’t experts,” he adds. But that hasn’t stopped the group from working with people and organisations to help them sell the mochilas at a dignified price.
Respecting the Wayúu’s artisan trade has more than monetary value. The production of these bags is tied up in the significant cultural history of weaving. For the Wayúu, weaving is a means of expressing their deepest emotions, desires and interpretation of the universe.
Buying these bags from ABACO is one of the many ways the public can help the Wayúu community. Other monetary donations can be done via sponsoring a child in La Guajira or by donating to projects such as Banco de Hilos. Volunteers can also give their time and there is a role for everybody. Publicists can help generate campaigns, people volunteer in vulnerable communities or you can simply collect and send food to ABACO.
December’s a great time to travel in Colombia, but it can get expensive. Here’s how to have fun and keep costs down.
Tunja’s annual Aguinaldo Boyacense lights up the city. Photo: Cineltunjo, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
The holiday season is a great opportunity to spend time with friends and family. Sadly it can also be an expensive time of year, particularly if you want to travel. That is why the Aguinaldo Boyacense in Tunja is a good option. Tourists can enjoy looking at Christmas lights, participating in different public activities, and eating delicious food without breaking the bank.
The event is the oldest popular festival in the country and it is going to take place in Tunja’s Plaza de Bolívar between December 15 and 22. There plenty of different activities to choose from. In these seven days people can see parades of floats, troupes, parades, costumes, sports competitions, children’s contests, and musical festivals. They can also participate in the novenas, which are devotional prayers that are practiced for nine days to obtain some grace or ask for a certain intention.
One of the costumes that stands out is the Matachin, a devil with a mask that does satirical dances and plays with children in the streets of the city. It is inspired by the Italian matachines who made parodies of war dances. There are different groups that participate in the parade of floats, all competing for their originality, creativity and beauty. Locals and tourists alike cheer the ones they like the most.
Seeing the fireworks contest is a treat at night. While people look at the sky they can enjoy traditional desserts like ‘brevas con arequipe’ or ‘cuajada con melao’. If adults feel cold, they can take a typical hot drink of aguardiente, cinnamon and sugar, a canelazo. It costs approx COP$2,500.
In the mornings (from around 10 am) people can see the launches of the programs people from Tunja have prepared for the festivities. Different neighborhoods and sectors, companies, and institutions collaborate to put together a mix of events. For example, there are exhibition halls where people can see paintings, sculptures, mixed techniques and mixed arts. Those activities are free. Don’t miss the ‘arepas boyacenses’ that cost approx COP$3,500 each.
Various orchestral and choral events take place in the afternoons in the Plazoleta de San Laureano, near the cathedral. These usually start around 12.30 pm. Afterwards, you can eat traditional hearty plates such as ‘mute’, ‘cuchuco con espinazo’’ or ‘cocido boyacense’ that cost around COP$8,000. Also, watch out for the movie projections – Cine Familiar at 3pm on a couple of days – in the Major Bicentennial Theater. It’s a three-minute walk from Plaza de Bolívar, so tourists are not going to spend money to get to the places.
In the afternoon, people can also see the floats, in which the children participate, and see presentations of plays. At night, the group of family or friends can go to the Christmas novenas. It is typical to taste custard, fritters and Christmas dishes to the rhythm of Christmas carols. The novenas are sometimes held at San Antonio Church, Neighborhood San Antonio and people can get there in six minutes on foot.
The Secretary of Culture and Tunja Mayor’s Office invite artists to sing until late for tourists who want to dance and don’t want to sleep early. You’ll have to pay to see the bigger names, but many concerts are free.
In terms of accommodation, people can stay at El Cid Plaza, Boyacá Plaza, or Boutique Santuario. Prices range from COP$76,500 to COP$140,000 per night and they are super close to Bolívar Plaza, the place where the events take place.
In conclusion, tourists will be able to enjoy the holiday season without spending a lot of money, and also find out more about Boyacá.
Bogotá has a brand new shiny bike hire scheme, but what’s it like to use? We go for a spin on the new wheels.
We took Bogota’s new Tembici bikes for a spin. Photo: Emma Newbery
You might have seen rows of brightly decorated granny bikes in Bogotá recently. It’s the start of a new scheme by Brazilian company Tembici to finally bring a bikeshare service to the Colombian capital. There are some 3,300 of them in more than 300 locations across Bogotá. Well, not all across Bogotá, but more on that later. These schemes have been wildly popular in Europe, most famously Paris, Barcelona, and London. They’ve struggled in other places though, with famous pictures of abandoned Chinese bikes. Which way will Bogotá go? We thought we’d try the system for ourselves.
The eye test shows most docks are often empty, so it’s either already popular or some bikes are being held back. With the aid of the BP editor, Emma Newbery, we decided to test out the system on a relatively easy jaunt from Calle 53 to Lourdes. That’s a 20 min or so walk, so just about worth using a bike. There are also three docking points close together. That’s important because the system wasn’t showing many of those 3,300 bikes as available. In total, we could see under 10% available. With two together at Calle 53, we were in luck!
It’s fiddly and annoying to get started, to say the least. The first dock we find has no guide to the system and it’s not intuitive. The next dock along, though, has a sticker explaining how to download the Tembici app. We strongly recommend doing this well before taking a bike. Preferably from a comfy chair at home. It’s a long process and requires your passport number and country code. Cédulas Extranjerías are not accepted, strangely, and it rejects the number if you enter six digits in the CC field. The app is pretty insistent with reminders to get started and it’s not clear how much data it harvests. It also seems to flit between English, Spanish, and Portuguese at random.
Once it’s all sorted, the system clicks into gear and gets easier. There’s a map on the app with the dock sites, so you know roughly where to go. We used our phones to unlock the bikes via scanning a QR code on the handlebars, but there’s a way to register TuLlave Transmi cards if you have a regular plan set up. That’s probably a good idea – you won’t always want to be getting your phone out. The app tracks you – I bought a day pass for 10 mil while the editor tried out the pay-as-you-go function. While it confirmed our rides, the times didn’t match up and critically, the final cost of the pay-as-you-go ride wasn’t given.
The bikes themselves aren’t what you might be used to – they’re designed to be underpowered and could be annoying for long-distance routes. That’s to deter people from stealing them and make sure that people get them back into docks for other users. They do their job, though, spectacularly well. I went out of my way to go over potholes and puddles and hardly felt a bump. My feet remained bone dry despite riding through the aftermath of a Bogotá downpour. There are built-in dynamo lights and the seat has a whopping nine inches of flexibility in height – at six foot tall I was comfortable enough.
Another of the minor niggles in the system is the placement of the docks. After freeing our steeds, we have to cross roads and make left turns to get to a bike lane. While a fair few docks are handily situated next to a bike lane or transmi station, it’s certainly not always the case. We get the same situation on arrival at Lourdes – forced down to the other side of Caracas, two blocks away from the transmi and on the wrong side of the tracks. There are tonnes of spaces free.
Bogotá’s new bike system isn’t perfect, but we’d use it again
The real test of course is, would we use it again? Both of us agree that we would. It made a slightly irritatingly long walk into a quick journey, without any of the faff of getting on a transmi. At peak times for short hops, this scheme is perfect, and it will likely also work well for connecting some of the places that public transport doesn’t easily reach. As long as you’re not turned off by the initial registration, it’s pretty seamless to use.
While we had a good experience using the system, there are some large questions that may turn off some users. One is about helmets – we spoke to a couple of bike cops that said they wouldn’t hassle anyone for not using a helmet, but that’s far from official. Then there’s insurance, both for collisions and for theft. There’s a big sign on the stem that says the bike is your responsibility when using it – which may make some people nervous. Finally, there’s the zoning – Caracas/autopista to the mountains; Candelaria up to around 140. That’s a limited area, and one that’s very well served already by public transport.
Financially, the marketing has been unhelpful at best. Social media is ablaze with criticisms of the cost – and it’s worth pointing out that it would have been cheaper for us to take taxis to/from Lourdes. A monthly pass brings that cost down significantly, but Colombia isn’t used to travelcard plans in the way that some countries are. The scheme needs to work on selling this. Then of course, you need an internet-ready card (debit or credit), which not everyone will have access to, especially younger people.
At the moment we’re giving a cautious thumbs-up to the scheme. There are a couple of issues to iron out, but it has some serious potential, especially in terms of access for people who can’t use a regular bike. That alone could make the whole scheme a resounding success and shows real ambition. The biggest question marks, as ever in la nevera, hover over the real-world application of the idea. On paper it’s superb, but will it work in practice?
Find a bike. The app has a built-in google map which will show free docks and free bicycles. On first view, you won’t see all the bikes, but as you zoom in it will show a more detailed display.
Walk to wherever the closest bikes are. Open the Tembici app up onscreen and touch the station you are at.
A blue bar at the bottom will say Scan QR code. Click that and a camera will come up so you can scan the QR code on the centre of the handlebars. This will release the bike.
Docking is even easier. Just find an empty space at a station and push the bike in forcefully until you hear a click. To check, pull gently back to check it’s locked.
The capital’s heaviest musical event, Knotfest, opens today for a furious Friday of pure metal.
Photo: Knotfest Colombia
After two weekends of Rock al Parque this year, the capital is bracing itself for yet more heavy riffs and brutal blastbeats. Yes, Knotfest is back, headed by not one, but two genuine legends in Judas Priest and Pantera. Better yet, they’re rocking the parallel stage setup, so you literally won’t miss a beat as one band starts immediately after another finishes. There’s also an extreme stage in the Movistar arena. It’s a stripped down Rock al Parque – none of the twee folksy rock, just all killer no filler pure metal for ten straight ear-shredding hours.
Pantera are touring with Phil Anselmo again, but obviously no Dimebag Darrell. Given that Pantera was all about the pure fucking hostility of Anselmo’s delivery, that’s a massive plus. After a twenty-year hiatus, they’ve been together for a single week. It may not last, so this could be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Judas Priest presents a similar situation – Halford is in his 70s now, so won’t be touring for much longer now. His voice isn’t the same as it used to be, but they still put on a barnstorming show live. In between the two metal gods are South Yorkshire eclecticists Bring Me the Horizon.
Before that, there’s plenty more to enjoy on the main stages, with Sepultura guaranteed to put on a show. Every time they come to Bogotá, they lay waste to everything before them. They’re on early, though, while the sun will still be high in the sky at 4.15 pm. Trivium were the next big thing years ago and haven’t lost their fury, whereas Venom literally invented Black Metal (sort of). Sadly, the only local band are Bogotá thrash legends Acutor, but they’re worth turning up early for.
If you’re seeking heavier sounds, the Movistar Arena is the place to be for actual death and black metal. Heavyweight headliners Hypocrisy form a bridge between Florida and Sweden for melodic death metal. Before them, the equally atmospheric Samael will conjure up dark spectral soundscapes in the bowels of hell (well, the Movistar arena). Ceguera are the pick of the two local bands on the third stage with blindingly fast thrash riffs underpinning death vocals.
The event happens in the Movistar complex – the main stages are outside in the car park to create an open air atmosphere. Entrance is by the south side of Campín, coming from the NQS (Carrera 30), and then it’s a long file up to the Movistar section of the complex. Once inside though, it’ll be a piece of cake moving between stages and sections. VIP tickets are sold out, but there are still general entry tickets available online. Foreign cards are accepted.
The UN recently made significant steps through a set of initiatives to reduce the extreme gender inequality affecting women worldwide. There are millions of women who are informal workers, and many were forced to stop working during the pandemic—the numbers speak for themselves with women making up 80% of domestic workers globally, and another 72% losing their jobs as a result of the pandemic.
Unfortunately, the aftermath of the pandemic has not entirely cleared and the informal economy, otherwise known as the gray economy, is stronger than ever. The International Labor Organization estimates that about 2 billion workers, some 60% of the world’s population, currently participate in it.
The gray economy is most prevalent in emerging economies, where 93% of the world’s informal employment takes place in developing countries. Although it does exist in advanced economies, the population in emerging economies depends a lot more on the gray economy. In these nations, its stronghold shapes the growth of the GDP and the opportunities available to civilians. It has also in some ways stifled these countries’ recovery from the pandemic.
In Colombia, for instance, although much economic progress has been made in the past few years, patriarchal fault lines run deep. The divide in opportunity between men and women is perpetuating the antiquated ways of the past and only degrading the potential of the economy as a whole. Let’s take a closer look at Colombia’s struggle with the gray economy, the way it’s affecting women, and one company that is looking to change this negative trend.
Colombia’s Gender-Bias Socioeconomic Gap
Colombia has historically struggled to patch the income disparities that draw a steep chasm in the country. In 2021 the poverty rate was 39.3%, a circumstance of the pandemic exacerbating an already broken socioeconomic system. In fact, a study in 2020 showed that the trend toward poverty reduction and greater equality that started over 20 years ago reversed thanks to ongoing after-quakes of the pandemic.
This has led to a gray economy with a tight grip, forcing many people to rely on informal work to make ends meet. Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa have the highest levels of economic informality, and in Colombia, the biggest players in the gray economy are market stands and a rotating carousel of street vendors. Another sector that is shadowed by the informal sector is the textile and apparel industry, which collectively represent one of the most traditional and essential sectors of Colombia’s economy.
The majority of employees in this sector are women, mainly for their cultural and historic experience with sewing. If not in that portion of the informal economy, women are often enlisted for household work such as cooking or cleaning—perpetuating quite an old-school stigma in regard to female opportunities in Colombia. In all of these circumstances, women are mainly paid under the table, which further entrenches the country’s informal economy and women’s place in it.
Image Credit: Colorchain
“Textile manufacturing in Colombia is 70% women and most of the industry remains in the gray economy,” says Dr. Carolina Hernandez, the CEO, and Founder of Colorchain, a Colombian-based medical apparel brand that looks to bring gender equity to the country’s textile industry. “Most often this work is based on a term contract, where a company can cut you loose at any time, and a worker may or may not be hired back. Companies typically only pay for each piece that is produced and there is also no type of long-term career development.”
Hernandez admitted that even her father, who has been in the industry for 40 years, wanted to hire workers for their clothing brand in the same way, but in truth, how could he know any better? It’s the way it’s always been and he didn’t know any other way. When a system has been in place since the dawn of time, people grow into that system, never questioning its merit, or perhaps if things could be different—maybe even better.
In 2021, 43% of the households in Colombia were led by women. The problem is, however, that the majority of those breadwinning women continue to be a part of the informal economy. This made Hernandez realize that the stigma would continue unless someone changed it.
Forging a New Narrative for Colombian Women
A female trailblazer, Hernandez first made major achievements in medicine before starting her own business in Colombia. Female entrepreneurs are an under-represented population, coming in at a paltry 25% of the total population of business owners.
“How do we create micro-economies, that are official, so that we can add value to the whole economy? And how can we do it in a way that empowers women?” said Hernandez. “Efforts such as these are so complex because there are social patterns that touch on everything in society.”
Carolina’s company Colorchain produces clothing for medical professionals, and it is no coincidence that the company is a stakeholder in the textile industry. The company is aimed at evolving Colombian society’s dependence on the informal economy and empowering women at the same time. They employ women, both who have formerly worked in textiles and those with a minimal amount of experience such as having some experience working a sewing machine. Regardless of how much tenure they have, the company aims to change their career outcomes.
Colorchain started at the foundation of the problem. By employing women for the long term and with regular pay, the company helps to provide job stability as well as the income that many of them need to provide for their families on a consistent basis.
“These are the decisions that we make at Colorchain daily, to try and set females up for success to work in a society that is weighted against them,” said Hernandez. “We look to create a network that communicates to females that they can have a job, can be a female, and succeed as a mother as well.”
This is just the baseline, however, as the company goes much further to try and help these women develop a career and improve their standing within Colombian society. Recently, the company partnered with BSocial, an NGO that focuses on materializing projects that generate sustainable development (social, environmental, and economic) in communities. The entity is focused on strengthening citizens’ life projects from entrepreneurship and employability.
For example, BSocial recently directed a project aimed at the gender disparities found in Colombia’s transportation industry—one of the most male-dominated industries in the country. In a pilot that started two years ago, the NGO set out on an initiative to improve the number of women who are able to drive in the country.
Image Credit: Colorchain
“This is how we bring women out of the gray economy, by giving them the skills they need to take more opportunities that they haven’t been exposed to before, which in some cases, can be as simple as the freedom of getting themselves from point A to point B,” said Hernandez.
A new project entitled “Essence of Women” that Colorchain will lead will kick off in January. A total of 10 women have been selected who have some basis of sewing knowledge and the initiative will teach them the technical abilities to perform this skill at a larger scale, as well as other capacities needed in the modern textile industry today.
BSocial will be in charge of teaching the women the necessary social aspects for being a part of a workforce—skills such as how to self-manage a schedule or how to communicate with team members. A third party will be CUN, a university in Bogota, that already has textile and design programs. The university will give the females a certification of their development in the textile industry, giving them an accreditation that provides them a better chance at lifting themselves up in society.
Colorchain plans to document this project and evaluate the impact on this group of females, sending their report to the government’s state department once the program has run its course.
Shaping a More Female-Friendly Culture
Image Credit: Colorchain
“As the head of this company, I have had exposure to different industries around the globe. Unfortunately, there is the wrong kind of similarities being seen across cultures for women,” said Hernandez. “We must stop putting bandaids on problems and start looking for a cure. We need to find the root of the problem, diagnose it, and come up with a teaching plan for success. This is what women need, especially in developing countries.”
Colorchain is growing, as manufacturing is, and is looking for talent. There are five positions the company is looking to fill before year-end and all Hernandez asks is that applicants show that they want to work, and more importantly learn.
Companies that are willing to forge a new path are critical in countries that have systems long overdue for improvement. As Colorchain grows, so too will the opportunities for women in Colombia—hopefully generating momentum towards cultural change that uplifts females country-wide.
Disclosure: This article mentions a client of an Espacio portfolio company.
ArtBo, Bogotá’s annual art fair is back after a pandemic pause, and there’s plenty to see.
This weekend, art will take over Bogotá once again as ArtBo returns after a three-year break. Find out what the fair’s about, how to make the most of it, and what else is happening in the city in the coming days.
What is ArtBo?
Beatriz González sketch of Wiwa life at ArtBo 2022. Photo: Sally Wilson
ArtBo is an annual international art fair that takes place in Bogotá each year. Apart from a pandemic pause, ArtBo has been going since 2004 and is a key event on the Latin American art circuit. It attracts a wide mix of art and galleries. This year there will be over 50 galleries from various different countries, representing more than 300 artists.
What’s worth seeing this year?
Good question. There’s so much to see that the best bet is to explore and soak up as much as possible. Some have commented that there’s not a lot of work from newer artists and that a lot of the work on show at ArtBo 2022 isn’t very recent. Nonetheless, here are just a few artists to watch out for.
Beatriz González is a big name in Colombian art. She’s currently got an exhibition called Bruma on at Fragmentos in the Espacio de Arte y Memoria which reflects on themes of forced disappearance. It echoes her Auras anónimas, an installation next to the cemetery of silkscreen images replicated across over 8,000 tombstones. Her work at ArtBo sketches stories of the Wiwa tribe.
Ella McVeigh (UK) is one of the newer artists featured at the show. Her abstract work was brought to Bogotá by a Belgian gallery called Newchild. Her striking use of colour and form conjure echoes of nature and are well worth seeking out.
Ella McVeigh’s work was brought to ArtBo 2022 by the Belgian Newchild Gallery. Photo: Sally Wilson.
Kindi Llatju is a Colombian indigenous artist from Putumayo who mixes his cultural traditions with modern techniques. According to the Adrián Ibáñez gallery, his work captures memories of childhood, people, myths and values. His art has depth and texture due to a process of removing and adding layers of paint.
Kindi Llatju, artist, and Adrian Ibañez, gallery director at ArtBo 2022. Photo: Sally Wilson.Kindi Llatju’s magical combination of traditional and modern art captured attention at this year’s ArtBo. Photo: Sally Wilson.
Pedro Ruiz is another well known Colombian artist. His work explores various social and political aspects of the country, particularly its indigenous culture, the disconnect between rural and urban life, and the way we interact with nature.
Pedro Ruiz explores Colombia’s relationship with nature, past and present. Photo: Sally Wilson.
Pablo Arrázola’s art evokes the playful and power nature of childhood. The Colombian artist juxtaposes painting and drawing against the textures produced by tearing, scrunching, and cutting paper.
Pablo Arrázola at ArtBo 2022. Photo: Sally Wilson.
Given the furore around non-fungible tokens (NFTs) last year, it probably won’t surprise you to learn that they feature heavily at the fair. Indeed, the Colpatria tower will be alight with an NFT from Álvaro Barrios during ArtBo. As you walk around the fair, you’ll see a number of works also have associated NFTs.
Before you ask, NFTs are essentially a digital certificate of ownership, and they’ve changed the way people can own or collect digital art. NFT art really hit the headlines when Christie’s in London sold a huge digital collage called “Everydays – The First 5,000 Days” for almost $70 million.
ArtBo may be the reason everything’s about art in the capital this weekend, but it’s not the only gig in town. Several other art events, such as Barcú and Open San Felipe will also be worth a visit.
OK, and what’s Barcú?
Barcú is more focused on emerging artists and one of the special things about it is that it’s set in various historic buildings in the city centre. According to its website, the Barcú team is obsessed with building social transformation through art, music, and culture. Barcú takes place from October 25 to 30 and tickets cost $25,000 for a day pass and $40,000 for an evening pass.
And Open San Felipe?
San Felipe has been building a name for itself as Bogotá’s art district. It has fairly regular events, including Open San Felipe which is a weekend affair. There’s an Open San Felipe taking place this weekend (October 28, 29 and 30). It’s free, and you can wander around the galleries, all within walking distance of each other. We’d recommend starting/finishing in Casa 73-22 for a coffee-book-art stop.
OK, so when is this big art bonanza taking place?
The official dates are from October 27 to 30. ArtBo is open from noon until 8pm on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. On Sunday it’s open from noon until 7pm.
Bear in mind that while the main event in Corferias will wind up on Sunday, many of the exhibitions across the city will continue for longer. For example, there’s an exhibition called “Rituales, saberes y tejidos” (Rituals, knowledge and fabrics) in the Claustro de las Aguas on Calle 18A #1-06 which runs until November 16. It brings together contemporary art and traditional craftwork, all themed around a solar eclipse.
Photo: Sally Wilson
Where is it happening?
Bogotá’s convention centre, Corferias (Avenida La Esperanza con Carrera 39) will be the heart of ArtBo this weekend. That said, art-related things are happening throughout the city.
In Corferias, ArtBo is divided into various sections:
Principal: Various galleries from Colombia and the rest of the world present
Referentes: Focuses on historical work by Latin American artists.
Proyectos: This year Proyectos looks at the aftermath of failed national projects and the emotions that go with them.
Sitio: Situated at different points in the fair, Sitio plays with ideas of audience perception.
Artecámara: Featuring over 30 Colombian artists under the age of 40.
Foro: The academic section of the fair explores the theme of tropical gothic.
Articularte: Encourages interaction around modern and contemporary art.
Libro de Artista: Explores the use of books as an artistic medium. This year the title is “Ups, algo salió mal” or “Oops, something went wrong.”
Phew, there’s a lot to see
That there is. And we’ve only given you a small flavour of what’s on offer. If you’re even slightly interested in art, particularly Colombian art, this is the weekend to explore.
Huge thanks to Sally Wilson for additional reporting and photos.
As the USD nears ever closer to COP$5,000, Mat Di Salvo takes a look at why this is happening and what it means for the country.
The Colombian peso is the weakest it’s ever been against the dollar. Photo: Freek Huigen
You know it’s a hot topic when the kids are making Instagram memes about it. It seems the US dollar’s unstoppable rise – and the Colombian peso’s fall – has got lots of people taking notice of tedious economic issues.
This is because the dollar now is fast closing in on COP$5,000 per $1 – something that has never happened before. But what does this mean for Colombia, and why is everyone talking about it?
You’ve probably heard about inflation and how it’s hurting citizens’ wallets the world over. Nearly every country around the world has been hit hard and many are taking drastic measures to get it under control.
The US is perhaps taking the most aggressive action by upping interest rates in an attempt to tame 40-year high inflation. This means many people are buying dollars for various reasons, pushing the price up. At a retail level, people are less likely to borrow cash and invest, instead preferring to hold onto greenbacks.
What a strong dollar means for Colombia
This is not good news for less wealthy countries like Colombia. Why? Partly because their debt is denominated in dollars, so paying it back gets more expensive. There is some relief for exporters who receive dollars – they are currently very competitive internationally.
Colombia, however, also imports a lot from the US and Europe, like farm machinery and computer equipment; a weak peso means the country has to pay more for these foreign goods.
But this isn’t just about the dollar’s surge. The peso is falling in value too – last week it was one of the world’s most depreciated currencies. This is partly because there is financial uncertainty under the country’s new president. Investors are worried by some of the things Gustavo Petro has said and what he may do.
An example: This month, he criticised the central bank’s independence in a string of tweets. JPMorgan analysts said this brought volatility to the Colombian markets. There’s also a lack of clarity over the extent of his proposed reforms, and their financing.
La Corte constitucional ordenó al Banco de la República ajustar sus decisiones al crecimiento de la economía y el empleo. El ascenso de la tasa de interés va contra el crecimiento económico y el empleo de los colombianos.
This, combined with other global macroeconomic factors, is scaring off foreign investors. Colombia Risk Analysis founder Sergio Guzman told The Bogotá Post that all this has led to a decline in the value of the peso.
He said that various factors are contributing to investor fear and “raising the country’s risk profile.” These include “domestic circumstances including Petro’s statements criticising the central bank” as well as “the Finance Ministry’s lack of detail about planned spending increases and how they will be paid for.”
The U.S. dollar has strengthened against most other currencies in recent months. Photo by Alexander Mils on Unsplash
Mixed signals on oil
There’s another factor, too: Oil. Colombia depends heavily on oil revenues as it remains the country’s biggest export. The long-term perspective of future oil exploration is shaky as Petro has said he would like to wean the country off it. And since he has come to power, the government hasn’t been too clear about what exactly will happen.
Yessica Prieto, consultant at Colombian energy advocacy group Crudo Transparente, told The Bogotá Post that it is precisely these mixed signals about the future of Colombia’s oil industry that is spooking investors.
“The government has not been clear about what the decision on this matter will be,” she said. “There have been statements about prohibiting new exploration projects and others saying that a decision has not yet been made.”
Whatever happens with the country’s largest industry, Colombia has two difficult things to deal with right now: a super-strong safe-haven dollar and a weak peso – a toxic combination that will continue to hurt most Colombians.
But even if Colombia’s new government manages to bring stability to a shaky market, external factors like supply chain chaos, global inflation and the dollar’s surge will be difficult to deal with. The end to this situation won’t be quick, and it certainly won’t be easy.
The ‘Banksy: Genius or Vandal’ exhibition runs until December 31.
Banksy has become one of the best-known street artists in the world, even though the identity of the artist remains unknown. For the next three months, more than 100 pieces of his work will be on show in Bogotá, including artwork, sculptures, installations, videos, and photographs. Book tickets online to see the show at the Villa Adelaida (Chapinero. Cra 7 #70-40), the exhibition’s open every day though times vary.
Banksy: Genius or Vandal will be in Bogotá until Dec. 31. Photos: Phil Stoneman
Latin America (LATAM) is currently at a pivotal point for Venture Capital (VC). The region had a hallmark year in investment in 2021, but as they say—what goes up, must come down.
The region isn’t alone in its investment slowdown, however. Overall, global venture funding is down significantly, according to Crunchbase—mostly as a result of numbers being compared to record highs. And naturally, when records are set, a slowdown is not only predictable but is sometimes even projected.
This past spring, the Latin American Business Associations (LABA) VC conference made this very prediction for LATAM’s regional market. Leaders forecasted this partly because LATAM still lacks a lot of the entrepreneurial infrastructure that startups need, such as more seed investors and better infrastructure.
But not all hope is lost.
In an interview with Bloomberg Linea, Carlos Ramos De la Vega, the VC director for LAVCA, an association for private capital in Latin America, said there is still a positive outlook for LATAM. According to the association’s data, 2022 is already the region’s second-strongest year for LATAM’s VC—meaning that the movements made by founders and investors on the ground floor will be critical for where the business sector lands at the end of 2022.
For Colombia, this slowdown could actually be an excellent opportunity to achieve certain benchmarks that need to improve in order to be more competitive in the LATAM VC landscape.
Fostering the growth of its technological infrastructure, building strategies that help pique the interest of both local and international investors, and developing a supportive network for entrepreneurs on the ground floor will help Colombia evolve into a more mature player in the LATAM business ecosystem.
Stage 1: Fostering Colombia’s Technological Boom
As of 2022, Colombia is one of the top economic contenders in LATAM alongside Mexico and Brazil, and the country’s economic year in 2021 blew away forecasts—growing at the fastest pace seen in more than a century. This has a lot to do with the country quickly getting on board with digital implementation, allowing modern industry to hit its stride. With much of Colombia’s economic rebound between 2021-2022 due to the technology industry, the country is experiencing a technological renaissance.
Out of the roughly 50 million Colombians, nearly 34 million started using the Internet following the onset of the pandemic, of which about 22 million then became regular online shopping users. According to the Colombian Chamber of Electronic Commerce (CCCE), in 2021, eCommerce remained at levels of more than double what was registered in 2019—even when physical stores had reopened their doors.
“The e-commerce sector went from being considered as a complementary sales channel to becoming the engine for economic reactivation,” said María Fernanda Quiñones, executive president of the Colombian Chamber of Electronic Commerce (CCCE).
Executive President of the Colombian Chamber of Electronic Commerce, María Fernanda Quiñones. Image Credit: CCCE
This interest in the digital interface is good for innovation and local startups looking to lead the technological transformation. Yet, only 2% of Colombian companies carry out cross-border operations through electronic channels—making for some seriously untapped potential in the country’s online market. The CCCE is one governmental entity currently taking steps to implement infrastructure that will help get the ball rolling for companies wishing to digitize operations.
“We recently launched eXporta.online, a free digital platform which is sponsored by Google. The platform seeks to prepare people, medium to small enterprises, and entrepreneurs for cross-border electronic commerce,” continued Quiñones.
The platform analyzes close to 1,517 data points collected from different sources such as the World Bank, UNCTAD, and International Trade Center, among others. The data then creates an automated process that provides recommendations for the three best destination market options for companies who are looking to start utilizing eCommerce. The engine chooses these destinations based on the ideal confluence of demand, market stability, eCommerce, language, and access to that company’s product.
“Through cross-border e-commerce, businesses have the opportunity to diversify their market and not depend solely on the local economy,” said Quiñones. “In addition, strategic alliances can be created abroad that allow businesses to gain experience and become more competitive, expand opportunities, and increase their sales capacity.”
Digitizing commerce will be vital for ensuring that Colombia can remain competitive within the larger regional and international business markets. Now technologically primed and ready, the country can provide new opportunities to startups hailing from the country.
Stage 2: Transitioning Colombian VC From Seed to Series A Investment
Within the last decade, VCs from all over have been looking to Colombia for investments. Thanks to startups showing significant growth in both size and number, the VC sphere in the country has seen a noteworthy upward trend.
This is backed by 2021’s numbers, as Colombia increased its overall value of funding to $1.24 billion—making for a 144% increase compared to 2020. Rappi is one example from the country that has helped to prove Colombian startups have the capacity to increase their valuations tenfold and build multi-billion USD companies.
But this unicorn was the first of its kind, and there are many other startups in the ecosystem wondering how they can also see this kind of success.
“Startups have to show their path to profitability,” says Diego Noriega, Managing Partner at Newtopia VC, a venture capital firm that has made 60% of its most recent investments in Colombia. “It doesn’t always have to be immediate, but investors are preferring startups that have done their homework in making their company robust and know how to scale themselves.”
A Cohort of Newtopia Startups. Image Credit: theorg.com
According to the most recent Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), carried out by the World Economic Forum (WEF), Colombia actually presents the best conditions for entrepreneurship out of all the countries in LATAM. Investors’ confidence in the country has also grown at a global level, with Colombia now ranking at 25 as an investment destination worldwide.
Global investors often inspire the growth of capital into emerging markets. With international investor notoriety, a ripple effect in funding occurs, leading to investment from multiple local sources and leveling up the market. This gives growing startups access to the knowledge and resources it takes to scale globally. It also means that founders and their teams must step up to the new level of play.
“At the beginning of a startup’s lifecycle, trust (from investors) is built around the problem that the company is solving, as well as their internal team. But, for Series A the game changes dramatically,” says Noriega. “Startups are not going to reach Series A unless they can show metrics that validate they can do so. There is no magic trick to fast-track this. Companies must achieve revenues and growth rates that show traction to get the interest from VCs who invest at this level.”
The next critical step for Colombia’s emerging businesses is to show investors that they have what it takes to climb the investment ladder from the seed stages to Series A—helping to propel the country to new entrepreneurial heights.
Stage 3: Creating a Supportive Startup Ecosystem
With digital transformation well on its way, and increasing interest from local and foreign investors, Colombia’s last step in maintaining competitiveness in LATAM commerce will be to build a supportive network for startups and enterprises alike. This is especially important in the current funding drought, and even more critical for developing startups that are just coming into their own.
According to Embroker, about 70% of startups fail during years two to five. This phase of hardship is termed “The valley of death”, and typically occurs after the company launches a product but has not yet seen any revenue. For Colombian companies navigating these growing pains, experiential insight can go a long way.
“The CCCE understands the importance of the country’s medium to small enterprises. This is why we seek to create a large community of companies, brands, and people with immense relationship potential that everyone can benefit from,” said Quiñones. “Training is still needed to develop new skills for entrepreneurs in their digital appropriation process. Understanding the importance of business models in digital commerce will make it easier to complete and foster sustainable digital transformation over time.”
The CCCE offers asynchronous courses that guide business owners and entrepreneurs in the construction of their internationalization plans. By improving the business sector’s digital literacy, and working on the articulation of state policies, they hope to promote the adoption of technology to both mature and emerging companies.
Startups also need to understand how the global marketplace works in Colombia, and this is where more seasoned players can come in to help support young startups. The insight of those who have come before them will help emerging companies understand the complexities of the business market within Colombia.
Newtopia, a hands-on VC firm based in Argentina, is helping to connect startups from either side of the growth spectrum in the Colombian community. One of the most active venture capital firms in LATAM, Newtopia recently arrived in Colombia to join the country’s entrepreneurs as they find the right product-market fit. Newtopia offers a hands-on mentorship model that guides startups through the more vulnerable initial stages—helping them to grow sustainably.
Five of Newtopia VC’s six co-founders, from left to right: Diego Noriega, Sacha Spitz, Jorge Aguado, Juan Pablo Lafosse, and Mariano Mayer. Image Credit: Newtopia VC
“Early-stage growth is vital. Without this, it’s impossible to achieve later stages. Latin America is a higher-risk market because sometimes there is no traction and in some cases, no product or revenue—a risk not many VCs are willing to take,” says Noriega. “At Newtopia we aim to help build startup-to-startup relationships to create healthier local, and thereby regional, ecosystems.”
Each semester, the VC accepts 10-15 startups for a 10-week program, filled with content and advice to help teams take their startups to the next level. The aim of the program is to share knowledge, channel smart money, and enhance experiences for early-stage startups. Afterwards, the entrepreneurs get an opportunity to participate in a Limited Partner (LP) Day, where they pitch to Newtopia´s team, plus LPs, and investors hailing from top VCs in the US.
This past week, the VC hosted a demo day in the capital city of Bogota, bringing startups together to exchange knowledge on navigating Colombia’s startup ecosystem and sharing insights into how to raise capital during such difficult times.
For Colombia to continue its consistent climb as one of the region’s most viable markets for startups, young companies must show VCs that they can achieve bigger outcomes—which will allow the ecosystem as a whole to graduate to the next level.
“We must work together, as a society, to articulate the factors that will lead us to a digital as well as an inclusive economy,” said Quiñones. “This will help to promote the country as a business leader in the region.”
The future of Colombia’s startup community is bright, but ensuring that each one of these stages is achieved along the way will help the country commence a new wave of impacting startups for both the LATAM and global markets.
Disclaimer: This article mentions a client of an Espacio portfolio company.
We’ve made a playlist of some of the highlights coming up on Sunday at Festival Cordillera 2022 in the Parque Simón Bolívar.
This weekend sees the Festival Cordillera 2022 rock up in Parque Simón Bolívar. It’ll feature the very best of Latin talent both established and up-and-coming. Tickets are still available, and they’ll even plant a tree to celebrate your purchase. We’ve made a playlist featuring the Saturday superstars, now it’s time to look at Sunday’s artists. There are four stages – Aconcagua is the main stage, then Cotopaxi and Cocuy as smaller setups. There’s also a tent for when it gets cold, the Bosque Electrónica.
Café Tacvba will be performing at 11.45pm on the Cotopaxi stage at the Festival Cordillera. Photos: Courtesy of Páramo
Conociendo Rusia (2pm, Aconcagua) kick things off on Sunday afternoon. The young Argentine and his band are looking to emulate the successes of yesterday’s headliners. It’s a radically different sound though, measured and softly emotive rather than exuberant and raucous. He’s in the running at the Latin Grammys this year with Disfraz.
If you’re not into guitars this early, get on board with N. Hardem (2.15pm, Cocuy) for some raw hip-hop. Eschewing the clichés of gangs and guns, his songs speak to the soul rather than bling. He’s actually a lovely guy face to face, by the way. Although a lot of his older stuff is lo-fi genius, he’s slightly more polished these days, as you can see in Quest. It’s calmer and less urgent, but retains a quiet power. Going from strength to strength.
For a certain type of Bogotano, Aterciopelados (3.45pm, Aconcagua) are literally the stereotype. These idiosyncratic hippie-rockers are as Teusaquillo as it comes. It’s fairly standard 90s soft-Latin-rock in the Soda Stéreo mould. But back in the day, it was revolutionary. You’ve likely heard this song in the background before, but in case you’ve not caught the name, it’s Bolero Falaz.
He used to be a boy bander. Now he’s older and wiser but still has all the flair of his youth. Draco Rosa (5.45pm, Aconcagua) is heartfelt and broodingly intense. Let’s just hope he keeps his other ‘pink dragon’ in his pants, and not Dentro de Ti.
Don’t be fooled by the name, because Akapellah (6.15pm, Cocuy) actually has a sparse backing track to accompany his laconic lyrics. He switches effortlessly between almost catatonically slow choruses and quick staccato raps. A good sense of fun too, as seen in the video for Como Mario.
Julieta Venegas (6.45pm, Cotopaxi) has a hell of a voice and her whimsical songs belie a sort of constant mild heartbreak. It’s all rather uplifting in a way. A nice background for taking some time out, standing at the back and eating some chips to. Time to take it Lento, in other words.
Shockingly not on the main stage, La Etnnia (7.45pm, Cocuy) are as Bogotano as cheese in your chocolate. There’s nothing cheesy about their music though, with sharp social commentary about the harsh realities of la nevera scything through sparse hip-hop soundscapes that recall Cypress Hill. If Aterciopelados are the sound of Teusa, Etnnia are the sound of the periphery, where most of Bogotá really is. We’ve gone with Manicomio 5-27:
Hailing from, errr, the Welsh borders, Quantic (8pm, Bosque Electrónica) is nonetheless as Pacific as they come. It seems strange that a Midlander might have fallen into the West African-influenced rhythms of tropical Colombian music, but don’t take our word for it. He’s got the approval of the likes of Pacific legend Nidia Góngora, showcased in Que Me Duele.
Zoé (10.15pm, Aconcagua) are the first of a Mexican headline pair. The better of the two, they’ve got a very Britpop feel, echoing the likes of Suede or Placebo, even if they do veer dangerously close to U2 territory at times. Light guitars dance slowly over a full bottom end, accompanied by lyrics that evoke the gritty glamour of a crack den in an antique shop. In Bogotá you’ll never see the stars, so Vía Lactea can at least let you hear them.
Ending the festival, although across the way, are the other big-name Mexicans, Café Tacvba (11.45pm, Cotopaxi). They absolutely tore Rock al Parque to pieces last time they hit Colombia, in 2019. Expect to see tens of thousands of rolos bouncing along when they hit Ingrata somewhere in the middle of their set.
We’ve made a playlist of some of Saturday’s highlights from the upcoming Festival Cordillera 2022 in Parque Simón Bolívar.
This weekend (Sep 24 and 25) sees the Festival Cordillera 2022 rock up in Parque Simón Bolívar. It’ll feature the very best of Latin talent both established and up-and-coming. Tickets are still available, and they’ll even plant a tree to celebrate your purchase. These artists are all big news in Latin lands, but not necessarily elsewhere so we’ve compiled a little mixtape to catch you up with some of the sounds of the weekend.
Some quick orientation notes: The main stage is Aconcagua, with Cotopaxi and Cocuy as the second and third stages. If you’re cold, try the Bosque Electrónica tent.
First up on Saturday, it’s a straight shoot out of young Colombian talent on the second and third stages. We’re picking Briela Ojeda (2.15pm, Cotopaxi) to open this list, with her striking vocals matching the power of her heartfelt lyrics. Doña Justicia showcases her extraordinary voice perfectly.
At the same time is Duplat (Cocuy, 2.15pm), the capital’s premier fashion-forward whimsy-popster. Párpados Cerrados has a suitably bananas (see what we did there?) video to match the idiosyncratic music.
Arath Herce (3pm, Aconcagua) will be making his debut in Colombia to open the main stage. It’s a big stage for a single man and a guitar, but his uplifting ballads could just be perfect for mid-afternoon. We’ve leaned into the recent rough weather with Lluvia, and hope that the chorus “danzamos por la lluvia” will be how we manage the likely downpours.
After the Mexican ingenue comes the oldest performer of the weekend, Totó la Momposina (3.45pm, Cotopaxi). She’s retiring shortly after this performance, so if you haven’t caught this bona fide legend, get on it this weekend. We’ve chosen El Pescador for its characteristic rolling drums under the perfect melody of her voice, but you could lose an afternoon surfing her back catalogue and you’ll not hear a bad song.
A radically different direction is next with the genre-bending reggaetech bomba that is Rosa La Pistola (4.45pm, Bosque Electrónico). She brings the sex and violence to the movie of the festival, with a likely XXX-rated show that seems far too early in the day. Cumbia Malandra is about as PG-rated as she ever gets – pretty much any other video you watch will push the YouTube limits on sexual content, that’s for sure.
After that, let’s keep things boisterous with Bogotá legends LosPetitFellas (7pm Cocuy). They’ve been around forever, it seems, but haven’t lost any of their infectious energy as they bounce from big beats to rap-rock. Rock n’ Love is a joyous celebration of rollicking nights out in la nevera of Bogotá.
Over on the main stage it’s our favourite of the Big Foreign Names in the shape of Mon Laferte (7pm, Aconcagua). Like a woman trapped out of time, she’s got all the style of the 1920s but the sensibility of the 2020s. She flits between genres with ease and always seems at home. She’s never sounded more Colombian than in her cumbia Amárrame, and thankfully won’t be bringing Juanes.
Los Amigos Invisibles (10.45pm, Cocuy) are closing out the third stage. Hailing from Venezuela, these boys bring solid and dependable Latin-rock to the stage. Of all their songs, we’re sure that the one you’ll like is La Que Me Gusta (see what we did there?).
It’s worth staying up late for Los Fabulosos Cadillacs (11.45pm, Aconcagua), one of those Argentine bands that have been the guiding point for three successive generations of fans of rock en español. Similar to the equally long-lived AC/DC, pretty much every song sounds very, very similar, but we’re going with their paean against fascism, Mal Bicho.
Closing out the Saturday (we’re aware it’s technically Sunday at this point, pedants) festivities are lo-fi legends Mitú (00.15am, Bosque Electrónico). They’re not from Vaupés, but there’s still something magical and otherworldly in their music. This ode to every Rolo’s favourite holiday destination, Melgar, is a comedown classic if you’ve been on the naughty stuff this weekend.
The capital is receiving a plethora of Latin talent this weekend as Festival Cordillera 2022 sets up shop in the centre of the city.
Don’t miss Café Tacvba at the Festival Cordillera. Photos: Courtesy of Páramo.
The cold nights are closing in as we head into rainy season, and what better way to warm yourself up than a giant music festival? Like a hearty stew, it’ll reach right down and heat your tired soul. The olla for this musical soup is Parque Simón Bolívar, across three stages and an electronica tent. The ingredients are world class, from the likes of Café Tacvba and La Etnnia to more delicate seasonings like Briela Ojeda and a bit of N.Hardem to spice things up. The name of this Rolo recipe? Festival Cordillera 2022.
What makes this festival so special is its focus on Latin music. That doesn’t necessarily mean staid and traditional music, but mainly Latin takes on contemporary sounds. Rap, hip-hop, punk and rock. There’s also cumbia if it’s all a little too modern for you. Just like the laboured soup analogy above, mixing is the name of the game, with artists blending all kinds of genres both with each other and with traditional sounds too. Best of all, it’s in the middle of the city like Rokal, and has beer like Estéreo Picnic. Perfect combo, in our eyes.
Briela Ojeda will be on stage at 2.15pm on Saturday. Photos: Courtesy of Páramo.
There’s plenty of Colombian talent, as you’d imagine, led by legendary rappers La Etnnia (7.45pm Sun) and alt-rockers Aterciopelados (3.45pm Sun). Both bands made their names in the 90s, chronicling the trials and tribulations of those years in la nevera. Elsewhere on the lineup, you’ll find cumbia legend Toto La Momposina(3.45pm Sat) bringing some much-needed sun to these chilly mountains. LosPetitfellas (7pm Sat) are surely future legends, having seemingly been around all century with their jazzy indie hip hop.
Among the younger generation, look out for N.Hardem (2.15pm Sun), a favourite of ours who spits raw fury through frenetic rhymes. Rosa La Pistola (4.45pm Sat) is a bad-ass underground reggaetonera who rewrites the script for this oft-maligned genre and Briela Ojeda (2.15pm Sat) brings folk-whimsy to follow up her impressive Estéreo Picnic set. She clashes with Duplat (2.15pm Sat), sadly, with his interesting take on pop-electronic-rock mash-up. For more traditional electronica, try Mitú (00.15am Sat) for a relaxing comedown after a hard day’s night. Perhaps strangest of all is a bit of Worcestershire sauce in Quantic (8pm Sun), an Englishman inspired by Pacific sounds.
From overseas and across mountains we’ve got stacks more of the region’s finest, from Mexico to Chile and everywhere in between. Mexican rockers Café Tacvba (11.45pm Sun) return to Parque Simón Bolívar after 7 years alongside compatriots Caifanes (9pm Sat), Zoé (10.15pm Sun), who also have a long history with Bogotá, and Maná (7.45pm Sun) are the biggest names, but there’s quality oozing out of every pore of the bill. Los Fabulosos Cadillacs (11.45pm Sat), Los Auténticos Decadantes (5.45pm Sat) and Babasónicos (8pm Sat) from Buenos Aires are the big Argentine names from the 90s.
Mexican rockers, Caifanes will perform on Saturday night. Photos: Courtesy of Páramo.
If you’re not waiting for Maná, you can play with the girls and see rap-rock Molotov (4.45pm Sat) on Saturday evening or wait for Julieta Venegas (6.45pm Sun). There’s also younger talent coming through, with Arath Herce (3pm Sat) making an eagerly-awaited debut in Colombia and the pop-rock revivalists Conociendo Rusia (2pm Sun) from Argentina. Caloncho (4.45pm Sun) brings his take on reggae from Mexico.
Smaller Latin nations are well represented too. From Santiago comes the irrepressible art-pop pixie Mon Laferte (7pm Sat), so impressive at Rock al Parque in 2017. Puerto Rico sends ex-boyband hero Draco Rosa (5.45pm Sun) and Uruguay are sending No Te Va Gustar, (10.30pm Sat), who you’ll love. Relations with Venezuela can be strained, but Los Amigos Invisibles (10.45pm Sat) will be very visible, as will Akapellah (6.15pm Sun) the rapper. The West Indies are representing on the first day too, with The Wailers (8.30pm Sat) and Mad Professor (10pm Sat) throwing down reggae and dub in the tent.
Getting to Festival Cordillera 2022 couldn’t be easier, as it’s in (more or less) the geographical heart of Bogotá, in Parque Simón Bolívar. Don’t mug yourself off though – the park is big and the festival is only in one corner. You’ll be able to enter via Calle 63 – get off at the roundabout where Calle 63 meets Carrera 60 and follow the signs. Tickets are still available online and there’ll be a tree planted for every transaction made, so buy them one-by-one. Even if you’re not so bothered about the trees, you’ll not regret this chance to see a slew of bona fide regional legends. If you’re only going for one day, Saturday seems to be a better bet.
Corona, one of the largest beverage companies in the world, announced this month the launch of its Corona Island. Located just outside of Cartagena, off the Colombian Caribbean coast, the island looks to be a beacon of growth for the sustainable travel industry.
Corona is working with the nonprofit Oceanic Global to obtain the highest level of sustainability on the island, getting the Ocean Global Blue Seal for eliminating single-use plastic. When Corona Island opens next summer, Colombian tourists will have a new eco-destination to visit in the form of an island resort that celebrates nature and sustainability.
Said Felipe Ambra, Global Vice President for Corona, “On Corona Island, we are celebrating the majesty and beauty of the outdoors by getting guests engaged in protecting paradise.”
“Everyone on the team, from our chefs to our architects contributed to creating a truly single-use plastic-free paradise. We look forward to welcoming visitors, rekindling their relationship with nature, and hopefully creating more advocates to protect our natural world,” added the executive.
Tourism, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council, contributes approximately 10% to the world’s economy. And travelers are becoming increasingly concerned about the impact their activities could have on the locations they visit. According to Booking.com’s 2020 sustainable traveling report, 69 percent of U.S. travelers identified sustainable travel as important to them, saying they have a responsibility to make sure their trips do not result in damage to a location.
Founded in Mexico, Corona is a leading beer brand that sells beer worldwide exported to more than 180 countries. It has long been a pioneer in the space, being recognized as the most valuable beer brand in the world – at a $7 billion valuation – and one of the strongest brands in the space.
As part of the experience for visitors, workshops and excursions will be hosted at the Oceanic Global’s Blue School. Design and vision for the island was led by international architectural and design firm, James & Mau, in partnership with Colombian architect Jairo Márquez. Guest menus were created by Chilean-born Chef Christopher Carpentier.
Economically, eco-tourism has been shown to do good and be sustainable financially as well. A 2016 study by Sustainable Travel International and Mandala Research showed that eco-tourists tend to stay longer and spend more.
Individuals interested in booking a stay on Corona Island should visit here.
There’s been plenty of heat around Petro’s victory last month, but precious little light. What will a Petro presidency actually look like?
The inauguration of Gustavo Petro as President of Colombia marks a key point in Colombian history. Photo: Petro Presidencia
Now that Gustavo Petro has finally taken his seat in the Casa de Nariño, we officially enter a new period. For the first time, a leftist leader has the reins of power, and a country waits with bated breath to see what will happen. We’ve had a go at separating myth from reality. For now, all we know is that Marbelle hasn’t left the country. But there’s good news too.
Promises and fears
Petro made a whole raft of promises in his election campaign, ranging from the easily achievable and popular to the more extravagant and ill-defined. That lack of definition means that he has leeway on implementation of his ideas.
Economy: To start off with, he wants significant change to public finances. He needs money for his various reforms. The fears are that he will impose punitive taxes and nationalise private property, as well as precipitate a crisis in the peso’s value.
Law and order: There’s police reform, including the abolition of the riot squad (ESMAD), and prison reform as well as various judicial changes. The JEP is likely to receive significant support. His critics argue that crime will rise, while his supporters fear a coup. He’s open to negotiation for armed groups, both for guerilla groups such as ELN and paramilitary groups like the Clan de Golfo.
Environment: This is intimately tied to the economy. He wants Colombia to move towards decarbonisation. This makes a lot of sense in the long term, as oil remains far more important to the economy than most people realise. He’s putting the brakes on further exploration, and some fear that he may try to dismantle existing projects.
Wellbeing: He’s promised a healthcare system that will cover everyone at low-to-zero cost. Key to that is implementing ley 1751, and also eliminating the EPS. The formation of vice-president Francia Marquez’ much-vaunted equality ministry will take a couple of years. In the short term, it’s possible that the abortion protection granted by the Supreme Court will pass into law and that there will be a greater focus on feminicides, homophobia and transphobia. He’s likely to apply great reform to tertiary education, in particular by reforming ICETEX.
Vice-president Francia Marquez at the inauguration. Photo: Petro Presidencia
International relations: As a leftist, he’s much less hostile to Venezuela than previous administrations have been, and correspondingly less welcoming to the US. Some fear that he will open the borders to Venezuela and lessen relations with the US.
Can he deliver on the promises? Or are the fears founded?
Financial reform: The finance changes are likely to get heavily caveated but pass. The public fury of 2021 is still heavy in the minds of many and funds need to be raised from somewhere. The initial proposals for reform seem balanced and sensible – targeted mainly at those earning over 10 million pesos monthly, which the ministerio de hacienda says is about 2% of the population. There doesn’t seem to be much intent from his camp to target anyone except the ultra-rich, so fears of mass requisitions are almost certainly unfounded. Indeed, Petro has said he won’t expropriate anything during his presidency.
Taxes on sugary drinks and plastic are unlikely to be unpopular, and there will almost certainly be significant pushback on inheritance taxes. The peso has already slid, but it’s been weak for a while anyway and there are a lot of reasons for this, many of which are outside of Colombia’s control.
Law and order: It’s likely that some of his police reforms will go through. The key idea of removing policing from the Ministry of Defence seems doable, although he seems to want it to remain under government control via the Ministry of the Interior. If that’s the case, reform is likely to be more cosmetic than effectual. There is one key exception, which is dismantling ESMAD. That certainly could happen, as they’re widely disliked. Again though, there will have to be some sort of replacement in the future.
Negotiations for the disarmament of armed groups are certainly likely to happen, although their chances of success are less clear. ELN will almost certainly come to the table, and could well sign a deal similar to that the FARC signed (with the attendant problems). More interestingly, the Clan de Golfo have already announced a unilateral ceasefire. Question marks remain over the viability of those negotiations, but Petro’s already closer to solving that problem than other politicians. If that can be pulled off, other armed groups may well put down their guns too. Regarding the more dramatic worries, a coup is unlikely. Many participants in recent protests have been on Petro’s side, so his opponents will need time to organise. After years of demonising the idea of protest, we can expect opposition to be in the Senate and media rather than on the streets.
Environment: Petro won’t start a fight with big petro-carbon companies, so it’s very unlikely that existing legal operations will be affected much. It’s entirely possible that he’ll try to crack down on illegal projects though, which are largely ignored at the moment. With an energy crisis raging and OPEC refusing to open the taps, he may well be tempted to backtrack on new exploration projects. He’ll be taxing plastic and CO2 emissions and slapping sales tax on fuel. More critically, a 10% tax on some mining/petrocarbon exports will bring in revenue and auto-regulate some of the dodgier exploration.
Wellbeing: The EPS is widely disliked, so changes to the system shouldn’t be too hard to get through the Senate. The changes may be more about language than reality in the end, as the private system will fight tooth and nail to retain some form of engagement with the public. Implementing ley 1751 should be straightforward as well, but it’s been ignored for quite a while, so don’t be surprised if that continues to be a problem. His inauguration speech featured tubthumping about the failed war on drugs, so expect addicts to receive medical care rather than police attention. As long as that’s kept relatively quiet, it should be incontroversial and not make too many waves.
To education, then, and reform of ICETEX will depend on how much money his tax reforms will raise. He’s aiming for the sky, and if he hits high he can go for full abolition immediately. If he has to abandon certain measures, expect to see more modest reforms, starting with the more vulnerable students and those in public universities. This isn’t likely to face much opposition: ICETEX isn’t popular and a lot of its loans will never be repaid in full anyway. Petro is promising the teacher’s union FECODE a lot, and they are unlikely to dissent for at least a year. If he can’t get funds to them, or he ties improvements in conditions and pay to results, that will change fast.
International Relations: There will most likely be vague anti-US rhetoric from Petro’s camp, maybe even from the man himself. It’s extraordinarily unlikely that he’ll cause any serious spats, especially with the Biden administration. The neighbours raise different questions. He’ll likely be more open to dialogue with Maduro, yet wary of being too chummy. If Lula comes back to power in Brazil, expect Petro to be among the leading lights of a new pink wave of Latin leftist leaders.
Overall
The common thread running through all of this is the difference between reform in reality and reform on paper. He’s likely to get watered-down versions of his big ticket proposals on paper at least. He will certainly trumpet those from the rooftops, but their impact may well be limited. The concerns that he will run the country into the ground are hyperbole, although there may well be a few bumps in the road as Colombia moves towards decarbonisation, for example. Petro may herald a change in Colombian political opinion, but as far as day-to-day life is concerned it’s likely to be largely business as usual.
We speak to Adriana Santacruz, one of the first designers to integrate indigenous traditions into her fashion designs.
Photography by @cesarubiano. Styling, Makeup and Hair by @franklinramostoscano. Art direction by @joseaudasuki. Models @nadia.nnkk @maleikaverbel @dianaortega_95
On a semi-sunny day, I ventured into Rosales to interview the renowned designer Adriana Santacruz. We met in her boutique, nestled between chic high-rise condos and overpriced pet stores, along with her son, Juan Santacruz whose Perdido watering hole is downstairs.
Santacruz pioneered the use of traditional weaving techniques in contemporary fashion, beginning back in 1999. While she hasn’t participated in a live show since before the pandemic, her passion and eye for style remain undiminished. Juan explains that they now concentrate on B2B orders.
In addition to Bogotá and her native Pasto, Santacruz sells her work as far afield as Portugal, Kuwait, and Bahrain. It’s also available from Donna Karan’s pricey, upscale Urban Zen boutiques in the United States where pieces can sell for upwards of a thousand U.S. dollars.
Before we start the interview, she gives me a tour of the current collection. It includes ruanas, jackets, coats, mantos (capes), and skirts which stood out on rollaway garment racks on wheels. Plus, there were leather bags made in partnership with the French-Colombian luxury brand Atelier Artisanal that even Sex and The City’s Carrie Bradshaw would die to own.
The collection consisted primarily of dark hues and earth tones, which Santacruz said were the inspiration for this season’s collection. This is the opposite of the patina for the prior season, namely blues, greys and whites. Most of the pieces are wool or a cotton wool blend and even incorporate PET or recycled plastic which have been turned into thread. The current collection ranges in price from COP$1.2 million to COP$3 million.
Photography by @cesarubiano. Styling, Makeup and Hair by @franklinramostoscano. Art direction by @joseaudasuki. Models @nadia.nnkk @maleikaverbel @dianaortega_95
When we finally began our conversation, Santacruz was in a buoyant mood. The sun had made its appearance and I had ordered a chilled glass of white wine to get those creative juices flowing.
Santacruz told me that grey and blue were harmonic colours, the right colours to begin this season’s collection. She sees red as the colour that symbolises the life she wanted to bring in. The lion’s share of the pieces are structured/unstructured shapes. For instance, in her hands, a ruana will not resemble what we think of as your typical ruana but becomes a timeless, elegant piece. Santacruz describes this as “complejo simplicidad,” complex simplicity.
Another of Santacruz’s claims to fame is that she was one of the first designers in Colombia to integrate the weaving techniques of indigenous communities in her work. Santacruz wanted to assimilate these woven fabrics into contemporary fashion at a time when most other designers were loath to do so – nor were customers likely to purchase them. Now it has become what she calls the DNA of the brand.
Santacruz began her collaboration with the los Pastos community more than twenty years ago. Los Pastos are an indigenous community from southern Colombia, where Santacruz and her family hail from. At that point the idea of using these woven design techniques which are passed down from generation to generation was unusual. But Santacruz used it as the basis for her university graduate thesis and then went on to launch the brand.
Now supporting indigenous communities and their cultures is all the rage and sampling their work in fashion has become the norm. Her designs, her son tells me as we wrap up our conversation, are waterproof because of the tightly woven design technique which is done on looms. Most importantly, the ancestral legacy mentioned on their website is alive and well at the House of Adriana Santacruz.
Colombian voters elect Gustavo Petro to lead the country for the next four years, the first time the country has ever elected a left-wing president.
Gustavo Petro elected as Colombia’s new president. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The results are in and Colombia has elected Gustavo Petro as its new president. Petro will lead the country for the next four years, winning what was an extremely close-run race. At time of writing (5pm), after the 9th bulletin from CNC, Petro had 50.88% of the vote, while Rodolfo took 46.85%. With 89% of the tables declared, the numbers are unlikely to change much from here. Voto en blanco – essentially a way to register a vote without supporting either candidate – took 2.23%. Over 22 million Colombians voted today.
Bogotá’s former mayor and ex-M-19 guerilla had a solid core of support for much of the campaign. Gustavo Petro – who also reached the second round in 2018’s election – is Colombia’s first real left-wing president. The last election descended into an ‘anyone but Petro’ approach. That happened this year too, but he overcame the negativity and won a historic mandate.
Petro tweeted, “Today is a holiday for the people. Let them celebrate the first popular victory.” As a former member of the M-19 guerilla, Petro is a controversial figure for many. However, others believe he represents a necessary change to the established order. He is a notable change from Colombia’s previous presidents, although he is far from the communist his critics make him out to be. As a left-wing president, he follows a strong Latin American tradition that has been strangely absent from Colombia until now.
Hoy es dia de fiesta para el pueblo. Que festeje la primera victoria popular. Que tantos sufrimientos se amortiguen en la alegria que hoy inunda el corazon de la Patria.
Esta victoria para Dios y para el Pueblo y su historia. Hoy es el dia de las calles y las plazas.
Rodolfo Hernández was somewhat of a wild card in the first round. The 77-year-old building magnate gained ground in the polls in the final weeks of the race, eventually taking 28% of the vote. His non-traditional campaign focused on TikTok and other social media but did not involve lots of rallies. Rodolfo did not take part in the televised presidential debates. However, following his success in the first round, it seems voters weren’t as convinced by the engineer when they delved deeper. Hiding in Miami and avoiding debates has not gone down well at all.
Francia Márquez becomes Colombia’s first Afro-Colombian woman elected as vice-president
Today was a day of firsts for Colombia. Not only did it elect its first left wing president, it also elected an Afro-Colombian woman to the position of vice president for the first time. Petro’s running mate, Francia Márquez, is a prominent social and environmental campaigner whose straight-talking appealed to a large swathe of voters who previously felt unrepresented. However, others questioned her lack of political and governmental experience.
Rodolfo also chose an Afro-Colombian woman as a running mate. Marelen Castillo was the least known of the four faces of this race, a devout catholic and – until she joined the campaign trail – the academic vice-rector of the Minuto de Dios University in Bogotá.
Election day marred by accusations of fraud, violence, and misinformation
Predictably, in a campaign that’s been rife with misinformation and allegations of dirty tricks, there have already been accusations of irregularity. Last night, videos and screenshots were circulating on social media. One appeared to be from the CNC itself, the other from CNN Español. It’s most likely that the CNN one is simply journalists preparing a practice run for results day – fairly standard practice in journalism – whereas the CNC one is a little less clear.
The initial report from the MOE, the country’s electoral monitoring system, at midday expressed regret for two murders today: An electoral witness from the Pacto Histórico party in Cauca, and a soldier near a polling station in Caquetá. According to the MOE, the soldier died after gunfire broke out between the army and FARC dissidents. In its second report of the day, the MOE reported that another human rights defender had been murdered in Cauca and an explosion near a polling station in Norte de Santander had injured three soldiers. The MOE also said there had been various complaints of dots or marks on ballot papers due to printing errors.
The new president will take charge in August
Gustavo Petro will be inaugurated as President on August 7. In some ways, winning the election is the easy bit. The new president takes on a divided country with significant economic challenges and deep rooted inequality. Progress on implementing the country’s historic peace deal with the FARC, signed in 2016, has been slow at best. But Petro has promised to advance the peace deal and to reopen talks with the ELN.
More problematic still will be the challenge of delivering on what has been promised. The plan de gobierno was filled with a lot of rich promise but was very light on detail. The sums need to add up, and that won’t be easy. It may not matter, of course, as much of his vote is likely from people who haven’t read the manifesto. It’s an ‘anti-the existing order’ vote as much as support for Petro himself.
It was clear from the first round that Colombians wanted change. Now they have it. The next questions are what shape it will actually take, whether they’ll be happy with the choice they’ve made, and how much will get done.
In 2022, there’s a lot of talk about environmental issues and green matters. Colombia could be at the forefront of these discussions, with abundant natural resources and as much biodiversity as anywhere else on earth. To what degree any of this moves the ordinary voter, it’s hard to know. With inflationary pressures making post-Covid economic revival somewhat rocky, many people have too much on their own plates to worry about the wider world.
While people may not all be eco-warriors, locally the la niña rains have been particularly problematic this year. Plus, internationally the last few months have given cause for concern abroad. With oil shocks reminding us of the late 70s, this is as good a time as any to push towards energy self-sufficiency. The Amazon too is reaching a tipping point, so changes are here.
Frack off
Fracking is the topic that seems to be most widely discussed on social networks. Petro virulently opposes it, proposing a total ban on new projects, stopping some that are already in place and promising to respect any public opposition. He will also ban large open cast mines, but allow small traditional and artisanal mines to continue. Rodolfo has indicated in speeches and videos that he’s not opposed to fracking, but it’s absent from his manifesto. He does talk about mining, but only to say that he will insist on multinationals following the same rules in Colombia as they would in their own countries.
With fracking off the table and further resource extraction limited, green energy is the way forward for Petro. He plans to invest in all forms of renewables, depending on the area. Colombia is already in a good position with regard to hydroelectrics, but there will have to be investment in solar and wind. He acknowledges this, proposing a gradual decarbonisation plan which will protect both employment and economy along the way. He plans to make energy a ‘common good,’ although it’s not clear what that means exactly. His critics paint this as a plan for nationalisation. He will keep Ecopetrol as a national company and create a National Institute for Clean Energy. He plans to use existing biocarbon reserves for internal use as much as possible. Rodolfo follows a similar tack, advocating for responsible use of non-renewables and a gradual increase of renewable energy depending on the zone.
Deforestation
Deforestation is more commonly associated with Brazil, but it’s a big problem in Colombia too. Rodolfo wants to stop this by paying farmers not to cut down trees or to plant trees, especially native species, and a basic income for those that protect forested areas. He would also strengthen the existing environmental authorities and push for swift justice in cases of ecological destruction. He promises to ratify the Escazú Agreement for Latin American cooperation on climate change and apply the targets from COP26 last year. There will be a special protection plan for the Amazon. Petro plans to work with neighbouring countries to present a united front protecting, for example, the Amazon. He will do this by offering carbon offsetting.
Petro plans to develop more biodegradable materials, which Colombia is more than capable of doing. He will also prohibit single-use plastics, which are heavily used in Colombia. Recyclers will be formalised and their work valued, while open dumps for rubbish will be phased out. Even in cities, there will be moves by Petro to allow measures to combat pollution. For example, local governments will receive funding to promote walking and biking as well as the permission to create low-emission zones within cities. Rodolfo has similar plans, giving green budgets to regions via the vice-president’s office. Each region can use the money to promote cycling, recycling, conservation, renewable projects, and so on.
Although the electorate doesn’t seem particularly bothered by the issue, this is one thing governments absolutely are obsessed with, and for good reason. Both candidates agree on the basics here, and will both work towards a more eco-friendly economy. The big question is how much they can do without inflicting too much pain. It won’t be easy to fully green the economy and some benefits will be invisible and/or delayed.
Colombia has several big advantages here, with a relatively low carbon footprint per person already and plenty of natural resources. Although there is still plenty of opposition from oil companies and the like, the wind is blowing in one direction: towards a greener future. Colombia should orientate itself towards that, especially in terms of international relations. Questions linger over precisely how this will happen, but the will does seem to be there at the top level.
It’s no secret that Bogotá was poised to become a tech capital in Latin America sooner or later. In the global startup ecosystem report from Startup Genome, Bogotá ranked third in LatAm behind Sao Paulo and Mexico City; it also ranked third in the region for funding, third for performance, and second in performance for an emerging Latin American ecosystem.
All the right ingredients for growth are here: top universities, connections to all of the major international companies doing business in the country, a rapidly evolving and expanding Venture Capital network, an entrepreneur-friendly chamber of commerce, and opportunities to work directly with the country’s central government.
Bogotá’s entrepreneurial and tech ecosystem is extremely young both in terms of how long it’s been on the VC radar and in terms of the median age of investor/entrepreneur involved. As such, the city has become a big draw to people in their mid-to-late 20s seeking to finally bring some disruption to the capital’s business scene.
Top of the list when it comes to churning out the next generation of entrepreneurs is the Universidad de Los Andes Center for Entrepreneurship. Enforcing the claim that Andes is the best isn’t difficult, as approximately 40% of the Forbes list of entrepreneurs in Colombia are Andes grads, with an additional report prepared for iNNpulsa by KPMG also stating that roughly 60% of tech companies in Colombia are led by alumni from the prestigious university.
Founded in 2016, the entrepreneurship program is relatively new – but it’s growing fast. Last year, the university supported 650 entrepreneurs through 50 hands-on training and mentoring hours, and a total of 1,169 entrepreneurs since 2021. In addition, the university signed a partnership with SENA (Services Nacional de Aprendizaje), which provides the largest financial mechanism to support entrepreneurs in the country.
Universidad de los Andes
One reason the program may be growing is the fact that between 2020 and 2021, the amount of foreign capital invested by foreign VCs in Latin America increased fivefold from $4 billion to $20 billion, with most of the investments made targeting late-stage ventures – no doubt an effort on behalf of mega-funds seeking the next Rappi or Habi, Colombia’s recently crowned proptech unicorn.
However, in the pre-and-seed stage of things, actionable entrepreneurial experience is in high demand as the ecosystem is still too young to have many mentors capable of offering their advice, funding, and experience.
“It’s a young ecosystem. We need more mentors. So now we have a program to certify them,” said Andrés Gurrero, Head of the Universidad de Los Andes Center for Entrepreneurship. “In Colombia, there are only two university programs to certify mentors for entrepreneurship. Last year Universidad de Los Andes had 68 mentors, this year that number has risen to 100 mentors. It’s about bringing back the older generation to invest in the younger generation.”
This is particularly interesting because the idea of appointing high-level expertise to the board in order to garner legitimacy is a move that actually saved University de Los Andes from failure in its early days. Two years after its founding, the (startup) university was in trouble, so the 10 entrepreneurs who founded the venture asked Albert Einstein if he would like to join their board of advisors. Einstein accepted, and overnight the academic institution garnered instant international credibility.
Connecting mentors with founders
Santiago Rojas Montoya, Director of cube.ventures accelerator, is an example of an ecosystem entrepreneur giving back to the next generation. Santiago sees the future of Latin America in Bogotá, and is excited when he hears stories about founders from a few years ago recycling their capital and insight back through the ecosystem to help raise up the next generation.
“We’re trying to help close the strategy/execution gap. You can have a great idea, and plan and prepare all you want but the best way to learn is by doing – you have to get out on the dance floor to know if you’re any good,” Santi said.
“So at cube.ventures our goal is to connect over 100 mentors with first-time startup founders and we help them bridge the gap so they can hit the ground running. We want to give the ecosystem 100 startups by the end of the year,” he added.
Equally as ambitious is Laura Maria Gonzalez, a Senior Associate at inQlab, the Venture Capital arm of Grupo Santo Domingo – the conglomerate that established the brand that makes all of Colombia’s beer (Bavaria), but also places bets on media (Caracol (TV), Blu (Radio), property and infrastructure developers (PEI, Terranum), and retail (D1), amongst others.
Laura tells me, that ⅓ of inQlab’s portfolio are companies they’ve devoted to taking from the whiteboard to profitability. More recently, the fund has pivoted to working with foreign and first-time founders.
“Even for a local first-time founder, trying to understand how taxes work here is like learning a new language,” Laura said. “We also help first-time angels understand what a stake is – how to make investments.”
And because of their tremendous capital backing, inQlab’s hands-on approach is all all about playing the long game and applying their valuable growth-minded expertise directly, “We ask for an observer in the company. We really like to get our hands into the mud. Some entrepreneurs don’t like that, but we’re okay with that,” Laura said, adding, “New valuations should be a gauge of growth strategy, and a mark of milestones achieved.”
Article Author Nick Kipley
What’s most interesting is that even though Bogotá sent more companies to Y Combinator last year than any other city, the current tidal wave of entrepreneurs is the result of local organizations like Connect Bogotá, local universities, VCs like cube.ventures, and inQlab, and government accelerators like iNNpulsa.
Isabel Muñoz, the executive director at Invest In Bogota, the VC/startup-focused subsidiary of the Bogotá Chamber of Commerce says that this shift to accessing local resources also comes at a time when “We’re witnessing an explosion of entrepreneurship. 15 years ago when we talked about entrepreneurship we were talking about a few people,” Isabel said. “We cannot compare the quality of the teams, investors, and founders we’re seeing right now to anything we’ve seen before.”
The Bogotá startup ecosystem raised USD $110,000,000 in FY2021 through direct foreign investment, and triple that amount in the first quarter of this year alone, Isabel notes, commenting on an interesting reversal.
Entrepreneurs are seeking local resources to grow companies, but the finding is now pouring in from the outside. It used to be that Colombian entrepreneurs attended university abroad, returned home, and then sought local sources of funding. Recently, that’s all changed.
“We’re moving away from the local mindset when it comes to funding to attract international investors,” Isabel continued. “We’re a new ecosystem so it’s tough for VCs because they’re first-time managers with no track record, so it’s very challenging.”
No shortage of ideas
Ivan Pérez, who oversees Invest in Bogotá’s connection with the startup universe, explains that because of the relative newness and high energy of the ecosystem mean, there is no shortage of founders with new ideas – however, the general lack of experience among the current cohort means many entrepreneurs are trying to build the airplane and get airborne as it travels down the runway.
By taking a slower, and more measured approach, founders can (paradoxically) prove to investors that they are responsible enough and skilled enough to bring their companies into profitability.
“What do investors want? Rentability. The way to grow used to be to burn money through financing rounds, that’s over,” Ivan said. “Founders should first focus on their local market, and then expand responsibly.”
And in anticipation of a time when the ecosystem will be fully-mature and packed with profitable ventures, the local and national governments have embarked on a huge new project called the Distrito de Ciencia Tecnología e Innovación. Ivan tells me that it will be a purpose-built ‘tech city’ designed to accelerate innovation across the entire ecosystem.
The current downtown comes after an unimaginably high round of IPO valuations in the US market last year. Right now, there’s a lot of liquidity in the market right now – so the question remains: will the mega-funds continue to invest their money into the Bogotá ecosystem, or will they wait for the value of their portfolios to recover before investing tons of their money into the Bogotá ecosystem? Either way, the future looks bright.
There are one thousand and one reasons to check out Rafael Barón Herazo’s show. Here are one or two of them.
Rafael Barón Herazo’s 1000 +1 show features stars from the golden age of cinema. Photo: Galería Otros 360º
Rafael Barón Herazo’s show entitled 1000 +1 on the second floor of Galería Otros 360º / Otros 360 Gallery located in a popular restaurant on Quinto Camacho could be misconstrued as kitschy work, embodying the screen sirens of Hollywood’s Golden Era.
There are no Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan visages here. Only the glamorous faces of Dietrich and Garbo grace the large-scale canvases of this Barranquilla and Medellín-based artist. Asked about his inspiration and why he depicted movie stars from the 30s and 40s in this work Barón stated, “Stars from the golden age of cinema were used as a nod to that idea of timeless beauty, idealized and close to the concept of divinity.” This is why he says, “The use of halos were also prominent in the work.”
“I feel that my work is melodramatic, exacerbated in feelings, and theatrical and these characters, or their frames, give the perfect accent and atmosphere that I want to convey in my images,” he explained.
Another element that is prevalent in the work and in this series – indeed it’s where it got its name – is the Arabian Nights or A Thousand And One Nights. Barón explains it’s about the night and the oriental aesthetics of the rugs. He added, “I understood that the universe was where both are combined and that was my closest reference and meeting point of the two topics I wanted to address: the night and oriental rugs.”
Barón states, “This period developed in my imaginary universe is where my work takes place and my characters live, and what I call the ‘Macondo Social Club;’ I was also inspired by the night, that’s why all the works have grey backgrounds.”
The carpets and rugs come into his art as a dress worn by Barón’s glamorous divas or a bodice, the composition of a jacket on one of his dapper male escorts, or even as a halo. The price of the works ranges between ten and twenty-two million Colombian pesos. The magic carpet ride of Barón’s work really does seem to take the viewer into his universe of L’amour and divinity.
Rafael Barón Herazo’s show can be seen at Galería Otros 360º until 2 July 2022
We look at both presidential candidates’ positions on a range of key issues. Find out what Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have to say about tourism.
View onto the beach and the palm-covered cabins at the Dahlandia lodge on Isla Múcura. Photo: Stefanie Brandli
Colombia is a world-class tourist destination with less than world-class numbers of visitors. In terms of potential for growth, tourism still has plenty to offer. In 2019, Colombia had reached 4.5 million foreign visitors. Then the pandemic kicked in and everything shut down for a while. With one of the world’s longest border closures, tourism went into a tailspin. Things got better in 2021 as domestic tourism – an often-overlooked sector – started to increase. It reopened before foreign visitors started trickling back. COVID is now largely out of people’s minds but has still had a significant impact. What’s next for the sector and what do the two presidential candidates promise?
Both Petro and Rodolfo note the importance of tourism to the economy. The former sees it as “one of the biggest generators of economic well being” and the latter says it’s “key for the development of the country.” Despite this, neither of them dedicate more than a page in their manifestos to the idea, which is a little worrying. At a point where tourism could become a major secondary motor for the economy, there are doubts over how seriously either candidate is treating it.
Rodolfo calls for better English in the tourism sector, but doesn’t provide details. He also wants to improve transport systems, hotels and gastronomic offerings. The first of that list could certainly be improved, so that’s a positive sign. Petro wants Colombia to work in accordance with the UNWTO, the world tourism organisation. He wants tourism to help bring societies in Colombia together and provide much-needed income to the regions. He hopes that increased tourism can build local communities and help them develop further autonomy.
Eco-tourism
Petro focuses mainly on the need for eco-tourism. He hits all the right notes in terms of buzzwords, but it may not surprise anyone who’s read our other articles on the candidate’s manifestos to learn that there is little in the way of concrete detail. This is important, as one of the big problems with ecotourism in Colombia is a lack of clear standards that are enforced and checked. There are schemes to monitor eco claims, but these don’t usually target greenwashers.
Rodolfo notes that this sector is particularly attractive to foreign visitors and accordingly calls for more advertising abroad. He’s particularly focused on the national parks that he sees as the jewel in the tourist crown. He talks about the importance of sustainability in maintaining an equilibrium between the needs of business and protecting the biodiversity that makes such tourism possible. However, he’s come under criticism for comments that seem to imply he would like to see mass hotel development around Santa Marta, possibly endangering Tayrona national park, an emblem of Colombian tourism.
National tourism
Rodolfo makes a call for national tourism to be protected – specifically to organise prices and structures that don’t exclude Colombians (and probably foreign residents) from enjoying the country. This already exists in practice, with the national park system operating a graded payment scheme for different nationalities. He also wants airlines to reduce prices for internal flights, if necessary introducing new operators to the sector in order to increase competition. Petro doesn’t mention domestic tourism, instead focusing on the benefits that general tourism could have for local communities.
Put simply, it’s hard to know. Other articles in this series have focused on topics with much clearer aims and big reform calls. That’s simply not the case with tourism. On the one hand, the words and ideas are largely positive and in line with most modern tourism trends. On the other hand, it seems like both candidates are more comfortable attacking and changing existing structures than developing relatively putative sectors.
Mass tourism in Colombia is still in its infancy in many ways, especially in terms of foreign visitors. Taking the right path in the post-pandemic world could allow it to avoid the mistakes that some countries have made. Leaving the sector to its own devices and allowing unchecked expansion will be disastrous.
We look at both candidates’ positions on a range of key issues. Find out what Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have to say about security.
The police will likely face wide-ranging reforms under either man. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Ask anyone in Colombia what they’re worried about in 2022 and the answer will either be the economy or security. Perceptions of crime have rocketed over the last few years, and the figures don’t look great for actual crime either. It’s a multifaceted subject in Colombia, encompassing petty street crime, serious crime, organised crime, separatist groups, dissident groups, the peace process and even the police themselves. As we come into the final days of the campaign, let’s look at where the candidates stand.
Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have a lot to say on the subject and very different personal experiences. Petro’s relationship with the police and the armed forces could charitably be described as rocky and less charitably described as outrightly hostile. It’s worth noting, though, that his rhetoric is aimed at the leadership, not the rank-and-file. After having been a lawmaker and a prisoner for his activities with M-19, he’s seen different sides of the coin. Rodolfo, on the other hand, has been a very high-profile victim of crime. Two of his children have been kidnapped, one of them murdered.
Despite the high crime figures and intense public concern, both candidates gloss over what they would actually do about this. The details are sparse while they focus on the grand schemes of reform. For the many Colombians who deal with street crime on a regular basis, it’s a surprising oversight. There seem to be no clear targets in either manifesto for reducing robbery or homicide, probably the two biggest security concerns for most people, certainly in their day-to-day lives.
Colombia’s prisons are overcrowded
Once people have been arrested, there’s a further problem: Colombia’s jails are far past full and the judiciary is massively backlogged and overworked. Rodolfo is keen on ‘zero impunity’, a slogan he mainly applies to seemingly every politician. He also wants it to apply to every criminal. There will be no special treatment: prison means prison. He wants to build more jails, especially in areas where the criminals can work in agrobusiness or industry. The effects of this on employment are anyone’s guess. This means a full reform of the jail system (INPEC), with better conditions for inmates and guards alike. Petro is similarly in favour of resocialisation rather than punishment, and talks about restorative justice. Some have seen this as a way to get certain people off the hook. That’s also true of his unclear statement about demanding that Colombians abroad are treated the same as in Colombia. However, that’s only supposition for now – what he actually suggests is decentralisation and a greater focus on casas de justicia, especially in rural areas.
The ongoing peace process dominates Petro’s campaign. He’s clearly positioned himself as the candidate that supports peace. To this end, he supports all the points of the peace process in their entirety. Rodolfo claims the same, although some are sceptical about this, as he says he voted no in the plebiscite of 2016. He wants a full implementation of the peace process, especially the JEP, and to try to bring the ELN into the existing peace process.
Security in post-conflict Colombia
Petro says that moving into post-conflict entails changes in missions and aims for the military. He doesn’t fully define this, but he does say ‘so-called national defence’ will be changed. He also wants the military to take a bigger role in protecting social leaders, especially in the regions. The armed forces will be repositioned towards clearer aims under Rodolfo. Interestingly, he wants to create units dedicated to protecting natural resources such as water, forests and mineral deposits. He also backs better protection of border areas and more focus on cross-border crime.
After fierce criticism of police action in protests in 2019, 2020 and 2021, there has been talk of police reform. Most of the criticism focuses on the riot squad, known as ESMAD. Petro has come out swinging, promising the disbanding of ESMAD among a full citizen-led reform of the entire police. That doesn’t mean that he wants to defund the police, just that he doesn’t think ESMAD can be reformed and needs to be fully replaced instead. He wants the police to focus on peaceful conflict resolution and education. He will also eliminate all non-police work, such as bodyguarding and carrying bags for dignitaries. Rodolfo agrees that the police in general need reforming, promising that any officer violating human rights will be sacked. Both candidates say that they will respect the right to protest.
Interestingly, both candidates are throwing bones to the rank-and-file of the armed forces and police. Petro thinks that education and wellbeing of the armed forces should be central to their mission. He’ll also raise salary and better pensions. Rodolfo will raise basic pay and conditions, as well as streamline promotion so that any soldier can progress through the ranks. He will achieve this by cutting inefficiencies such as executive pay and benefits. All members of the armed forces will have access to education and there will be modernisation of equipment designed at eliminating dependence on other countries.
Summing up: Petro vs. Rodolfo on security
So what’s going to happen? Petro is far more radical than Hernández, but the latter’s plans will still entail a lot of work. There wouldn’t be as much structural revision under a Rodolfo presidency, but the zero impunity alone would create an enormous strain on the justice system. Petro’s plans are popular with many citizens but will be bitterly opposed by the bosses.
We look at both candidates’ positions on a range of key issues. Find out here what Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have to say about healthcare.
The two Colombian presidential candidates have big plans for healthcare. Photo by Online Marketing on Unsplash
Both Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have grand and radical plans for healthcare. There’s a few minor differences in what they’ll do, but the gist is similar in both plans. With so much agreement, it’s time to find out what healthcare might look like going forward. The main gist is that it’s likely to be a lot more equitable than it is today. All reforms here apply to mental and physical healthcare.
Healthcare in Colombia has long been a contentious issue, most notably since the implementation of ley 100 in 1993, which was designed to bring healthcare to all Colombians and establish norms and standards of care and provision. It also removed the state monopoly on healthcare. Prior to that, only around one in five Colombians were in the healthcare system. While 96% of Colombians are now covered, the law also meant that many more people are exposed to rapacious healthcare providers under the EPS system rather than public services.
New healthcare systems
Continued universal care is at the heart of both candidates’ visions. Petro is unambiguous in wanting all healthcare to be universal as well as public. He thinks this can be done by immediately implementing ley 1751, which already provides for much of this. However, that law was passed in 2015 and has been largely ignored since then, meaning there’s significant opposition. Along the same lines, Rodolfo stresses the need to revive and expand the public health system as well as heavily controlling private providers, especially in terms of costs to end users. He will give care to all people in all situations, which means ripping up all the existing plans.
The EPS system will likely be eliminated in its current form if either candidate is elected. A lack of precision in both manifestos and public discourse means that it’s not entirely clear how they’ll carry this out, but the broad aims are clear. For Petro, it’s an essential state monopoly. It’s unlikely he’ll be able to ban all private practice, but he’ll try to take it as far as he can. Management of health will be under a Consejo Nacional, incorporating absolutely every voice you can imagine, from the LGBTQI+ community to academia. The private sector would have some involvement too. Rodolfo is less direct, but his plans to equalise payment, costs, and contracting mean that they will have to make enormous changes. He also plans to recover the public healthcare system anyway, which would also push the EPS providers to the margins.
Into the regions
Rural areas are key focus points for both men. As with other policy areas, such as education, they promote a vision of Colombia that includes and supports the hinterland as well as the major cities. Petro promises hospitals and clinics everywhere, with the express aim of having a healthcare centre within reasonable distance of every Colombian’s home and place of study/work.
Prevention is better than cure, say both men, and so they’ll orientate health measures towards that. Rodolfo sees patient responsibility as important here, so he’ll have family doctors educating and helping people to monitor their own health. On Petro’s side, it’s more about identifying social conditions to seek out the sources of problems. Top-down like Petro or bottom-up like Rodolfo, both hope that these measures will pay for themselves in reduced hospital admissions.
Drugs
Drug addiction is seen as a healthcare issue in both camps, so addiction will be treated rather than persecuted. This is a major step forward for Colombia and follows similar models in countries such as Portugal. The idea is to get addicts away from the streets through centres providing drugs. This in turn should reduce the problems associated with the ollas where drug users congregate.
In the end, it seems whoever ends up victorious next weekend will try to implement big changes. However, the reality may be more complicated. Cost is a big issue. Petro says that progressive taxation will solve it, Rodolfo thinks that it will come naturally from the efficiency savings and trimming off the profits. Given that corruption is endemic and tax reform has been very contentious, there may be problems for both here.
It’s also unlikely that the proposals in each plan de gobierno will go through Congress without a lot of fighting and modification. With the EPS commanding a fair deal of clout in lobbying terms and political influence, it won’t be easy to bin them off. Smaller measures such as increased rural coverage and addiction treatment are much easier targets to reach, so we are likely to see more changes in these aspects. Just don’t expect a revolution tomorrow. In the meantime, an apple a day keeps the doctor away, so stay safe.
Find out what Colombian presidential candidates Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have to say about trans rights as we enter the final week of campaigning.
Last month, Colombia chose Rodolfo Hernández and Gustavo Petro to participate in the second round, a one on one presidential vote on June 19. There is one topic that most candidates and debates have left unanswered: Trans rights. The candidates have talked a lot about same-sex couples, but most debates have left out the T in LGBTIQ+. Today we will analyse the stances of Rodolfo Hernández and Gustavo Petro on trans rights.
Rodolfo Hernández
Rodolfo Hernández, leader of the liga de gobernantes anticorrupción, has made some polemic statements in interviews during or before his candidacy regarding women, Venezuelan people and poor people. Regardless, Rodolfo does have some pro LGBTIQ+ policies, none directly for trans people but still benefiting them in some way. Here are a few of them:
To create cultural and artistic places for LGBTQI+ and other minorities. The argument is that art and culture are great ways to create inclusion for these communities.
To reinforce already existing policies (Decree 410 of 2018) that are not enforced correctly. The intention is to prevent discrimination because of gender identity or sexual orientation.
To create dialogue spaces for minorities with the goal of creating a development plan for LGBTIQ+ rights.
Rodolfo also says that he stands for LGBTIQ+ rights. In a tweet published on June 2 he recognised pride month saying, “On pride month I want to give you the tranquility that in my goverment LGTBIQ+ rights will be guaranteed, we will never have a possibility of union while discrimination persists. My mayoralty was the first one in Colombia’s history to fly the LGTBIQ flag.” He is right, he even faced legal problems because of this gesture destined to reject discrimination in the city.
Even though Hernández is accused of being misogynistic, xenophobic and violent, there is no proof of homophobia or transphobia on his mayoralty or presidential campaign.
Gustavo Petro
Gustavo Petro, leader of the Colombia Humana party, is the left’s candidate and has a great share of the support from LGBTIQ+ youth. Petro has his fair share of pro-LGBTIQ+ proposals, including policies that directly benefit trans people.
Petro also wants to reinforce Decree 410 of 2018 to start attacking discrimination.
His biggest proposal is the creation of a new Ministry, the Ministry of Equality, with the mission of empowering women, LGBTIQ+ community, younger generations, ethnic, and regional minorities. He also believes this will eradicate violence and discrimination against these communities (similar to Spain’s Ministry of Equality).
His government plan directly mentions facilitating the lives of trans people, binary and non-binary, via a national program of discrimination-free cities, destroying barriers in education and employment, one of the biggest problems for trans people.
Petro also proposes medical and psychological support for trans people, facilitating gender alignment surgeries and supportive therapy sessions.
Petro, like Rodolfo, has a history of support for the LGBTIQ+ community. As mayor of Bogotá he also flew the LGBTIQ+ flag, but for another reason. He flew it to commemorate the inauguration of the ‘center of LGBTIQ+ citizens’ – an organisation dedicated to helping these communities with any legal, psychological or medical problems they may have. There was also a big presence of LGBTIQ+ civil servants during his time as mayor. This was criticised by some voices of the Bogotá council, saying that Petro had ‘excessive’ support for the LGBTIQ+ community.
Bottom line: Hernández vs. Petro on trans rights
Having analysed their proposals, one thing is clear: Both candidates support the LGBTIQ+ community, showing that Colombia has advanced in inclusion. Direct homophobia is no longer a way to appeal to Colombian voters, as it was in the plebiscito of 2016, for example. However, at the same time, people still ignore the T in LGBTIQ+, only thinking of gays and lesbians when this community is mentioned. Colombia still has a long way to go, but it’s good to see that a candidate benefits when adding LGBTIQ+ rights on their government plan. Now the only question that remains is, who has the best proposals for the trans community? That’s for you to decide.
The story of the Galleon San José is back in the news as President Duque presents new underwater images. The story may have resurfaced but the wreck is still a long way underwater.
Searching for treasure. Launching the underwater remotely operated vehicle. Photo: Colombian Ministry of culture
Fresh film footage of the legendary treasure ship has put it back in the news. Here’s a brief summary, just in case it pops up in the Pub Quiz.
Is this the same Spanish ship we were talking about in 2018, and 2015? And then again in 1989? And way back 1981?
Yes. The Galleon San Joséalso made the news back in 1708 when it was attacked on the Caribbean coast close to Cartagena. It was the flagship of a treasure fleet carrying gold, silver and treasure from Panama to Spain, but was raided by British Navy boats hiding in the Rosario Islands. The galleon exploded and quickly sank. Today the loot is worth around US$17 billion.
And it’s just sitting on the seabed? Where’s my mask and snorkel…
Don’t hold your breath. The wreck’s exact location is a closely guarded secret, but it is believed to be in deep water, like between 600 and 1,000 metres down. And it’s been protected by the Colombian navy since its discovery in 2015.
But I read somewhere it was discovered in 1981? Did they lose it again?
Depends on who you talk to. In 1979, a US company called Gloca Mora Company set out to find the wreck off the Colombian coast using sonars and a submarine which played cat-and-mouse with the Colombian navy. Then, in 1981, having found a wooden wreck consistent with the San José, they were boarded by a gunboat and sent packing from local waters.
The loose deal they had made with Colombia to find the wreck somehow unraveled. Then their salvage company – Sea Search Armada – became locked into decades of legal wrangling to win back the salvage rights, with the main case dating back to 1989. Since then several court rulings have backed SSA’s claim to a share of the treasure, but the Colombian government has steadfastly refused to cut a deal, and in turn claims that the San José is nowhere near the site originally identified by the US company.
Wow, this is like a movie. Is there a role for Captain Jack Sparrow?
Or maybe Aquaman. Take your pick. But anyway, this story has its own larger-than-life hero in the form of Roger Dooley, an American-Cuban underwater explorer variously described as an archaeologist, plunderer or treasure hunter who scoured Caribbean waters for sunken wealth at the behest of Fidel Castro.
But there’s a further twist: Dooley has previously worked with contractors for SSA, causing the salvage company accusing him of pinching their own coordinates for the San José. The adventurer hotly denies this, having himself spent decades investigating the wreck in old colonial archives.
What is clear is that Santos trusts Dooley. In 2015, the American Cuban was named Chief Project Archaeologist and joined the Colombian Navy and the prestigious Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute to search again for the San José. If in fact it was ever lost in the first place.
Sounds like a team to get the job done.
Yes, and the wreck was found conclusively in November 2015, though only scant details emerged until 2018 when the partners agreed to release details of exploration. Hence the slew of San José news stories and photos of intact cargo, including gorgeous Chinese pottery. Meanwhile Dooley’s Swiss company Maritime Archaeology Consultants (MAC) was trying to hammer out its own salvage deal with Colombia….
Oh no, haven’t we been here before?
Yep. The problem for Colombia is the cost of recovering the cargo, which could run to US$70 million. And the billion-dollar treasure is an estimate; there was never an inventory. And how much can be successfully recovered? One option recently mooted the Colombian – and backed by MAC – was to fund the salvage with a share of the goods retrieved. But there remains the problem of who actually owns it.
Yikes! The treasure might not be Colombian?
Exactamente. This was a Spanish Crown Ship sunk by the British while carrying wealth from colonised countries now recognised as Peru, Bolivia and China, and now resting in Colombian waters. Plus, out of a crew and passenger list of 600 souls, only 11 survived. The rest are in a watery grave marked by the remains of the San José itself. Several countries, and an indigenous group, have dibs on the loot, and there are ethical arguments to not touch it at all.
A right legal tangle in other words. So, remind me, why is it back in the news?
In June 2022, the Galleon San José once again made world headlines after President Iván Duque presented a new video of cannons, coins and crockery on the seabed, filmed with undersea rovers purchased by the Colombian Navy. The gist of the story is that Colombia now has the technology to find and monitor wrecks, in fact two more wooden hulls were presented as being new finds close to the larger treasure wreck. Though experts say this is incorrect: these boats were already known.
Underwater images show cannons and other buried treasures. Photos: Colombian Ministry of Culture
Will Colombia ever see any benefits from the galleon?
Because of these legal issues, and the headache to find a formula for how to fund any recovery, the Duque government has left the wreck untouched for the last four years while empowering the navy to find practical ways to monitor the site. But at least he is now clear that the treasure – and that from future ships – is “patrimony for all Colombians”.
OK, so that scotches any “treasure for salvage” deal then.
Pretty much. Partly under pressure from Spain – which sees the wreck site as a tomb for Spanish sailors – the Colombian government has cut out companies like MAC from a partnership deal where they receive some of the cargo.
So, will it all go in a museum?
Here’s the thing: A museum and investigation center is planned for Cartagena, but it’s not practical to protect and display such a huge treasure. Also, large parts of it – silver and gold ingots, coins, and uncut gems – are not that exciting to look at. These bits could be sold off, but any cash coming in will attract new claims from countries like Bolivia where Spanish conquistadors looted the precious metal or forced slaves into extracting it.
Tricky. Perhaps it’s not such a great find after all?
My point exactly. With billions of dollars of wealth at stake it will be almost impossible to mount any salvage that’s not at risk of corruption, particularly one run by the Colombian military recently accused of inflating the cost of the robot submarine purchased to monitor the wreck.
Meanwhile, the national overseer of the Submerged Cultural Heritage of Colombia has raised the “terrifying possibility that the wreck is already being systematically looted”.
Sounds like hot air. How can you loot a wreck 800 metres down?
Well, look at the Titanic. The wreck of that famous ship is 3.75 kilometres deep in the cold Atlantic – more than four times deeper than the San José – and despite US protection is being stripped out by submersibles. Titanic portholes sell for US$50,000. How long before a San José doubloon pops up on Craigslist?
Good point. What happens now?
The incoming president will not rush to pick the “Galeón San José” file from his in-tray and will be happy to kick this can further down the road. But pressure will mount to do something amid rumours and speculation that the treasure is at risk, maybe even from the people tasked to protect it. Expect much more newsbytes before the stricken ship and its 600 hapless souls are finally laid to rest.
We’re looking at both candidates’ positions on a range of key issues. Find out here what Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández have to say about education
Ivan Aleksic, Unsplash
Education, education, education. Tony Blair would have approved of both candidates in this race. It’s been a keystone touchpoint for years, and there’s broad agreement that education needs serious improvement. Unfortunately, most of the debate gets sidetracked onto university education, although primary, secondary and further education are also in dire need of resources. Colombia’s PISA results are appallingly bad, which Rodolfo acknowledges in his manifesto.
Compulsory education: Petro’s and Rodolfo’s positions
For many Colombians, the rot in education starts in primary and secondary education. State services are notoriously underfunded and overcrowded. There are some excellent teachers, but they are few and far between as private schools poach a lot of talent. Petro wants to steadily increase coverage for state kindergarten, until all children are covered. Emphasis will be on the 2.7 million vulnerable children in the country. He also wants to target illiteracy, which he claims still excludes around a million (mostly older) Colombians. It’s worth noting that Colombia is at 95% literacy now.
Petro also promises to connect education to the cultures of the regions, although it’s not fully clear what that will mean in practice. The final two years at school will become springboards to further education in an attempt to quell desertion rates. Added to this is full connectivity, better food in schools, more infrastructure and more resources. It’s not clear how much all this will cost, where the money will come from, or how it will be evaluated. Rodolfo wants more money for rural schools and to target desertion rates above all. Other than that, he has little to say on obligatory education.
Teachers’ rights and work conditions are a key bone of contention, as it’s the best way to retain and attract talent. Rodolfo’s key aim with obligatory education is to push for quality levels to be increased. Interestingly, he wants to introduce qualitative assessment of teachers’ impact, rather than crude number-crunching. He also wants more formalisation of contracts and less prestación de servicios. There’s also a full reform of conditions, including better healthcare. All of this will be targeted at rural teachers first. Petro, as before, is offering more of everything. He will also include ethnoeducators in these reforms.
Petro and Rodolfo’s positions on university education
Onto the universities, then, and they both favour an expansion of university access, especially for children of families in lower strata and especially in public universities. Rodolfo wants more public universities, especially in the regions, while Petro would strengthen and finance the existing public universities as well as building new branches in the regions. Neither have much to say about private universities.
Rodolfo wants university management to be in the hands of academics, managed by professional administrators. He also wants universities to be moral centres with an academic focus at the same time as preparing students better for the world of work. It’s all a bit contradictory. Petro sees SENA, the largely vocational training organisation as a key alternative for teens leaving school and it will be included in his general amplification of public education. Rodolfo also supports apprenticeships for those that can’t make university, run by private companies.
The student loan body, ICETEX, is widely loathed and both candidates have major plans for reform. Petro unsurprisingly favours cancelling the outstanding debts and moving the organisation towards funding international scholarships. Rodolfo, for his part, will cancel debts progressively, with priority for the poorest: estrato 1 and 2. He will also prioritise those with high grades and students currently in term. His ICETEX would also focus on international study. It’s probably a sensible move by both men – ICETEX affects a lot of people and many of its debts will never be fully paid off anyway. Cancelling the debts now saves a problem further down the road (for some other president!) and will be very popular with many voters.
Looking at the two candidates, it’s clear to see that they both focus largely on tertiary education, and that both of them are in favour of public universities. Unfortunately, they both also lose focus with details and it’s not clear quite how any of these reforms will actually come about or be made to work. On paper, these are two sets of exciting and forward-thinking proposals with much to recommend. If nothing else, it’s heartening that both candidates are thinking about reform rather than streamlining, and key problems such as desertion are front and centre. Even if the victor can’t achieve all their aims, education is likely to see some significant improvements. The devil, however, will be in the details and you can forgive us for a little scepticism on how realistic all this is. Grade B+, good ideas but more coherence needed.
In the first of a new series, we’re looking at both candidates’ positions on certain issues in the run-up to the presidential election in Colombia. We’re starting with animal rights.
Animal rights have been important on the political agenda in the last few years. More and more activists are advocating for animal rights, making it a pivotal issue for some voters. Here is a short summary of where the two run-off candidates stand on this issue. To be fair, there is little specific mentioning of animal protection in either of the candidates’ government plans – just three references across both manifestos. However, they have both appeared on social networks with animal rights advocates, and expressed their concern about this issue.
Rodolfo Hernández
Rodolfo Hernández, on the one hand, got together with Yefferson Cossio, an influencer who, among other causes, is known for rescuing dogs and cats from abandoned locations. When invited to be part of Hernández’s movement a while ago, Cossio answered he wanted to join it, but he wasn’t a sellout. After a recent meeting with the candidate, this paisa influencer has said he’ll vote for Rodolfo, to which Hernández tweeted: “Protecting our pets is protecting life.”
There has been criticism on social networks of Hernández’s promise to protect animals though. When running for mayor of Bucaramanga, Hernández promised to build a Centre for Animal Welfare. The completion of this construction became unclear as Bucaramanga’s budget could not cover the two billion pesos in yearly maintenance. In a 2018 report, the mayor’s office announced they would not build the centre and would instead rebuild the zoonosis centre. Animal defenders and bumangueses alike were disappointed since Hernández had promised the centre during his campaign. His promise had been backed by a document signed before a notary that, “It is my commitment to build an animal centre…this commitment will be effected once I’m the elected mayor of Bucaramanga.”
Gustavo Petro
Gustavo Petro has a slightly clearer idea for animals. He promises to recognise animals as sentient beings, protect good treatment of animals and free Colombia from speciesism. Bullfighting would be stripped of all public funding. He was officially backed by elected senator and animals rights defender Andrea Padilla who, on a video published on her official twitter account, stated, “Let´s hope with [a Petro] government, animals are offered the State we always denied them.” She cited the organisation and responsibility she believes Petro has for animals.
Candidate Petro has made a commitment with Senator Padilla on the following items:
Institutional strengthening to take on the implementation of public policy practices for the protection and welfare of domestic and wild animals, strengthening which must allot “financial, legal, and human” resources to perform this implementation.
Broadening of the “capabilities to provide assistance and to take action regarding animal protection and concerning the fight against animal abuse” as well as to widen the “human resources appointed to the Special Team against Animal Abuse of the General Attorney´s Office and of the Environmental Police Force.”
To support “legislative initiatives” to: “put and end to violent and abusive cultural manifestations, reduce cruel and unnecessary cattle-raising practices, to protect wild animals and improve their institutional care, to strengthen the laws related to the protection of animals and to the fight against animal mistreatment, to end the exploitation of animals for touristic, entertainment, safety and surveillance purposes, to substitute comercial activities where animals are involved with other activities to generate Jobs.
Also, “legislative initiatives” to: acknowledge the work of animal protectionists and rescuers, and to support shelters and animal protection foundations, the regulation of responsible pet keeping, including a national sterilization policy, education in animal and environmental protection for children and youngsters, and any other policy to improve the welfare of domestic and wild animals.
Finally, here’s a little gossip on the candidates’ pets (they’re both dog people).
Petro’s: Golden retriever Phillipe and English cocker spaniel Tequila. Bacatá, his dog when he was mayor of Bogotá died while on one of her walks.
Hernández’s: No pets of his own, but presents his son’s Frenchies as his. Narcojosé (this name was given by his son when narconovelas were hip), and Oreo. Both pets have Instagram accounts.
Confused by candidates calling for ‘change’? Here we unpack the Petro – Rodolfo run-off.
Petro and Rodolfo will now face each other in the second round of the Colombian elections. Photos: Creative Commons
“A country gets the government it deserves,” said French philosopher Joseph de Maistre. But I doubt Colombia – the country that brought us cocaine hippos, porn-star nuns and flesh-coloured cycling kits – has earned its current predicament: a presidential race between a divisive former guerrilla and a 77-year-old Tik Tokking construction magnate with no clear agenda who refuses to engage in political debate.
For many Colombians, the current run-off campaign between Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández will be a nail-biting three weeks with a less-than-positive outcome whichever way it swings. Here’s a quick Q&A to remind us how we got here, and where we might go next.
Petro’s Pacto Historico alliance was the clear winner of the first round with 40% of the vote. Surely, he’ll coast to victory on the June 19 run-off?
Not at all certain. Petro successfully consolidated left-wing political forces – and some centrists too – behind his campaign for change and scored well in the first round. Meanwhile, a bickering centre-right split itself between various establishment candidates who polled badly. Then there was an anti-establishment former mayor, construction magnate and social media star standing on an anti-corruption platform and drawing in voters via homespun Facebook videos and Tik Tok. Septuagenarian engineer Rodolfo Hernández is now unifying right-wing voters and on track to defeat Petro according to current polls which put the ingeniero at 52% and the former M-19 guerrilla at 45%.
Despite this, Petro’s result was a best-yet for a leftist platform in Colombia and suggests significant shifts in a population trying to put decades of internal conflict behind. The Pacto Historico has been more inclusive, with a popular AfroColombian Vicepresident, Francia Márquez. It pushed a more tempered narrative to calm market nerves and persuade voters that a left-wing leadership won’t tear down traditional institutions. All the while promoting themselves as anti-establishment and the agents of change.
Sounds like a balancing act. Do the majority want change?
Clearly yes. Mainstream candidates were firmly rejected, in fact, the current ruling party, Centro Democratico, didn’t even have a hat in the ring. For most pundits, a younger electorate is frustrated by career politicians’ shifting allegiances to best get re-elected and prop up a system that failed to deliver the peace process – armed groups and bandits are more active than ever – and has met public protest with state-sponsored violence in recent years. The problem for Petro’s party is that their second round rival, Rodolfo Hernández, has an equally potent anti-establishment message and is quickly mopping up the NiNi votes.
NiNis?
Sorry, slipped into local slang: “Ni con Petro, Ni con Uribe” are voters rejecting Petro’s left-wing tendencies but also influences of right-wing former president Álvaro Uribe, seen by many as still a major power player with the overriding goal to thwart any trend towards socialism. Hernández could be seen as a safe haven for a majority wanting change – but not prepared to vote for a former guerrilla. These are known here as the “Anyone Except Petros” (Cualquiera menos Petro).
Not surprisingly, Hernández got top votes in areas of Colombia which previously rejected the Peace Process in 2016, and currently have a high presence of armed groups. Some commentators question whether these voters were really rejecting Petro – or too scared to vote against him, given the all-pervasive presence of right-wing gangs who previously threatened Petro supporters.
The fact is voters and politicians disenfranchised in the first election round are now coalescing around wildcard Hernández, seeing him as the best way forward.
Looks like Petro is getting trumped!
Ha! I see where you’re going there… Yes, there are plenty of comparisons to former US president and Twitter King (before he was banned) Donald Trump; that’s to say, a populist outsider who cuts through to voters with simple issues strongly stated, a touch of misogyny, a tendency to invent statistics, and a potty mouth.
Hernández’s speeches have a central theme of fighting corruption and the porqueriadeladrones politiqueros (‘pig-sty of thieving political class’) meanwhile cutting costs and boosting incomes for the poor. His slogan is a snappy ‘Don’t lie, Don’t Cheat, Don’t Betray’ – even while he himself faces corruption charges from his time as Bucuramanga’s mayor.
Behind this bombast, there is little flesh on the bones. Hernández has vague policies, and he’s previously flip-flopped on touchstone issues such as the previous Peace Process, ELN guerrillas, fumigation of coca crops and how to balance the budget.
Still, even his macho views on women (“They should be raising children”) may not be enough to counter Petrophobia. Plus, the current ruling class are throwing their weight behind him.
OK, so the old politiqueros want to jump on the Hernández boat. Won’t he just become the new face of the establishment? And then lose votes?
Yes, it’s possible. Hernández is frank about his political naivety – it’s part of his rough charm – and accepts he lacks the political machinery to form an effective government. He has already revealed he will recruit some seasoned politicians to run the ship – maybe some of the same bunch he is currently bad-mouthing. The question is when he brings them on the board: too soon, and the ship sinks as voters see where his real sails are set.
But Petro faces the same dilemma: how to play the outsider and ‘agent of change’ while simultaneously promoting stability. Ironically for Petro, this means now casting himself as the conservative candidate – he has been in politics for decades – against the capricious Hernandez.
This interesting game currently favours Hernández. Like Trump, he seems Teflon coated and revels in his anti-PC image, whereas Petro’s personal attacks could fall as flat as Hilary Clinton’s did on Trump six years ago. Petro, meanwhile, is running out of road: he already consolidated his voter base before the first round and will struggle to add more to his cause for round two.
Maybe Hernández is part of a crafty plan by the established políticos to scupper Petro?
For sure, many Petro supporters see a Machiavellian plot; a clever trick by the elite to outflank the anti-establishment candidate (Petro) with an even more extreme version (Hernández), but then sneak back into government under his umbrella. And of course, the sorcerer behind this necromancy is none other than Álvaro Uribe, who made some uncannily similar campaign speeches 20 years ago.
Of course, Hernández has distanced himself from Uribe, for now at least. But the dilemma for voters is that he may not reveal his new team until after the next vote. And then it’s too late for people to change their minds…
But hang on a minute… couldn’t Petro join with Hernández?
Now there’s a thought. In fact, Petro already had it. He proposed a National Accord earlier this week, perhaps when he saw Hernández ahead in the polls. But according to Petro, it’s because the policies of Hernández’s loose coalition, under the banner of Liga Anticorrupcion, are “ever more closer” to those of Petro’s Pacto Historico.
This is more likely a strategy by Petro to appear conciliatory and draw out Hernandez’s true political colours (“so what do you really stand for?”), rather than a genuine overture.
For now, Hernández is not responding, meanwhile hoovering up centrists like fourth-place Sergio Fajardo and his Coalición Centro Esperanza. So more likely the front runner will hope for election victory then bring bits of Pacto Historico in under his own terms.
Wow, seems like a certainty
Well, a day is a lifetime in politics, as they say, and there are still two weeks to go. And with 45% of the electorate staying home in the first round, there are plenty of votes to pick up if the candidates get motivating. But any gains can crash down with the vagaries of social media and fake tweets are on the rise.
Petro has the harder row to hoe, but also a bigger power base to do the hoeing. Rodolfo has so far sat back and let the accolades – and new acolytes – roll in, whereas Petro has stayed the course and might get a last surge of sympathy votes. So don’t bet your house on the Bucaramanga magnate.
Could it turn nasty?
The first round of the election went peacefully, and so far, the next-round debate is civil. But given the pent-up frustrations that led to the first-round outcome – an apparent rejection of the political status quo – there could be storm clouds ahead if voters feel cheated in the second round.
Colombians already have super high perceptions of corruption in their own country. Any hint of election wrongdoing spreads like sparks through social media. The tinder box could ignite if either candidate wins by a very small margin.
Another pressure point will come if Hernández wins the election only to bring the very political establishment he trash-talked to get votes in the first place back into power.
For this reason, the next few weeks are crucial for Colombia. We’ll try our best to keep you up to date so stay tuned.
Key industry players agree that the word luxury has taken on a new meaning.
Bogotá Fashion Week 2022 took place in May, with a great line up of talks, runways, pop-up stores and experience rooms. It was an excellent comeback after the Covid-19 pandemic. The event aims to be a platform to position Bogotá as a worldwide fashion business capital, promoting the talent of many local designers and creatives. It exposes emerging brands as well as established businesses to national and international audiences.
The talks really grabbed the audience’s attention, as key figures like journalists, designers and theorists discussed issues facing the industry. These spaces are very important for the Colombian scene because they put many topics in perspective, some of which are not very well known or frequently thought about.
I was impressed by one such talk, called ‘Lujo, estilos, tendencias y comunicaciones’ (Luxury, style, trends and communications) which had a very personal approach. On stage with moderator Lucety Carreño, fashion and business journalist were:
Lina Bustillo, coach and author of the book ‘Pilares del lujo latinoamericano’
Laura Echavarría, creator of the blog Fashion Lessons
Raúl Peñaranda, Creative Director and founder of Raúl Peñaranda
Manuela Álvarez, Creative Director of MAZ Manuela Alvarez
Every member started by saying what luxury meant for them and the impact their history in the industry and the way they grew up has had on their current work. They agreed that the word ‘luxury’ nowadays needs to be redefined. It is seen as expensive and inaccessible, but in reality, luxury can be found in our everyday lives. For example, it may be the time we spend with family and friends. Ultimately, it depends on our facility to interpret and appreciate what is special about life experiences.
Regarding the fashion industry, Manuela Álvarez said, “The artisan is part of that woman’s life, and that is a luxury.” She was referring to the differences between fast fashion and luxury, where fast fashion often comes from horrific worker conditions – which is what allows us to pay low prices for clothes. Álvarez argues that luxury fashion comes with an acknowledgement of the artisan’s expertise, where they are well paid, work for a normal amount of hours and have recognition.
Discussing race and fashionSENA students showcase their designsThe panel discuss the need for luxury in fashion.Black models featured prominently on the Día de Afrocolombianidad.
This statement was seen on the MAZ runway, which showcased Manuela Álvarez’ brand. We were able to see the artisans’ work projected in the collection ‘Flor de Venus’. These outfits had the fabrics of the artisans that work for the brand, and were made by the team behind the brand, which is composed mainly of artisans and single mothers. The MAZ brand perfectly portrays their Latin American roots, combining style and the aim to empower women with tailoring work.
This event has endless discussions around it. It’s important to notice that the discussions on Latin American and Colombia’s point of view is more and more considered nowadays. There’s a focus on our ancestors and way of life, and how they impact on the ways we see clothes and create fashion.
Grey skies and rain didn’t put off Bogotanos this morning, as they thronged voting stations. As the grim clouds gave way to sunshine in the afternoon, so too did Colombia’s presidential election results become clearer. Rodolfo Hernández will join Gustavo Petro in the second round in three week’s time.
Queues of people ready to vote in today’s Colombian presidential elections. Photo: Ángela Forero-Aponte
After an often gruelling and bitter first round of campaigning, the results of the first round of Colombia’s presidential election are in. As expected, Gustavo Petro has taken first place with just over 40% of the vote. He will be joined by Rodolfo Hernández who took around 28% at time of publishing (97% declared). Campaigning for the second round will begin in earnest tomorrow, with both sides aiming to convince the 30% of voters who went for other candidates. On June 19, we will be back at the ballot boxes to see who will be the next President of the Republic.
Although it was no surprise to see Gustavo Petro take first place in the first round, the vote percentage is key. The votes are not fully counted, but it seems that he will take around 40%. That puts him in a strong position for the second round, but the challenge is that he’s unlikely to pick up many of Fico voters. With Hernández not only beating Fico but polling near 30%, he will need to bring some of those voters over to his side.
On the other hand, Rodolfo – who was polling in third place – will be delighted to have made the second round. The hard work starts here, though, with a deficit of around 12 percentage points to make up. If he can pick up a good proportion of Fico’s votes, he’d be able to win. But it isn’t clear how many people will simply cast a vote against Petro. We also don’t know whether turnout will increase or decrease, and whether Rodolfo can keep the votes he’s picked up in recent weeks of campaigning.
On what was a grim and grey morning in Bogotá, turnout was just over 50% from Colombia’s 39 million registered voters. With 97% of tables declared, there had been just 20,660,000 votes cast, broadly in line with recent Colombian elections. It’s possible that the second round will see a higher turnout, although that remains to be seen. What is for sure is that Colombian democracy as a whole is still turning off an increasingly disengaged electorate. Voto en blanco picked less than 2%, but it’s of more concern just how many people don’t even take that option.
Another concern is over irregularities. This euphemistic phrase covers a wide gamut of shenanigans, from vote-buying to fraud to other dodgy practices. Twitter has been aflame with supposed irregularities. As of their report at 3:30PM, 322 reports had been made to MOE, an independent monitoring organisation. That number is likely to increase in the next few days, as people come forward. The Petro camp have also raised concerns about the registrar’s office.
Colombians will vote today in the first round of the country’s 2022 presidential elections.
Colombia elections: People queu up in the rain from early in the morning to vote for the Presidential elections. Photo: Ángela Forero Aponte
Colombians take to the polls today to vote for one of six presidential candidates. Everybody’s talking about Gustavo Petro, but there’s a genuine question about who will join him if there’s a second round. The other two candidates that stand out in the race are Federico Gutiérrez and Rodolfo Hernández. Today we’ll discover how accurate the pollsters are and whether Rodolfo’s surge will take him above Fico. We’ll also find out just how much support Petro has, and whether Colombia might be ready for left-wing governance.
If one candidate can win more than 50% of the vote in the first round, they’ll win the race outright. The more likely scenario is that there won’t be a clear winner and we’ll move to a second round. On June 19, the two candidates with the highest number of votes will then face off against each other. At 8 am this morning, over 80,000 mesas de votación opened in over 11,000 locations, which will close at 4 pm this afternoon. Results will come in thick and fast after that as nearly 700,000 people help out with the counting. We should know the results by the evening.
Gustavo Petro is leading the polls
Leading the polls is Petro. Colombia has never really had a left-wing president, and some are nervous about the possible impacts of a Petro win. With high levels of poverty and inequality, faltering implementation of the peace deal, and growing frustration with the status quo, many want change – in any form. That’s what Petro and his running mate, Francia Márquez, promise. However, others fear that same change, predicting economic issues and problems for country’s international relations, particularly with the USA. If he gets around 40% in the first round, he’ll be in a strong position. Any lower, and he could well struggle.
Recent years have seen increasing numbers of protests, some of which have turned violent. What began as protests against unpopular tax reforms spread to a general expression of discontent. Plus, for those living in rural Colombia, the idea of peace is still a distant dream – in reality, the conflict continues. Not only have illegal armed groups filled the vacuum left by the FARC, but many of the commitments made in the country’s historic peace agreement also remain unmet. That matters because the agreement was a framework for long term peace, including commitments: things like land reform and tackling injustice.
As WOLA put it in an analysis of the first five years of the peace accord, “It offers a blueprint for how to work with communities – most of who had almost no prior contact with their government – to address their isolation, poverty, uncertain land tenure, dependence on illicit economies, and lack of protection.” The report explained, “Colombia – especially rural Colombia – remains the most dangerous place on the planet to be a civil-society leader, human rights defender, or environmental defender, while journalists and opposition political leaders remain very vulnerable.”
Petro’s main rival is conservative candidate Federico Gutiérrez, aka Fico. Petro does have a clear lead in the polls, but polls have been unreliable over the last decade. Plus, it’s difficult to measure the strength of the ‘anyone but Petro’ sentiment. Fico is seen as the right-wing candidate and more of the same, though if you read his manifesto, his economic proposals are not actually all that right wing – on paper at least.
Fico can count on a large number of conservative voters, as well as a chunk of the ‘anyone but Petro’ group. He proposes a relatively austere program of public spending and offers a safe choice for the establishment. However, he’s lost ground recently as a third candidate has gained traction. The real dark horse in the race is Rodolfo Hernández.
Hernández, commonly known as simply Rodolfo, is a construction business tycoon with a straightforward anti-corruption message that has garnered support. Put simply, he offers change, promises to fight corruption, and he is not Petro. Rodolfo has found particular success on social media and an article in Al Jazeera compared him to Donald Trump. Interestingly, a recent report from Capital Economics said the economy would probably suffer the most under Rodolfo. It raised concerns about Rodolfo’s steep tax cuts and loose fiscal policy.
The challenge for all the candidates is that Colombians have little faith in their politicians and some are clearer on what they don’t want than what they do. It’s difficult to galvanise people or make them believe in change when few people can articulate what concrete changes they want. Following the pandemic, people are certainly tired of the status quo and frustrated by the increasing cost of their weekly food basket. The trouble is that several people we spoke to are unconvinced any of the candidates will solve those issues.
“It’s like a box of eggs,” said one Bogotano. “They’re all the same inside.” The taxi driver’s antipathy is not so unusual: Petro may have more support than he did last time but some dismiss him because of his past as an M-19 guerilla. Others – like my taxi driver – simply blame all politicians and corruption for all of the country’s problems. The way that Rodolfo has shot up in the polls in recent weeks is more a reflection of frustration with the alternatives than necessarily an endorsement of the man himself.
Few are willing to predict the outcome of today’s elections as there are too many unknown factors. What’s for sure is that the second round will be an entirely different kettle of fish. It will be much more polarised and may look more like a referendum. Whichever person faces Petro, there will be strong lines of difference between the two camps. Whoever wins in the end, there will be a large contingent of very sore losers. With ever-growing fears of fraud, it’s also likely that there will be challenges and suspicion about the validity of any result. One thing is for sure: the next few weeks will be full of rancour and bile and light on decency.
Confused about the upcoming election? We’re here to help you with a set of cheat sheets on each candidate so you can follow the local news. This time we’re looking at Fico of Movimiento Creemos Colombia.
Find out what Fico’s manifesto promises to Colombia. Photo: Federico Gutiérrez website
Who is Federico Gutiérrez, aka Fico?
His full name is Federico Andrés Gutiérrez Zuluaga, but he insists on using Fico. It seems like everyone in the race has been a mayor, and Fico did so in Medellín (2016-2020). He won that race narrowly – by a single percentage point – so he has experience of close fights. Before his mayoral position, he stood on the council for many years and had also challenged for the mayorship in 2012, finishing third.
Well enough, but not as well as he would like. He started to rise in the polls after being confirmed as the Equipo Por Colombia candidate, but has plateaued over the last few weeks. He still has a lead over third-place Rodolfo. However, the gap is narrowing. The last two weeks have been poor for him, with little impact.
What’s his campaign like?
Officially, he’s campaigning as “President of the People”, but in reality it’s a barrage of targeted anti-Petro rhetoric. Essentially, Petro is bad, Petro is a guerilla, repeated ad infinitum. He’s also seen as being right-wing, even far-right, although that’s not what he says and not his manifesto. For example, he says that he voted for the peace deal with the FARC, but few people know that. Another slogan is Orden y Oportunidades, but that’s not been used much lately.
And what’s in his manifesto?
This one is a whopper, at 106 pages. He starts off early with the economy, stupid. That may be an apt word, as there are some issues here. He puts in a baseline and his targets. Reasonable idea, but the baseline is slightly cheeky. He’s cut it short by a year, so the current economic bounceback will go in his target figures, whereas the pandemic effects will be in the baseline. It may only be six months, and the data might not be there yet, but it’s a bit naughty. It’s also quite misleading, given that 2020-2021 was, let’s say, unusual. He wants growth to average 5% annually, raise investment to 30% of GDP and get GDP per capita (PPP-adjusted, we think, but he doesn’t make this clear) up to USD$16,000. He’s aiming to get GINI under 0.5 as well. Finally, he wants unemployment back into the single figures. This will be paid for by the mythical ‘efficiency’ in part, but also by tax reform that won’t hit the vulnerable or those at middle-income levels. Pensions to be lower than proposed by other candidates (at least COP$330,000 a month) but he promises to reach millions more people than are covered now.
Corruption is a big deal for him. First off, jail and a complete lifelong ban from public office, elected or not, for anyone found guilty of corruption. Next up, getting rid of unfair laws that force ordinary people to pay for specific papers arbitrarily demanded by companies. All public contracts will follow set and standardised rules and procedures rather than being tailored to the occasion and they will all be on a transparent public database. Anything outside the database will be invalid. Essentially everything will have to be done on the open market. By 2026, all state contracts to be on a database and at least half using the standardised rules. Fico wants tax evasion to be fought in the regions, putting in more investment to apply the laws, and to make DIAN fully online.
Security and crime is another big area. Here are some headline figures: He wants to reduce homicides per 100,000 people to 21 (from 26) and halve theft from 540 per to 270 100,000 people. He’ll go after the heads of organised crime, rather than the rank and file, with tough anti-mafia laws. A national anti-robbery unit to combat personal attacks – apparently that’s not standard policework. Drugs to be combated with crop substitution and anti-dealing measures, going after the finances rather than street dealers. Addiction to be treated as a public health issue. More jails, built with private money, and less congestion in the court, mainly through greater virtualizacion.
Technology underpins a lot of this. With 5G on the way, he wants to get everybody using at least 4G by 2024. The construction of 20,000 digital centres in the regions will bring broadband to half the rural population. An entrepreneur fund in SENA will start 10,000 new businesses and tourism will provide 400,000 jobs, a key part of the pledge from earlier. Gutiérrez envisages 18,000 km of new roads in four years, mainly tertiary connections. In education, more investment in SENA, more free places in higher education for people from estrato 1,2,3 and ICETEX loans to be repayable only when employed, on a sliding scale (like the UK system). Plus, 200 million trees to be planted, and protection for 2 million street dogs.
Who is he running with?
Rodrigo Lara Sánchez, ex-mayor of Neiva. Elected with a record number of votes, he was widely celebrated in his time as mayor. Under his governance, the city implemented a new system for transparency in contracts and its education projects got noticed. He also won awards for digital innovation and the World Bank has recognised his work on education.
Fico seems young.
Fico is the youngest candidate in the race. Among the frontrunners, he’s in his 40s while the other candidates are in their 60s and 70s. He does try to project a youthful image – open necked shirts, hair flowing in the wind and so on. It’s worth remembering that Duque (even younger on the campaign trail) was criticised for his perceived lack of experience and ended up dying his hair. Fico is also seen as a bit of a Johnny-come-lately in some quarters, lacking experience at the national level.
My friend says he’s el que dice Uribe. What does that mean?
It means that controversial and influential politician Álvaro Uribe supports him. While Uribe is supporting him, he’s not fully embracing the endorsement. He has good reason for that – Uribe brings a lot of votes, but those votes will go to anyone against Petro anyway. Uribe also brings a lot of hatred, so he’s a divisive figure. He’s not representing the Centro Democrático directly, but many are certainly supporting him. Others, though, are sending support to Rodolfo. If it comes to a second round against Petro, though, he absolutely will get all the support from the Uribista camp.
Any skeletons in his closet?
He seems to have some dubious friends, that’s for sure. He had Cielo Gnecco, a powerful political clan leader from Cesár, up on stage last week. Controversy and corruption allegations swirl around the Gneccos, but they can probably deliver votes. A murky business. Then there’s the Char clan, another powerful coastal family that backs him, again accused of corruption.
‘La bodega de Fico’ was another worrying incident. This was an investigation by the University of Antioquia into his use of public funds to attack rival politicians online, using both bots and false profiles. Others claim that he inflated his figures while he was mayor of Medellín.
So, can he succeed?
Absolutely. It looks likely that he’ll finish a distant second to Petro in the first round, but the second round will be a different kettle of fish indeed. He’ll take a lot of the non-Petro vote, but he won’t take it all. The big question is if he can attract enough to cross the 50% threshold. It’s far from a done deal, but he certainly has a good chance. This is assuming, of course, that he makes the second round. That’s likely, but again, not a done deal.
Confused about the upcoming election? We’re here to help you with a set of cheat sheets on each candidate so you can follow the local news. Put on a coffee, this one’s long. Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s most divisive political figure since you-know-who.
Presidential candidate Gustavo Petro already held one of the most important jobs in the country as Bogotá mayor. Photo: Wikipedia
Who is Gustavo Petro then?
Gustavo Petro, former Bogotá mayor (2012-15), ex-guerilla, senator and perennial presidential candidate. It’s fair to say he’s seen Colombian politics from a lot of different positions. He has a reputation as a man of the people and he’s possibly the most successful left-wing politician Colombia has ever seen. For that same reason, he’s also one of the most divisive figures in Colombia, inspiring both fervent support while also drawing intense criticism.
He’s rock-solid in first place for the first round. He’s not polling well enough for a first-round victory, but the fact we’re even discussing it tells you how far ahead he is. His problem lies elsewhere: He needs to pick up votes in the second round. Last time, he didn’t gain enough to beat Duque after a taking comfortable first-round victory. Polls – which it should be said aren’t always reliable – currently have him at 40% or even higher of the vote share.
What’s his campaign like?
He’s positioned as the candidate for change. And he’s effective. He dominates social media, has flooded all platforms and the debate is centred on him. His real calling card, though, is speaking directly to large crowds. He’s been on tour around Colombia, eschewing the big cities. Notably, his vice-president, Francia Márquez is also popular and this is much more of a team effort than the other campaigns.
And what’s in his manifesto?
Yet another 50 page document. It’s noticeably less clear and precise than the others. There’s vague language in all of them, but this one doesn’t have concrete targets, preferring to focus on holistic ideas. You could see this as a positive, that he’s more focused on systems and processes than raw numbers. Most, though, will see it as unclear and vague. Apologies in advance for a lack of following details.
Peace is a clear platform for Petro – both fully implementing the existing agreement with the FARC and working towards a peace with the ELN. The JEP (Colombia’s Special Jurisdiction for Peace) will receive full state support and programs for ex-combatants will be fortified and extended. The JEP is the mechanism by which transitional justice is being delivered.
He plans to negotiate with drug traffickers to achieve a peaceful disarmament. He aims to go after financing and structure rather than low-level dealers and growers. That said, he also promises a comprehensive program of coca substitution and basic income for rural populations – without any forced fumigation or prosecution. It’s about a commitment to help farmers find other ways to use land. Some cannabis production to be legalised for export.
He will guarantee the rights of Colombians imprisoned abroad. A reform of both the Procuraduría and Contraloría are promised. Jails will no longer be places of punishment, but of resocialisation. In general, restorative justice will be prioritised. Police to do only policework, no administration or bodyguarding for important individuals. The controversial ESMAD, Colombia’s riot police, to be disbanded. Better protection for social leaders. The armed forces will all have the right to further education.
Petro promises that all Colombians will have access to the internet. Where installing fiber-optic cables would be difficult, he plans to use low-orbit satellites. On gender equality, there’s a detail: minimum 50% women in all levels and all branches of power, as well as a Ministry of Equality to ensure gender balance. Local government will have the power to introduce congestion charges to promote public transport, cycling and walking. A single health system, publically funded and preventative. Education to get a massive budget boost, improving all areas, from SENA to universities. ICETEX to focus on international scholarships.
To finance all this, he promises to levy a wealth tax on the 4,000 richest Colombians. It’s not clear how these people would be identified or whether foreign investments and savings would be counted. Tax reform to eliminate exceptions and to work towards a progressive tax system. Dividends will be taxed. Tax evasion to be punished heavily and those receiving state resources will be prohibited from using tax havens. International trade to favour neighbouring countries over trading partners further away. Existing pensions will be protected, but a half a minimum salary will go to all those currently without pensions.
Who is he running with?
Francia Márquez – or Francia Elena Márquez Mina to give her full name. She’s a renowned social leader now turning her considerable personality towards politics. She’s most famous for winning the Goldman Prize in 2018, viewed as a Nobel for environmental activism. She’s endured plenty of death threats and attempts on her life, including a 2019 attack that left two injured. She was forced out of her birthplace in 2014 and faces constant danger. This hasn’t changed in the election campaign, with plenty of abuse coming her way, much of it misogynistic and/or racist. She draws plenty of supporters in her own right, and got nearly 800,000 votes in the March elections to define the candidates.
As a communist, will he expropriate my house for the common good?
Simply put, no. First, he’s not a communist and secondly, he’s gone as far as signing a notarised document promising not to expropriate private property. However, he himself has muddied the waters a little here. He says he is worried about unproductive land, and some fear this will be expropriation under a different name. Particularly, his ally Gustavo Bolívar has mentioned ‘democratising’ some 15 million hectares he claims have no plants, no livestock, nothing.
My friend says he was a guerilla. Surely that’s not true?
It is. It’s also a little misleading, he was an administrator rather than a fighter or direct terrorist. However, it is true that he espoused violent means in the past. Many voters can’t or won’t forgive him for that and it’s unquestionably the biggest hurdle he needs to overcome. He’s also supported by a lot of former guerillas. He absolutely is the Comunes candidate, and that doesn’t sit well with many.
Will he prosecute former guerilla members?
This is complicated, with more unclear language. He’s floated the idea of perdón social, but avoided clarifying exactly what that might mean in practice. By not clearing things up, he’s adding fuel to the fire for those who worry that he will use it as a mechanism to guarantee political impunity for his allies.
I saw a video with thousands in a plaza, surely he’ll win!
He does draw enormous crowds at those countrywide rallies, but that doesn’t mean he’s certain to win. His supporters are fanatical and passionate, no doubt, and his name was widely chanted at the protests of the last few years. National elections, however, are won by attracting moderate voters too. That’s where Petro has struggled in the past. This time around he has a larger base, but he’ll still need some of the centre to come to him.
What’s all this about making Colombia into a new Venezuela?
That’s the fear that anti-Petristas have. This has been a trope that’s been repeated for years now in Colombia – that leftwing politicians will destroy the economy in a similar manner to the Venezuelan collapse. There’s an oft-repeated story about the Foro de Sao Paolo, a supposed plot to deliver all of Latin America to a communist New World Order. It doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, but it gets shared a lot on WhatsApp.
Any other skeletons in his closet?
Depending on who you talk to, yes and no. Basically everything he does, has done or will do is wrong for some people, so crack open a bottle of whisky and settle in if you want to hear it all. For those of us less concerned about his choice of footwear or holidays to Eurodisney, there are still a few things. There are people in his coalition who corruption allegations against them – Gustavo Bolívar and Piedad Córdoba for example. He seems to have a habit on not finishing his studies – his specializations, a master’s and a doctorate are all missing one or two components and therefore have not been completed.
There were the farcical scenes over rubbish collections when he was mayor and temporarily unseated. That was found to be unconstitutional, but it’s also true that his plan to make rubbish collection public met fierce opposition from entrenched powers. That doesn’t augur well for an ambitious national manifesto. For years, Petro and Peñalosa supporters have clashed over exactly what was achieved in his time as Bogotá mayor, with the latter accusing him of not delivering on very much.
So, can he succeed?
Yes, undoubtedly. He even has a chance to do so in the first round, although it’s relatively unlikely. He won’t necessarily attract a lot of voters in the second round though, and there might be an increase in turnout if he looks on course to win. If he gets less than 40% vote share in the first round, he may well be in trouble. Still, he remains in pole position, and the most likely winner. This election is almost a referendum on Petro – are you for him or against him?
Confused about the upcoming election? We’re here to help you with a set of cheat sheets on each candidate so you can follow the local news. Today we’re looking at Sergio Fajardo of Alianza Social Independiente.
Presidential candidate Sergio Fajardo. Photo: World Economic Forum, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Who is Sergio Fajardo?
Sergio Fajardo Valderrama was born in Medellín, where he later became mayor. In terms of the presidential campaign, he’s been here before – in the last election he narrowly lost out to Duque for second place. The rest, of course, is history. He’s a PhD from Wisconsin and has also governed the department of Antioquia. Want more? He also ran for vice-president with Mockus in 2010. Even more? He’s been a columnist for various papers and sub-editor of El Colombiano. Whew. A long CV.
Is he polling well?
He was. He’s slipped a lot in recent weeks. The glory days of 2018 are far behind him as the country is in a different place to four years ago. This week, he’s languishing at 6% and some polls have suggested voto en blanco might outrank him. Worse, he’s been losing votes as steadily as fast as first Fico and then Rodolfo have been gaining.
He sees himself as a ‘Third Way’ candidate, neither on the right nor left but representing the unheard centre. He’s trying to position himself as an alternative change to Petro, but so far that hasn’t gained much traction. His manifesto is actually very progressive, but there’s a perception among many that he’s simply more of the same and politics as usual.
So what’s in his manifesto then?
You can read it for yourself online. Like most candidates, he leads with education. He wants a new curriculum, designed with input from all sectors. More money for teachers, and more integration for teachers from ethnic minorities. He plans to expand both SENA (which provides mainly vocational training) and create a Universidad Publica Digital as part of the National University’s distance learning scheme (similar to the Open University in the UK).
For the economy, he’s talking about a move away from carbon-dependency and towards sustainable power. He thinks this could bring power to 430,000 more Colombians. He wants to raise and expand taxes on unenvironmentally friendly activities, as well as those on sugary drinks and fast food. Progressive taxation will hit wealth over COP$5,000,000,000 (1% at first, 2% after ten billion), dividends and high earners.
Food independence and employment will be the key metrics. He wants to formalise large sectors of the economy, especially in rural areas, and protect those working on zero-hour contracts such as rappitenderos. Finally, he plans to cut deforestation by half and officially protect 30% of both the marine and land ecosystem.
Tourism has a major focus – he’s aiming to receive 9 million foreign tourists per year, providing 100,000 new jobs. To achieve this, there’ll be a common fund for tourism development, a drive to attract direct foreign investment and a new campaign to advertise Colombia abroad. Sustainable tourism will be at the heart of all this.
He’s also committing half a million pesos a month for senior citizens without pensions and an expansion of schemes for youth out of employment and education. Also 440,000 new jobs created across 4,000 new projects under state control. He’s looking to make Colombia more inclusive and plans program to improve the lives of those with disabilities. More than a thousand kilometers of 5G roads are to be built or upgraded, as well as incentives for electric vehicles and an optimistic target of no road deaths or even injuries per year.
Who is he running with?
Gilberto Murillo, ex-governor of Chocó. Well, sort-of ex-governor. Originally elected in 1997, accusations of irregularities in his election meant he was kicked out after serving just over a year of his term. He returned in 2011 – believing he’d served his his time out of politics – and was reelected in 2012. However, this was immediately contested and he left his post after ten months when he lost the legal fight. All this, in spite of two certificates from the procuraduría saying he was no longer excluded from politics. No? Us neither. He also served under Santos as Minister for the Environment, reflecting his background in mining.
My friend says Sergio Fajardo’s el tibio. What does that mean?
He’s lukewarm, literally translated. Man think the idea of Third Way politics he values so highly doesn’t appeal to either side. In Colombian parlance, he’s ni fu ni fa. If you want more of the same, he’s not that, but he’s also not a big change. A lot voters don’t see the point. It doesn’t help that he’s reluctant to attack or criticise either side too much.
Any skeletons in his closet?
You could say he has a ‘dam’ big problem in Hidroituango. The Antioqueño megaproject has been beset by all kinds of problems, both technical and financial. Fajardo maintains it has nothing to do with either him or his team, and the problems really started in 2018. Earlier this year he was judged not responsible. However, some of the problems began under his watch, and there are questions about how much he knew.
So, can he succeed?
It seems unlikely. Unlike Petro, his star has waned in the last four years and the idea of a centrist candidate seems to be less popular in an increasingly polarised election. He’s fourth in the race now and doesn’t have much momentum. If he got to the second round, it’s absolutely possible that he could win due to a dislike of the other candidate (likely Petro), but that seems a tall order at this point.
Our guide to the presidential elections covers the basics on how the voting works, what the two contenders stand for, and what else to expect. Plus, you’ll find links to all our coverage as we do our best to keep on top of the latest presidential election news.
How will the voting work in the upcoming Colombian election?
The incumbent, President Iván Duque, isn’t able to stand for reelection as Colombian presidents are only allowed to serve for one term. There were six contenders in the first round, and two — Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández — won the most votes, taking them through to the second round. The elected president will then serve a four-year term.
If you haven’t been in Colombia during election time before, one thing you might find odd is that people often go back to their family homes or elsewhere for election weekend. This is because people can only vote in the polling station where they are registered – usually the one where they voted last time. You can update your registration, but people often forget or don’t bother to do so and end up having to go back home.
Another aspect of voting that people who are new to Colombia might find unusual is voto en blanco. This is a constitutionally recognised way to express dissatisfaction with any of the available options. If voto en blanco were to win a majority, it would trigger a new election with different candidates. Candidates would have ten days to throw their hats into the ring for new elections.
Rodolfo Hernández, often referred to as simply Rodolfo, with Paola Ochoa as running mate
t’s important to know that these candidates don’t really represent individual parties. There are various coalitions coalescing around one candidate. For example, over 15 parties formed the coalition behind Petro’s El Pacto Histórico coalition, making it more powerful than Petro’s Colombia Humana party alone.
What are the key dates?
Following the legislative elections in March, and the first round on May 29, there is only one date that really matter now:
June 19: Voters will take to the polls for the second round of the Colombia election
Bear in mind that there’s always a Ley Seca – no alcohol rule – in Colombia for the whole voting weekend. You won’t be able to easily buy alcohol between 6 pm on the Saturday before and 6 am on the Monday after the vote, and sometimes the dry law is enforced even earlier.
What can we expect?
There’s a lot of nervousness around this election. There are rumours on all sides about vote manipulation, corruption, and potential violence, which only adds to the tension. Like many countries, Colombia is extremely polarised at the moment. There’s a fear that people might take to the streets – whatever the result. We’ve seen unprecedented levels of protest in the past four years, some of which turned violent last year when Human Rights Watch says at least 25 people were killed by police.
One consequence of the country’s historic pact with the FARC is that it’s allowed the growth of a political left – as evidenced by the fact that Gustavo Petro won 40% of the vote in the first round. Some are concerned because Colombia has never really had a left-wing president, and if Petro is elected there’s uncertainty about how both the establishment and armed groups might react.
Sadly, Colombia is no stranger to political violence. Several presidential candidates have received death threats. The Financial Times reports, “The country is on edge,” citing rumours of a military coup or even a postponement of the election. It is hard to know how much of this anxiety is the result of is fear-mongering, similar to the 2018 election.
Last time, the second round descended into a choice between Petro or “anyone but Petro” and it now looks like this scenario may be repeated in June. It’s now down to a race between Petro and Rodolfo — both candidates who represent change, but in very different ways.
What are the main issues?
After two years of pandemic and with rising economic uncertainty around the world, many Colombians are concerned about the economy. According to the Banco de Republica, in April, inflation reached over 9% year-on-year – the highest it’s been since 2000. Tax reform was violently rejected last year. While a watered-down version was passed, some sort of reform will be necessary soon. That’s guaranteed to be unpopular and controversial.
In addition to peace, which we’ll cover in more detail below, there are also concerns about health, poverty, corruption, and crime. Many feel that crime has worsened during the past four years, and hope that the new administration will be able to do more.
Find out how the candidates stack up on key issues:
How will the presidential election impact the peace process?
What many people outside Colombia forget is that signing the peace agreement was only the beginning of a long journey towards peace. It takes time to end decades of conflict. What matters now is how it is implemented, how the country handles the illegal armed groups that have filled the vacuum left by the FARC, and how well former fighters are able to reintegrate into society.
In many parts of Colombia people still face as much, if not more violence as they did before the peace deal. Carlos Ruiz Massieu, Head of the UN Verification Mission in Colombia recently said, “Violence is also exacting a particularly high toll on indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities in the form of killings, displacements and the increasing recruitment of minors.”
Iván Duque was one of the leaders of the ‘no’ campaign during the plebiscite, and he’s followed what’s at best a go-slow approach to implementation. As a piece in El Espectador put it, “The Duque government has been the object of serious questions regarding its asymmetrical commitment to the implementation of the Agreement.” A December report from the Kroc Institute showed that just 30% of the provisions in the agreement had been completely implemented.
Alll in all, this election illustrates divisions that have only grown in Colombia since the beginning of the peace process. Questions of inequality, a need for change, a fear of what shape that change might take, and a desire to protect the status quo make for a potent melting pot as Colombians head to the polls.
Article updated following results of first round of voting.
Betancourt has stepped aside and given her support to Rodolfo Hernández.
Íngrid Betancourt and Rodolfo Hernández following yesterday’s meeting in Barranquilla. Photo: Íngrid Betancourt Twitter
With just over a week to go before Colombians go to the polls to elect a new president, one of the seven remaining candidates has resigned from the race. Íngrid Betancourt announced on social media yesterday that she would no longer stand and instead will support Rodolfo Hernández.
“I join the presidential campaign of @ingrodolfohdez!” she tweeted. “This decision is to offer Colombia a different option that defeats the corrupt and the [political] machinery.” Rodolfo sits in third place in the polls, while Betancourt was struggling to make it to 1%.
¡Me sumo a la campaña presidencial de @ingrodolfohdez! Esta decisión es para ofrecerle a Colombia una opción diferente que derrote a los corruptos y a las maquinarias. ¡Juntos venceremos el miedo, el odio, la polarización; juntos, ganaremos! pic.twitter.com/59BDHfc9TP
— Ingrid Betancourt Pulecio (@IBetancourtCol) May 20, 2022
Rodolfo was somewhat of a dark horse before the presidential election race and still lags behind Petro and Fico in the polls. However, the former mayor of Barranquilla is gaining ground rapidly. The 77-year-old engineer has won support from those who don’t want the extremes that Petro and Fico are perceived to represent.
Betancourt and Rodolfo met in Barranquilla and, according to a joint statement, found that they had more in common than what separated them. Betancourt argues that Rodolfo is the only candidate that has a chance of defeating Petro in the second round. Her name will still appear on the voting sheets, but votes will automatically transfer to Rodolfo.
Betancourt was kidnapped by the FARC in 2002 and spent six years as a hostage. Rodolfo’s father and daughter were kidnapped by the FARC and ELN respectively. Betancourt ran primarily on an anti-corruption ticket, but has struggled to gain traction with voters. Part of the problem was that the politician has spent much of her life in France, which made it difficult for her to connect with many Colombians.
Confused about the upcoming election? We’re here to help you with a set of cheat sheets on each candidate so you can follow the local news. First up is Rodolfo Hernández of the Liga Anticorrupción
Rodolfo Hernández is surprising the pollsters in Colombia’s presidential elections. Photo: Luis Enrique Ochoa, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Who is this ‘Rodolfo’ then?
Rodolfo Hernández Suárez is a 77-year-old engineer from Piedecuesta in Santander. An ex-mayor of Bucaramanga, he was raised in that city and still lives there. He spent a long career in construction, mostly building affordable homes in Bucaramanga and the surrounding area. His father was kidnapped by FARC and his daughter was kidnapped and killed by ELN.
Is he polling well?
Remarkably so. From being a relative outsider even in March, he’s rising steadily to challenge for a place in the second round. This week’s polls have him at 16%, not too far off Fico in second place (23%). Some polls predict he may already be on level pegging with Fico.
What’s his campaign like?
He’s focusing on his record as Bucaramanga mayor (2016-19) and on his qualification as a civil engineer. In fact, his twitter handle and his campaign website both introduce him as Ing. Rodolfo. He’s gone on the attack against Fico for being the candidate of Duque and has largely left Petro alone. In what is threatening to become a simple Fico-Petro race, he is currently the best hope for those who want neither. He’s strongly anti-corruption, with “don’t lie, don’t steal, don’t betray” as his motto. Ingrid Betancourt has pulled out and her votes will go directly to Rodolfo, which is a useful bonus.
And what’s in his manifesto?
Read it online. First off, anti-corruption. He’s a little reticent on exactly what that could mean, although zero tolerance is the key. No impunity for those found guilty of corruption and an end to house arrest. On security, he’s talking about modernisation and better protection of the borders. Better links with Africa, Asia and Oceania are proposed abroad; more autonomy for the regions at home. VAT (sales tax) to be cut to 10% and made easier to pay. Basic income for all senior citizens, regardless of former contributions.
Education is another strong priority, and Rodolfo has ICETEX (the Student Loan Company in Colombia) in his sights. He’s proposing progressively writing off debt for students, with priority for those in estrato 1 and 2; active students; those with the best grades. That would be expensive, but on the other hand those debts are unlikely to ever be repaid anyway. He also wants more universities, especially in the regions, and better conditions for teachers.
On health, he wants 100% coverage and better controls on prices, especially drug prices. That could mean eliminating the EPS system. Drug addiction will be treated as a disease rather than a crime. He’s considering a basic income payment for the poorest families. There’s more social payments to be found for successful sportspeople, up to COP$100,000 per day. Olympians and world record holders will receive state pensions.
On gender issues, he’s proposing 50% quotas for women in public service and in his cabinet. On the environment, he plans to give welfare payments to those that maintain forested areas rather than cutting them down. Clean energy is a recurring theme, although there are also plans for 14,000 km of new roads.
Who is he running with?
Marelen Castillo, about whom little is known. She’s a Cali-born teacher with no previous experience of politics and very religious. This campaign is very, very much about Rodolfo rather than the team and she was chosen as someone explicitly outside of politics. At 54, she is much younger than him.
I heard he’s going to donate his salary if he’s elected…
He says he will, but politicians say lots of things before elections. In his favour, though, he says he’s financing his own campaign, and so far that appears to be true. Most notably, he’s not able to tour the country and flood squares like Fico and Petro are, nor is he inundating social media with paid sponsorship in the same way as the above two.
Isn’t he a bit on the old side?
He was already well past retirement age when he became mayor of Bucaramanga and at 77, he’s now the oldest candidate in the race. If he were to arrive in the casa de Nariño, he’d celebrate his 80th birthday as president of the republic. There have been older presidents – Sanclemente was 84 when elected – but the recent trend has been towards younger leaders such as Duque and Santos.
Any skeletons in his closet?
Yes. He was suspended as mayor and then resigned after the suspension, with a little over three months left of his term. The suspension was partly for political participation, although he maintains he was simply telling the truth about corrupt politicians. The other part of the suspension was for aggression towards a council member. It’s also worth noting that there have been a number of accusations against the anti-corruption candidate and his family, though that happens to most Colombian politicians. Finally, he caused indignation in the Venezuelan expat community after describing Venezuelan women as “baby factories” who would need to be supported by the state.
So, can he succeed?
It’s not impossible, but he has a hard task ahead. The first hurdle is getting to a second round, as overtaking Petro in the first is impossible now. That means squeaking past Fico, who is stuttering but still a good distance ahead in the polls. In a second round situation, he also has problems – he won’t have the advantage of youth, nor is he seen as a big change. On the other hand, he could attract leftwingers that can’t bring themselves to vote for Petro, as his guerilla history is very different. And of course, anti-corruption is always a popular stance to have. On the other hand, if he reaches the final two it’s likely there’ll be more examination of his manifesto and whether or not the sums add up. There’s a lot basic income being paid out and not much gain in the tax base to cover the increased spending.
We unpack the corrientazo – Bogotá’s cheap and cheerful lunchtime menu.
Corrientazos are cheap lunches in basic restaurants all over Colombia, but are particularly common in Bogotá. You can eat well for little money if you don’t mind the lack of variety. Photos: Steve Hide
Google Translate says corrientazo is a “large electric shock”. What am I missing?
Here corrientazo better translates as “large set lunch”, derived from the almuerzo corriente, the workman’s set lunchoriginallydevised in Spain by dictator General Franco, but now big in Bogotá.
Is that the same as menu del día?
Not really. Regular restaurants draw in the lunchtime crowd with a cheap set menu – menu del día – but still have a wide menu where you are welcome to choose. A proper corrientazo restaurant keeps costs down by mass production with limited options. These food choices might be written on a blackboard or barked at you by the waiting staff.
If you’re in a hurry, order the simple set menu – menu del día. Any other option will cost more time and money.
Sounds very limited.
Yes, on any given day. But most places change the corrientazo daily, so eat there all week and you’ll get a variety.
So, what are the options?
Pay attention, as you will only have a microsecond to decide and order before the waitress gives up and moves to another table.
Sopa o fruta? (soup or fruit?). This is the starter and will arrive precisely three seconds after you gave the order.
Pechuga a la plancha, pollo sudado, o carne en bifstek? (Grilled chicken, stewed chicken or steak?). The second course is often called the seco (“dry”, todistinguish it from the soup) and there might be three or four options. It will arrive exactly 30 seconds after you finished the starter.
Ensalada, lentejas o espeghetti? (Salad, lentils or spaghetti?). Whichever you choose will come with the seco. If you smile nicely you might get all three.
Limonada o mango? (Lemon or mango?), the juice drink (jugo) to wash it all down. There is invariably homemade lemonade, but an alternative fruit is usually offered.
Of course, these are just examples. Brisket, pork chops and kidneys are also common. Some corrientazo restaurants offer a top-tier option, the menu ejecutivo, slightly pricier, with things like fish (usually mojarra) and BBQ ribs. Red beans (frijoles) and plantains (flattened as patacones or fried as tajadas) are often offered with the second course, or maybe mashed pumpkin (ahuyama), or Russian salad with beetroot.
Is there any dessert?
Usually not. You might get a boiled sweet with your change after paying.
Are corrientazo’s healthy?
Very. These restaurants are family run, with homestyle cooking, and food is mostly stewed or grilled, making it healthier than fry-ups common in countries like the USA and the UK. Ingredients are bought in local markets, and the high turnover means food is freshly served. In theory, the Bogota Health Department monitors hygiene in all 23,000 restaurants in the city, but don’t count on that. A more useful measure is a restaurant’s popularity with the lunchtime regulars. A busy eatery is unlikely to be poisoning its customers.
Does it taste good?
This is wholesome food, but unlikely to set your taste buds ablaze. You can spice it up by asking for a small bowl of picante sauce. Also remember you can spend a lot more money on bland food in Colombia; at least this is cheap.
What about veggie options?
Some vegetarians ask for the seco without the meat or fish, and stick with the lentils, rice and salad. This is still a good lunch, and you’ll get a discount. The other option is the menu del dia at one of Bogotá’s growing number of vegetarian eateries.
So how cheap is it?
Inflation caused a 25% price hike in prices in 2022, and a proper corrientazo now costs around 10,000 pesos (US$3) in Bogotá, though in workman’s cafés in poorer areas of the city there are still lunches for 5,000 pesos. Generally, corrientazos are around half the price of fast-food meals in large shopping malls, and in most cases cheaper than cooking at home.
Don’t expect an elaborate menu choice, or even any at all.
Where can I find a corrientazo?
Corrientazo restaurants are in humble buildings with cheap rent in parts of the city where workers congregate for lunch, close to office buildings, industrial zones, busy streets and local markets. Avoid shopping centers and Estrato 6 areas where a cup of coffee will cost more than a whole almuerzo corriente.
Several websites provide lists of their top corrientazos, but beware; these are mostly mainstream restaurants with a set lunch option. For the real deal, you need to get out on the streets and look around. Here are some tips for a good corrientazo establishment:
There is no sign. The reputation speaks for itself.
The place is close to full, with suited businesspersons, manual workers and arty types.
There is no cardboard menu, and especially no QR code. Look for writing on the wall or wait for the waitress to reel off the options.
Your legs can’t quite fit under the table.
It opens at 12 noon and closes at 3pm. Proper corrientazo eateries only do lunch.
Costs are maximum COP$10,000 for the corrientazo, and maximum COP$13,000 for the ejecutivo, if that option exists.
Variations on a theme
Of course, over time Bogotá’s corrientazo culture is diversifying and there are variations in many parts of the city: dine-in bakeries (panaderias or cafeterias) are offering set lunches, and even small corner shops (cigarrerias) will cram a few tables in and offer hot food. There is an increasing crossover with comida rapida – which is generally fried food but will also offer a healthier corrientazo. You’ll also find regional varieties such as the Pacific seafood restaurants whose menu del día is likely to be fried fish, coconut rice and a large patacón.
Paying and tips…
Pay after the meal at the counter, not at the table. The price is usually fixed, but if you had extras let the owner know to include them in the bill. In larger places, the waiter will leave a tab on your table to take with you to pay. Tips are not expected, but if you give a small note to the waiters they won’t complain.
If you’re looking for chillies and sweet potatoes in Bogotá, Paloquemao is the place to go.
Photo: Daniel Sanchez, Unsplash
Excluding tourists, there are only two types of people that come to Paloquemao: those looking for something very specific and those who are buying in bulk. Prove me wrong. Find me someone, anyone, who comes here to shop casually on a Saturday. It’s just not practical. There’s no reason to favour this place over your neighborhood frutiver unless the frutiver either doesn’t have what you need or doesn’t have enough of it. By that logic, I should come by roughly once a month – just often enough to grab a few 100g bags of the hot peppers I can’t find elsewhere, maybe an arepa boyacense if the mood is right, and then leave as soon as I’ve got everything I need. Unfailingly, I hang around long after my shopping is done.
It’s almost 11am. They’re sweeping up outside – you have to get here early if you want to see the flower show – but inside, things are still bustling. The layout of the market is labyrinthine, which adds to its allure. As you walk up one corridor and down another, you never quite shake the feeling that something fascinating is waiting for you just around the corner. In many ways, it’s true, if for no other reason than the extent to which this place absolutely bombards the senses.
The floors are slightly gritty beneath your feet, powdered by the dirt from the thousands of shoe soles that got there first; pressure cookers rattle and hiss as closet-sized diners prepare their soup of the day; the unctuous aroma of just-fried chicharron wafts in from street vendors, filling some halls and disappearing entirely from others; and reggaeton, bachata, salsa, and ranchero take turns as the default background music depending on where you are in the market, only giving way briefly to the occasional “a la orden” or, in my case, “qué busca, papa?”
When you walk through the main entrance, an expansive foyer welcomes you, showcasing fruits that seem too perfect to be real. There are mounds of strawberries and granadillas, oranges and bananas, grapes and papaya, and every last one of them is immaculate. Off to the side, you’ll find heaps of calendula, parsley, mint, and a dizzying array of other herbs whose names I don’t know laid out beneath different spices, incense, and herbal remedies that hang from low-ceilinged stalls. The Colombian grandmothers who try to convince their grandkids that the cure to any strain of COVID is agua de panela and Vick’s vapor rub single-handedly keep these stalls afloat.
Read more of our Dispatches to visit Bogotá’s migration office, Parkway, and Gran Estación Plaza.
The more you wander the more you see. Miniature supply stores overflowing with cleaning products, tupperware, and a handful of other kitchen staples; egg and cheese shops; and fishmongers and butchers who, for reasons I still don’t understand, are clad in white smocks that have been soiled with the blood of whatever flesh they’ve been carving. Red or black aprons seem more practical.
But too much walking is disorienting. A byproduct of my hanging around is getting lost, not because Paloquemao is set up like a maze, but because so many of the kiosks are exactly the same. It’s something I’ve griped about on myriad occasions – not just in this market, but all over the city. The pet shops on avenida caracas with 50-whatever; the lechonerias around Quiroga; the auto repair garages in 7 de agosto – the sellers all seem to be carbon copies of one another, selling the same stuff and providing the same services at the same prices during the same operating hours.
The silver lining is that the sameness puts things in perspective. It makes you appreciate the businesses that take risks and try to do something new – the woman who sells hot peppers or the hard-to-find kiosk that only sells handmade corn tortillas. It’s one of the reasons why I come to Paloquemao. I’m always looking for something very specific, something different. I don’t always find it, but it keeps me hanging around long after my shopping is done.
The Embera and other indigenous groups in the Parque Nacional should make us consider our own impact on the world around us
Indigenous groups in Parque Nacional. Photo: Oli Pritchard
The Parque Nacional is a vital part of the Bogotá landscape, a crucial green space for people in the centre of the capital and a gateway to the Cerros Orientales. For the last half a year, much of the park has been blocked off and become a refugee camp for indigenous people protesting their treatment by authorities and fleeing persecution. Despite strong words from the mayor’s office, no solutions are coming forward and the degradation of the park continues apace. Today and yesterday, yet more talks are taking place between communities in the park and various local and national authorities.
For more than eight months now, the Embera people have been in the Parque Nacional, occasionally holding demonstrations to block traffic. Even so, barricades have been erected to help block visibility. But visible it is, this camp of a hundred or more black tarpaulins. And that’s the point of it – these people need a place to live and by occupying a central space, they hope to get guarantees from the government on health, housing, and other issues. Abject poverty is now brought into sharp contrast with privileged tennis players a scant few yards away. As I jog past in the morning, I am reminded of the damage my smug privilege causes elsewhere in the world. So often, these are issues that Colombia brushes into obscurity, hides in the shadows, and deliberately ignores. The state of course, but most of us in wider society as well.
Maybe you are close to zero rubbish, or have your own solar panels generating all your power. If you’re like most of us though, your carbon footprint will dwarf anyone in the Parque Nacional camp. Seeing columns of smoke rising from inefficient woodfires might be unpleasant, but the energy I’m using as I write this will be doing exactly the same thing, just far from view. The rubbish I put out on the street last night might not be festering there now like it is in the camp, but only because it’s in a squalid mass tip somewhere far from my middle-class reverie.
The topographical map of Bogota is now a toilet
For all that many might think of indigenous people living in perfect harmony with the natural world, the reality is somewhat different. Be under no illusions – the damage done to the park over the last few months is notable. The Río Arzobispo, such as it is, is now an open sewer, its edges completely befouled with human faeces. The topographical map of Bogotá and its surrounds is a literal toilet. The forest surrounding the park has had many of its young trees hacked down. Black water oozes permanently over the pathways.
None of this, though, is to blame the (mainly) Embera people for their actions. It’s hardly as though they want to be there, for a start, rather that they have been forced into this position. Kicked out of their lodgings in Simón Bolívar after being displaced from other parts of Colombia, the only option was to live in tents. Better to erect those there than on the outskirts of Bogotá. It’s just that the Parque Nacional was never designed to house humans, nor is it suitable for that purpose. Now nobody wants to take responsibility.
For those who feel angry over the occupation of the Parque Nacional, save your fury for an alcaldía that can’t find appropriate housing for desperate people. Turn your anger at a government that makes at best no attempt to protect land and at worst openly colludes to exploit it. Rage against a system of absurd overconsumption and grotesque inequality. Those should be the targets of ire, not the people trapped in an awful situation.
Background: The indigenous groups in Parque Nacional In September 2021, groups of Embera and other indigenous communities set up camp in Bogotá’s Parque Nacional. According to a March census by various groups, including the Ministry of the Interior and the Unit for Victims, there are over 500 families living in the park making up about 1,500 people. About half are Embera and half are from other indigenous groups.
Accusations fly on all sides about who should be doing what. Various officials have made various offers, but the challenge is to find alternative housing and give guarantees that the communities in the park can actually trust.
The people camped out in the park aren’t only hanging ecological laundry out in public. The people living in the park have been let down by systems that should have protected them, displaced from their homes by violence. They are a visible reminder that the peace deal did not end conflict in rural parts of Colombia. They are a reminder of the things we seek to ignore to make ourselves feel better.
Three journalists tell very different stories, all of which are both moving and shocking.
On stage at FILBo: Pablo Barrientos, Diana López Zuleta, and Pablo Navarrete share the stories behind their books. Photo: Ángela Forero-Aponte
FILBo has, literally, tons of books. How many are sold every year? That’s for the post-show statistics to show. But, it is the narratives which give FILBo its character, especially when we get to hear directly from the players themselves. Last Saturday, I headed to Corferias with a hunger for stories. Journalists Juan Pablo Barrientos, Diana López Zuleta, and Pablo Navarrete gave us a glimpse of the painful, mostly unknown stories they have put into words. How and why did they decide to write about a story of paedophilia, a father’s murder, and the unknown sister to Carlos Pizarro, M19 guerrilla commander, respectively?
Diana López Zuleta: Lo que no borró el desierto – What the Desert did not Take Away
Diana López has been struggling since she was 10 years old to discover the reasons for her father’s murder. Her book is the result of a dialogue with herself, and an investigation into what happened. She reckons this book has grown up alongside her. But it was only when she had the proper investigative tools that she could make it a reality. Writing it helped her finally close the grief cycle, something she couldn’t do before because of the impunity of her father’s killer.
López says the title of the book is a homage to her father; she says his death was heart wrenching. “It was usual to be in school” in Barrancas, Guajira, “and receive the news that your mom or dad had been killed” she recounts. She doesn’t remember much of the day, most of her account she had to draw from videos and interviews she collected. It’s shocking to hear her tell that her father’s killer was cynical enough to show up at the wake and read a plagiarized eulogy.
Juan Pablo Barrientos: Este es el cordero de Dios – The Lamb of God
Juan Pablo Barrientos had already written one book about the number of paedophilia cases in Colombia. Entitled Dejad que los niños vengan a mí, the name comes from a bible quote “Let the little children come to me…” A while after the book was published, he got an anonymous message on Twitter telling him 19 priests had been suspended in the Archdiocese of Villavicencio for paedophilia. His journalistic gut told him there was something there to investigate and report. His one and only conversation with the Archbishop there confirmed the tweet was true.
Barrientos travelled to Villavicencio to talk to Pedro*, whose name has been changed to protect his identity. Now a man, as a child Pedro had been both molested and introduced to prostitution by 30 priests. He also talked to the two women who uncovered this horrible story. Publisher Planeta contacted Barrientos and made his news reports into a book. He is proud that his book is a homage to the two women. In his words, these faithful Catholics confronted the Archbishop and uncovered this prostitution network.
To hear Barrientos talk about priests who had a whip-around to have Pedro killed is gut-wrenching to say the least. The journalist openly accuses the Catholic church of being “a transnational organized crime group, mobsters.” In Barrientos’ words “Pedro is the lamb of god, a child who was mistreated, abused, and almost killed by the Catholic church.”
Pablo Navarrete: Nina Pizarro, la pirata blanca – Nina Pizarro, the White Pirate
Pablo Navarrete, was a family friend of Nina Pizarro. He and his family would usually visit Nina in Guayatá and he always wondered how someone who’d been involved in operations to steal weapons ended up marrying a military man. As a child, Navarrete would overhear stories of how Nina – Pizarro’s sister – had driven the truck on the day of the robbery. But this didn’t fit with the image the young Pablo had formed. So he decided to investigate now and tell the story of Nina.
Navarrete wanted to focus on Nina´s story without actually connecting her to her brother or her brother’s story. Nina loved building scale ships and that’s the reason the title is called The White Pirate. Nina was just 25 when she came back from France and became a member of the M19 guerrilla. Seven months pregnant, she directed the whole robbery operation; the person in charge of driving the truck did not show up and so she stepped in. She drove back and forth eight times between the military base and the groups’ hideout. She was eventually caught, interrogated, and imprisoned for a little over three years.
Without giving away any spoilers, hearing these writers talk adds another dimension to their accounts. All three of these painful unknown Colombian stories are worth reading. Barrientos closes the session by giving us more insights into the story of Pedro. The 13-year was working on the streets when a priest lured him in with the offer of new clothes. This priest not only abused him sexually, but also sent Pedro to other priests’ houses to offer them prostitution services. Barrientos says he’s discovered a pattern: priests in these dioceses look for boys who are poor, come from dysfunctional families, or boys who have been abandoned by their parents. They seduce them with clothes or money and have them provide sexual services.
There is still time to visit FILBo (May 2 is the last day) and listen to the authors themselves. Whether you’re Colombian or international, these types of stories can help us to understand the country more. And that knowledge may help to end these loops of violence.
FILBo – the Feria Internacional del Libro de Bogotá – is back in person after two virtual editions during the pandemic. With over 1,600 events planned in Corferias and over 100 in other parts of the city, it promises to be a literary smorgasbord.
This year over 500 guests from 30 different countries will take to various stages in the convention centre. Korea is the country of honour, marking 60 years since the start of diplomatic relations between Colombia and Korea.
Korea is this year’s guest country
The guest of honor this year is Korea. That means we’re in for a good dose of Korean literature, as well as a hefty K-pop presence. There’ll be a Korean pavilion and over 20 guests, including former UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon. Other participants include authors, translators, calligraphers, graphic designers, and various other key figures. There’s also a Korean film season at the Centro Cultural Gabriel García Márquez. Colombia will be the guest of honor at the Seoul Book Fair in June.
The theme of the Korean pavilion is coexistence. The idea is to explore the coexistence between people, nations, humanity, and nature. “That the central theme is coexistence is very appropriate given the current circumstances in which the whole world is suffering from the new calamity,” said the Ambassador of the Republic of Korea in Colombia, H.E. Choo Jong Youn. “Now the world is closely intertwined by interdependence. Therefore, concepts like state egoism or extreme nationalism cannot survive anymore. We have to find a way to live together.”
What to expect from this year’s Feria del Libro
You can download the full program from the FILBo website. But with so many different activities, planning your visit can be a bit daunting. The online Agéndate tool helps, especially as you can add events that might be of interest to your personalised plan. Broadly speaking, there’ll be events to suit most tastes, and it’s worth going even if you’re not terribly bookish.
If you’ve never been before, you can expect huge pavilions packed with bookstores and other stands, huge queues for popular events (and even some unpopular ones), fun spaces and activities for children, food stalls, coffee stops, and more. Also, be aware that the schedule can change, so double check the info if there’s someone you’re super keen to see. Looking through the program, here are some of the themes that jump out:
Gender politics and identity
Music
Graphic novels and illustrations
Biodiversity
Impact of the pandemic
Conflict and human rights
Role of art and language
The ministry of culture is also launching a digital library which gives free access to pdfs of a number of books.
In addition to Korea, there’ll be speakers from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Korea, Cuba, Spain, the United States, France, Holland, Israel, Italy, Mexico, Norway, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Romania, United Kingdom, El Salvador, and Venezuela.
There’ll be many well-known Colombian faces there, some of whom will be familiar from previous years. These include Brigitte Baptiste, William Ospina, Piedad Bonnett, Diana Uribe, Laura Restrepo, and Chocquibtown’s Goya.
While much of the event is in person, watch out for a virtual appearance by Isabelle Allende. She’ll be discussing her most recent book, Violeta, as well as broader themes such as love, and dictatorships. It’s hard to pick just one or two names from the international guests, as much depends on your personal tastes, but it’s worth watching out for J.J. Benitez, Mircea Cartarescu, Anne Boyer, and many more. Canadian anthropologist Wade Davis, author of Magdalena, historias de Colombia will discuss his book with Carlos Vives in what could be an unusual but interesting pairing.
Attending FILBo 2022
Dates: April 19 to May 2
Times: 10am-8pm (Sun to Thu), 10am-9pm (Fri & Sat)
Freddy Rincón, one of Colombia’s best footballers in history has passed away after being injured in a car crash
Freddy Rincón after his key goal against Germany at the World Cup in 1990.
Freddy Rincón died on Wednesday, aged 55. The former captain of the Colombian national team succumbed to the severe injuries he sustained in a car crash in Cali in the early hours of Monday morning.
Rincón was taken to hospital with severe head trauma, and died two days later from his injuries. It seems the car had jumped a red light and was hit by a bus at full speed. The bus driver and three other passengers in the car were also injured. According to the hospital, none of them are in critical condition.
Rincón one of the most famous Colombian footballers of all-time
Freddy Eusebio Rincón Valencia became world famous in the nineties as captain of the golden generation of Colombian football. The creative central midfielder represented los cafeteros in three different World Cup championships. He played alongside other stars like Carlos “el pibe” Valderrama, Andrés Escobar and Tino Asprilla. Rincón and Valderrama still share the record of most World Cup matches played for Colombia, with 10 games each.
Rincón is most remembered for the 1-1 against Germany in the 1990 World Cup. It was the first time in history Colombia had reached the knockout stages of the World Cup.
Another memorable moment became known as el cinco cero. In a 1993 World Cup qualification match in the United States, Colombia recorded a famous 5-0 victory over Maradona’s Argentina with two goals from a prolific Rincón.
Freddy Rincón’s club career included spells at Napoli and Real Madrid
Born in Buenaventura, Valle del Cauca, Freddy Rincón was brought to Bogotá by an Independiente Santa Fe representative and made his professional debut for that club in 1986. He quickly became one of the best players in the league, and moved to América de Cali, at that point one of the biggest clubs in South America. After winning several titles with América, Rincón moved to Brazil to play for Palmeiras. Soon after el cinco cero he went to Europe to play for Napoli.
After a successful season at Napoli, Real Madrid signed the gracious central midfielder, making him the first Colombian to feature in the Champions League. In Spain, he suffered from racist abuse from sections of Real Madrid fans. The celebrated footballer didn’t feel he got a serious chance there, so he moved back to Brazil where he became captain of Corinthians. Rincón led his team to victory in the World Cup for Clubs in 2000.
After his active career, Rincón came back to professional football in short spells in different manager and assistant manager positions. However, he was very much on the sidelines and hasn’t been actively involved in football since he left Millonarios in 2019. Nonetheless Rincón left his mark on generations of Colombian football and will be mourned by many.
Uniting Colombia’s divided parts through fabrics, fashion, and ancestral craftsmanship
The indigenous community of Embera Katío in Tierralta crafting traditional clothes and molas. Photos: Emily Hart
Maria Luisa Ortiz’s background is not politics – it’s high fashion. She originally studied haute couture with Christian Dior in Paris. Now she’s using that knowledge to help re-thread connections in communities badly damaged by Colombia’s conflict. “Once you’re sitting at the sewing machine – that’s when you have everything in common. It’s the same worldwide,” says Maria Luisa.
A moment of political awakening in her native Colombia, led her to return and build something that’s become a lifeline for former combatants as well as survivors of the conflict. The collaborative project weaves together peace, history, and ecology – repurposing used uniforms with artisanal embroidery to create brand new pieces of clothing.
“Back when I started my career, I wasn’t so conscious of my country and what surrounded me – I was focussed on my oficio – my craft. It is still my passion,” Maria Luisa tells me. The small plaster on her finger feels out of place with her casual glamour and effortless elegance. But it’s crucial evidence she hasn’t strayed far from the needle and thread even after a decades-long career.
In 2013, three years before the peace deal was signed with the FARC, at an event to celebrate and preserve the country’s artisanal practices, she saw the potential of Colombia’s traditional crafts and artisanry – and how undervalued much of it was.
“My brain exploded,” she said. “I had the opportunity to travel to those communities and see that what – in Paris, where I had studied – was so valued and highly-paid for in Europe, was providing only situations of poverty for artisans here. To too many people they are just part of the landscape.”
Maria Luisa started to train survivors of conflict, displaced people, and former-combatants. The more she travelled, the more she was struck by the division in the country.
“We are from the same land, we are from the same past. It was hard to understand our division. But I saw there could be a unifying thread between us, all of us. So many families have a sewing machine at home, rural and urban families.”
“And we asked one another, ‘Who taught you to sew?’ It was a magic moment.” She continues, “The conflict disappeared… Something in common which doesn’t put you on one side or another – especially in this country. The spark stayed in my head. I had to do something.”
Then came a joint design project repurposing police uniforms. Hundreds of thousands of uniforms head to landfill every year in Colombia. And so the idea was born – uniting the power of sewing with the idea of upcycling old textiles: “The two problems united,” she says.
With state support, a workshop was set up in Tolima and a connection was made with a cooperative of the indigenous community of Embera Katío in Tierralta, Córdoba, a region of Colombia often caught in the crossfire between guerrillas and paramilitary groups. The workshop creates the clothes, and the cooperative in Córdoba produces traditional molas – symbolic beaded panels which decorate them.
Building cooperation with various parts of society
It’s now a patchwork team involving former FARC combatants, indigenous artisans, local entrepreneurs, civil society, and social enterprise. By building cooperation between these parts of society, the project aims to stitch together parts of Colombia that have been pulled apart by conflict.
Maria Luisa Ortiz: “We are from the same land, we are from the same past. It was hard to understand our division. But I saw there could be a unifying thread between us, all of us. So many families have a sewing machine at home, rural and urban families.”
It’s been a complicated process and a lot of sacrifice, says Gonzalo Beltrán, a former FARC combatant who now works for the collective in the workshop in Tolima. But it now supports him and his family as well as the team in the workshop, who are also building strong links with the community.
“There’s still insecurity for us, but we have learnt to work hard to demonstrate to people who don’t believe in the peace process that it is possible, that we are still committed to this process despite everything,” he says. “Via these designs we can link people, transmit a message of unity, joy, resolution.”
The used uniforms and textiles are often even donated by companies who then buy the finished products. They are now being shipped all over the world by ISHKAR – a London-based company which specialises in preserving traditional craftsmanship, and providing market access to places which are often excluded from global trade. They also work with creators from Afghanistan.
“We wanted not only to create something that could generate income for the artisans, but also a symbolic object that speaks of reconciliation.”
“We wanted not only to create something that could generate income for the artisans, but also a symbolic object that speaks of reconciliation. Working with both the ex-combatants and the indigenous community, the jackets and bags represent cooperation, stitching together parts of Colombia that have been pulled apart by conflict.” says Nadia, ISHKAR’s Head of Production.
Gonzalo says he’s hopeful about the project and its potential not just to support reintegration after the conflict, but to keep faith in the peace process, uniting former opponents and rebuilding communities.
“The future of Colombia is pretty complicated,” he said. “But we want to demonstrate to society that we can build a better country, and leave a better future to the new generation.”
Emily Hart is an independent journalist based in Colombia. She’s written for The Times, TheTelegraph, Pitchfork, Dazed etc. She runs a weekly news digest: Colombia’s top news stories in English – curated, digested, and delivered straight to your phone every Monday as a 5-minute audio and text. Sign up here for $5 per month!
Live music is starting to roll in postpandemic Bogotá, and last weekend saw another huge step forward in the shape of Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. We were in the middle of the action all over the three days – here’s what happened!
Estéreo Picnic 2022 was well organised and handled the tragic news of Taylor Hawkins death as good as can be. How was the music during the weekend? Photos: Oli Pritchard
Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 was a welcome return to the festival season for Bogotá, if underpinned by tragedy. The heavens shone upon us and kept the weekend dry, there were cracking performances across the stages, but the death of Taylor Hawkins was never far from our minds.
All the festival’s acts paid tribute to Hawkins, in different forms. Crudo Means Raw had pacific style drumming, Golden Dawn Arkestra elected to blast out My Hero, Doja Cat got his details wrong. Black Pumas had the unenviable task of passing on the news and asked for a moment of silence, as many others did.
The music itself was hit and miss as always. With the Foos understandably cancelling, The Strokes took the indie/rock mantle and bottled it. Julian Casablancas was visibly and audibly off it, rambling incoherently between songs. There are still enough hits to please any crowd, but it’s time for these lads to be out to pasture. The same goes for the Libertines, who were simply disappointing, especially for the main stage. One of those bands that were perfect at their time but have aged more like milk than wine. The look is still there, Carl Barat insouciantly dragging on fags as he plays and Pete charismatic if atonal.
Idles at the top of their game
Bristol boys Idles, though, have swagger and confidence compared to the dull whimsy of the Libs. This is a band at the top of their game and they absolutely own the stage. We’ve seen some good shows over the day and the years here, but this is one for the ages. Completely in the moment, they make the vast Adidas stage feel as intimate as a small club, while at the same time acutely aware of the giant crowd. They’ve all donned their free Colombia shirts and when Joe Talbot slips in “my blood brother is a Colombian” to the lyrics of Danny Nedelko, the crowd roar.
An absolute racket in all the best ways, they finish with Talbot hammering away on drums just for the sheer noise of it all. With a furious, coruscating sound, they are anti-fascist, pro-immigration. “It’s been a fucking pleasure,” Lee Kiernan says at the end, and he’s not wrong. Joining them in hardcore chaos are Turnstile, lighting up Sunday with a brief blast of aggression and fury that’s sadly been lacking in the last two days.
Black Pumas energetic and soulful performance
What of Black Pumas themselves after the announcement of Hawkins’ death? Obviously affected by the news, they put in a fittingly energetic and soulful show. Burton had done his homework and repeatedly said “que chimba, Bogotá!” to get on the right side of the crowd. While very much a second stage band, they rose to the challenge elegantly and ensured a solid end to the main part of the first day. Earlier, The Drums provided perfect calm down music for dark o’clock as the sun faded away. Jonny promised and delivered portamento in its entirety, but we got a couple of treats at the end, including let’s go surfing from the first album.
Diamante Eléctrico deserved a bigger stage.
Diamante Eléctrico led the charge of rolo talent and were far too big for their tent with people spilling out at every side. A barnstorming show from the local legends went down an absolute treat and served notice to the organisers not to sideline bogotano bands. Should have been second stage at a bare minimum. Getting a bigger audience were Piel Camaleón on the main stage in colour-coded outfits. Infectiously fun and bouncy, they were great for the lowering sun. At ease even on the giant stage, they had the audience in the palms of their hands, getting everyone’s hands in the air like they just didn’t care. From disco to indie to rap to art-noise, every genre landed. Los Niños Telepáticos were the first band to get things rolling on Friday with a heavier and denser sound than we’d expected. The vocals got a bit lost in the sound desk, but a crunchy, muscular performance set things up perfectly for later.
More classically, Pacífican Power were at the fourth stage, warm and welcoming. They probably deserved a bigger crowd, Friday was not the day for them, really. Still, they lit up the space they were given with a show that was traditional, but not stuck in the past as rap intertwines with tambores. Powerful lyrics that address social problems, hitting all the right notes. Warm music for a chilly night. Briela Ojeda on Friday had an otherworldly voice. Enchanting and rhythmic, her unique composing style means her voice is an instrument in and of itself. She created a traditional, natural atmosphere that evoked glades and forests yet also gave a shout out to menstruation issues. Then there was Binomio De Oro de America Latina. Whoever put them on the fourth stage needs speaking to.
We’re all disappointed to have missed the likes of Pavlo and the Gaiteros de San Jacinto as they were just on too early. However, missing Babelgam and Margarita Siempre Viva on Sunday really stung, as it was down to rescheduling issues. However, there was plenty to discover, including the Golden Dawn Arkestra. Very funky, very prog and very dancey. All of that says a big reaction from Colombia, and that they got in abundance. Bonkers politics but superb performers.
Ela Minus’s delicate vocals lit up the night
Saturday was electro-day, among other things, and Martin Garrix was the first big name up. Professional, polished, efficient, he was cool in the way that big skyscrapers in steel and glass are cool, all VIP, Zona T, anodyne. Lacking personality and engagement, it was a detached performance that ticked the right boxes with no commitment. Over on the third stage, Ela Minus was a completely different experience. This wonderful techno elf gave a human and surprisingly sweet performance. Following the audience to the tee, she lit us up with delicate vocals flitting over a brutally minimalist backing track.
Then there was Fatboy Slim. Decades of experience were on show with a performance that blasted everyone away. Norman Cook absolutely still has it, keeping the crowd in the palm of his hand with ease. Huge booming basslines, heavy beats over the top and frequent sallies out to gee up the audience. Big shout out too to Nina Kravitz (no relation) who overcame technical difficulties to provide a barnstorming end to the festival itself on Sunday night
Sunday earlier saw a quartet of female singers take the stage. Ashnikko was the pick of the bunch. Doja Cat was her obvious comparison, but so different in terms of sexual messaging. Where Ashnikko was talking about how she wanted to fuck, Doja simply offered herself and her backing dancers as fucktoys. Mind you, for a completely false personality, the show was outstanding and her stage presence massive, managing to get away with thanking Argentina at one point.
Dogs may not have been allowed at Estéreo Picnic, one did manage to sneak in.
The alternativas were Marina and LP. The former was good, if you like that sort of thing, but a bit flat and uninspiring if you don’t. LP, on the other hand, managed a difficult situation well. With one song clearly the focus of her performance, she celebrated and played with that rather than being embarrassed. A striking performance to go with a remarkable voice. Less notable were the male singers, ASAP Rocky being a disappointment. More successful a day earlier was J Balvin. Easily the most controversial booking of the festival, he held up well. His mate Crudo Means Raw was underwhelming over on the second stage though, another victim of technical difficulties.
A star of the festival that flew under the radar was the weather. For late March, we were blessed with cloudy skies that weren’t threatening downpours or sunburn. In terms of logistics, it was outstanding. We’d been worried about the cashless system, but after a couple of hours of people getting used to it, it performed perfectly. That might not be a spectacular thing to note, but in a festival of thousands, that sort of thing really makes things better. In fact, from food queues to toilets, pretty much everything worked, which is a minor miracle under the circumstances.
Colombia’s biggest party is winding down in Barranquilla. But in a sleepy pueblo on the outskirts of the Caribbean city, the carnival work never stops. Nine siblings are hard at work, carving and painting the wooden masks which characterise the festival – elaborate animal heads in many stages of life and colour.
The carnival masks from the de la Cruz family. Photos: Emily Hart
The famous parades of Barranquilla’s Carnival are defined by their masks: hundreds of dancers swirl down the hot streets of Barranquilla – snarling tigers, colourful donkeys, and bulls with ribbons flowing from their horns.
“Galapa is the birthplace of masks in Colombia – it’s a cultural epicentre,” explains Brenda. Gapala is a small, dusty village famous for its woodworking. On its eastern edge, the Armocana workshop is nestled.
As soon as Brenda opens the door, the sweet and rich smell hits. It’s the smell of red ceiba wood, wafting through the house from the workshop, floating past a black and white cat, small but heavily pregnant, dozing on a worktop in a bright patch of sunlight.
“Our work gives a message to the world: Barranquilla Carnival is joy. It allows us to show everything that we are – everyone brings something beautiful to it. It’s love and passion and happiness,” explains Brenda. It’s more than simply joy: it’s like therapy for the senses, she continues. “The spectacle, the colours, and the movement– all of it alleviates stress and monotony.”
The airy workshop is piled high with curled wood chips and pieces of bark lying at the feet of whizzing machines and saws. There’s Colombian vallenato music in the air, thumping from a huge speaker system outside a shop opposite the house.
Brenda de la Cruz and her eight siblings are the third generation working in this workshop, and they won’t be the last. A number of Brenda’s brothers, dusty, slide past me as I admire the perfect circles of rough bark stripped off the trunks, leaving only the pale soft-looking wood inside.
The blocks of wood are carried just around the corner, where their identity starts to emerge. Kalill picks up his machete and swipes at a block, cutting an edge off a rounded ear: a tiger is coming.
These masks are more than costume
The masks are not just for costume: they are totemic. According to tradition, they offer a way to commune with the natural world, embodying the bravery of the bull, the courage of the tiger, the strength of the donkey.
With these masks, what is on show is much more important than what is hidden. They represent Colombia’s most marginalised and endangered cultures, particularly indigenous and Afro Colombian traditions. Many keep masks in their homes or hung on walls. They are an emblem of the mix of heritage and history in the area, as well as a symbol of regional pride.
“It’s a privilege to carry all this knowledge, which I’ve absorbed from my father and from his father,” says Kalill, gently hacking at the block. Kalill’s wooden block has no markings on it and there’s no template to be seen. He started woodworking with his father at nine years old. Now, with 15 years of work under his belt, he can see the tiger’s head without instructions, lying in wait inside the wood.
“I am proud to make a contribution to our culture, and form a part of it too. It brings me closer to my culture, by means of what I express through this art – through these masks. Few people do this work, and nowhere else in the world are these made,” smiles Kalill.
The de la Cruz work shop for mask making.
But it’ll take the whole de la Cruz family to free the animal from the wooden block; each family member specialises in one stage of creation. The wood is passed from Kalill with his machete all the way down to Brenda. She finely paints the masks once they have been cut, whittled, filed, and smoothed by other family members.
“I feel fulfilled that my generation has passed this process down. It’s not just a culture and an art, it’s also a way of life – and it brings income to our home and our whole family,” says Jaime – Brenda and Kalill’s father.
One of the first parts of the mask making is cutting out a piece of wood.
The masks are like the faces of the De La Cruz family, or any other. They share characteristics, but each is totally and unmistakably unique. “Even in this pueblo each workshop has a different style – even among my own children. Their bull will never be the same as my bull, each has their style,” explains Jaime.
The tradition has its roots in West Africa. During the slaving period of Spanish colonial rule, the culture of those trafficked was under attack and at threat of intentional elimination by colonial rule. The masks reasserted a cultural heritage – a form of resistance, memory, and self-recognition.
The masks gradually took on the influence of indigenous groups and communities living on the River Magdalena. Some were made from local animals like the donkey, and birds and monkeys from Colombia’s Atlantic coastal region.
Changing the narrative
As well as being a cultural heritage and an art form, the masks are a medium to tell a new story about Colombia after half a century of conflict and a historic reputation for being a narcostate.
Carnival and its artisanry offers a different narrative: an older, richer story of Colombia and its people. “Drugs have won us mala fama – a bad reputation – but Colombia is much more than that: we aren’t a drug nation. We have beautiful places. We are culture, tradition, music, and art,” says Jaime.
“This work is a part of the peace process. We also bring work to vulnerable people and families in the community – we train and employ vulnerable women and recovering addicts. We are contributing to peace,” affirms Jaime.
Beside the workshop is a room packed full of finished pieces – masks of wood and paper-maché and wooden animal figures of all sizes and forms. A bull’s head the size of a thumbnail – perfectly painted with a brush so fine that you can count the fibres – sits fearlessly next to a tiger’s head, so huge that I needed help to lift it and stare into its impressive jaws.
All three generations, and centuries of tradition behind them, are represented at the workshop, and on the buzzing streets of Barranquilla’s Carnival too. It’s four generations if you count the tiny toddler playing with a book at the feet of her great-grandfather’s rocking chair – though she hasn’t picked up a paintbrush just yet.
Emily Hart is an independent journalist based in Colombia – she has written for The Times, TheTelegraph, Pitchfork, Dazed etc. She runs a weekly news digest: Colombia’s top news stories in English – curated, digested, and delivered straight to your phone every Monday as a 5-minute audio and text. Sign up here for $5 per month!
It’s the final round of the South-American World Cup qualifiers, and Colombia still have a chance to qualify for Qatar, but it is slight and los Cafeteros depend on results from other matches
The first day of Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 was overshadowed by the news of Taylor Hawkins’ death, but it was a celebration of a beautiful life as well as a commemoration of death
“Taylor Hawkins forever,” on the first day of Estéreo Picnic. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Eric Burton of Black Pumas was the first to announce the news to us. Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins had died in Bogotá yesterday afternoon. He then called for a moment of silence to be followed by almighty applause. The crowd followed the instructions to the tee. It was a fitting tribute to a man the Foos themselves said should be remembered for his “musical spirit and his infectious laughter”. At the time of writing the cause of death is unknown and speculation should be avoided.
Everyone at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 handled the situation incredibly. A moving tribute was paid at the main stage as a velatón was set up at short notice. Fans gathered to pay their respects and the mood was sombre and restrained. On the stage itself, there was a desire to celebrate Hawkins’ life with live music as well as commemorate his passing. Once the second stage was also clear, the PA blasted out My Hero while visuals simply said ‘Taylor Hawkins por siempre’. It was sensitive, as was the generous offer to allow ticket holders for Friday to return gratis on Sunday.
What of Black Pumas themselves? Obviously affected by the news, they put in a fittingly energetic and soulful show. Burton had done his homework and repeatedly said “que chimba, Bogotá!” to get on the right side of the crowd. While very much a second stage band, they rose to the challenge elegantly and ensured a solid end to the main part of the first day. Just before them, Pacífican Power were at the fourth stage, warm and welcoming. They probably deserved a bigger crowd, but it’s not the day for them, really. Still, they lit up the space they were given with a show that was traditional, but not stuck in the past as rap intertwines with tambores. Powerful lyrics that address social problems, hitting all the right notes. Warm music for a chilly night.
Los Niños Telepáticos were the first band to get things rolling in the afternoon with a heavier and denser sound than we’d expected. The vocals got a bit lost in the sound desk, but a crunchy, muscular performance set things up perfectly for later. Over on the main stage we found Piel Camaleón in colour-coded outfits. Infectiously fun and bouncy, they were great for the lowering sun. At ease even on the giant stage, they had the audience in the palms of their hands, getting everyone’s hands in the air like they just didn’t care. From disco to indie to rap to art-noise, every genre landed.
Briela Ojeda on the third stage has an otherworldly voice. Enchanting and rhythmic, her unique composing style means her voice is an instrument in of itself. She created a traditional, natural atmosphere that evoked glades and forests yet also gave a shout out to menstruation issues. Diamante Eléctrico followed her and were far too big for their tent with people spilling out at every side. A barnstorming show from the local legends went down an absolute treat and served notice to the organisers not to sideline rolo bands. Should have been second stage at a bare minimum. On the second stage, The Drums provided perfect calm down music for dark o’clock as the sun faded away. Jonny promised and delivered portamento in its entirety, but we got a couple of treats at the end, including let’s go surfing from the first album.
The Libertines get the first big crowd of the day, but Pete’s singing voice is fucked. Carl still has it, at least as much as they ever did. The Libertines are one of those bands that were perfect at their time but have aged more like milk than wine. The look is still there, Carl Barat insouciantly dragging on fags as he plays and Pete charismatic if atonal. Don’t look back into the sun boys, those days are gone.
Bristol boys Idles, though, have swagger and confidence compared to the dull whimsy of the Libs. This is a band at the top of their game and they absolutely own the stage. We’ve seen some good shows over the day and the years here, but this is one for the ages. Completely in the moment, they make the vast Adidas stage feel like the intimacy of a small club, while at the same time acutely aware of the giant crowd. They’ve all donned their free Colombia shirts and when Joe Talbot slips in “my blood brother is a Colombian” to Danny Nedelko the crowd roar. An absolute racket in all the best ways, they finish with singer Joe Talbot hammering away on drums just for the sheer noise of it all. With a furious, coruscating sound, they are anti-fascist, pro-immigration. “It’s been a fucking pleasure,” Lee Kiernan says at the end, and he’s not wrong.
Fantastic, fabulous and fun, Pavlo opens Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022’s second day.
After tragedy hit the Friday of Estéreo Picnic, Medellín band Pavlo opens Saturday. Photo: Pavlo
Even by Saturday’s eclectic standards, Juan Pablo Merino, better known by his stage name Pavlo, cuts an arresting figure. He’s a fabulous pop star in the making with a sound and style that should be on a much, much bigger stage. And for a pop star in Bogotá right now, that means following the titanic Miley Cyrus performance on Monday. “Of course, yeah,” he says “I was here in Bogotá for the concert and I was, OMG, so happy. I was shaking, those powerful vocals, the visuals, everything. I want to be like her.”
It’s a big ask, but he’s having a go. “I’m going with dancers, with visuals, I want to do the best that I can. The clothes that I use are not going to be regular weekend clothes, you know? They’ll be more special, like Lady Gaga, imponente!” His style is a large part of his stage personality, and he wants to stand out: “With me on the stage, it’s like ‘who is this guy, he’s different,’ that’s what I want to do.”
Unlike some of the more classically indie bands playing Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, he’s unashamedly pop. “I’m a pop star, and I’m trying to do something new here with my music. I don’t think there are many artists like me that make this type of music here in Colombia. I’m trying to do something different. When you finish a song and see the reaction, I love it. It’s addictive. We’re constantly changing as people, and that happens in music too.”
Reactions have certainly come, as Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 came to call, despite his tender years. “I’m really excited. I didn’t see it coming this fast, but I’m so ready to do my best and make everybody dance.” He thinks that the capital is more than ready for him: “When I was in Bogotá a few years ago, I was walking in Chapinero and people stopped me in the street to get a photo and I was ‘OMG, of course,’ that’s who I am. That doesn’t happen in Medellín but in Bogotá, so I’m really happy to be here.”
He’s no stranger to the festival, and is excited to share a stage with Gwent legend MARINA. “I was always there as a fan and thinking ‘I’m going to be there on the stage someday,’ and now I’m the artist that’s opening the stage that has Marina on it. I want to be her, I need to meet her!” I wonder if he’d like to follow Miley and play the Movistar in the future. “That would be crazy, but I would love it. Who knows? I want to be as big as possible, that’s what I always say.”
He comes across as enthusiastic and confident, never arrogant. He explains a little about how it was different when he was younger. “I was so shy, I didn’t like who I was. It took hard work to feel this confidence and think ‘OK, this is what I want to do’. He says he’s a different person on stage: “Pavlo with the ‘V’, he’s so different from me, Juan Pablo. One is so shy, the other one wants to be the centre of attention.”
He divides the two sides of his personality clearly, as he still thinks of himself as that shy kid. “It was a long time to get to this point, putting on makeup and feeling comfortable on stage. But I’m so happy with it. I like small groups of people, but Pavlo, the performer, he wants to be seen, he wants to be heard. He likes to be in the spotlight.” As well he should be, as one of the most flamboyant artists of the weekend.
You can find Pavlo at 2:45pm on Saturday, opening the Adidas stage.
For the first time in two years, one of the world’s biggest parties returns to the streets of Colombia. Barranquilla Carnival is back with a vengeance after the pandemic.
Colourful dresses and a lot of dancing, Barranquilla’s carnival never disappoints. Photo: Emily Hart
The Mayor hands over the keys to the city to the Carnival King and Queen: a new and strange order is declared in Barranquilla. Dancers and bands swirl through the streets under the pounding sun as though gravity itself is suspended. Everything is stripped of seriousness, and clothed brightly in smiles and celebration.
But the festival, which takes place this year from March 26 to 29, is not just about parades and costumes – it’s music, freedom, and a profound expression of cultural diversity.
The Carnival King and Queen will reign over the city for the whole weekend – keys in hand. A third character has been resurrected too: The mythical partier ‘Joselito de Carnaval.’ He represents the spirit of carnival, never without a drink in his hand, dancing until he drops: literally. Every year the Carnival ends with his funeral, and he is carted about the city in wheelbarrows and makeshift coffins, still clutching his beer.
Joselito in his wheelbarrow. Photo: Emily Hart
“Carnival is in the DNA of every Barranquillero. From very young – in the stomachs of our mothers – we listen to the music and are immersed in our culture. It’s huge and profound. We carry it inside of us,” says Emir Lara, Director of Communications at the Cultural Center of the Caribbean.
The venue? Everywhere. Barranquilla is filled with movement. It’s Colombia’s fourth-largest city and a place that is quickly becoming nearly as synonymous with carnival as Rio. Whether you’re at a stadium concert, watching folk poetry and theatre, or dancing to a sound system stuffed into the open trunk of someone’s car, warm can of aguila in hand, you’re at Barranquilla’s Carnival.
“Quien lo vive es quien lo goza” (“Whoever lives it, enjoys it,”), grins teenager Jesu, fixing his flowered hat, brandishing his cardboard machete and running back to the parade with his group of friends. It’s the motto of Barranquilla Carnival, ringing out from billboards and throughout the city’s streets.
It’s true. It’s hard to imagine the absorbing totality of the event until you’re in the middle of it. The whole city is alight with sound and movement. Streets are filled with bunting, barbecue smoke, masks, costumes, party foam, and an endless pounding mix of rhythms. You’re never out of range of the music. You’ll start to wonder if your own pulse has taken on a cumbia, bullerengue, porro, or mapalé beat.
Barranquilla Carnival means peace
The first big parade of carnival weekend is the “Battle of Flowers.” It celebrates the end of Colombia’s Thousand Day War in 1902, when flowers replaced bullets – a new symbolism of peace.
“Throughout our history of conflict, we have craved peace,” Lara says. “Carnival has always been a counterweight against war and a show of resilience. Carnival is synonymous with peace.”
That exorcism of tensions and violence remains a key aspect of carnival today. Colombia retains fragile stability through a groundbreaking peace agreement signed with the FARC in 2016, which marked the end of nearly 50 years of violence.
Although the agreement – along with nine other agreements in place with other paramilitaries, guerrilla groups and urban militias – has been perpetually threatened by conservative opposition – and reticent implementation – under the current government, many at carnival feel the country needs to celebrate peace whenever possible.
A snapshot of Colombia’s diversity
The carnival tradition was originally brought to Colombia from Europe by Spanish colonisers. But it quickly took on traditions, events and imagery from the indigenous and Afro-Colombian populations.
“Cumbia, for example, is a mixture of African and indigenous and Spanish influence – it’s a way of expressing ourselves – it’s a combination of our three ethnicities,” explains Roberto Amargo.
Amargo has been playing the tambor drum at carnival for 25 years. For him, the music and dance – with unique rhythms and folk instruments seen only here – reflect both the individual nature and the combined character of the area’s cultural inheritance.
Carnival preserves and teaches history, and fosters pride in cultures that have long been marginalised. Afro-Colombian communities and indigenous groups were oppressed not just by colonial rule and its participation in the slave trade, but in the 20th century too. They were disproportionately affected by Colombia’s long and bloody civil war. Even now, these communities suffer ongoing rural violence, displacement, and state neglect.
“It’s not just dancing, it’s a way of knowing and understanding history,” says Lara. “Carnival is a window of historic memory.”
Laughter is at the heart
A fierce pride permeates the city – it isn’t limited to those involved in parades and bands. Taxi driver Juan Jose works all four days of carnival and wears a different costume each day as he ferries people around the city. This year, he is a farmer, a pilot, a bull – and a monkey.
“I just want people to laugh and have a good time when they see me,” he says, peering out from under the rim of his sombrero vueltiao – his taxi is even in costume with a stuffed marimonda figure gripping onto the roof.
The marimonda perfectly embodies carnival – from past tensions to present laughter. Mokaná indigenous warriors wore these masks to raid the Spanish colonisers’ camps. An elephantine face with exaggerated eyes and ears to demonstrate vigilance, and a huge nose; a phallic symbol of virility. The Spanish would, it is said, retreat in panic.
The Marimonda is one of the most popular images at carnival Barranquilla. Photo: Emily Hart
The marimonda is now the most ubiquitous image of carnival – dancing in the parade, in the stands, on t-shirts, hats, and even cars like Juan Jose’s. “It’s also very characteristic of the culture in this area to use humour to explore and resolve tensions,” Emir explains.
Laughter pulses at the heart of carnival. In keeping with its mediaeval European roots, it’s a time when authority can be challenged by open ridicule. There’s an escape from the restrictions of class, ethnicity and gender. Masked, costumed and lost in a dancing crowd, you can be more of yourself, less of yourself or someone else entirely.
“Barranquilleros love disguises. Whatever the news is in the country, we always turn it into laughter and happiness,” says Hilda Romero Agamez. Agamez has been making marimonda masks for more than twenty years. She was taught the craft by her mother and now teaches her own daughter.
Among the blinding swirl of sequins, animal heads, feathers and fire-breathers walk traditional costumes. Many of these are centuries old, and a number of them represent, remember and parody Barranquilla’s many communities. These include the Spanish colonists, indigenous groups and Afro-descendent communities.
There are newer additions to the parade, and nobody is safe from mockery: Donald Trump, Fidel Castro and the Pope himself wander the streets. The figure of death stalks the parade too, sporting Ray-Bans to shield his eyes from the sun’s blaze.
A victim of its own popularity?
For Barranquilla, carnival is a huge economic engine. Two million visited Barranquilla Carnival in 2020, but the celebration risks becoming a victim of its own success. The carnival’s popularity threatens its traditional street party atmosphere – many roads, parties and viewing points are now closed off and ticketed.
“Carnival is becoming a more controlled space. The people themselves now can’t attend,” says Monica Gontovnik, a Barranquillera and academic of carnival tradition. “It’s a huge contradiction. It has become a tourist party.”
The event is increasingly in the hands of local government, sponsors, and big business. Carnival is traditionally a raucous expression of the city’s people, chaotic but authentic, with potential for social and political dissent and nonconformism. But many say it has more and more become an “authorised chaos” – too geared towards political control, sponsors and branding, and big money. This sense of control can only be worsening under pandemic management, though clearly necessary.
The traditional music and dance are also under threat, as a drive for profit plays to an increasingly globalised audience. Folk music is increasingly marginalised through events which struggle to get funding. “Carnival is a cultural space with the potential to resist capitalism, but it’s too much viewed as a way to make money, and not enough as a cultural vehicle,” says Amargo.
A funeral and a prayer to Shakira
But finally, after a long hiatus, the sound of tambor drums fills the air and chuzos – meat and onion kebabs – cover grills, and costumed Barranquilleros dance in the streets. Though it is undoubtedly becoming more of an official event, some modern elements – like the recent addition of a Gay Guacherna Parade – are welcomed by many.
The parade of widows mourning Joselito. Photo: Emily Hart
Too soon, Tuesday arrives. The last event of carnival is a funeral parade – Joselito de Carnaval has died, as he does every year on this Tuesday, four days after his symbolic resurrection. The streets are full of black-clad “widows”, many visibly pregnant, just as many visibly bearded, and wailing in mourning.
Some mourners loudly blame Colombian President Iván Duque while others pray to Shakira (Barranquilla’s most famous resident) for Joselito’s soul.
A widow in a glamorous lace dress, paired with a red lip and a full goatee, clutches a pillow-shaped pregnancy-belly and wanders the crowd. She occasionally wails at an unsuspecting audience member: “Señor, es SUYO” – “Sir, it’s YOURS.”
Barranquilleros and tourists watch Joselito disappear into the distance, and an unfamiliar calm settles on the city. The old order is restored. But Joselito won’t stay dead for long, and a new King and Queen will rise before the year is up.
Emily Hart is an independent journalist based in Colombia – she runs a weekly news digest: Colombia’s top news stories – curated, digested, and delivered straight to your phone every Monday as a 5-minute audio and text – sign up here for $5 per month!
After a run of seven World Cup qualifiers in a row without scoring a goal, Colombia’s chances to qualify for the World Cup in Qatar are hanging by a thread. Can Colombia stay in the battle for Qatar?
William Tesillo, Rafael Santos Borré and Luis Suárez are preparing for Colombia vs Bolivia, Thursday March 24 at 6:30pm in Barranquilla. Photo: FCF Colombia
After the defeat against Peru in January, Colombia’s outlook on qualifying for their third World Cup in a row is not good. Manager Reinaldo Rueda had a decent start to his return to the national team, but with four points from the last seven qualifiers, they find themselves in a place where they depend on results from the other contenders. Los Cafeteros need Uruguay and/or Peru to drop points in both their games, Chile to not beat Brazil and most importantly, the match against Bolivia is a must-win, and they need to be flawless against Venezuela too.
Who will have to do it for Colombia vs Bolivia and Venezuela?
The squad is commanded by Luis Díaz. El guajiro earned a transfer to Liverpool in January and has settled in without any problems at one of the strong candidates for the Champions League. They are without Yerry Mina and Radamel Falcao, who both have to miss this game due to injury, but Carlos Cuesta, who left a great impression in the Colombia matches last October, is back from injury and will surely feature as centre back. Familiar faces like James Rodríguez, Juan Guillermo Cuadrado and David Ospina are all expected to start as well.
At first sight, Colombia’s schedule for this international break seems doable. Bolivia have collected 15 points so far, but only two of them came outside 3600 metres La Paz, so in hot and humid Barranquilla little is expected from them. Venezuela are bottom of the group with ten points, but Colombia have a bit of rivalry with the neighbours and barely ever have an easy game against arguably the worst team in the South American qualification tournament. On top of that, Venezuela signed a familiar face as their new manager with José Nestor Pékerman.
For six years Pékerman was in charge of Colombia and they were the best days in recent history. Pékerman lead them to two World Cups, but the people in charge of the federation were never really happy with the way he managed things and didn’t want to extend his contract. The Argentinian manager and the federation didn’t end on good terms, so the Argentinian manager will get his chance for revenge here.
But before that becomes an issue, Colombia first need to get the full three points against Bolivia and hope Chile don’t beat Brazil to remain in contention for the World Cup.
Colombia vs Bolivia, Thursday, March 24, 6:30pm in Barranquilla.
Before jetting off to play at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, Jonny Pierce from Brooklyn’s iconic band The Drums spoke to us from NYC.
Jonny Pierce is a fan of Colombia, with The Drums he’ll perform at Festival Estéreo Picnic on Friday. Photo: Luckeee Ngin
“I’ve been all over Colombia,” says Jonny Pierce from The Drums, even before I can get the tape recording rolling. He catches himself soon after, clarifying that he means playing gigs in the big cities, but it’s clear he has affection for the country. He’s coming back this month to play at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022.
Jonny is looking forward to his trip, “We’ve always had such a lovely time,” he explains. “The fans that show up to our concerts just carry an enthusiasm and a passion for what we do that I feel is unique to the Colombian audience. It’s not what we encounter everywhere we go so it feels like a big warm hug every time we play a show there, it’s just so lovely.”
Of course, Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 fans will be dying to know which side of the cordillera he prefers and he gives a shout out to paisalandia first, “I love to see how different cities do their thing,” he says. “I have to say, the probably the most lovely memory I have is riding down the mountain after landing in Medellín. The view looking down into the valley is just so stunning.” It’ll please the likes of Margarita Viva Siempre.
He also waxes lyrical about la nevera, and says he prefers the capital. “I’m looking forward to being in Bogotá, I’m a real city boy. I think I have more of a personal connection with Bogotá, I’ve made friends there and had a chance to hang out with fans more. I’m drawn to Bogotá, the beauty and the serenity up in the mountains.” We heard similar from Los Niños Telepáticos, so he’s in good company as a nature lover.
Covid has been rough for the band, and Jonny tells me about having to cancel gigs as he worried about the ethics of playing in the pandemic. There were some upsides though: “At the start of the pandemic I just left New York City and went upstate. I have this tiny little one-bed cabin there and I spent a year there alone. I really learnt about myself. I took some psilocybin and, without exaggerating, had a real spiritual rebirth.”
“Playing shows now feels kind of exotic,” he says. “Because up until very recently, every show I’d played felt a bit chaotic to me. If I’m being honest, I’d be eager for the show to be over. I was panicked and feeling insecure, stressed out. I was either too much or not enough. I’m really present now, playing with a lot of intention and it’s a whole new experience.”
At Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, The Drums will play 2011’s Portamento in its entirety to celebrate its (slightly Covid-altered) tenth anniversary. Jonny is happy about that “It’s nice to be bringing Portamento back on the road, it’s like a redo. Going back out, playing the same album, being present and God forbid, maybe enjoying it a bit. It’s awe-inspiring for me.”
That’s different to the early days of the band, when things were much more intense. “When I look back at playing Portamento as it had just come out, it was a chaotic time for me. From the outside it seemed like a dream come true, and of course on some level it was, but it compounded my confusion and my search for a place in the world.” Luckily, Jonny’s in a better place now, and looks set for a huge performance on Friday alongside locals like Piel Camaleón at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. Catch The Drums at 5.45pm on Friday.
For the latest of our features on Colombian bands at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, we have Piel Camaleón, a bright and breezy indie jangle-pop outfit.
Piel Camaleón will make their debut at Festival Estéreo Picnic this year. Photo: Piel Camaleón.
Piel Camaleón are getting ready for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 and after one late-night practice session we had the chance to talk. They’ve just released new single mestizo and hope to debut it live at the festival. It’s exactly the type of song that Estéreo Picnic will always swipe right on – slow rhythm, a marvellously full sound and heartfelt lyrics underpinned by breathy backing vocals. Jacob Moreno, bassist, says, “It’s a bit more rock, more guitar, more bass and drums.” His brother Daniel Moreno, the singer and lead guitarist follows up by saying, “It has this raw sound we like to make.”
“We’re thinking about playing it,” says backing singer Lucía Angée, “but our set is pretty long already, so we’ll see, I dunno. We’re lucky, we’re on the main stage and the time they gave us, an hour, that’s pretty big for us.” It’s an enthrallingly chaotic interview as the entire band chip in at points. Drummer Alejandro jumps in here to say, “It’s a pretty big responsibility, yeah.”
Friday is their debut show at the festival, alongside the likes of the Niños Telepáticos, and everyone’s excited, says Lucía. “A little thing I’ve noticed we’re doing, 15 minutes ago we were rehearsing the intro song and we started screaming, all of us, we felt we were on stage and it was pretty exciting.” Daniel agrees, “Since 2014 we’ve always been to the festival and thought someday we will be on that stage, and today’s the day, it’s so cool.”
They’d been booked to play in 2020, originally, so it’s been a long wait for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. Alejandro says “that was a surprise for us. We got told a week or two weeks before, that was really exciting but then Covid hit.” Daniel reflects today that it wasn’t so bad. “Now it’s better,” he says. “Because we only had two singles from our album PONG and now we’ve had more time to release the album and get more people as fans. Now it’s a great time to play.” Alejandro concurs, “There’s more hype, now it’s better.”
Piel Camaleón know how to switch things around
Piel Camaleón means chameleon skin, and that’s a perfect name for a band that switch styles and sounds with ease. They’re folk-pop one minute, classic indie jangle-pop the next and always whimsically deft. Daniel describes it as dance music. “The people that go to our music like to scream and dance,” he says. “It’s a pop party, if you want to enjoy Piel Camaleón live you have to know the songs.”
Lucía takes over to say, “If you know the songs or not, the vibe is something you hear in the air and you will start singing and dancing.” The whole band joins in to agree and nod. “The fans we have, the energy is so contagious that you’ll dance too, it’s a beautiful thing to have everyone dancing and singing together,” says Alejandro. I tell him he hasn’t seen dour old English hacks like me at a festival like Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 and everyone laughs before Daniel says, “I’m sure you’ll dance a lot.” We’ll see.
More laughter too, when I ask why the chorus of Medusa is quite so sweary (watch the video for words we can’t print in a family website). “Alejandro recorded the vocals, why doesn’t he explain it,” says Jacobo, passing the buck over. Alejandro defends himself, “I just said what I was told to say. Daniel, he just shuffled some lyrics in English together to make a phrase that means nothing at all.” Daniel grins and says, “Random words that sound cool.”
They’ll be there to watch too, as Daniel says, “We’ve been there many years as spectators, we’ve so many good bands and we love it.” I ask who they’re most looking forward to on Friday and there’s some collective murmuring before Jacob says Foo Fighters and Lucía quickly adds, “The Libertines too.” Everyone agrees that they’re looking forward to all three days of Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. “We’re really big fans of the festival,” says Lucía, “Whether we’re playing or not we always come to all three days, so it’s cool to be a part of it this year.”
You’ll find Piel Camaleón at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 at 4:45 on the Main Stage, and they know you’ll dance, scream and sing along. The show is recommended by Babelgam, with good reason. Alejandro promises “It’ll look beautiful. We’ve already kind of seen it in rehearsals and it’s fantastic. Even we’re surprised by how amazing it is.” Daniel is more modest, saying, “We have a big team working on it, we have cinematography, styling, choreography. It’s a show you can enjoy wherever you see it.” Lucía adds that there’ll be some surprises. “Our intro song is new, and it’s really beautiful, we all feel really connected to it. It’s pretty chill, so it’s a great start for a show that’s going to be crazy.” You heard the lady – don’t miss out!
Water water, absolutely nowhere and definitely not a drop to drink. Oliver Pritchard tries to get to the bottom of the great Chapinero drought.
Acueducto send water trucks through the streets to provide people with water. Photo: Oli Pritchard
The last time I had water running through the pipes in my apartment, it was Wednesday morning. Over 120 hours later, it’s Monday and there’s still no real sign of a return to normal service. The company running the capital’s water and sanitation services, EAAB (Empresa de Acueducto y Alcantrillo de Bogotá), have failed badly.
On Wednesday, March 16, it seems, there was an unforeseen problem with a major pipe at calle 39 and carrera Séptima. That affected the water service for an area stretching from 39 itself right up to 60, between Séptima and Carrera 13. EAAB announced on Saturday that the immediate problem had been solved, but that there were problems with reconnecting the affected area.
I think I speak for many of my vecinos when I say that we’re not unsympathetic to the problems that EAAB has in reconnection. Unforeseen things do happen, and we understand that they’re not always easy to fix. But we’d like more practical solutions. What we got was a carrotanque of water that passed by without warning on Saturday afternoon. The lack of warning meant many people couldn’t take advantage. And half an hour later, that truck was gone again.
Many Colombians don’t have access to water
The lack of water in Chapinero for almost a week is a drop in the ocean when you think about other parts of the country, and indeed the city. We’re privileged enough to kick up a fuss, but would we get even worse treatment if we were living in a less affluent neighbourhood? There are certainly zones of the periphery of Bogotá that have trouble with reliable access to water. During the pandemic this became evident as handwashing suddenly became of paramount importance.
This in turn pales in comparison to areas like the Alta Guajira or even the departmental capital of Casanare, Yopal, which still has no proper water system. Santa Marta has seen protests and marches against the lack of decent water supply recently. Another departmental capital, Leticia in Amazonas, is issuing alerts. Poor infrastructure means a shocking number of people in Colombia still don’t have safe, clean, accessible and affordable drinking water and sanitation – which is a human right.
Hundreds of municipios around the country do not have access to drinkable water. The number of people without access to any clean water is estimated at 1.4 million by WaterAid, and the Colombian state reckoned 5 million people didn’t have regular access to drinking water last year. In Chocó, only 40% of people have access to drinkable water.
These numbers are frightening, as water is the most basic of human necessities. It’s the responsibility of the Colombian state to provide the basics for its citizens, but in so many places they are simply abandoned.
Mismanagement and poor communication
Back to Chapinero. Why couldn’t EAAB at least use Twitter to keep people informed? Put out a schedule and allow us all to know when we might be able to collect some fresh water. Ideally, they could print flyers and send people door-to-door. Or at least give some idea of how long this might last or when a solution might come. Instead, it’s been a PR disaster.
Everyone affected has stories of EAAB representatives hanging up the phone or ignoring complaints. Twitter posts receive a simple “DM us” message which is inevitably ignored. EAAB are aware that they can get away with this, even in the middle of the capital. This is the service many Colombians receive from their state institutions, often underfunded and rotten through with corruption.
In the end, it’s we the people who bear the costs of this, from the irritation of having to ask friends to borrow their facilities to the real costs of having to buy water. A 24 hour water cut isn’t the end of the world, as you can use litres of water to supply animals, to drink, to brush teeth and the like. Showering, flushing toilets, washloads of clothes – these things require much larger quantities of water, and are basic parts of regular life that can’t be put off for too long. This week’s stoppage is a reminder that this is daily life for many in Colombia.
In theory, the Colombian government is working to ensure everybody has drinkable water by 2030. But after years of poor investment levels in infrastructure, will we see more of these cases going forward? Colombia says it is working on improving water access throughout the country, but is EAAB’s behaviour this week indicative of systemic issues? In the UK, for example, check valves would be able to supply water by rerouting through other lines. Why didn’t EAAB take steps before the problems arise? When will impoverished and underprivileged zones get the same treatment? And finally, will we ever see accountability from public institutions?
Next up in our series on Colombian bands at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, we’re chewing the fat with Babelgam, electro-clash punks with a pop edge.
Juan is ready for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. Photo: Bradley Cashman
I sit in a café in the capital’s posh 93 with my photographer, struggling with the QR menú and waiting for Juan Tuaty, lead singer of Babelgam. It’s not the sort of place I expected to meet him, and when he arrives he stands out – dressed all in black against the bright yet bland colours of this Scandi-chic café. He greets us warmly, but still seems as out of context as you’d expect a young punk from Suba to be.
He instantly name checks the likes of Turnstile, which is no surprise for a hardcore kid. “I really want to see their show, it’s one of the ones I most want to see in the festival,” he says, before switching musical styles completely, adding, “Caribou, too, is a project that has influenced me a lot.” This seems in keeping with a band that in just four years has covered a wide range of genres. I’ve been mildly fascinated by the lyrical content of Babelgam for a while, since the song Hikikomori came to my attention a few years ago.
Babelgam’s doom-pop genre
Musically, Babelgam are sort of dark electro-clash for the main part, but with some punkier undertones on earlier recordings like the aforementioned Hikikomori. “They call us doom-pop, or dolor cachaco as well,” says Juan, “but doom-pop is the word I prefer, it’s a genre of pop that soaks up a lot of things, a palette of many influences. Hikikomori is a different song, a very punky burst of energy.”
Z-11 is the song he picks out as a favourite. “It covers everything we’ve done and explored, and Klan-destino as well. We’re consumers and producers of music as well, it’s like an art project. We’re influenced by many things: the different members of the band have their own styles, but also film, graphic designers, fashion trends influence the band. And obviously we live in a chaotic city like Bogotá, which is our muse.”
Babelgam and Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022
The show they have planned for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 sounds special. Projections and a light show are more than you might expect for the 4th stage, but that’s what’s coming. Juan is happy with their time, “This edition, Sunday is the best day for me,” he says. “We’re sharing a lineup with Doja Cat, with King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Turnstile. It’s a show a little more expensive than others we’ve done, but we’re ready for bigger stages.”
The conversation jumps, predictably, to the Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 itself. Juan’s been a few times as a spectator. “This is my first time as an artist, I’ve always been on the spectator’s side. They’ve always had bands that I’ve loved from the internet, and always bands on the lineup that have been surprises too. I’ve discovered so many bands I love through the festival. This year will have so much energy, a new generation after two years away.”
Juan explains that their music is a sancocho of many things
Briela Ojeda and Los Niños Telepáticos are on his must-see list of local bands, alongside Piel Camaleón who he says have “a perfect live show,” Ela Minus and Diamante Eléctrico. Having been booked to play in 2020, this has been a long wait for the band. “We were excited to be called when we had only launched an EP, a very rocky, guitar-based sound. Then we went much more electro, and they’ve called us again. Now we’re a much more complete band than we were after the first EP.”
As for their performance at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, Juan excitedly promises, “You’ll see a miscellanea, a sancocho, a market, a mix of sounds, of images. You’ll encounter a real visual and sonic experience.” Make sure you catch Babelgam on the Páramo Presenta stage at 4:45pm on Sunday.
Colombian festivals don’t come any bigger than Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. We’ve pulled together everything you need to know about the music as well as the practicalities.
Previous editions of Festival Estéreo Picnic (like this one in 2018) have seen large crowds, will the first post-Covid one be even better? Photo: Oli Pritchard
After a three year delay, festivals are back, baby! It’s been a while, but we’re ready to go to Colombia’s best lineup of bands at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 on March 25, 26 and 27. It’ll be spectacular on stage, but we’ve also got a guide for what you need to know offstage as well. With less than ten days to go, tickets are still available, going all the way from half a grand to nearly two million pesos depending on combos and days. Make sure you don’t miss out with our guide to the action.
On Friday you’ll know all about the Libertines and the Foo Fighters, but there’s perhaps the biggest name in Rolo Rock, Diamante Eléctrico. There’s also Los Niños Telepáticos and Piel Camaleon for Bogotá beats. Pastuso powerhouse Briela Ojeda and La Pacifican Power bring the regions of Colombia to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 – perfect for late afternoon sunshine! Nile Rodgers offers something a bit different, while the likes of The Drums, Phoebe Bridger and IDLES keep the indie guitar flame burning. A barnstorming first day.
Saturday is a day of contrasts and possible surprises. Sandwiched on the Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 headliner list between the Foos and the Strokes is…J Balvin, reggaeton megastar. It’s a departure, that’s for sure. The rest of the day is eclectic, from techno to vallenato. Balvin’s former schoolmate Crudo Means Raw will be dropping urban hip–hop beats. Los Gaiteros de San Jacinto and Binomio de Oro de America will be bringing costeño cool to the fields of Cundinamarca.
Sunday returns to the indie driven theme at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 with The Strokes playing once more. Just before dark o’clock, Margarita Siempre Viva will take to the stage, and nearly every band we’ve interviewed is looking forward to King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. Also on the bill, Doja Cat, LP and Turnstile are joining The Strokes for Stateside representation, El Mató a un Policía Motorizado join from Argentina and Babelgam are local lads.
FEP 2022 aims for formidable shows like this one from Gorillaz in 2018.
If it’s your first time at the festival, make sure you’re ready for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022. Practicalities are a big part of the picnic. Transport is the big one. The festival is located in Briceño golf camp, a little outside Bogotá, which means it’s a pain to get in and out of. Luckily, the organisers have laid on both buses and vans as well as a car service. The buses leave every 20mins from three locations – Los Andes University, Carulla carpark at Alhambra and Maloka. COP$25,000 there, 35,000 back, with discounts for bulk purchase. Vans will pick you up from a place of your choice and drop you off at two chosen places, but will cost around COP$500,000 split between 10-18 people. If you get stuck, you can ask for a driver service to get home. It’s 140k, but could get you out of a big hole in an emergency.
Enjoying Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022 also means thinking about the notoriously treacherous Bogotá weather – they don’t call it la nevera without good reason! It might be great weather as you leave the city, but it will get dark and therefore cold and possibly rainy. A raincoat is best, if not, get one of those big ponchos before you leave Bogotá.
When onsite at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, you’ll hopefully find decent enough beer at the BBC trucks, and food is generally OK. There will be festival pricing, so budget for that. The mask laws aren’t fully clear so far – best to have one in your pocket ready to put on when needed. It’s worth downloading a digital vaccine cert too, because you’ll need a jab to enter. Even foreign ones are usually OK. If you haven’t been vaccinated, you still have time. Finally, although we don’t recommend drug use, if you have some you can use Échale Cabeza tents to check the contents of what you’re taking before you accidentally put rat poison up your nose.
After the legislative elections in Colombia on Sunday, the Senate is very divided.
Petro, Fico and Fajardo seem to be the main candidates to win the elections in Colombia this year.
Colombians took to the polls this weekend for the first of several elections this year. Almost 12 million people voted on Sunday in legislative elections in Colombia to decide who will sit in the house and senate. Three coalition groups also selected their presidential candidates.
It’s worth noting that this was not the first round of the presidential elections in Colombia — that will happen later this year. However, Sunday’s vote was when several coalition groups chose who would represent them in the presidential race. Here are the candidates who came out on top:
They will join the existing list of presidential candidates such as Íngrid Betancourt, who are either independents or representatives of individual parties. The deadline to ratify presidential candidates is March 18, so there will be a number of discussions in the following days to finalise who will actually stand. Some candidates may pull out and give their support to another contender so as not to split the vote. For example, the Centro Democrático candidate Óscar Iván Zuluaga has already pulled out to support Gutiérrez.
The legislative elections in Colombia often get overlooked in the presidential drama, but they are crucial in terms of how the country is run. It’s no good winning the presidential race if your party doesn’t have enough seats in Congress to get anything done. The vote is also an important indicator of political sentiment. The biggest indicator from yesterday is that sentiment is divided.
Results of the legislative elections
President Duque’s Centro Democrático lost ground, reflecting a general frustration with the status quo. Indeed, the coalition that’s currently in power won 10 fewer seats in the Senate compared to the 2018 elections in Colombia.
The two groups who won the most seats are the Pacto Histórico – made up of around 20 left-wing parties – and the conservative party, Partido Conservador. Analysts are already talking about the challenges of making decisions in what will be a very polarised Congress.
This is the new shape of the Senate:
Pacto Histórico – 16
Partido Conservador – 16
Partido Liberal – 15
Alianza Verde / Centro Esperanza – 14
Centro Democrático – 14
Cambio Radical – 11
Partido de la U – 10
Mira / Colombia Justa Libres – 4
MAIS* – 1
AICO* – 1
Comunes** – 5
Presidential runner-up*** – 1
* voted for by indigenous communities
** not voted for nationally
*** to be decided in the presidential election
To some extent, the degree to which the Senate will be divided depends on who takes the presidency – the position of the winner could cause the Liberals and the U to stay neutral or join government/opposition. The new Senate will certainly be a lot more left-leaning than the current assembly, though.
The creation of the Pacto Historico has meant that the left wing of Colombian politics has a lot more representation, and this has come primarily at the expense of the Centro Democrático and Cambio Radical, although the traditional parties of Liberals and Conservadores have gained ground too.
What this means for the presidential campaign
Various names have been bandied about as potential presidential candidates over the past few months, but this is the point where things get serious. In the coming days, we’ll find out who is actually standing in these elections in Colombia and campaigning will ramp up significantly.
Gustavo Petro dominated the results. The former guerilla and ex-mayor of Bogotá who was defeated by Duque in the 2018 elections in Colombia took double the votes of the other two winners. However, don’t assume those 4.4 million votes for Petro mean he’ll have an easy ride to the Casa de Nariño – he’ll need more than double that number to actually win, and this really is only the initial stage.
Interestingly, even the Pacto Histórico’s second place candidate, human rights campaigner and activist Francia Márquez gained more votes than Fajardo, the Centro Esperanza’s winner. The somewhat lacklustre performance of the centre suggests Fajardo will have to work hard to reach the second round of the presidency. The Centro Esperanza was only able to take around 20% of Sunday’s votes and is struggling to make headway against the more extreme messaging from both the left and the right.
Here’s how the votes break down for the first and second place in each coalition.
In the second of our features on bands at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, we talked to bassist from Margarita Siempre Viva, Daniel Velásquez.
Margarita Siempre Viva, Monday at Festival Estéreo Picnic. Photo: Margarita Siempre Viva
Margarita Siempre Viva, playing at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, are an odd band. They sound uncannily like The Smiths, yet hail from Medellín, as far removed in tone from Manchester as Morrissey is from Toto La Momposina. How did a band best known for melancholy reflection come out of a city best known for reggaeton? Pop Los Días Apacibles in your earphones and tell me where you’d think this band comes from.
Bogotá or Medellín? Medellín or Bogotá? It’s the eternal discussion in Colombia, even as the Costeños, Caleños et al shrug their shoulders. Different things fit better in either city – Medellín has the gyms, Bogotá the theatres, Medellín produces renowned reggaetoneros, Bogotá rockeros. Curious then, that a band like Margarita Siempre Viva should come from the western cordillera rather than the East.
Bassist Daniel Velásquez doesn’t deny it. Indeed, he says many people assume they’re a Bogotá band, “That’s a thing. That’s something people always tell us, and we are like ‘no, we’re from Medellín, it’s a different scene.’ It’s a much smaller [indie] scene, but it exists. Here in Medellín there is also a scene of bands that are really good friends.”
The Bogotá band scene is tightly knit, everyone seems to know one another and even from across the valley, Margarita Viva Siempre have made friends. “From the beginning of the band, we had made connections with the Telepáticos, with los Fumadores, with Babelgam and it’s for that reason that people think we’re from Bogotá,” says Daniel.
In the city of eternal spring, it’s hard to imagine dark, melancholy music, although Daniel points out, “It’s grey, rainy and cold today, although I imagine Bogotá must be colder.” For sure, in the cold austerity of Lentas Nubes de Fuego, the opening notes evoke drizzle and work towards driving rain, which we may well have in Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022.
Weather is one thing, but the band also addresses life issues that affect Colombians all over the country. Daniel sees coldness in the heat of Medellín. “The people are really warm, but the classic question they always ask is ‘hey man, where are you from,’ meaning what neighbourhood, what gang. That is really heavy and that’s something we try to translate in the music”
That’s one reason the group has a following in Medellín. But the market for this cold, chilly music is much bigger in la nevera. “In Bogotá it’s a crazy thing. The first show we played in Bogotá was sold out. That was us leaving our city for the first time, it was mind-blowing. I have a very good memory of Bogotá.”
Daniel’s also aware that his Medellín is likely different from the city that many foreigners see. “Medellín for foreign people, it’s a happy place, you can party all the time. But for those of us who live here, we know all the situations, all the faces of the city. For us, it’s kind of a sad place. The government is always fucking us, you know?”
Talking music with Margarita Siempre Viva
I tell him that Margarita really remind me of The Smiths. Listen to the fragile beauty of Fractal, for example, and you can instantly picture gladioli-era Mozza whirling about. Daniel’s open about it, “You know, I think the bass in The Smiths is really underrated. Krist Novoselic as well, absolutely. Those basslines in Nirvana are incredible. Love it!”
Daniel’s a real musician, a producer as well as an artist, so he has a lot of love outside genre lines as well. He namechecks bands like Joy Division and The Smiths but also classic rock like Pink Floyd and Black Sabbath, and a yet more surprising name. “I’m really eclectic in my tastes, I think you have to learn from other types of music, it’s a very enriching experience to listen to everything. A lot of people are throwing hate at J.Balvin, but he performs well in the shows I’ve seen on Youtube, he kills it.”
Saturday is the key day for different sounds at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, and he’s certainly not going to miss out. “We’re going for the three days, and I’m looking forward to watching some friends and some new bands. For example, I’m really looking forward to King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. And Binomio del Oro – I love vallenato! Los Gaiteros too, I’ve never seen them perform live and I think they’re great musicians.”
Of course, as an honorary Bogotano band, they’ve been to Festival Estéreo Picnic before. “We also played in 2019, and I really enjoyed Interpol, Arctics, man that show was amazing. The visuals, the performance, everything. I take those performances as influences for my own shows, as an example for what I’m going to do.”
With that as a benchmark, watch out for big things on Sunday at 5.45 pm on the Banco de Bogotá stage. If you can’t make it to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, keep an eye out for them on bills – in Bogotá or Medellín!
This weekend sees the first of what will probably be three sets of elections in Colombia this year.
Sunday March 13th will be the first of three elections in Colombia. Photo: Element5 Digital on Unsplash
You’ve probably heard a lot about the presidential elections in Colombia later this year, as we’re starting to move into full campaign mode. But the presidency is not the only important election taking place this year. Colombians will head to the polls this weekend too. This election is officially for the Senate and the House of Representatives, although there’s an unofficial consultation for the presidency as well.
The presidential elections coming up in late May (29th) and probably June (19th) hog the limelight, but elections in Colombia for the two houses of government are just as important. Surprisingly, the parties in each contest are quite different. The Congress is dominated by five or six main parties, who don’t always field strong presidential candidates.
To vote in Colombia, you need to be of sound mind, 18 or over and hold Colombian nationality. It’s worth noting that the last of those conditions doesn’t apply for local government elections in Colombia (coming next year), where residents can also vote. There are 38.5 million registered voters, although apathy means turnout is likely to be significantly lower – around 50%, possibly under. Last time around it was 47.25% for Congress.
Elections in Colombia are always held on a Sunday, and it normally sees a dry law (ley seca), meaning alcohol is banned for sale from Saturday evening to Monday morning. Every cédula holder registers their card at one of the 113,000 voting stations and then votes there on election day. However, large voting stations can also receive floating voters for those that can’t travel to their assigned station for any reason. When voting, you request various slips, depending on what you wish to vote for, and rather counter-intuitively place an X over the number of the desired candidate and/or name of the desired party.
What’s up for grabs in the elections in Colombia?
The Senate has 108 seats (curules), of which 100 are open to national popular vote. The remaining seats are reserved for Comunes (5), indigenous vote (2) and the runner up of the presidential election (1). The indigenous community’s seats are guaranteed by the Constitution, and the Comunes seats are guaranteed under the terms of the peace process until the 2026 electoral cycle finishes. Voters in elections in Colombia request either the national voting slip or the indigenous community slip, as appropriate.
The House is much larger, clocking in this year at 187 representatives. These are not centralised elections in Colombia – they are divided regionally. Like the Senate, though, there are special voting slips available for indigenous and also Afro-Colombian communities. The 187 are divided on a population basis among the regions (166), indigenous communities (1), Afro-Colombians (2), Colombians abroad (1), the special areas designated under the terms of the peace process (16) and a final one for the running mate of the runner up in the presidential race.
The number of nationally elected seats in the Senate for each party will depend on the number of votes they receive in the elections in Colombia. To gain any representation, a party requires 3% of the total votes cast – likely to be around 450,000-500,000 this year. Dwarf parties can form coalitions to gain some sort of representation between them, even if individually they fail to reach the limit for representation. After the parties with fewer than 3% have been discounted, the remaining seats will be assigned proportionately. Parties that presented named candidates for popular vote will generally assign their seats to those candidates in order of popularity. Other parties simply assign the seats as they please.
These elections in Colombia will undoubtedly have an effect on the presidential race as well, not least because there are also three coalition groups ascertaining their most popular candidate. Basically, these groups have agreed not to run against each other, and have put their pre-candidates together on a list, from which the most popular will run in May’s election.
You can find election posters on walls all over the country. Photo: Oli Pritchard
The three coalitions are the leftist Pacto Histórico, from which Petro will undoubtedly be chosen as candidate, and the two other groups Coalición Centro Esperanza and Equipo por Colombia. The Coalición is likely to be won by Sergio Fajardo, although Juan Manuel Galán and Alejandro Gaviria whereas the Equipo’s big names are Alejandro Char, Federico Gutiérrez and Enrique Peñalosa. Francia Márquez is tipped to be a distant second for the Pacto, meaning she will likely be Petro’s running mate for the elections in Colombia.
It’s time for lights up on FITB, the biggest theatre festival in Bogotá. Bradley Cashman gets the lowdown on what’s going on.
FITB hits several theatres in Bogotá. Photos: Bradley Cashman
El Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro de Bogotá (FITB) is more than one show, one company, or one venue. It is recognised as the biggest theatre festival in Bogotá and one of the largest theatre festivals on the planet. Since its inaugural version, created by callejero and theatre legend Fanny Mikey in 1988 under the slogan “An Act of Faith in Colombia,” FITB has returned to Bogotá every two years, boasting hundreds – if not thousands – of both national and international talent.
Los Niños Telepáticos are a very Bogotano band, and a perfect choice to open Festival Estéreo Picnic. We talked about contrasts in life and music, as well as the festival itself.
Los Niños Telepáticos: the Bogotá band will perform at Estéreo Picnic for the first time. Photo: Los Niños Telepaticos.
“Bogotá is a city of contrasts,” says Antonio Cortés from Los Niños Telepáticos. His band expresses that in their music, moving effortlessly through musical styles and emotional feelings in much the same way as the weather twists and changes through each Bogotano day. His bandmate Nicolás Mejía is with him for this interview, and they both take turns to jump in for different questions.
“I love the city,” says Nicolás. “Although it’s so hard and so difficult for so many people. There’s so much desperation, but also a charm to it. You have to learn to live with the chaos, if you want to live here.” He agrees about the contrasts. “The whole range of colours that Bogotá can give you, this grey, chaotic, smokey city but then 30 minutes away these beautiful mountains and water and forest.”
Antonio agrees, “Some days it’s so shiny, the sun and the mountains, it’s so beautiful. But then it’s Saturday night, everyone’s partying and there’s rain everywhere, you see dark things. I think we all have that inside of us.”
Although the third album is still in the studio, they’ve clocked up nearly a decade together. In that time they’ve moved from jazzlike experimental noodling towards psychedelic rumblings reminiscent of the Desert Sessions. Two singles have already been released: Rocal and Imágenes.
Antonio recognises the change in their music, “It’s a different mood, this album. We’ve been trying to record it since 2020. I think you can hear it in Rocal. It’s more melancholic, it has sadness in the music.” Of course, Covid had a large impact, too as he continues, “It’s a main thing for us, on this third album, it’s part of the album.”
Nicolás takes over, saying, “It was an inspiration for the lyrics, for the music as well. The context we got from the pandemic, like isolation and other related subjects. The new album has a lot of that energy.” We can see that already with the singles, he says, “In the video for Rocal, everything’s indoors, it’s black and white, just like the pandemic.”
It’s a concept album in part, and Antonio explains, “The pandemia helped in the concept. There’s a main character in the album. He’s a call centre worker and he’s like ‘shit, I want to play Rocal with my band’ He’s bored of life. The pandemia gave us the need to make music that wasn’t so happy, there’s sadness, there’s depression.” Nicolás jumps in: “Nevertheless, songs like Imagenes are brighter, more enthusiastic, more poetic. It has both sides, this dark pandemic feeling, and a more enthusiastic couple of songs about young life.
This brings us back to the idea of contrasts, because the two singles are so different. “There’s a lot of contrasts,” says Antonio, “Rocal and Imagenes show that. There’s that dark side in one and the bright side in the other. That’s the album, really. I bring a really dark song, and then Nico brings in one that’s so happy. That’s our feeling right now, not everything is all so happy, but also not always dark. A lot of contrasts and bipolarity, like Bogotá.”
Bogotá alternates between rain and sun constantly, which is reflected in their music. “We have a couple of songs that are like hymns to joy and enjoying life, like Alma Fuerte from the first album. It’s about dealing with life in a joyful way, with lots of flavour and colour,” says Nico. “La Ciencia de la Paz is about patience and being OK with returning to old places.” Then there are the darker songs, says Antonio “Rocal is one of them, then our next new song is very sad too. Girasol is very beautiful, but it’s dark, Diablo, too.”
Excitingly, Antonio says they’ll debut some of the upcoming album’s songs at Festival Estéreo Picnic. “We have three songs we have been rehearsing, that we have ready for the picnic, that’s like our joker in the pack. People want the old songs, but we have prepared new songs for them, and not just for the people, but for us as well. Nico adds, “…going to places we haven’t been before. There’s going to be a lot of new music in the show”
“That’s what we want to do,” says Antonio. “To give the people at the Picnic something new, something different. Everyone in Bogotá loves Estéreo Picnic and I think after the pandemic it’s gonna be huge. After two years of waiting, everyone’s excited.” Nicolás talks about other bands: “People have a lot of expectations, I think the line-up is very interesting. It’s for all musical tastes, from Binomio del Oro to Nile Rodgers. I think it’s going to be a huge thing, the first festival since the pandemic.”
If you’re going to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2022, catch the Niños Telepáticos at 3:15 on Friday afternoon, opening the main stage. If you’re not lucky enough to catch them there, keep an eye out for upcoming gigs.
Bogotá to go facemask-free as the return to normality continues.
Facemasks on the streets of Bogotá will no longer be necessary. Photo: Jacek Pobłocki, Unsplash
From today, March 1st, it will no longer be necessary to wear a facemask (tapaboca) in public in Bogotá. It only applies to open-air spaces and to those without symptoms who have been fully vaccinated. In reality, of course, it’s unlikely anyone will check whether those conditions are being met. According to the mayor’s office, 94.3% of adults and youths (over 12 years of age) are vaccinated. This means the capital is ready to continue easing off restrictions. Mayor Claudia López made the declaration last week, and it goes into effect from this morning.
Bogotá será la primera ciudad en eliminar la obligatoriedad del uso de tapabocas en espacios abiertos. A partir del 1 de marzo quienes estén vacunados con esquema completo y no tengan síntomas podrán estar sin tapabocas al aire libre. pic.twitter.com/lt2u7PcamT
Claudia López already facemask free here on Twitter
Covid is still circulating in the population, of course, but the combination of high vaccination take-up and the mildness of Omicron mean that there’s little risk of red alert in the hospitals. You will be expected to use tapabocas when in enclosed spaces, as before. The implementation of that has become increasingly inconsistent, as with vaccine passports.
Schools will expect to see students masked in class, but mask-free to play outside. Stadiums, concerts and festivals also will be free of the requirement for masks. López also made it clear that any place likely to see large agglomerations of people should continue to require mask use. That seems to include education establishments, public transport and churches, but not the aforementioned stadiums or concerts.
Colombia’s new mask rules
The measure will apply for all regions of the country where full vaccination levels are at 70% or higher. The country as a whole isn’t far off, at 65% or so. The list of the full 451 municipios at or above 70% are in the tweet below from Health Minister Fernando Ruiz. Note that some people will have been vaccinated in places other than their homes, which may explain why some municipalities are well over 100%. He also listed the departmental capitals that can apply the new rules: most of them, with notable exceptions in Cali, Santa Marta and Villavicencio.
Daily covid-related deaths continue to run under a hundred, with 74 on the last day of February. Only four were under 60 years of age. Vaccinations are still available, especially boosters, and you can check MiVacuna site and/or our guide to vaccination for more info. Bogotá still has an estimated 300,000 older folk yet to be vaccinated, and that seems to be for personal choice now. Vaccination has been free and easy for over a year now, meaning those still without the vaccine are likely to have their own reasons for not doing so.
Landmark decision means women in Colombia can now terminate a pregnancy up to the 24th week.
Causa Justa filed a lawsuit with the constitutional court to decriminalise abortion based on public health. Photo: Causa Justa
A recent decision from the constitutional court will decriminalise abortion in Colombia. On February 21, the court voted that women could terminate their pregnancies until the 24th week in what Human Rights Watch described as a “milestone for the reproductive rights of women.”
What just happened?
The constitutional court voted five to four to decriminalise abortion in Colombia up to the 24th week of pregnancy. It makes Colombia one of the most progressive countries in the world in terms of its abortion legislation, but a lot depends on how the court’s ruling gets implemented.
There’s been a lot of debate about the decision to draw the line at 24 weeks. Campaigners point out that the majority of abortions take place a lot earlier, but emphasise that a longer timeframe protects those who need it most. For various reasons, women who seek abortions after the first trimester are often the poorest, most vulnerable, or have been victims of rape. The first newly legal abortion took place two days after the decision.
What drove the change?
Back in September 2020, a coalition of around 100 organisations called Causa Justa filed a lawsuit with the constitutional court. The suit argued that the rules on abortion were unconstitutional.
The group, made up of various organisations, argued that abortion should be a public health issue, not a criminal one. Causa Justa points out that criminalising abortion does little to stop the practice. Instead it drives women to seek clandestine abortions, endangering their health and putting them at risk of criminal prosecution.
It showed evidence that the rules unfairly persecuted already disadvantaged women. For example, Causa Justa showed that over the past 20 years:
97% of women reported for abortion lived in rural areas.
30% of women reported for having an illegal abortion had been victims of domestic or sexual violence.
Human Rights Watch highlighted similar statistics:
34% of women investigated for having illegal abortions between 1998 and 2019 were domestic workers.
A 2013 study showed 33% of women who used clandestine abortion clinics had complications requiring medical attention. That figure went up to 55% in rural areas.
The debate around abortion in Colombia is often polarised between two extremes: Those who believe women always have the right to choose and those who believe that life begins at conception. Causa Justa reframed the debate by focusing on human rights and inequality. Rather than trying to get Congress to support new legislation, the campaigners forced change by getting the constitutional court to rule the existing situation unconstitutional. The court has now urged Congress to act on its ruling.
Was abortion in Colombia illegal before?
Previously, abortion in Colombia was only legal in certain situations, and the punishment for illegal abortions was up to four and a half years in prison. A 2006 judgment made abortion in Colombia legal in these three situations:
When the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest.
When the foetus is seriously malformed and life outside the womb would be untenable.
When continuing the pregnancy would represent a danger to mother’s physical or mental health.
The trouble is that many women, especially those in rural areas or from poor backgrounds can’t access legal abortions – even when they should be able to. There are issues of education, social stigma, and poor access to health services at play.
For example, according to figures from DANE, Colombia’s office of statistics, over 4,000 girls aged 10-14 became mothers in 2020. These girls should have qualified for legal abortions as the Colombian criminal code says pregnancies in this age range are the result of sexual violence. However, this does not apply in practice. El País says over 500 minors were prosecuted in Colombia for illegal abortions between 2005 and 2017.
The dangers of clandestine abortions
A lack of access to safe, affordable, and timely abortion care can pose risks to women’s mental and physical well-being. The World Health Organization says unsafe abortions cause about 5% – 13% of maternal deaths worldwide. Issues can include severe bleeding, infections, and blood pressure disorders. It estimates around 7 million women are hospitalised every year as a result of unsafe abortions.
Unsafe illegal abortion is not only a Colombian problem. According to the WHO, 45% of all abortions are unsafe, and 97% of these are performed in developing countries. The WHO says that a lack of safe access to abortions is a public health and human rights issue.
What next?
It’s sad to say, but Colombia’s rules can be progressive on paper, while the implementation is often patchy and much less progressive. One example is the way the existing abortion rules aren’t always applied in practice.
The constitutional court has urged Congress to formulate and implement a comprehensive public policy as soon as possible. It calls for various legislative and administrative measures. These include:
Giving pregnant women clear information about their options
Offering tools and information to prevent and plan pregnancy
Developing educational programs around sexual and reproductive rights
It will be important to watch what happens in Congress and how it now implements the constitutional court’s instructions. For sure, the recent decision is a big step forward, but education and implementation will be crucial if we’re to see real change.
How does abortion in Colombia compare with other countries?
The new ruling means Colombia is one of the most progressive countries in terms of its abortion legislation. Colombia joins Great Britain, Canada, and The Netherlands in allowing abortions up to 24 weeks. In Great Britain, all pregnancies are assumed to affect the health of the mother, giving medical grounds to justify a termination. In the U.S. abortion laws depend on the individual state.
In Spain and Argentina, abortions are permitted up to 14 weeks. Germany allows terminations during the first trimester through an exemption. However, it has not yet changed an old law that means abortion is still technically illegal. Women in Uruguay can terminate a pregnancy in the first 12 weeks.
Other Latin American countries are also in the process of debating or introducing new legislation. Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled last year that it wasn’t constitutional for individual states to criminalise abortion, while Chile took the first step toward approving a bill that would allow abortion up to 14 weeks.
Indigenous people deserve thoughtful solutions to their problems, not to be used as pieces in a political game.
The Embera in the Parque Nacional. The claim is of a united people, but there’s a fence between the camp and the rest of the city, guarded by men with machetes. Photos: Oli Pritchard
As the Colombian football team sank to defeats against Peru and Argentina this week, a game of political football has been going on between Defence Minister, Diego Molano and Mayor of Bogotá, Claudia López. Trapped in the middle of this are a thousand or so human beings. López has sought to lay responsibility for them at the door of the Defence Ministry, who in turn say it is her responsibility. After the lynching of a truck driver who fatally killed two Embera people in a collision this week, the matter has come to a head.
Embera in the Parque Nacional: The camp now claims to act as a centre for various indigenous peoples
There’s a definite need to get this camp out of the park, both for the people in the camp and for the park itself. Claudia López blames the Defence Ministry, whose chief, Diego Molano, points out that his institution has helped people to return. There’s truth to this: Some families have boarded trucks and gone back to their homelands. Others haven’t. López herself has made offers to the indigenous leaders with alternative habitation, but been rebuffed.
There’s no proper sanitation in the park, the only access to potable water are the taps in the toilet blocks next to sports facilities and tarpaulin tents provide limited protection against the elements. Toilet facilities are at best limited, so the Río Arzobispo is used as such, and trees are cut down for firewood, as there is neither electricity nor gas in the park. These conditions are horrific.
The indigenous leaders have good reason to distrust offers by Colombian state institutions. They have a very, very poor record of delivering on their promises. Once the camp is gone, the deal may well not be honoured. Then there’s the advantages of being located in the centre of Bogotá. Food, clothes and toys are donated frequently. Money can be earned by selling handicrafts and begging. And it’s a very visible reminder of their situation. That seems much less viable if the community is hidden away on the margins of the city.
With no access to gas or electricity, burning firewood is the only way to get heat
Some indigenous people have already returned home, but others remain
In the initial days the camp was open, although in recent months it has become fenced off and insular
With each passing week of inaction, the situation worsens. It’s been allowed to continue because no one wants to send in ESMAD to break up a camp of mainly children. The ICBF have made attempts to care for the children in the camp, and the alcaldia sends healthcare support regularly at least. Although these are good temporary measures, there remains a need for a definitive solution. Whether or not that will happen, is still unclear. Many temporary measures in Bogotá last for a long time, for good or for bad.
We speak to the founder of a refuge that houses some of the city’s worst treated abandoned animals.
Adopting is one of the best ways to help out the foundation. Photo: Fundación Misión Animal.
The story behind Fundación Misión Animal started when Ivonne Lula began rescuing mistreated and abused animals she encountered on the streets of Bogotá. Since then the foundation has grown in both size and vision. Currently, she has 123 animals dependent on her – including dogs, cats and other wildlife. Many are animals the district refuses to collect for financial reasons.
Her goal is not only to provide refuge for animals which would have little opportunity for a normal adoption but also to revolutionise animal welfare education in the wider community of Bogotá.
“We try to alleviate the pain and save the lives of animals who have fewer opportunities,” Ivonne explains, often lovingly referring to these animals as “her sons.” It is clear from her work Ivonne has more love in her heart to give than most. From the age of six she had been rescuing strays, slowly creating what today is Fundación Misión Animal.
But as big as Ivonne’s heart may be, her task remains enormous, with an estimated 90,000 stray dogs and cats in Bogotá at any one time. She currently works alone, and cares for animals with some of the most difficult health complications and worst cases of neglect imaginable.
Her voice falters as she tells me that many of the animals that arrive at the foundation are those with terminal illnesses or severe behavioral problems. Some with “complete loss of some organs, with complete loss of limbs – those are the ones that become part of Misión Animal,” she says. According to Ivonne, these are some of the hardest animals to find adoption for, due to the lengthy and expensive rehabilitation process they need. Human preference also plays a role; Ivonne often struggles to find adoption for big, black dogs.
Ivonne believes change needs to happen at both a human and institutional level. In her experience, there’s a lack of commitment and an unwillingness to help. Ultimately, she believes humans need to change their perception. Rather than seeing animals as a problem to solve, she wants people to recognise that humans need animals as much as they need us.
She also complains of corruption, saying it stops money from going towards animal welfare as intended. “The biggest threat is the corruption of the public organizations which manage resources for animals in Bogota,” she said. Ivonne believes these institutions are not really on the side of animal welfare, and as a result investment is often delayed and euthanasia is a favoured solution.
Colombia’s animal welfare laws
There has been progress for animal welfare laws in Colombia, such as the 2016 modification to the Animal Protection Statute. This finally recongnised animals as sentient beings and brought in tighter punishments for animal cruelty. But, as is often the case in Colombia, implementation is an issue.
Ivonne is not the only one who’s frustrated by a lack of progress. In September 2019, protesters, accompanied by their furry friends, took to the streets of 11 different cities across Colombia to demand politicians implement tighter animal protection laws. Marchers echoed Ivonne’s sentiments, chanting, “We are the voice of animals.”
In practical terms, Ivonne suggests improved laws for animal welfare at a national level would give animals the protection they need. But for the everyday person, she suggests continually looking for how we can educate ourselves about our environment and animal welfare.
What keeps Ivonne motivated? Her biggest reward is the love the animals give to her. “We don’t have money but we help and are helped,” she explains. Despite financial struggles, her outlook for the future of the foundation remains optimistic. Ivonne hopes to make the shelter self-sustainable, so she can reinvest in the foundation and fulfill her dream of having their own land to establish themselves.
What you can do to help
Adopting is one of the best ways to help out the Fundación Misión Animal. There is a real need to adopt older animals or those with behavioral issues.
If adoption isn’t right for you, the foundation also welcomes donations. Ivonne recommends either monetary gifts or good quality items such as food or equipment.
Details for both adoption and donations are available at the foundation’s Instagram and Facebook pages:
The National Health Institute identified the first three cases of Omicron in Colombia.
The health authorities say that vaccination is still the way forward with Omicron. Photo: Jeremy Bezanger on Unsplash
Last night (Dec. 20) the ministry of health confirmed three cases of the Omicron variant had been identified in Colombia. Two cases of the Omicron variant – which is a lot more transmissible than other COVID variants – were discovered in Cartagena and one in Santa Marta.
The Omicron cases were found in people who had travelled to Colombia from the U.S. or Spain and the National Health Institute (INS) is trying to track down everybody they’ve been in contact with. At least one of those patients had made a stopover in Bogotá.
The Omicron variant of COVID-19 was first discovered in South Africa but quickly spread – it has now been detected in over 80 countries.
Bogotá mayor Claudia López tests positive for COVID
Claudia López confirmed via Twitter that she had tested positive for COVID. The capital’s mayor, who previously had the virus back in May, tweeted: “I tested positive for COVID. Thanks to my full vaccination, I have light symptoms and will continue to work from home.”
The mayor confirmed that Omicron has reached Colombia and urged people to get vaccinated.
How Omicron has affected other countries
Omicron has surged through countries like the UK which has seen record COVID case numbers in recent weeks. Governments across Europe are introducing new restrictions to try to slow the spread.
The Netherlands has introduced a new lockdown which will stay in place until at least Jan. 14. Only essential services will be open, with bars, restaurants, and other non-essential venues closed throughout the holiday season.
Japan has closed its borders to all non-residents, and Thailand has re-introduced quarantines for new arrivals. Many countries now require negative PCR test results in addition to vaccine passports for non-residents.
If you were planning to travel over the festive period, be aware that many countries have increased their anti-COVID precautions and make sure you check for updates regularly.
Will Colombia introduce new restrictions?
So far, the message from authorities in Colombia appears to be: Be careful and get vaccinated. Colombia announced vaccination certificate rules beginning in mid-November, requiring people to show proof of vaccination to enter many establishments. But as yet, there’s no talk of new lockdowns.
That said, if we’ve learned one thing during the pandemic it’s that Colombia can introduce new rules extremely quickly if emergency ward occupancy gets to critical levels, and getting to critical levels can happen fast too. It’s a good idea to pay close attention to local news, especially if you’re planning to travel.
We’re extremely likely to see a fourth peak of COVID infections in January – in part because of the increase in travel and socialising over Christmas, and in part the almost inevitable spread of Omicron. Additional restrictions may follow, depending on the number of cases and hospitalisations.
However, the hope is that vaccination will limit the number of severe COVID cases and deaths. Vaccination may not stop the spread of Omicron, but it does appear to reduce the severity of the infections.
What difference does vaccination make?
According to Imperial College London research, neither double vaccination nor previous COVID infection give a lot of protection against Omicron infection. It suggests that previous infection may only give people 19% protection against the Omicron variant.
The Imperial College researchers also think that double vaccination only gives up to 20% protection against Omicron. That figure goes up to 55%-80% with a booster. Booster shots seem to be the most effective way to slow the spread of Omicron.
Worryingly, the report also found that no evidence that Omicron is not as severe as the Delta variant. There has been speculation that Omicron might cause less severe cases. But given that vaccination does reduce the risk of hospitalization or death, it is difficult to know whether it’s Omicron that’s less severe or that vaccination is protecting people against the worst of the virus.
Colombia’s health minister, Fernando Ruiz Gómez said: “There’s also evidence that vaccination prevents hospitalization and mortality from the Omicron variant, especially within six months after completing the initial doses.”
There is some speculation that Colombia was not as impacted by the Delta variant which spread quickly through Europe in the summer because many people had already had COVID. INS boss Franklyn Prieto told RCN that around two-thirds of the Colombian population had probably already been already infected and so had immunity. This may not help when it comes to Omicron.
How many people are vaccinated in Colombia?
According to the INS, as of Dec. 19 over 62 million doses of vaccines have been given out. That translates to around 27 million people who are fully vaccinated (with either two doses or the single Janssen shot). About 2.7 million people have already received the booster dose.
Health minister Ruiz said they are hoping to ensure 3 million people receive the booster in the coming weeks. “Those most at risk are those over 50 years of age. There are about 7 million people and our goal is to vaccinate at least 3 million by the end of the year and Epiphany [Jan 6] at the latest.”
Interestingly, Colombia is hoping to become a vaccination hub in 2022. The country has signed an agreement with two companies to build a vaccination production plant in Rionegro, Antioquia.
How can I get vaccinated?
If you haven’t yet got your first dose of vaccination, there are vaccination points all over the city. Head to Mi Vacuna or log on to your EPS provider to make an appointment.
Colombia has divided the population into five priority groups, depending on age and profession. You can find out which group you’re in on Mi Vacuna.
Booster shots are following the same pattern as the original doses. Those who are eligible can then get jabbed if it’s been six months since they completed their previous vaccination. Those over 50 can get a booster shot four months after their previous jab.
Find out which group you belong to and watch out for news announcements.
From December 14 you’ll need a negative PCR test or a vaccine certificate to enter Colombia.
Vaccination certificate to be required to enter Colombia. Photo: Lukas on Unsplash
Colombia’s health minister, Fernando Ruiz Gómez, has just announced that from December 14 anyone entering the country will need to show a negative PCR test and/or a vaccination certificate depending on their status.
Colombia does not have any plans to restrict travel to individual countries. While Omicron has not yet been detected in Colombia, Ruiz Gómez said that he did not think that it was possible to prevent the arrival of new variants.
Those entering the country will need to complete the Check Mig form on Migración’s site. The ministry says arrivals fall into two categories, essentially those who live in Colombia or are Colombian, and tourists who are visiting.
Group 1: Colombians, foreigners residing in Colombia, and diplomats and their families
This group will need to show proof of vaccination from at least 14 days before the date of travel or a negative PCR test. “We won’t stop any Colombian residents from entering, all of them can enter, and for that to work, if they haven’t been vaccinated they need to show their test,” said the health minister.
It isn’t clear whether people with an M visa will qualify as residents or fall into the tourist category. As the onus is on airlines to enforce these rules, M visa holders may need to be ready to prove they live in Colombia when travelling.
Group 2: Foreigners who do not live in Colombia and are visiting for tourism or leisure
This group will need to show either that they are fully vaccinated or that they’ve had at least one dose of the vaccine AND a negative PCR test from the past 72 hours.
A few weeks ago, Colombia introduced rules requiring people to show a vaccination certificate to enter bars, restaurants, and other spaces. This has not been an entirely smooth process. For example, some physical vaccination certificates were not stamped leading to problems with entry. Digital certificates are available from the Mi Vacuna site, but we’ve heard several reports of incorrect information appearing on the certificates.
Many countries now require vaccine certificates
Colombia is not alone in requiring vaccine certificates. In fact, some might argue it is late to the party – various EU countries have required them for some time and the EU has just announced rules for all member states. The United States, Canada, Chile, and various countries in Asia all ask that visitors show a proof of vaccination to enter.
After four matches without scoring a goal, on Tuesday, Colombia will receive Paraguay in Barranquilla. Can Colombia get on the winning path again?
In September, Paraguay vs Colombia ended in a 1-1 draw in Asunción. Photo: FCF Colombia
Five days after the slightly disappointing game in Brazil, Colombia will face Paraguay on Tuesday. Colombia’s defence against Brazil was mostly solid, even though the team was missing three key defenders through injury. But, just as with the previous games, los cafeteros barely created any opportunities. This meant that one moment of inattention decided the game.
Paraguay is not in Brazil’s league though. It is almost bottom of the group and has very little chance of making it to the World Cup. In contrast, Colombia is still very much in the running for qualification — despite the lack of goals in the last four games. Tuesday’s match is where Colombia is expected to pick up some valuable points.
Davinson Sánchez and William Tesillo’s strong defence against Brazil showed that manager Reinaldo Rueda is capable of making his defence work, even when he’s down several injured players. It won’t get any easier for this game as Johan Mojica has joined the list of unavailable defenders. The left back picked up a yellow card against Brazil and is suspended. However, there is no doubt about the replacement. Yairo Moreno, who played as central midfielder against Brazil, showed in September against Chile he is a great option for the left back position.
On the midfield, Rueda faces another problem. Wilmar Barrios, arguably Colombia’s most important player in this qualifying cycle, shares Mojica’s fate and is suspended. Against a weaker Paraguayan side, Rueda could opt for more football from the back with Victor Cantillo. But the biggest question is, will James Rodríguez play from kick-off? The iconic number ten had only played four games in six months before his fifteen minutes against Brazil last week. His fitness is far from his best years, but with his creativity, he could prove a vital solution for the lack of goals in the past matches.
Miguel Borja is expected to start in the centre of attack in favour of Duván Zapata. Borja scored twice in the last home game he took part in against Chile. Plus, after several years with Junior in Barranquilla, the striker knows the Metropolitano Roberto Meléndez stadium through and through.
A bad result against Paraguay wouldn’t see Colombia eliminated. But it would seriously complicate Colombia’s aspirations to go to the World Cup in Qatar. With several players injured and suspended, it won’t be an easy game. But it’s still a great opportunity to get some much-needed points and hopefully a few goals.
The kick-off for Colombia vs Paraguay is this Tuesday, November 16 at 6 pm in Barranquilla.
Last month, Colombia kept Brazil on a draw in Barranquilla and became the first country in this South American World Cup qualification to take points away from the Seleção. What will Brazil vs Colombia have in store this time?
Last month in Barranquilla, this match didn’t get a winner. Photo: FCF Colombia
This Thursday, Colombia will face Brazil in São Paulo. With 31 points in 11 matches, the home side has pretty much already qualified for the World Cup in Qatar. But Colombia has still got it all to play for. The team with manager Reinaldo Rueda in charge is sitting in fourth place. Importantly, Colombia is only one point ahead of Uruguay, who could knock them out of the spot that grants them direct qualification.
It remains to be seen whether Colombia will be able to pull off a stunt in São Paulo. But it won’t be easy for the cafeteros as several of their main players are out for this international window. Defence has been Colombia’s forte in the last few matches – Los Cafeteros didn’t concede a single goal in the three previous matches. However, both Yerry Mina and Carlos Cuesta, who formed the centre of defence in those games, will have to miss this match due to injury. Their normal replacement Oscar Murillo suffers the same fate and is absent due to injury.
Against Brazil, it seems Rueda will start with Davinson Sánchez, who only lost his spot in the starting line up to Cuesta in October and possibly Jhon Janer Lucumí or William Tesillo next to him.
Apart from the three centre backs, the other key players who’ll be missing out are Mateus Uribe and Radamel Falcao. Colombia’s all-time top goalscorer may be reaching the end of his career, but he shows every week at his new club Rayo Vallecano that he hasn’t forgotten how to score. Last weekend, against Real Madrid, bad luck struck for the 35-year-old striker, he came on, scored and got injured, all in 12 minutes.
Colombia could do with Falcao’s goals, although he failed to score in his last four matches with the national team. Lack of scoring is an issue for Colombia – all three of its World Cup qualifiers in October finished 0-0, and the lack of goals could become problematic. However, James Rodríguez might be able to help out. The number 10 had been left out of the Copa América and the World Cup qualifiers due to a lack of fitness. But he’s found a new club with Al Rayyan and despite only having featured four times in Qatar, he received the nod from Rueda to return to the national team.
The Colombia squad for this match, Falcao and Murillo are late drop-outs.
The goals seem to have to come from Miguel Borja this game. He returns to the squad after missing the last matches because of an injury. Another option up front is Duván Zapata, who has been in great form for Atalanta Bergamo in both league and Champions League matches. But he crumbles when playing for the national team. Zapata failed to score in his last 14 appearances, since scoring the opener in the first qualifying match vs Venezuela last year.
In contrast, Brazil doesn’t face any such injury problems – only Roberto Firmino and Lucas Verrísimo will be out injured. But Brazil manager Tite can count on the rest of his star players, mostly featuring at the best clubs in Europe, for this match.
The kick-off for Brazil vs Colombia is Thursday the 11th of November at 7:30pm
You’ll now need to show a vaccination certificate to go to the pub or watch a football match in Colombia.
You’ll need to show a vaccination certificate to go to many public spaces in Colombia from November 16.
The government announced today that it will soon require vaccination certificates for people attending face-to-face events and activities in the country. Essentially, if you want to go to any activity where there’ll be lots of other people, you’ll need to show proof of vaccination — in either electronic or physical form.
This includes: Pubs, bars, cinemas, nightclubs, concerts, casinos, sports events, church services, museums, and theme parks. From November 16, anyone over the age of 18 will need to show their vaccination proof. And from November 30, the rules will apply to anyone over the age of 11.
The health minister, Fernando Ruiz Gómez said that the new measures are intended to reduce the risk of contagion. “A high proportion of the population is already vaccinated, but an unvaccinated part of the population remains, which ends up affecting and increasing the risk of contagion,” he said.
If you’re worried because you’ve only been able to get one dose so far, this shouldn’t be a problem. A certificate showing you’ve had one dose will do the trick.
If you got vaccinated in Colombia, in theory, you can download an electronic copy of your vaccination certificate from Mi Vacuna. Though it’s worth saying we couldn’t make it work.
If you got vaccinated abroad, there’s not yet any information about what proof will be accepted. But things will probably become clearer in the coming weeks.
Colombia vs Ecuador: Colombia preparing in Barranquilla for the crucial match against Ecuador. Photo: FCF Colombia
Colombia will face direct rivals Ecuador in Barranquilla this Thursday. A victory for the home side could catapult Colombia into a comfortable position for qualification for Qatar 2022.
Before the start of this international break, few expected that Colombia would be in this position. But los cafeteros recorded two valuable draws against direct rival Uruguay and Brazil, who dropped their first point in 10 games against Colombia. Ecuador, Paraguay, and Uruguay on the other hand didn’t get the results they expected – and so could see Colombia run ahead. However, Colombia’s got something to prove against Ecuador. Ecuador ran rampant against the visitors last year in Quito. The fallout from the embarrassing 6-1 score meant the end of manager Carlos Queiroz’s time as head of the national team.
For this match in Barranquilla, the circumstances are very different. Quito’s high altitude gives Ecuador a strong at home advantage. But in the heat in Barranquilla, Colombia is expected to have the upper hand. Besides that, manager Reinaldo Rueda, who replaced Queiroz, has made Colombia almost impossible to beat. As such, Colombia is a huge favourite for this match.
It looks like Rueda isn’t going to touch his backline, meaning that Yerry Mina and Carlos Cuesta will again form the centre of defence. So far they haven’t conceded a single goal in this international break. Cuesta came in for Davinson Sánchez when the Tottenham Hotspur centre-back was suspended and firmly claimed the spot with three flawless performances. Stefan Medina and Johan Mojica again seem destined to be the fullbacks for this game.
Barrios and Ospina likely to shine
Ahead of them, Wilmar Barrios will be the lock on the door on the midfield. The holding midfielder from Zenit St Petersburg has been outstanding for years, and showed no signs of changing against Uruguay and Brazil, where he was one of the – if not the – best players on the pitch. Though captain David Ospina would also be in the running for that accolade. The goalkeeper had a few key saves in both games and his performances reopened the discussion on whether he is the best goalkeeper Colombia has ever had.
It remains to be seen whether there’ll be changes to the rest of the team. In spite of the good results, Colombia was on the back foot most of the last two matches. The attacking line weren’t able to create enough danger or relieve pressure on the Colombian defence. That means that Radamel Falcao, who started both games, could be starting from the bench this game. Juan Guillermo Cuadrado will probably be back in the side after a suspension. The winger is one of Rueda’s most used players and is expected to start.
Can Colombia take another big step towards the World Cup in Qatar next year? The kick-off for Colombia vs Ecuador is this Thursday at 4pm in Estadio Metropolitano Roberto Meléndez in Barranquilla.
Despite a difficult start, Colombia keeps Uruguay on 0-0 and stays in full strength for World Cup qualification for Qatar 2022.
David Ospina kept another clean sheet for Colombia. Photo: FCF Colombia
Colombia hasn’t taken a result home from Montevideo in the World Cup qualifiers since 2001, so the expectation for the national team weren’t that high. But manager Reinaldo Rueda – in his second stint at the Colombian national team – hasn’t lost a single one of his first five World Cup qualifiers. He extended that run with the 0-0 in Montevideo.
Rueda chose a defence with Carlos Cuesta and Yerry Mina. That left Spurs defender Davinson Sánchez on the bench. Sánchez has been a regular in the national team, but his previous performances had been very shaky. Radamel Falcao also started, in favour of Duván Zapata.
Falcao was nowhere to be seen. In the first half Uruguay put Colombia on the back foot from the get go and gave the cafeteros little time to breath. After 12 minutes, Luis Suárez squandered a big chance when a cross from the right went past the entire Colombia defence. But the Atlético Madrid striker put it wide from a good position. Halfway through the first half Suárez did find the goal, but the linesman saw offside and, despite Suárez heavily protesting the decision, the VAR confirmed it.
When the Uruguayan storm petered out after 25 minutes, Colombia got a bit more control over the game. But the visitors failed to produce a goal attempt in the rest of the first half.
Colombia looked a lot better in the second half. It didn’t have serious problems containing Darwin Nuñez or Edinson Cavani, who had come on at half time to replace the injured Suárez and Brian Rodríguez. The intensity of the match lowered a bit and Colombia got its biggest chance after 70 minutes when a quick counter-attack over the left wing landed in Zapata’s feet on the edge of the six-yard box. But the Atalanta Bergamo striker produced a weak attempt – Uruguay goalie Fernando Muslera had no problems with a ball that came straight at him.
The draw gives Colombia one point, meaning it stays in fifth place. Both Uruguay and Ecuador are in striking distance for direct qualification for the World Cup in Qatar. Colombia will next play Brazil in Barranquilla on Sunday, October 10 at 4pm. But the team will have to do without Juan Guillermo Cuadrado who picked up a yellow card and is suspended for the next game.
Uruguay vs Colombia is the first match in the important October international break for Colombia. In Montevideo the Cafeteros are looking to close in on the World Cup 2022 in Qatar.
In Bogotá, Colombia prepared for the tough away match in Uruguay. Photo: FCF Colombia
Colombia has got a difficult schedule coming up with three important games in eight days. After Uruguay, Colombia will host Brazil and Ecuador in Barranquilla. Manager Reinaldo Rueda mostly stuck with the squad that got him five points in three games in September.
That means that James Rodríguez is again not included. The number ten, who joined Al Rayyan in Qatar in September, hasn’t been able to make his debut yet at his new club due to an injury. It’s a different story for Colombian talisman Radamel Falcao. The 35-year-old striker had a great start at his new club Rayo Vallecano with three goals in his first three games and joins the national team in good form.
Rueda may not want to make many changes to his starting eleven compared to the convincing 3-1 victory over Chile last month, but he has to make at least two obligatory ones. Miguel Borja, the striker who scored twice against Chile, dropped out last minute and didn’t travel to the national team. And Yairo Moreno will also not play, the left back who ran circles round the Chileans last month is not available due to a knee injury.
Yerry Mina and Davinson Sánchez are back in the team. Mina missed the last matches due to an injury and Sánchez was suspended against Chile. Whether they will immediately be back in the team is unclear, because Carlos Cuesta performed so well on his debut, that he is also an option to start this game. Where Mina has generally been ok, Sánchez’s recent performances for the national team left a lot of doubts.
Against Chile, Colombia showed that they are a strong contender for World Cup qualification. The same form will be needed in Montevideo, because Uruguay is a direct opponent for World Cup qualification.
The first four qualify directly for the World Cup, the number five qualifies for a World Cup play-off.
Uruguay are generally known for their defensive strength, but they also have two strikers who are in good form in the form of Darwin Nuñez and Luis Suárez. Nuñez is very impressive for Benfica, and he almost personally tortured Barcelona in the Champions League last week. Suárez also scored against his old club at the weekend. Edinson Cavani is also available, meaning the Colombian defenders will have their hands full with the Uruguayan attacking strength.
The kick-off for Uruguay vs Colombia is tomorrow, October 7 at 6pm at the Estadio Centenario in Montevideo.
Violence against women is a problem all over the world. The WHO estimates that almost 1 in 3 women have been victim to some kind of violence by a partner in their lifetimes. This type of violence can take many forms and has far reaching health and human rights implications.
Colombia has high numbers of domestic violence cases, femicides, sexual violence, and conflict-related sexual violence. It does have some progressive laws in place to tackle these issues, but prosecution rates remain low. Activists point to impunity of over 90% for some of these crimes.
You might think the day of Amor y Amistad would be about love and friendship. It is, but sadly it’s also the day that sees the second most reports of violence towards women in Colombia. Mother’s Day is the worst.
This year, Bogotá’s mayor Claudia López re-introduced a campaign called ‘Pregunta por Ángela’ which encouraged women to approach staff in bars and clubs and say they need Angela if they are in need of help. A similar scheme lets women ask for help in supermarkets and other public spaces.
Pandemic made it hard for victims to get support
It is hard to get an accurate picture of what happened during the pandemic. Ana María Peñuela, from the Ministry of Health said that the risk of violence against women and girls in the home had increased during the health emergency. But several activists and observers, including Peñuela, point out that victims may have had trouble reporting these crimes because of the quarantine restrictions.
What we do know is that all Colombia’s helplines — 155, 123, and 122 — reported a significant increase in calls related to domestic violence. Indeed, 155, the domestic violence hotline, said it received almost 19,000 calls between March 25 and October 29, 2020. That’s more than double the same period in 2019.
The Fiscalía also reported an increase of 6% in domestic violence cases, from 88,859 in 2019 to 94,270 in 2020. The number of sexual crimes fell from 38,697 in 2019 to 30,579 in 2020.
Juliana Castillo Rodas, of the Fundación Feminicidios Colombia, an NGO that monitors gender-based violence told The Guardian: “Sadly when we speak about violence against women in Colombia, there isn’t a single place that we can call ‘safe,’ but what we can say is that the home has become one of the most dangerous places for women.”
There are a number of groups and NGOs in Colombia that advocate against and raise awareness of violence against women. Support groups for survivors of sexual violence — like Mujeres Gestionando Paz — also campaign for justice. But it’s also important to tackle the roots of the issue, with the hope of slowly changing the dynamics that lead to violence.
That’s why projects like the Escuela Nacional de Desaprendizaje de Machismo (ENDEMA), a school for unlearning machismo, are key. The project, which involves Brigitte Baptiste, president of Ean University and a leading voice on gender issues, the European Union, and Colombian journalists, aims to combat prejudice. As Baptiste put it, “the exercise invites us to unlearn, to watch what we say and who we say it to, to not widen the gap between men and women.”
Femicide
Femicide has long been a problem in Colombia, so much so that in 2015, the country passed a law that made femicide — a gender-based hate crime — a legally defined crime with heavy punishments. It gives the state more power to intervene and gives more power to the victims of these crimes.
However, according to data from the Observatorio Feminicidios Colombia, the number of femicides increased from 571 in 2019 to 630 in 2020. These figures are higher than reports from other organisations — the Fiscalía registered 186 victims in 2020.
According to No Es Hora De Callar (It’s Not Time To Shut Up), a campaign led by journalist and activist Jineth Bedoya, only 7% of the femicide cases have been fully pursued by the courts. By October 2020, 93% of the femicide cases from that year remained in impunity.
Conflict leaves shadow of sexual violence
One additional aspect to understanding violence against women in Colombia is the sexual violence that took place during its conflict. According to research by PeaceWomen, 489,687 women were victims of sexual violence between 2001 and 2009. This equates to about 150 women suffering this type of violence every day.
The peace agreement was the first of its kind to specifically include a gender sub commission and dedicate a chapter to gender. The final accord included 130 measures to promote equal rights, including commitments to include female ex-combatants in economic initiatives and that women would play an active role in peacebuilding. It also included specific measures to ensure victims of violence could access the transitional justice system.
However, implementation is proving a challenge. According to the latest Kroc Institute report on gender implementation, in 2019, 42% of the gender commitments had not been started. In comparison, work is underway on 27% of the overall commitments.
In addition, a report from the committee set up to monitor the implementation of the victim law, showed over 90% of cases that were referred to the Fiscalía remain uninvestigated.
And the violence continues. The peace agreement may have brought about peace on paper, but in reality, many regions of Colombia still struggle with armed violence as gangs attempt to fill the vacuum left by the FARC. COVID-19 restrictions meant women in these regions were especially vulnerable. According to a report by the UN, “The pandemic increased vulnerability in areas affected by conflict, making it difficult for survivors and women’s organizations to gain access to protection mechanisms and referral pathways.”
It may be some time before we know the full impact of COVID-19 on violence against women, but we can already see that the picture has worsened. However, authorities have at least shown they are aware of the problem. As Colombia grapples with a new normal, we can only hope the figures from 2021 show a reduction in this type of violence and an increase in prosecution.
“The pandemic might have halted a lot of things, but definitely not child trafficking,” explains Katherine Jaramillo to the Bogotá Post. Jaramillo is the director of Valientes Colombia, an NGO dedicated to the prevention of child trafficking and sexual exploitation.
Valientes has recently worked with a 16-year-old girl who accepted a work offer through social media to improve her financial situation. When she turned up at the interview, the man offered her money in exchange for sex. Having already provided a lot of personal information, the girl felt complicit and approached Valientes to get help.
Child trafficking has tripled over the last 15 years, according to UNODC.
Falling into the trap of exploitative labor is a phenomenon that increasingly affects vulnerable children and adolescents. “Children account for 13% of human trafficking worldwide, in Colombia, they assume 12% in all human trafficked,” Rocío Urón Durán highlights to the Bogotá Post in an interview. She is the coordinator for human and migrant trafficking at The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Although the percentage is not much different, Colombia has some alarming dynamics when it comes to child trafficking. Colombia has specific conditions, a dangerous mix of structural factors, dysfunctional policies, and blind cultural norms.
A land of origin, transit, and destination
Colombia enjoys a privileged geographical position, being the access point between North and South America. This, however, predetermines its role as a key migratory and human trafficking hub – the UN found that in 2020, people from 39 different countries (most predominantly people from Haiti) passed through Darién Gap, the perilous mangrove swamp that bridges the two continents.
Undoubtedly, this puts tens of thousands of migrants in a position of extreme vulnerability. Perhaps the most recent example of this is the humanitarian crisis seen in Necoclí near the border with Panama, where over 10,000 stranded migrants contributed to the collapse of public services. And according to the UNODC, the rise in child trafficking we have seen since 2019 directly coincides with migration flows, putting unaccompanied minors in a precarious situation.
This is particularly visible in many areas of Colombia, such as the major cities or areas with vast extraction industries. For example, the highway between the capital Bogotá and the country’s second-largest city Medellín is considered one of Colombia’s worst sites for child sex trafficking and exploitation. Criminal groups abuse underprivileged girls, often between the age of 12 and 15, to offer sexual services to the drivers passing through the service station Caracolí between the municipalities of Honda and La Dorada, as reported by El País.
Predators hit social networks
Katherine Jaramillo. Image Courtesy of Katherine Jaramillo, LinkedIn.
There’s a rich breeding ground for children to be abused, mistreated, and trafficked, and the fact that Colombia continues to be the most unequal country in Latin America isn’t helping. The recession caused by Covid-19 puts children at even greater risk of being trafficked. Moreover, during mandatory quarantines, social networks became new zones of danger that directly encourage different risk scenarios. According to UNODC, the anonymity of traffickers on the Internet, coupled with the high number of boys, girls, and young people who use the Internet uncontrolled, is highly precarious.
One of the most common strategies to recruit minors is catfishing. It has become common for predators to create false profiles and use fake photos to connect with minors online. Then, by inciting situations like sexting and requesting sexually explicit content, perpetrators pressure the child through sextortion. In some cases, they enter the household and abuse the minor for pornographic or other purposes, including recruitment for the webcam modeling industry. As the New York Post reports, in Colombia there are around 60,000 webcam models, making up 30% of the worldwide share.
But blackmail is not the only issue here. Facing limited opportunities to make a living, more and more teenagers began to turn to the digital space and their WhatsApp networks, and were quickly lured into exploitative structures through job offers.
“It’s common for perpetrators to feed on necessity,” Jaramillo, of Valientes, affirms. She tells of a case where a man went to the poorest neighborhoods in the coastal city of Cartagena, giving out food packages in exchange for sex with girls in the communities. So, while it could seem that direct prostitution is on the decline, child trafficking takes on novel forms, with activity “behind closed doors” increasing.
Child exploitation, normalized?
Many of the modalities of child trafficking are fueled by many cultural and socio-economic preconceptions. For example, Venezuelan migrants tend to fall victims to trafficking networks simply because they have limited access to education or the job market, and it’s discrimination and xenophobia that then normalize the crime. Moreover, according to Fundación Renacer, a Colombian research institute focused on exploring sexual exploitation in Colombia, it’s the capitalist society that crowns consumption as the supreme value, and, coupled with rigid notions of the role of both women and men, beauty and youth are indirectly turned into objects for purchase.
According to Valientes, selling sexual favors by children has become so normalized that people – and even authorities – believe it’s “mere” prostitution. “When you go to report to the police in Cartagena, it’s like a joke. Often, they simply don’t do anything,” Jaramillo adds.
She further affirms: “People don’t know it’s a crime, so they can’t become actors of change,” explaining that this is why even family members can become perpetrators. Often, mothers that went through abuse and other traumatic experiences when growing up feel like they got through it “just fine”, so their children will too. These values can then be passed on: For example, there’s been a recent case of a woman in the Cesar department selling her 14-year-old sister’s virginity for a phone and money.
Tourism as an underestimated driver
There’s a normalization of child trafficking in Colombian society, but it’s not just Colombians guilty of flawed preconceptions. The most touristic regions in Colombia also report the highest numbers of illicit prostitution and child labor. Particularly in Cartagena, a popular Caribbean destination, the figures are alarming. An estimated 650 minors are systematically victimized through the sex trade, of which 70% are girls and 30% boys.
This high number of child trafficking cases in the coastal city is mainly related to two factors. Cartagena is ranked the most attractive tourist destination by foreigners visiting Colombia. At the same time, as DW reports, 26% of Cartagena’s inhabitants live in poverty, and many families have no other way out of deprivation than to sell their young daughters and sons into prostitution rings.
Even though the total number of cases is somewhat lower in Medellín and Bogotá, people working in the tourism industry and local authorities report the same problematic dynamic of sex tourism and related child exploitation.
The problem is widely known here in Medellín where we are based. When we asked Jose, a police officer patrolling in one of the city’s most popular tourist districts, Parque Lleras, about the situation he answered rhetorically: “Have you ever been here at night?” continuing by affirming that his regular activities include checking the age of people in the area after dark.
In Medellín’s touristic neighborhoods, hotels and hostels are frequently confronted with the prostitution of minors. “If we register suspicious behavior, we call the police, but sometimes it’s difficult to detain the suspects,” Sara, a receptionist at the frequently visited Hotel Charlee, says.
Following the recommendations by the government, most hotels try to regulate minors entering their facilities without an authorized guardian: “Without [identification] or a passport, there is no entry. Anyone claiming to be a relative or guardian not only has to leave all their details but also can’t leave the hotel without the person they are registered with or enter with another person,” explains a receptionist — who also wanted to remain anonymous — at Hotel Marquee, another tourist haunt in Medellín.
However, looking at the hotel industry only overshadows the darker, less visible traces exploitative sex tourism follows. Since Airbnb and private short-term rentals have come to dominate the lodging industry, the possibilities for control are becoming limited, and measures are increasingly falling into the realm of individual moral judgments. Basically, after the keys are handed over, these places are left to the devices of their short-term occupants.
According to Fundación Renacer, exploitative sex tourism takes place in the “private sphere”. Minors sign up on popular platforms like Tinder, Grindr, or Happn either to offer their services independently or because they are being told to do so. Even if they are signed up as adults, there are no real safety checks on those platforms, and it becomes an easy task to sell services without any checks and balances.
The role of preconceptions in sex tourism
But why are so many foreign tourists susceptible to paying for sex with minors? Shouldn’t travelers be particularly cautious? Many of the travelers in Colombia have a relatively high level of education and as the majority of tourists are from North America and Europe, they are also from places where child abuse is massively frowned upon.
According to Fundación Renacer, tourists take advantage of their anonymity, the lack of control by the authorities, and the permissiveness of some social groups (cab drivers, managers, or other hotel workers). But there’s even a more shocking dynamic behind tourism and sex trafficking:
“Some foreign sex tourists believe that the destination countries are underdeveloped and that by exploiting children, they are helping them to better themselves,” reports Fundación Renacer. “The sex tourist feels superior to his victims because of his greater economic capacity believing that this gives them the authority to abuse the environment and people.”
Tourism may not be directly responsible for the existence of commercial sexual exploitation of children and adolescents. However, sexually exploitative tourists do take advantage of the easy access to the sex tourism industry. This industry, in turn, helps to create demand by promoting exotic (and erotic) images of the beautiful youth.
Sector players might fear Colombia could lose attractiveness as a tourist destination if they start discussing the relationship between tourism and child exploitation. Those who visit Colombia because of sex tourism also order their beer in the bars, eat their food in the local restaurants, and visit tourist attractions.
Still, child prostitution is mainly a demand problem, and to protect children from exploitation, people working or driving the industry must work on reducing this demand. According to Sara, the receptionist at Charlee, this should start with explaining the problems to hotel guests through awareness campaigns and holding open debates with anyone in the industry, including bars, guides, and travel agencies.
High impunity rates for child traffickers
On a national level, the authorities are trying to combat child trafficking by allocating investigators, the police, and social workers to identify, prevent and assist cases of child trafficking.
In 2018, the government announced strengthening penalties in the penal code for crimes of commercial sexual exploitation. They also established more comprehensive provisions to protect children against cybercrimes involving commercial sexual exploitation by sharing information and investigating suspicious profiles.
But many of those programs fail because of the same hurdles. According to Valientes, despite new laws and numerous public programs, the number of abuses is increasing every year. Perpetrators are even less often prosecuted and many victims do not report their abuse.
Danitza Marentes. Image Courtesy of Danitza Marentes, LinkedIn.
And, even if the perpetrators are detained, not much happens. The problem is that the functionaries don’t always necessarily understand how to typify the crime in the right way. “The law stays on the paper but is not complied with,” notes Jaramillo from Valientes. She points out how in 2019, a major child trafficking ring was dismantled with zero convictions in the end.
Danitza Marentes, Valientes’ director of ESCNNA Observation (Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Boys, Girls, and Adolescents) explains that the institutional and judicial weaknesses in Colombia result in a child trafficking impunity rate of a staggering 90%. This statistic coincides with other similar sources: According to the state prosecutor Mario Gómez Jiménez, out of 85,000 investigations into claims of child sex abuse between 2005 and 2018, only 6,116 ended in a conviction.
Only a holistic strategy can help
Can better law enforcement alone solve the problem of child trafficking? In reality, authorities can’t simply prosecute their way to social justice. Of course, people who exploit other people should be punished, but the problem must be tackled on several levels and from various angles simultaneously.
In the long term, both UNODC as well as Valientes agree that Colombia needs to address structural issues, eradicate poverty, improve access to decent work, and defeat the prevalent, persuasive power of easy money in developing economies. Only then, the country has a chance to fight child labor and trafficking.
Rocío Urón Durán. Image Courtesy of UNODC.
On a cultural-societal level, Fundación Renacer argues it is necessary to combat the strict sexist thought patterns, particularly to prevent the abuse of female or homosexual youth. Governmental organizations and nongovernmental foundations like Valientes, Save the Children Colombia, and Fundación Renacer do significant educational work by reaching out to the affected families and young people with informative campaigns. The premise is: Only those who can formulate and understand their own rights are empowered not to let themselves be exploited and, in the ideal scenario, to actively resist.
Both on the societal and judicial level, there needs to be further development in language directed towards the problematics of child maltreatment and trafficking. For example, while the groups at high risk include displaced Venezuelans, Afro-Colombians, indigenous communities, individuals with disabilities, internally displaced persons, or those living in areas with armed groups’ presence, it’s not possible to draw a clear profile of a victim. As Durán from UNODC points out, not all victims are from low-income families or lack education.
“Apart from the necessary solutions, such as legal norms and access to work, we need to prioritize education,” Durán tells The Bogotá Post. “We need to generate information, knowledge, and empowerment so that everyone knows what trafficking is, what the capturing methods are, and how to protect oneself.”
Taking into account the views of those interviewed for this story, it is clear that combating the problem needs efforts that work from the top-down and the bottom-up. An active civil society that discusses relations between men and women, as well as the role of children within families, will help battle normalization and reset existing values. At the same time, those who wield political or economic power must set the right course for advancing gender rights, reducing poverty, and protecting the most vulnerable ones.
Our writers tried to ring the National Child Abuse Helpline, but the first number didn’t work. With the correct area code, the phone rang, but we only got an answer after the third attempt.
Screenshots from Colombia Migration’s app, LibertApp, developed to help fight human trafficking.
Maybe it’s a coincidence, or perhaps it’s a symptom of an encrusted society in which child abuse has somehow become a commonality. And we are not talking about Colombia alone. As highlighted in this article, the lines between perpetrator, victim, and contributor have long been unclear. Whether tourist, mother, gang member, politician, or apathetic bystander, it is almost impossible to distinguish who bears responsibility.
At the end of the day, it’s our individual responsibility to keep our eyes open, listen, and shape discourses for those that build our future, the children themselves.
How we can help fight against child trafficking
First of all, it’s necessary to recognize the indicators of human trafficking.
Poor living conditions
Multiple people in cramped space
Inability to speak to individual alone
Answers appear to be scripted and rehearsed
The employer is holding identity documents
Signs of physical abuse
Submissive or fearful
Unpaid or paid very little
Under 18 and in prostitution
If you are in contact with a victim, here are some questions you can ask:
Can you leave your job if you want to?
Can you come and go as you please?
Have you been hurt or threatened if you tried to leave?
Has your family been threatened?
Do you live with your employer?
Where do you sleep and eat?
Are you in debt to your employer?
Do you have your passport/identification? Who has it?
In case you suspect or know about a case, inform:
If you believe you have identified someone still in the trafficking situation, alert law enforcement immediately at the numbers provided below. It may be unsafe to attempt to rescue a trafficking victim.
If, however, you identify a victim who has escaped the trafficking situation, there are a number of organizations to whom the victim could be referred for help with shelter, medical care, legal assistance, and other critical services.
Call the National Human Trafficking Hotline, a national 24-hour, toll-free, anti-trafficking hotline. Call to report a tip and connect with anti-trafficking services in your area. The Hotline is equipped to handle calls related to sexual exploitation, forced labor, slavery, servitude, begging by others, servile marriage, extraction of organs, and sexual tourism.
Download:
LibertApp on Google Play allows you to report human trafficking cases with a click of a button.
International travel from Colombia remains difficult as some countries do not recognise the country’s vaccines.
If you got vaccinated in Colombia, the UK won’t recognise it. Photo: Emma Newbery
The United Kingdom is refusing to recognise vaccines given in Colombia as legitimate. For a few weeks now, the country only recognises vaccines administered in the UK, EU, South Korea, NZ, Australia or the US. Vaccine tourists also face trouble, as US-administered vaccines are only recongised if the person is US-resident.
The move doesn’t only affect Colombia, but dozens of countries around the world. What’s particularly problematic for Colombia is that it is also on the UK’s red list. That means that travelling directly between the countries means either ten days in a government-approved quarantine hotel at a cost of £2,285 (around COP12 million) upon arrival in the UK, or ten days in an amber list country, followed by ten more days in self-isolation at a UK address.
The move has stoked fury and indignation worldwide. A range of countries have issued press releases condemning the move. It’s widely seen as discriminatory – not helped by the fact that the UK government is being coy over the reasons for the ruling. The main reason given to The Guardian was “wider considerations”. Many see xenophobia in the move, but there’s also genuine concern over the possibility of falsified documents.
Plus, given the case numbers in Colombia have been falling in recent weeks, many who want to visit the UK question the need for Colombia to stay on the red list. Especially since Spain has downgraded Colombia’s risk level.
Entering other countries from Colombia
It’s not only the UK that has expressed concern over foreign vaccination programs. A month ago, on August 23, Spain lifted a temporary measure that had seen non-resident travellers from Colombia, Bolivia and Namibia blocked from entering the country. That was put in effect because Spanish authorities had found a high number of falsified documents among travellers from those countries. Colombia is now on Spain’s medium-risk list, meaning quarantine is not necessary (at time of writing).
The European Union
Much of the EU have similar measures to Spain, but check with individual countries before travel. Theoretically, vaccinated travellers are all welcome, but individual countries have different rules concerning quarantine etc. Colombia is not currently accepted on the EU digital COVID passport system.
Australia
If you’re heading to Australia, you’ll face a 14-day hotel quarantine, no matter where you’re coming from. And you’ll need a visa as well, no tourists allowed.
The US and Canada
The US requires a negative test 72 hours before travel, but nothing more. Canada does recognise Colombian vaccination, but you will need to get it translated into English or French and upload it to the Canadian system. You’ll also need to make a quarantine plan just in case, and present a negative test within 72 hours or a positive test between 14 and 180 days.
The Colombian writer and journalist talks about gritty realism, literature, protests, and the pandemic.
Mario Mendoza talks about realism in Bogotá and more. Photo: Liliana Toro
“In the past Latin American writers went to Paris or London, it was an obligatory stamp to be a certified artist. That’s been flipped,” says Mario Mendoza, bearded and hoody-ed on the Zoom call, twisting his wrist. “Today, if you want to be truly contemporary, you go to Bangkok, Mexico City or Bogotá. The city of the future is a third world one, full of entropy, chaos and exuberance. We think that if we respect the traffic lights, if we behave ourselves, perhaps one day we will look like the Swiss. It’s the reverse. The Swiss are becoming more like us every day.”
Mendoza has been chronicling Bogotá, often from its seediest angles, in his crime novels and science fiction since the 1990s. Judging by the prominence of his books – photocopied and cling-film bound – on the knock-off book stands that line Avenida Séptima and Calle Jiménez, he can confidently lay claim to being the most pirated author in Colombia, with a cult status but no translations. In a country where Gabriel García Márquez’s shadow looms large, the literary visitor can be left flummoxed by Bogotá, a city as unwritten as it is unloved. Mendoza puts a grimy finger on the capital’s pulse.
“There’s no magical realism in my work, it’s not about exuberant, musical sentences,” he says. “For me, beauty isn’t to be found by looking up, but the contrary. You need to look towards the cloacas of the city, the underground, you have to face the darkness.” He compares his task to that of a war photographer, for whom the power of the image isn’t in the beauty of its subject, but in the ability to capture the revelatory instant in cruel and violent situations.
Mendoza recognized that Colombia lacked the sort of urban literature that had grown up in Mexico City and Buenos Aires over the course of the twentieth century. In 1994, at the age of thirty, he published La Ciudad de los Umbrales (City of Thresholds) about five university friends drenched in the lore of the city’s brothels, drug dens and cemeteries. His second novel, Scorpio City is a bleak police noir involving a serial killer, secret sects and the 1976 massacre of garbage recyclers, an act of urban cleansing by the police. His most famous novel, Satanas (2002), features demonic possession, scopolamine gangs and the 1986 mass shooting at the Pozetto restaurant.
This “trilogy of pure psychopathology” comes with significant first-hand experience. Hailing from a well-to-do neighbourhood in the north of the city, Mendoza spent most of his twenties in the roughest sectors of the south and he lived, for a period, with recyclers in the Cartucho neighbourhood. The Pozetto incident was even closer to home. Mendoza studied literature with the shooter, Campo Elias, a former US soldier who had written his thesis – chillingly – on Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Perhaps unsurprisingly, optimism is in short supply.
“In the western world the detective restores order and justice is served. In the Latin American case there is no catharsis, there is no happy ending, just general chaos. If you put Sherlock Holmes in the centre of Bogotá he wouldn’t survive twenty four hours.” With his dark topics and nihilistic outlook, Mendoza has been a forerunner of a more recent trend towards gothic novels and horror stories in Latin American fiction. He believes that many writers in the region owe a debt to Edgar Alan Poe, especially in the translation of Julio Cortázar, the Argentine master of the short story.
“Poe was the virtuoso of the horror of the conscience, the horror of the industrial city, of the lost individual. I think nowadays in the midst of the pandemic, we are all a bit amnesiac, a bit catatonic, lacking life projects, depressed, don’t you think?”
“The vampire and the zombie are becoming daily characters. We’ve spent the last year and a half burying our friends and being incommunicado with the others. The pandemic has confirmed the central horror of Latin American gothic literature: the fear of the other. The other who is the enemy, who might spit on me, infect me, kill me for no reason.”
Dark secrets
The current situation has only exacerbated the resentments of a citizenry that has “never sat down on the couch, never done the necessary therapy.” Colombia, in Mendoza’s eyes, is a like a family harboring a dark secret which passes its trauma from generation to generation. The country’s failure to deal with inequality and a caste system of social classes that refuse to mix, is at the root of the problem. Walking south a few blocks along Avenida Caracas from Calle Jiménez, one comes to the former site of the Cartucho district, where the “recyclers live a nomadic life, making fire on the street corners and wandering around with machetes, a type of urban prehistory.”
A few blocks further and you reach the Las Cruces district, “Where an evangelical group is on their knees and a priest cures lepers and the possessed. You’re in the Middle Ages.” Meanwhile, the wealthy northern neighbourhoods suffer futuristic problems, “You can find hikikomori, people who only live in the virtual world, who don’t have sex, don’t speak, don’t have friends.” In Mendoza’s view, when one walks the city, you travel more in time than in space. “Bogotá is like an onion and peeling back the layers is at form of urban archaeology.”
His most recent work, this year’s Bitácora del Naufragio is a collection of stories that deals with the “pandemic within the pandemic”, that of isolation and mental health issues. He has been encouraged by the commitment of the youth-led protest movements in Colombia in 2019 and 2021 and focuses much of his non-literary efforts on promoting participatory democracy and promoting reading in the city’s southern neighbourhoods.
“We need to capitalize on the rage of the new generations and convert them into votes at the ballot box,” he says. “When I meet with the kids in the south, I tell them that a library is a very powerful weapon. They [the political class] don’t fear us because we are violent, they fear us because we are intelligent.”
It’s not quite October and — even if the grey skies of Bogotá may feel like Europe — we’re not in Germany. But that hasn’t stopped the BBC from donning their lederhosen and sharpening their pretzels to celebrate Oktoberfest.
Last week, it launched a seasonal Cerveza Blanca, a German-style wheat beer, which is on sale at BBCs throughout the country. Not only do they promise free beer samples at certain times of the day, there’s also a seasonal German menu which, unsurprisingly, features sausages.
Wheat beers can be a bit of an acquired taste, but they tend to be cloudier (and often fizzier) than lagers. They taste a bit like breathing in bread dough, if that’s a thing.
Bavaria’s global brand director Diego Pomareda said: “With the celebration of BBC Oktoberfest, we want consumers to find different BBC pubs and have experiences that take them to the true German tradition and transport them to the old continent.”
Oktoberfest originated back in 1810 when a royal wedding was celebrated with a horse race. Weddings and races gave way to drinking, as they do. So in the following years, Oktoberfest became an annual festival.
Over 200 years later, here we are drinking wheat beer and eating sausages in Colombia.
When I arrived in Colombia in 2014, there really wasn’t much in the way of craft beer here. There were a couple breweries in their infancy (some of which we’ve covered here), but unless you knew how to find them, there was basically just BBC (while it was still craft beer).
Barranquilla-born Jean Taboada experienced this same anguish upon returning to Colombia after three years in the US. With not much to do in the country, he took up his wife’s suggestion to start his own brewery. Thanks to Jean’s wife, we can all now drink 13 Pesos. There’s a close involvement with the food and drink industry woven all throughout Jean’s family history. He comes from a family of chefs (especially on his mother’s side), and it was his sister who bought him his first homebrew kit for Christmas in 2011. The family beer legacy goes back far further than that though.
Back in the 1910s, Jean’s paternal great-grandfather, Gabriel Antonio Taboada, owned a small rural bank in Corozal, Sucre. One day the quiet town received a strange new visitor – a German, fleeing from the First World War. This mysterious new arrival fancied setting up a brewery and looked for investment from local business owners. Mr Taboada decided to invest a grand sum of 13 pesos. After a period of seeing little bang for their buck and nothing in the way of dividends, the costeño investors grew restless and asked for their money back. The German paid them all out, but managed to keep the brewery open. That brewery is now one of the biggest breweries in Latin America. Gabriel Taboada got his 13 pesos back though.
Jean’s fortunately had much more success in the beer business than his ancestor. While it hasn’t ever been exactly easy for him, 13 Pesos has pretty much always been on an upward trajectory. Eight months after founding it, Jean was able to set up a bar on Calle 82. While most businesses shut up shop because they’re struggling, Jean found himself closing the bar because he was too flat out making and selling beer to bother with a tasting room. 13 Pesos now has a good-sized brewery up in Zipaquirá, where Jean prefers the water, not to mention the price of rent. Right now they’re making around 3,000L of beer a month. Speaking of which, let’s get to the beers…
The beers
13 Pesos currently does an IPA, a blonde ale, a stout and, somewhat uncommonly for Colombian craft breweries, a lager. They used to have a wheat beer too, but that’s now been phased out. Right now they also offer two seasonal imperial stouts. I’m going to focus on the IPA here though, as it’s one of the beers I make sure I’m never ever out of at home, and it could also be the best value craft beer in Colombia.
The 13 Pesos IPA is quite a sweet IPA – very low on bitterness for the style, even though the IBUs would suggest otherwise. It’s certainly nothing like a West Coast IPA. Jean’s been working on the recipe for 2-3 years now, and the evolution of the beer is worthy of discussion. For most brewers when they start out and get stuck into making IPAs, there’s nothing more exciting than trying to feature as many exotic and citrusy hops as possible. Jean was no exception and his IPA originally had five types of hops in it, to go with four different barley varieties. He’s now arrived at a ‘two hop, two malt’ philosophy, and it seems to have paid off immensely. The Cascade and Centennial hops perfectly complement a much lighter malt bill, and their pine and citrus notes come through beautifully strong. It’s still fairly malty despite the lighter malt bill, which also contributes to the sweetness. As Jean says, ‘the beauty of it is down to the simplicity.’
How to get ‘em:
13 Pesos sell their beers in six packs ($38,000 COP) and cases of 24 ($125,000). Delivery’s an additional $7,200 and Jean can usually get them to you within 24 hours. You can pay online, via bank transfer or with Rappi Pay. Message Jean on WhatsApp (316 621 2438) to order. You can find more details about the beers and the brewery on their website.
Medellín is hailed globally as an example of innovation and transformation – but that’s only part of the city’s story
Many of the comunas are built on the steep hills of Medellín. All photos: Courtesy of ContraMiradas
Comuna 13 beckons tourists and visitors – with music and dance on every corner, walls covered in street art, and brightly-painted escalators – Medellín’s miracle barrio, bursting with the story of transformation from violence to civic pride.
This neighbourhood (along with its myriad tours, books, and merchandise) fits the wider mythology of Medellín’s transformative urban policy: declared in the international press as a ‘smart city’, a global innovator, an eco-city, as the centre of revolutionary urban policy.
And there’s no doubt that Medellín has seen transformations from a global homicide capital – with a huge drops in crime and homicide rates, replaced by thriving tourism, coworking spaces, digital nomads, and vegan sushi.
But if you glance up at the steep slopes above the city centre, into the outskirts of the city, there are different stories to be told, messier stories which don’t fit the neat narrative of the “post-narco” city which local government are ever-keen to tell.
Medellín’s Metrocable runs over de Comunas
“Is Comuna 13 the rule? Or the exception? To understand how people live in this city, we need to go further, look deeper than popular tourist attractions and government propaganda – and listen harder to its residents – much harder,” says Manuel Oberlader, director of a new exhibition which has sought to create space for new voices and new stories from the peripheries of the city, and bring them right to the centre of Medellín – to Parque de las Luces and the EPM Library.
Many areas still lack infrastructure and even drinkable water
The terracotta-clad slopes stare directly down onto the skyscrapers and government offices of Medellín. But, the periphery lies, in many ways, far from the centre. Gaps in infrastructure, services, and security persist, with acute consequences for the residents of many barrios.
Many of these neighbourhoods were not planned. More than a hundred of Medellín’s barrios are still considered to be informal settlements, built by arriving communities of displaced people – many from Colombia’s civil conflict. Homes and infrastructure were built without state intervention, in community building groups, with money from religious or even criminal organisations.
These neighbourhoods continue to see arrivals from all over the country, as violence continues to rage both in the rural and urban areas, and from Venezuela too.
Public services often had to be hijacked or pirated, and later companies arrived to formalise (and profit from) the usage. Bit by bit, some neighbourhoods were formalised, with services arriving, and even some government presence, though community government structures remain influential.
Many continue, however, with entirely informal infrastructure – lacking resources and state presence. The state presence which these barrios are subject to is often simply the ESMAD riot police attempting to evict residents from informal settlements – still known as ‘invasions’ – even during pandemic.
Mobility matters and the fetish of Medellín’s metro
The mayorship of Sergio Fajardo (now a presidential hopeful for 2022), and his ‘social urbanism’ policy brought huge strides in mobility – including Comuna 13’s escalators. This saved residents huge walking time on their commutes – including from Santo Domingo – once considered one of the most dangerous parts of the city.
One of the most eye catching elements of the ContraMiradas exhibition is simply shoes laid in a display case, telling the stories of “patiamarillos” – ‘yellow shoes’ –- a name given to residents of barrios due to the staining of their shoes, having to walk down long unpaved roads to reach bus stops or cable car stations.
People often change shoes when they reach the metro – and it has been good business to create ‘guardazapatos’ to look after people’s dirty shoes, so they wouldn’t have to carry their patiamarillos with them – often a cause of shame or stigma associated with being from a barrio of Medellín’s outskirts.
Connection to the centre via a metro station, undoubtedly, makes life, commuting, finding work much easier for residents of the barrios on the steep slopes of the city. What also came with Medellín’s metro and metrocable was pride – it’s Colombia’s first metro system. It’s incredibly clean, efficient, and well-staffed, and many of the stations double as museum spaces, libraries, or music venues.
But there’s danger of the Metro having become somewhat fetishised for paisas (people from Antioquia) – strong pride and public focus on this one urban achievement blinds citizens and governments to the huge amount left to do.
Mobility alone cannot solve people’s problems. Many neighbourhoods have strong community organisation groups and powerful histories of communal action, but need state presence and resources to tackle security, infrastructure, and social issues.
The spectre of gentrification also stalks the arrival of metro stations, with some lifelong residents priced out of their own neighbourhoods.
“Infrastructural development cannot become just another driver of displacement,” says Simon Palacio, an anthropologist, who has been investigating life and infrastructure in Medellín’s barrios for ContraMiradas.
“Urban intervention policies must be integral and holistic, and should take into account the perspectives of individuals and community organisations that operate in the neighbourhoods – they are the ones who can formulate tools and actions – they understand the issues first hand.”
Flashy solutions become white elephants
Flashy solutions and tech-heavy innovation are not what’s needed for many on the outskirts of Medellín. They demand grinding, detailed, focused, and sustained attention.
The Biblioteca España is a looming symbol – one of Colombia’s great ‘white elephants’: a huge public space built alongside the Santo Domingo metrocable station. It’s a vast structure visible to half the valley – then hailed as a modernist masterpiece and a revolutionary approach to public space, now abandoned on the mountainside, veiled in black fabric. The project has spent years embroiled in various legal cases trying to assign blame to its structural failures and grand claims of future renovation.
Providing electricity is one of the many challenges in Medellín.
“Community solutions are in place, as has always been the case here, but that doesn’t change the fact that the responsibility lies with the state to ensure that residents enjoy dignified living conditions and basic rights – like water,” says Oberlader.
Leidy Joana Patiño arrived from the countryside of Antioquia, fleeing paramilitary violence against her family, and found shelter in barrio Granizal. But, like all residents, she has to collect drinking water from tanks dotted around the neighbourhood. What arrives in the pipes causes health problems in children – who then have to travel long distances down unpaved roads to reach health services.
“The water is so dirty, it arrives yellow. I use it to wash, but when I first got here, it made my daughter break out in boils,” she told me.
Clean water, health services, lawroads – many of these issues would be facilitated simply by the recognition that people are there and aren’t going anywhere: formalisation of landholding.
The road to recognition – water is a human right
A long legal process finally got the right to clean water recognised in Granizal (technically part of Bello – a part of the urban complex of Medellín’s valley) in 2019, in a legal appeal which recognised not only the state obligation, but that formalisation and regularization of land occupation would facilitate access to basic services.
“These services are not gifts, they are rather of the state to guarantee rights that are constitutionally enshrined. It is no longer ‘do me a favour’, it is no longer thanking officials for what they are doing, but rather it is from an understanding of rights,” said Jaime Agudelo, the lawyer who led the case against the municipality and its public service provider, EPM. This round was an appeal after the former won the initial case on the grounds of ‘logistical impossibility.’
The city is slowly pulling itself out of the coronavirus recession. Poverty rates are spiking and unmet basic needs are rising, and the city’s peripheries are weathering the worst of the economic storm.
As Colombia pats itself on the back for accepting Afghan refugees into the country, it might be time to look closer to home. According to Colombia’s Ombudsman, in the first half of this year, there have been 102 mass displacements in Colombia involving 45,000 victims. City governments might do well to take a more pragmatic approach to their own displaced citizens – or at least listen to them.
The ContraMiradas exhibition is at the EPM Library, Medellín, until the end of October 2021.
Emily Hart is an independent journalist based in Colombia – she’s just launched a weekly news digest: Colombia’s top news stories – curated, digested, and delivered straight to your phone every Monday as a 5-minute audio and text – sign up here for $5 per month!
Our regular column that gives a snapshot of Bogotá life takes us to the plaza outside Gran Estación.
The Plaza in front of Gran Estación. Photo: Creative commons, Jairo1005
At the edge of the Plaza Metropolitana de Los Alfiles, just before you step out onto the narrow service road that connects you to Calle 26, there’s a tree-lined strip with a humble row of palms. They won’t be the biggest trees you’ve ever seen – not compared to other palms – but they’re something to look at. It’s a strange choice of tree. You wouldn’t imagine that they’d be indigenous to Bogotá’s climate. Even less-so than the also non-native pines you see in Quebrada la Vieja, and yet they pop up randomly throughout the city.
You wonder how the conversation went between whoever made that decision and whoever financed it. Having recently gone to Home Center to do a bit of exotic tree seed shopping for reasons that aren’t really any of your business, I can tell you that palm trees are more expensive per unit than just about any other species you can grow in this part of the country. I mention that to say that there’s no way those palm trees ended up there by accident or as an afterthought.
I figure maybe they’re meant to put people at ease – a Jedi mind trick used to transport shoppers to an idyllic travel destination.The problem with that theory is that there aren’t enough palms in the plaza to convince you that you’ve even left Bogotá. Perhaps if there were, the maybe ten planted there wouldn’t seem so out of place.
Question of belonging
It’s a Sunday and I’ve been sitting in the Plaza for about an hour. I’m watching two kids – presumably siblings – duel with white plastic rods that, only moments earlier, were used to support balloons their dad bought them from a nearby éxito. The kids were running around absent-mindedly (as playing kids do) when, almost simultaneously, their balloons grazed the fronds of one of the palm trees and popped. Told you those trees don’t belong. You could say that about a lot of what you find in this city.
It seems like everyone in Bogotá owns a husky – perhaps a collective commentary on just how cold Bogotanos find it here – even though those dogs originate from and are genetically adapted to live in much colder climates. The same is true of the vallenatothat trumpets out of the speakers of your neighborhood fruteria. Costeño in origin, the songs typically talk of romance, warmth, and general humanity. While it’s not husky climate, the Costeño warmth is somewhat missing in La Nevera. I’d go as far as to say life in the fridge has surgically removed Bogotanos’ warmth, but those who come from less-friendly countries may disagree.
This thinking leads me to wonder about the mix of people that dwell in the city and a term that has been instituted to help distinguish those who were born in the city but whose parents come from other parts of the country (rolos) from those who, along with their parents, trace their lineage through Bogotá (cachacos). Though the former is starting to outnumber the latter in number, it still seems that those who belong to the second group cling to a particular sense of pride in being cachaco.
The distinction was always a confusing one for me. It’s been used to justify every shade of elitism imaginable (in Bogotá, they’re all just shades of grey), despite their being baseless. It stops just short – if only explicitly – of a condescending pat on the head that says: “your way is cute, but things should really be done our way,” because Colombia is a place that has always taken its marching orders from the capital. Logically, the more tightly woven into Bogotá your lineage, the more deserving you are of a seat at its table. It’s Draco Malfoy shaming Hermione Granger for being a mudblood: not something one usually hears in civilised conversation.
The irony of it all is that the more a place becomes a hub of importance, the more outside influence it attracts. Bogotá was never going to remain unidimensional, nor – I don’t think – was that ever the intention. After a while, you realize that all of the new wrinkles that work their way into the fold of the city’s fabric are like those palms in the Plaza Metropolitana de Los Alfiles: they may stick out at first, but in the end, somehow, they fit.
After a year and nearly a half-century of shows, the Bogotá Nights show has turned one. Presented by Brendan Corrigan of the Wrong Way blog alongside myself, deputy editor Oli Pritchard, the show is live every Thursday at 9pm.
We’ve covered a wide range of topics in their own inimitable styles, from different sets of protests to the national team to the weather. Often, the pair reflect on the differences between Colombia and their home countries (Ireland and the UK respectively) and the idiosyncrasies they see every week in Bogotá.
We’ve celebrated Colombian culture in various forms – talking about music, sports, TV and much more. We’ve also talked about travelling, with some of our favourite destinations being discussed, even as we’ve spent much of our broadcast time in lockdowns. That’s one subject both of us are happy to have left behind!
The pair of us share a deep love for the city, but our guiding line on the show (as with the newspaper) is that we see Bogotá like a sibling. While there’s a lot of love there, that’s also a reason for us to point out when we think the city is going wrong – and there’s been a lot of that in the past 12 months. Claudia López has certainly come in for criticism, especially over her attitude towards Venezuelan migrants, and we’ve not talked about the police in glowing terms.
We live in different parts of the city, which is another regular topic of conversation. I’m in the south of Chapinero while Brendan is in the far northern barrios, giving us very different views on the city. “Before Bogotá Nights and before the pandemic, I used to host IQuiz ‘The Bogotá Pub Quiz’ on the odd Thursday night,” says Brendan, “So in some ways, the show is a continuation of my infrequent interactions, virtual as they are, with the world outside the barrio of which I speak so regularly!”
For my part, it’s fascinating to find that we have more Colombian viewers than foreigners, and I’m always interested to see people’s reactions and comments. Brendan agrees: “What I enjoy most about it is the fact that it’s live, enabling viewers to engage and leave comments in real time, which is something you don’t get when doing a recorded podcast. And I guess it keeps one on the straight and narrow on a Thursday night when otherwise that may not be the case!”
To celebrate the anniversary show, we’re giving away free* (you must pay the airport fees and tax) Viva flights to Mexico as well as artisanal coffee. Tune in tonight to find out how to win those exciting prizes!
* In case you didn’t read the parenthesis, you need to pay the flight costs…
The only thing we know for sure right now is that Colombia will provide temporary shelter for Afghan evacuees en route to the US.
Gul Ahmad, 30, had two children and they left their home-town, Lashkargah, due to conflict and war. In the last few months, the conflict has escalated and there are over 18 million people in need of humanitarian assistance. Photo: UNICEF/UN0498794/UNICEF Afghanistan
As many Afghan citizens scramble to leave the country after the Taliban took back power, various countries, including Colombia, have agreed to help. Over 80,000 people have been flown out of Afghanistan in recent weeks.
President Iván Duque said last week that Colombia would receive an undefined number of Afghans on a temporary basis as they transit to the US. While no official figures have been released, the Wall Street Journal says Colombia has agreed to receive as many as 4,000 Afghans.
Tens of thousands of Afghans worked with the US government during 20 years of a US-led military coalition. Many may be eligible for special immigrant visas, but these will take time to process.
Those who already have visas can go straight to the US. Others will be sent to transit hubs like Colombia where they will stay while their paperwork is processed. Various countries, including Albania, Kosovo, northern Macedonia, Uganda, Costa Rica and Qatar have agreed to provide temporary housing for the evacuees.
Duque stressed that the US would bear all the costs involved in accommodating the Afghan migrants. “The United States will not only cover all the costs of caring for these people, but will also ensure it is diligent in all its processes, so the people who receive this shelter temporarily can arrive quickly to their country [the US] to regularize their immigration status,” he said.
Details are thin on the ground
Although US troops are scheduled to finish their withdrawal from Afghanistan by August 31, there’s no information yet on when the Afghans might reach Colombia.
Vice President and Foreign Minister, Marta Lucía Ramírez, told press on Monday that they don’t know how many people will arrive; when they will come; or what the breakdown of men, women and families will be. Indeed, the only thing they know for sure is that these people are coming and Colombia needs to be prepared.
“We need this vulnerable population who come from Afghanistan to arrive in a place where they feel welcomed, where they can stabilise themselves, where they can put their lives, feelings, heads in order, and get ready for the challenge of a new life in the United States,” she said.
Ramírez explained that while Barranquilla and Cali have offered to welcome the evacuees, the ideal scenario would be to keep them together so they could support one another. The vice president suggested Bogotá might be an option, but stressed no plans could be made until exact numbers are known.
According to the UN, Colombia hosts an estimated 1.7 million of the 4.6 million Venezuelan refugees. Colombia did announce earlier this year that Venezuelans could apply for Temporary Protection Status, which would give them access to healthcare and the possibility of employment. However, many migrants struggle with poverty, a lack of social and economic protections, and unemployment.
According to research by Brookings, international monetary support for Venezuelan refugees has been a lot lower than for other crises. It estimates that the total funding per refugee came to $3,150 per Syrian, $1,390 per South Sudanese, and just $265 per Venezuelan.
And while the US is preparing to accommodate Afghan refugees, thousands of migrants from other countries are trying to get to America through Colombia and Panama. According to data from The World, at least 46,000 migrants have crossed the Darién Gap already this year, which is more than the past three years combined.
Hundreds arrive in Necoclí each day, readying for the harrowing journey through the jungle. Necoclí has hit the headlines recently as the coastal town is overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of people trying to cross.
Duque stressed Colombia’s responsibility to human rights and to democracy, which is why he says it is joining the other transit hub countries. Ramírez stressed that Colombia is happy to be part of an international coalition helping Afghan women, activists, and others who worked with the US. Those are worthy statements. But it would be good if some of that assistance for Afghans also reached some of the other migrants struggling to get by.
Virtual tourism might help to quench your travel thirst and visit Colombia or anywhere in the world without leaving your home.
Sergio carries out a virtual tour. Photo: Sergio Navas
If travel restrictions have left you with a case of itchy feet, a new form of armchair travel might be just the ticket. With virtual tours, you can travel the world without worrying about Covid tests or quarantines.
Sergio Navas is one of the front runners of this progressive new approach to tour guiding – one of the hardest-hit industries by Covid travel restrictions. The concept of a virtual tour is novel yet basic. Guides conduct a tour on a digital platform, which is often live-streamed to viewers. Tourists can enjoy some of the aspects of international travel, all from the comfort of their own living room.
“What we do is basically a walking tour that you normally would take in a city that you are visiting,” explains the Bogotá based tour guide. And the technical side? He explains the tour is broadcast live through a cell phone whilst a stabiliser transmits it around the globe to the public.
Some may see virtual tourism as nothing more than a short-lived gimmick. But given that the World Travel & Tourism Council estimates that one in 10 people are employed in the tourism industry, it offers a significant number of people a chance to work online. Even while travel remains heavily limited in many countries.
The World Tourism Organization has stated that only 1% of countries are open for international travel without any form of Covid restrictions. In the face of worldwide reductions in tourism levels, it has called for “collaboration”, digital solutions and clear rules’, even making the hashtag #restarttourism popular.
Clearly, the role of digital tourism has never been as important as it is now.
Bogotá in all its glory. Photo: Sergio Navas
Virtual tourism has its benefits
Some may see virtual tourism as restrictive. But Sergio insists there are many benefits, such as being able to reach many more people at once. “If in real life I was walking with 10, 15 or 20 people maximum, in the virtual tours this number is multiplied by as many as you like,” he tells me. Some of his tours have even had audiences of up to 200 spectators.
Beyond convenience, virtual tours can only be a good thing for the planet. Tourism has long been recognised as a leading contributor to climate change and pollution levels. The General Secretary of the WTO has called the Covid crisis an “opportunity that, by reconstructing it, the [tourism] sector will be better, more sustainable, inclusive and resilient”.
So, could virtuality be the future of tourism?
Sergio isn’t sure. “It’s still a new business,” he said. “It’s not certain how sustainable it will be in the future and what market it will continue to have,” he adds. It seems the arrival of both the vaccines and the summer have led to a “quite important- drop in the number of spectators” he explains. “So, the fewer people at home, the fewer people watching tours.”
See the streets of Bogotá from your front room with a virtual tour. Photo: Sergio Navas
Local knowledge is key
If you’re unsure about taking a virtual tour, Sergio insists it’s more engaging than some may think. “You can expect it to be really fun; in truth it’s better than it sounds and I personally go on other people’s virtual tours,” he assures me. In part, this is because nearly all tour guides are locals. This allows the audience to tour the area alongside the in-depth knowledge of a resident, or as Sergio puts it “with a visa.”
Sergio’s virtual tours go far beyond just highlighting the cultural and historical highlights of Bogotá. Whilst you can tour the city’s flea markets or its historic centre, some of Sergio’s tours also have political and social themes.
Sergio tells me “there are also tours which talk a little about the current situation, for example with all these protests and marches that took place in Colombia in the last two months.” He carried out tours during the protests which originally stemmed from the government’s tax reform and spiralled into almost two months of demonstrations.
Whether it’s learning about new political issues or just supporting local tourism, perhaps taking a virtual tour can do even more than just quench the thirst for travel during Covid times. If you’d like to find Sergio online and check out some of his tours, you can find him on his instagram or on heygo to book a tour.
Thousands of people took part in peaceful independence day protests throughout Colombia today.
Protestors gather in Héroes, the focal point for protests in central Bogotá today. Photo: Ethan Jacobs
Nationwide, Colombians from all sides of the political spectrum waited to see how today’s marches would unfold. Normally Bogotá hosts an independence day show of state strength, with parades from special forces and military hardware, capped off with a flypast from the Air Force. This year, there was a similar display, but it was not just for show.
The demonstrations that had been paused in June were set to restart and — fuelled by rumours of potential ELN activity — the police were out in force.
A lot of people in towns and cities throughout Colombia did take to the streets today. But it was still a far cry from early May, when we saw tens of thousands of people. In part, that’s due to protest fatigue, in part a lack of focus, and in part the heavy police presence and government warnings.
A heavy police presence in Bogotá’s city centre. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Colombia’s independence day protests
Marches and activities took place across Colombia, from Bogotá and Medellín to Cali, Barranquilla, Cartagena, Manizales, Popayán and other major cities. In Bogotá, there were over 45 official points for protests, sit-ins, concerts, and artistic events.
The police strategy in the capital seemed to be focused around keeping the centre clear and restricting major disruption to the periphery of the city. Plaza Bolívar and the surrounding area was completely barricaded off by police for around five blocks.
While the demonstrations unfolded peacefully for much of the day, as we write, there are reports of clashes with police in various places, including Cali which has been the epicentre of much of the violence this year.
Around lunchtime, a group of protestors in Manizales toppled a statue of Francisco de Paula Santander. In May, demonstrators in Popayán had also destroyed a statue of Santander who some see as a symbol of law and order.
Outside of these flare ups, for the most part, the protests were peaceful. The biggest upset was that transport in most major cities was disrupted.
Independence day protests in Bogotá
The Parque Nacional site was almost completely empty today, much like the centre. Only a few people gathered in Parque de los Hippies and there was a heavy preemptive police presence in much of Chapinero.
Only a smattering of people by the Museo Nacional. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Héroes was the only major central gathering point, with around 5,000 protestors creating a sort of carnival atmosphere. Other sites ranged from just 20 at Banderas to around 500 at Portal 80.
It was a different story in the south and west of the capital though. Predictably, stone throwing started late afternoon at Portal de las Américas, followed by a similarly predictable police response of tear gas and water cannons. After that, now-familiar running battles between police and protestors continued. Similar scenes also broke out at Usme and on Calle 80 with Avenida Cali. Again, numbers remained small, with less than 500 people at each site.
After so many protests, this feels like a well-rehearsed routine. People gathered in certain sites, mainly Portales and a few monuments. Singing and dancing through the early afternoon in a largely peaceful manner. Sometime between 4pm and 5pm the Esmad riot police turn up and protestors throw rocks thrown. They then respond with tear gas, water cannons and batons, descending into running clashes until around 7pm. Transport also shuts down with the arrival of Esmad.
Independence day protests at the Avenida Cali today. Photo: Claudia Canizales
Why are people still protesting?
In mid-June, the Comité Nacional del Paro opted for a temporary halt to what had been almost two months of protests. At that point, almost 70 people had died in violent clashes with police. There were also reports of disappearances and sexual violence. With COVID numbers reaching a third peak, public patience for continued disruption was running thin. Numbers were steadily dwindling with each further week of protest.
So why are people protesting? The big issue is that so little has changed since the mass protests of 2019. Indeed, the pandemic has magnified inequality, poverty, and a host of other issues. The government’s implementation of the peace accord has moved incredibly slowly, despite promising progress from the JEP. Killings of social leaders continue at a worrying level and there’s been a dramatic increase in armed violence in rural Colombia.
Today was not only independence day, it was also the beginning of a new legislative session in Congress and the day the strike committee had proposed to re-commence demonstrations.
In theory, it was supposed to be a chance for people to show their support for the strike committee’s wish list. This includes money for the most vulnerable, access to free education, and health reform. But in reality, it is hard to pin down exactly what today was even about.
The protests that started in late April encompassed many things, but were given focus by resistance to the Reforma Tributaria. Some union groups in the centre today were calling for changes to the healthcare system. But apart from that, there were few clear aims on display. What was present was the familiar howl of anger that has been reverberating around the country since at least 2019.
The Colombian flag is waved by protestors and police alike. Photos: Oli Pritchard.
Love for the country is one of the few things that generally pulls Colombia together rather than apart.
Tomorrow is Colombia’s independence day, and it’s hard to know what’s going to happen. There will be another national strike. It might be big, it might be small, there may be incidents or there may not. There have been all kinds of claims and suggestions. One thing we do know is that Colombian tricolores will be everywhere.
As a symbol, the Colombian flag is very much up for grabs. Álvaro Uribe plays on patriotism often, calling himself El Gran Colombiano. The C in FARC stood for Colombia, and they had tricolores on their uniforms, as do the Policia Nacional. Duque talks often of patriotism and flags fly on his desk and over his building, just as they do in the multitudes protesting against him.
So the tricolor is a banner that has many armies marching under it. Tomorrow, we’ll see protestors proudly bearing the flag to show they represent the people, facing off against police who have the flag sewn into their uniforms to represent their connection to the people. The president will stand under the Colombian flag, possibly with a tricoloured sash as well, showing that he represents the people too, as do all the opposition politicians. In the end, the flag represents everybody and therefore nobody.
Not just the flag, but in fact all the trappings of nationalism and patriotism (while they’re different, there’s plenty of crossover) are used in abundance. National team shirts are standard attire on protests, whether for the left or the right of politics. There’s a subset of protestors that retain the flag but invert it – showing that they believe the administration is betraying the country.
Footballer fans wave the Colombian flag, no matter what the team. Photo: Carl Worswick
Flag waving can have different connotations
For an Englishman such as myself, it’s all a little strange. The flag of England has had a bad reputation over the years, partially reclaimed by football. Certainly, for most of my life, it was explicitly connected to racism and violent neo-nazi groups. Of course, patriotism for the English is very different than for Colombians: many countries have independence from the British Empire, there is no freedom day for the English themselves, despite what Boris Johnson says.
Some of that carries over for me in Colombia – I’m uncomfortable with the flag-waving and chest-beating that still accompanies a lot of patriotic fervour. Luckily, Colombian flag fervour doesn’t seem to translate into xenophobia and racism. While both of those are problems that do exist, this isn’t the symbol that they use. The tricolor seems to genuinely include all Colombians, although some indigenous groups choose to eschew it.
The key in all this is trying to harness the power of all that nationalism and patriotism. While it might not be comfortable for someone like myself, the fact remains that Colombians are fiercely patriotic and rarely go too far into the darker depths of full-on nationalism. If a politician could subvert that for their own machiavellian ends, the results could well be horrifying. It’s a force that’s often gone that way – as Europeans have seen all too many times in the past.
A pro-police rally also features the Colombian flag.
The Colombian flag symbolizes national pride
In the end, it seems that the flag is a symbol of unification. If you speak to ten Colombians you’ll usually get 11 or more opinions on most subjects. But there’s a widespread agreement that the flag matters and patriotism is important. While there’s often violent disagreement about the path the country should take, the vast majority care deeply about their country. After years of stigmatisation and emigration, Colombians from all parts of society are again speaking proudly of their country and haven’t allowed any single faction to place themselves as the guardians of patriotism.
Our series that gives a snapshot of different corners of Bogotá visits a place that’s familiar to many foreigners in Colombia. The offices of Migración.
The queue outside Migración. Photo: Ethan Jacobs.
Tuesday, 20 October, 2020 10:00 am
A nun, two blondes, and a member of the Ejercito walk into the Migración. They immediately turn around and walk back out – wrong forms. The first part could very well be the set-up to some Colombianised joke I haven’t heard before. The second could very well be a standard Tuesday. You never seem to hear anyone speaking in glowing terms about their experience at this place.
It’s 10 in the morning. I got here 30 minutes ago, not wanting to be late for an appointment I was urged to make, and somehow it’s still unlikely I’ll get seen anytime soon. There’s a line but it’s unclear what purpose it’s serving. Everyone, at some point, makes their way to the front of the queue past those who’ve been waiting to plead their case.
You see it on their faces as they walk up: They believe their circumstances are unique enough to grant them expedited access. Surprisingly, they’re not. Listening in on the grace with which the civil servants – clad in polo shirts, cargo pants and, for reasons I still can’t wrap my head around, combat boots – turn these people away is one of the few treats of this whole ordeal.
You can tell they have their lines memorised, though they never turn down the opportunity to take artistic license in deviating wherever possible. “Yes, this is the correct line. Yes, they all have appointments. I’m sorry, no walk-ins.”
If you’re overly insistent, they may ask you what your appointment is for. You’ll tell them and they’ll ask to see your appointment confirmation email. They’ll pause, reflectively, before solemnly informing you that you’ve scheduled the wrong kind of meeting. You’ll have to reschedule for another day. Less-insistent visitors turn around and head to the back. I trace their path to the end of the line with more schadenfreude than sympathy, haphazardly sizing up everyone else as I do.
It’s amazing that on any given day, Migración draws the most diverse cross-section of people you’ll likely find in one place in Bogotá, and still, each person has the exact same facial expression. It’s something between anxiety and exasperation, probably more of the latter the longer you’ve been waiting. Kids, thankfully, are immune to this, still too young to sense the crippling bureaucracy that has slowly crushed the spirits of everyone else in line.
I’m finally allowed in, processed, and shunted to the building’s fifth floor. There are no people there, just boxes and boxes of files – presumably of everyone who’s run afoul of those in power. I wait. Looking around this and other parts of the building, you become aware of how often the Colombian flag is displayed in various forms and sizes. They’ll tell you that the red strip at the bottom of it represents the blood spilt for Colombia’s independence. In reality, it’s a subtle reminder of the red tape that underlies every single legal process that transpires here.
Finally, a woman shows up. I pass her my papers and cédula, explaining my circumstances. She pauses, looking up reflectively before informing me that I’ve scheduled the wrong appointment. I’ll have to come back another day.
Ken Loach’s latest film is currently available in Colombian cinemas.
Sorry We Missed You is available in cinemas this week.
The new film by acclaimed director Ken Loach Sorry We Missed You has just hit national theatres. It serves as a companion piece to his previous films I, Daniel Blake. Both movies deal with the problems and struggles working class people in the UK have to endure in this modern society. The realistic approach boosts the story above the average social drama you can find in similar movies.
The film cast consists of non-actors or lesser-known actors, led by an amazing performance from Kirs Hitchen. Hitchen portrays a father who not only has to manage to provide for his family but must also deal with his rebel young son and the financial problems surrounding his household.
Ken Loach is known for his naturalistic approach to filmmaking, using as little film equipment as possible, and placing real people in front of the camera. This approach (quite common in the Colombian filmmaking landscape) allows the film to detach itself from artificiality. It makes everything more believable, more grounded. As a result, the film can be gut-wrenching at points — the struggles this family goes through can hit too close to home.
In Sorry We Missed You, we find the usual problems and dilemmas faced by working-class, low-income families. And, in this case, the decisions and the pressures they have to endure while dealing with marital problems.
The director masterfully manages to make us empathise with our main protagonist. We just want him to get a break from all the bad things that happen throughout the film, to overcome the incessant obstacles that life throws at him. We are able to understand where he’s coming from and what’s keeping him away from obtaining what he desires.
There are a couple of moments in the film that can leave the viewer exhausted, desolated, speechless. These are moments where we can see the true self of our characters, where they speak up their mind and we are confronted with the harsh reality the film wants us to be aware of. The film’s sincerity and brutality towards its subjects leave us feeling helpless. But that is also the point of it all, the main goal of Ken Loach’s filmography as well.
The movie is quite simple, but in its simplicity the film excels. The approach that Loach used to film this story not only can be called natural but also minimalistic. And that’s the secret to the film’s success, that’s why it is worth it. It does more with less and says a lot with a few details. This movie departs from narrative conventions: Here we do not have heroes or happy endings, only real life.
If it’s your turn to get vaccinated in Bogotá, here’s how it went for our writer. It wasn’t quick, but it’s relatively easy.
Queuing to get vaccinated in Bogotá. Photo: Oli Pritchard
A couple of weeks ago my university told me that I was part of Group Three for vaccinations and as such could get vaccinated. I decided to wait a while as I still had classes and there were probably teachers more in need of it. Classes finished this week, so it was time to get vaccinated. I’d been told I’d need a certificado laboral to prove I was a uni worker, as well as the usual things such as my cédula. No problema.
Navigating the website: Thursday 16:00
I log onto the website to organise my vaccine jab and am confronted by a range of options. San Ignacio is almost visible from my house, so I try that. There’s a lot of information to scroll through, but all fairly easy and fairly self-explanatory. Helpfully, there’s also plenty of information and advice about potential problems. Having navigated it all, there’s a separate page to register as part of grupo tres. Nice. I go and do that, then return to the main page. It’s all smooth sailing… And then I see I can only schedule today or two days hence. And all days at San Ignacio are fully booked. No worries, I’ll try early tomorrow to see if more appointments are available then.
Making an appointment: Friday 09:00
I log back on in the morning and find I have to navigate almost all of the main page again. Once again, there are no days free for San Ignacio. It’s small, I think, so I try going through the page for Avenida Chile. At 4km away it’s not far. Bingo! There are slots all through today, tomorrow and Sunday. Great.
I make an appointment for 14:20 this afternoon and that’s that. Instant confirmation, which I screenshot and call up on my phone. It tells me to download and sign a consent form. Nice and simple, so I get a few chores done (including printing that consent form), took the dogs for a quick walk and headed off to Avenida Chile for my date with the syringe.
Arriving for my vaccination: Friday 14:00
I arrived at Avenida Chile, found the correct entrance point and proudly showed the security guards my appointment and apologised for arriving early. Unimpressed, they sent me to the back of the line. The appointment turned out to have been a complete waste of time. All my queue neighbours hadn’t made appointments and we were all in the same boat. There are yellow strips on the floor indicating 2m distancing, but they’re largely ignored.
A few minutes later a miVacuna guy comes round with the consent form, so it turns out printing that off was also a waste of time. He refuses to believe that I can be vaccinated as a foreigner, but I stick to my guns. It helped enormously that I had data on my phone. I navigated to the relevant page and showed him my confirmation of Group 3 status. Grumpily, he handed me a turno ticket and told me to hold on to it. It must be important.
Getting vaccinated in Bogotá was pretty straightforward. Photo: Oli Pritchard.
Running late: Friday 14:20
The appointment will not be on time. We have moved around the corner, and I’m about 30 people further forward. After a little while, a security guard comes and checks with me, saying a Polish woman was turned away in the morning. I assure him that my papers are in order and he’s much nicer than the miVacuna guy was. He tells me that the system of appointments is useless. This is because the Pfizer vaccination is slowing everything down and also they have half the doses they should have. Maybe it’s true, maybe it’s not.
Moving along the queue: Friday 14:40
“Cédulas, consent forms and turn tickets in hand,” barks the head security guy. Twenty or so of us are called forward to check those three things. We’re let into the mall. For a minute it’s not clear where to go, we really are in the mall with all the shoppers. Eventually, a miVacuna shirt pops up and beckons us over to the side, downstairs, along corridors and all the way into the car park.
There we are asked again for the consent form and verbal confirmation of EPS, although there’s no further check of the turn ticket or eligibility for vaccination. There are four lines for vaccination – SinoVac (first), SinoVac (second), AstraZeneca and Janssen. I choose Janssen and walk through to the first available seat. There’s no pressure to go one way or the other, although I imagine you’d have to show first vaccination proof if you wanted SinoVac two. Things are going smoothly so far.
A bit more waiting: Friday 15:30
Good thing I brought a book to read. This is by far the longest period of waiting and it’s not clear what’s happening. A lady eventually comes round to check our papers – she looks at the screenshots I’ve taken of my confirmations, takes my cédula and confirms my registration. She stamps and signs her part on my consent form. Doesn’t want to see my certificado laboral, so that was another waste of time too. On the other hand, there’s a dog in the queue, so that cheers me up.
Getting vaccinated in Bogtá: Friday 16:00
We’re called up, finally. Our consent forms are taken and back into the mall we go. This time we’re really in it, riding on escalators and everything. We arrive at a third-floor lot that’s been commandeered for vaccinations. This is it, the final boss stage. Our cédulas are taken from us and we’re asked to wait for a couple of minutes, before being brought into the room. There are three nurses there and 20 seats. We’re lined up in rows of five, but there are still three empty seats. The head nurse apologetically tells us that we have to wait to fill the twenty as the vaccine comes in rounds of five. That’s the most explanation I’ve had all day, I think. She runs through the basic details, does anyone have conditions etc or feel bad?
From here it’s fast. Two by two we go to the front, get a solid jab (I really felt it in the muscle) and that’s it. After a few minutes, everyone gets their vaccine documentation and cédula back. Mine has been filled out wrong, so I request a change, fearing officious immigration types in the future. That’s quickly done and the party is over. Two and a half hours after entering the line, I’m blinking into the setting sun and strolling to the transmi. It could have been worse.
The Tour de France 2021 is about to start and after Giro d’Italia success with Egan Bernal earlier this year, cycling fans in Colombia can’t wait for a new grand tour.
In three weeks, the Tour de France will finish on the Champs-Élysées. Photo: A.S.O./Alex Broadway
The biggest chance of success for the escarabajos seems to come from Rigoberto Urán. El toro de urrao showed his form by winning the mountainous time trial stage in the Tour of Switzerland. In 2017, the leader of Team Education-Nippo was already close to the yellow jersey when he finished second, within a minute of winner Chris Froome. This time he isn’t expected to get any competition from Froome. The Brit will compete for Israel Start-Up Nation but after a crash in 2019, is far from the level he had before.
In Rigo’s quest for success, he’ll be supported by luxury domestique Sergio Higuita. The 23-year-old from Medellín already marked his name on the biggest stage in 2019 by winning a stage in the Vuelta a España, his first ever grand tour.
Miguel Ángel Superman López will also fancy his chances in this year’s Tour de France, but as is usually the case with Movistar, he will first have to compete with teammate Enric Mas and good old Alejandro Valverde to see whether he will get full support from his team. Superman López impressed on Mont Ventoux a few weeks ago, by blowing his competition away in the Mont Ventoux Dénivelé Challenge. The competition wasn’t too strong, but his climbing time in the single stage race was a minute faster than Chris Froome recorded in his maiden Tour de France victory. With a double Ventoux ascent on stage 11 (July 7), that bodes well.
Nairo Quintana will also have another shot at a tour victory. The Boyacense, who twice came second in the competition behind Froome, has been racing for the smaller Team Arkéa Samsic, where he will get full support to go for the Tour de France victory. Nairo mostly played hide-and-seek in the preparation, so it is hard to say whether he has got a serious chance to win it, but he seems an outsider for the yellow jersey.
After the big three and Higuita we will probably see Sergio Luis Henao for Team Qhubeka – Nexthash and Esteban Chaves for Team BikeExchange in a free role going for stage victories.
The three leading Colombians are definite contenders for the top ten and maybe even for a podium spot, but the competition will be tough. Last year’s winner Tadej Pogacar is all set to defend his yellow jersey and Jumbo – Visma has built their entire team around getting Primoz Roglic his first Tour de France victory.
Team Ineos comes to the Tour de France without Egan Bernal. The Tour winner from 2019 successfully set his sights on the Giro d’Italia earlier this season and will also be part of Team Ineos’s Vuelta a España line up later this year. Nevertheless, Ineos is probably considered the strongest team in the race. With Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz, Brits Geraint Thomas and Tao Geoghegan Hart and Richie Porte from Australia, they have four potential winners in their ranks.
The Tour de France 2021 will start this Saturday and finishes on Sunday, July 18 on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.
The government announces ambitious plans to ease out of the crisis. But it could get worse before it gets better.
Front-line medical staff on a COVID-19 ward. In some parts of the country, intensive care wards have reached 100% occupancy during the latest peak. Photo: Steve Hide
After 14 months of crisis, and in the midst of a deadly third peak currently killing a record-breaking 500 people daily in recent weeks – including many younger deaths – Colombian health authorities have announced a phase-out of COVID-19 restrictions designed to contain the virus.
The question for many people, particularly in cities such as Bogotá, is: “What restrictions?” Apart from adherence to facemasks, to casual observers, the streets of the city have been operating near-normally for at least the last month.
Where we can expect changes now are in schools and colleges, international travel, sport and the hospitality sector. Key changes we can expect locally and nationally are:
No need for COVID-19 tests, tracing apps and quarantines for both national and international flights (inbound) from June 8.
Progressive return to presential school classes from July 15.
Near-normal operation of restaurants and food outlets
Easing restrictions on sporting and cultural events, late night bars and discos.
Another question for many Colombians is: “Why now?”
The country is in 10th place worldwide for active COVID cases, and 19th place for accumulated deaths per population. But historically Colombia has done better than both the USA and UK in terms of accumulated deaths per population. This suggests some agility in its COVID-19 response. But cases are higher than ever. Can Colombia get the re-opening right?
Communities need fixing
One politician leading the charge for a return to normality is Bogotá Mayor Claudia López, the same who pushed for stricter lockdowns in April last year.
Undoubtedly, she had read the runes of social unrest that unravelled last month into six weeks of protests and deadly riots leaving 60 people dead.
The clashes were initially anger at tax reform, but then a dam-break of frustration in poor barrios left even poorer by COVID-19 – and its restrictions – even as wealthy Colombians were flying to Miami to jump the vaccine queue, gracias a Uncle Sam.
Even the mayor admitted the contradiction in starting to end COVID-19 restrictions in the current peak. But she pointed out that communities need fixing.
“From the point of view of the social, economic and political context, with deep institutional mistrust, unacceptable poverty and unemployment that is especially affecting women and young people, it is necessary to do so,” she explained.
Behind this realpolitik is some political handwashing. Bogotá’s supreme leader was widely ignored in May when she implored the city’s angry youth to “stay home” to avoid the protest marches which many predicted would create superspreader events.
A medical doctor working in COVID-19 expressed to The Bogotá Post last week: “There’s no point keeping half of Bogotá locked down if the other half are crowding the streets. And if the hospitals overflow, the protesters share some blame.”
The fact remains that Bogotá’s buses were filling up even before the paros, and popular excursions such as the weekend walk up to Monserrate are more crowded than street marches.
But no-one doubts the dangers ahead for the capital, or where the blame will lie if it goes wrong.
Is COVID past its peak?
For a start, the assertion by Mayor López that Bogotá has “past the COVID-19 peak” is probably premature. Cases are on a plateau and could rise again before they go down, raising the spectre of hospitals closing their doors to the dying – an uncomfortable scenario.
Bogotá, with ten million inhabitants, has already seen the lion’s share of coronavirus with 28% of the country’s 3.5 million cases reported to date, and nearly a quarter of the 90,000 deaths.
Mayor López announced the roll-back of restrictions the same week the city saw a record 160 daily deaths, and Intensive Care Unit COVID beds occupancy briefly reaching 100%. This is a tipping point where the survival chances of critically ill patients are reduced to zero as desperate families find hospitals to take in their loved ones.
Studies have shown a correlation between ICU occupancy and survival rates: The fuller the beds the less chance individual patients have of making out alive as medical staff and supplies such as oxygen are stretched to the limit.
And it’s not just COVID: Bogotá counts on 2,736 ICU beds of which 2,262 are for COVID-19 patients. But as these fill up, and with general shortages of staff and supplies, there is also intense pressure on non-COVID beds which often cater for the city’s high levels of accident victims, often related to road carnage after late-night booze on weekends.
This was one reason that city leaders had imposed curfews and alcohol restrictions during the last year.
Step by step reactivation
How will the system cope with peak COVID and a population off the leash and on the lash?
This concern has led to some back-peddling from the health authorities with a narrative change from “raising all restrictions” to “step by step reactivation” across the country according to health indicators.
The COVID-19 vaccine uptake and prevalence of COVID-19 in the community (immunity acquired by vaccination or exposure to the disease itself).
The strength of the local hospitals.
The COVID test and trace levels.
The system, which is not unlike some of the “traffic light” schemes in other countries, will give a score between 0 and 1 for each area. Areas that score closer to 1 will have fewer restrictions.
Like most countries, Colombia’s Health Ministry is counting on COVID-19 vaccination as the only sure way out of the crisis.
The IREM scheme gives a pay-off for local leaders to promote their local vaccine rollout as they can tell their communities: “Hey, you want us to open the discos – well get the jab.” Keeping cases low and ICU occupancy rates below 85% will bring real benefits, the health minister explained last week.
In contrast, rising rates could bring new restrictions.
Key to ending restrictions will be the accelerating vaccination campaign. This month Colombia is vaccinating over-50s, some key workers and other vulnerable groups. To date, around 20% of the population has had at least one jab of Pfizer, Astra Zeneca or Sinovac vaccine and has secured enough vaccines for the coming months.
The Health Ministry has also announced the start of private jabs with the Chinese Sinovac vaccine – now WHO-approved – via companies wishing to accelerate vaccination of their employees.
Colombia’s COVID-19 deaths are on a high plateau of 500 per day in June 2021.
As we reported last month, the vaccine impact has already been seen in a massive reduction in cases and deaths among health workers, the first to be vaccinated in March this year. It is too early to see the impact on the general population. The high death rate is related to people infected before the vaccines, or in younger persons yet to get the jab.
A plan to level up
How will the IREM scheme work in the real world?
Probably not perfectly.
COVID-19 data is already weak in many areas of Colombia – some estimates suggest that real cases and deaths are 30% higher than reported. And tying benefits to results could create a perverse incentive for authorities to cover up COVD-19 cases, as is already happening.
Poorer communities, already disadvantaged in terms of health services, are likely to see slower vaccination rollout and reduced chances to meet IREM indicators. A plan designed to level up the Estrato Unos could have the reverse effect as swanky areas pull ahead.
Still, most people in Colombia welcome any chance to get out of the COVD crisis and return to bars, dances, discos, church services, or football matches.
But, for many, the lurking question is this: Is the worst of coronavirus still to come?
Strikes and protests in May 2021 could have contributed to COVID-19 cases.
Universities won’t listen, but social media will. Here’s how student groups are making sure that cases of sexual harassment don’t remain hidden.
Every year, women at Universidad Externado uncover the pot and denounce sexual violence on campus. Photo: Daniel Figueroa
Sexual abuse and harassment in universities are more common than people may think. And protocols for these kinds of cases are even more outdated. In Colombia, the statistics are concerning. Teachers and students have been accused of sexual aggression. Women are tired and they won’t stay silent any longer. We speak to some of the students pushing for reform.
Female students have held protests and marches to fight against sexism and sexual aggression. Most universities have at least one public testimony of campus harassment. But the support systems and protocols for handling accusations of harassment are insufficient. Many victims don’t believe they will be supported if they come forward, and that universities won’t take their stories seriously.
In fact, the few protocols that do exist in universities to handle cases of sexual aggression were introduced as a result of pressure from student groups — not by the universities themselves.
Harassment on social media exposed
In 2019 Rebelión en la granja, a movement created by female students at the Universidad Nacional, used Twitter to expose a group named FEDEGAN. This was WhatsApp group of male students who shared intimate pictures of female students from the university and schools nearby.
Desde el inicio fueron conscientes de que pasaba en el grupo y participaban activamente enviando fotos íntimas de las chicas con las que ellos habían salido, humillando, hipersexualizando y cosificando a cada una.
— La Rebelión de la Granja (@rebelionngranja) July 13, 2020
The same year, the Bolivar en falda collective was formed in the Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana (UPB) to address a case of campus harassment. A male student had lifted the skirt of a female student. The university’s response was basically to tell female students not to wear skirts or any kind of inappropriate clothes. Unsurprisingly, it created outrage.
Maria Alejandra Restrepo, a UPB student, says that in 2020 a girl denounced harassment from a professor on Instagram. Other girls then added their stories to hers.
“She also told us that men will be men and that there’s much harassment in life so we better get used to it. There is so much effort by female students, but the university has to stop covering for aggressors.”
“An advisor told us that we shouldn’t damage the [university’s] good name on Instagram ‘without proof’, that we should report it to Bienestar Universitario instead. But we knew that some girls tried and it was even worse,” said Maria Alejandra. “She also told us that men will be men and that there’s much harassment in life so we better get used to it. There is so much effort by female students but the university has to stop covering for aggressors.”
Franja Roja formed in Medellín
The Universidad de Medellín didn’t have any procedures for dealing with harassment until last year. A group of students put forward a proposal for how victims could denounce sexism in the university. The gender collective Franja Roja was created in that year.
“It’s very hard to discuss that with your female classmates and hear them say, ‘it happened to me too.’ There are too many cases and the institution does nothing,” said the co-founder of Franja Roja, Manuela Alcalá. “The university covers the aggressor, not so much for the person but for the name of the university”.
“We created Franja Roja as a proposal for a contest in the university, that’s why we have protocols. So what? Do we have to wait three years more so we can have protocols for every type of violence?”, said Mariana Giraldo, founder of Franja Roja.
Gender committees push universities to set up protocols
The gender committee of the Universidad Pedagógica y Tecnológica de Colombia (UPTC) was created in 2018. Alejandra Navarro, a member of the committee said, “Before the committee, there were no protocols in the university, when we started working on it we realized there was nothing”. Those protocols in the UPTC were the result of the pressure from the student movement and the committee.
Even though it is supposed to be a liberal university, the Universidad Externado is no exception. Before 2018, the university didn’t have any protocols to handle allegations of sexism.
Uncovering the pot
Destapemos La Olla (DLO) is the only feminist collective in the Externado University. It is a safe space where women can denounce harassment or sexual abuse and get support and advice.
“There was a group of friends, two of them had suffered harassment by two men from the university. They wanted to denounce but there were no protocols without them being revictimized. Those girls decided to create the collective so they could have another “face” to denounce harassment without affecting themselves individually”, said Daniela López, a member of Destapemos La Olla.
DLO was created on March 8, 2018, the members of the collective wanted to destapar la olla – uncover the pot of violence that takes place in the university. “We uncovered the pot for the first time because we were tired of the harassment and sexual abuse that is covered up in there”, they said. Destapemos La Olla has uncovered the pot every year since 2018.
“Uncover the pot is to take visibility and point out the gender violence that happens in the university”. Since 2018, DLO picks up testimonies of violence against women from female students to read them in a public place of the university to create awareness.
Colombia could be one of the big winners from the recent implementation of an outsourcing ban in Mexico, which is set to severely restrict a type of employment arrangement that is popular among foreign investors and potentially cost the North American country millions of jobs.
The outsourcing ban, which was passed into law on April 23 with the endorsement of populist President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, is designed to close a loophole that has seen companies avoid tax and employee benefits via outsourcing arrangements, and which has contributed to a major spike in outsourcing in the country over the past two decades.
President López, who is known as “Amlo,” had been promoting the legislation since the second half of 2020, despite suggestions it could cost millions of jobs, and he quickly moved to sign off on the new bill after it passed through both houses of the Mexican legislature in just a week.
It stipulates that workers engaged in “core business activities” cannot be outsourced, and that such outsourced workers must be brought onto company payrolls within three months. It also forces outsourcing companies to provide the same benefits to outsourced employees as they would enjoy if directly employed, improving profit shares.
This will effectively eliminate a large portion of professional employer organization (PEO) services, a popular outsourcing option among investors because it allows them to hire staff overseas without having to establish a local legal entity. PEO services can also be known as employer of record (EOR) services.
Many of the staff employed via EOR arrangements throughout Latin America are engaged in what could be considered “core business activities.” That will leave EOR clients affected by the ban having to choose between business formation in Mexico or taking their business elsewhere.
For clients who benefit most from the convenience of an EOR arrangement, and are not necessarily tied to having their outsourced staff in one particular place, Mexico’s biggest regional competitors, such as Colombia and Chile, as well as the nearby sub-region of Central America, appear to be well placed to benefit.
Why Colombia Could Benefit from Mexico’s Outsourcing Ban
Colombia stands to benefit from Mexico’s outsourcing ban because of a mix of its geopolitical location, well-established investment ecosystem, and growing tech sector and related workforce.
Geopolitical location
There is no denying that one of the big draws to doing business in Mexico is its status as a trade hub and proximity to the largest market on the planet — the United States. While Colombia obviously doesn’t benefit from sharing a land border with the global superpower, it is still less than seven hours by plane between Bogotá and Los Angeles or New York, while Cartagena and Miami are just a three-hour flight away.
What’s more, Colombia’s status as one of the closest regional allies of the US, as well as the large Colombian population in the North American country, means there are strong economic ties and significant commerce and traffic between the countries.
In terms of trade, Colombia also benefits from major ports that serve both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, while it is closer to some of the other key regional economies, such as Argentina, Chile, and Peru, not to mention the region’s powerhouse Brazil.
As such, for companies whose Latin American business is not concentrated in Mexico — or whose plans involve expanding further into the region — Colombia offers a central location with easy access to the entire Americas region.
Business-friendly environment
Another big pull factor in Colombia’s favour is the business-friendly conditions the country maintains and growing interest among international investors, which saw foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows grow almost ten-fold between 1999 and 2019.
Hiring through an EOR in Colombia is a popular option among investors, and is not going to be subject to the kind of ban that Mexico has implemented any time soon, making it a good alternative for anyone forced to look elsewhere by that ban.
Meanwhile, the country continues to promote entrepreneurship and innovation, as highlighted by the 2019/20 edition of the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, in which Colombia scored better than the worldwide average in terms of government policies in support of enterprise, government-run entrepreneurship programmes, and post-school stage education.
That in part explains how Colombia has been able to emerge as a tech and innovation hub in the region, with Medellín and Bogotá boasting well-developed and growing startup scenes, and other cities throwing their weight behind support for innovation.
Growing tech sector
That leads to the final reason why Colombia stands to benefit: its rapidly growing tech and startup ecosystem, which means there is a ready supply of providers and talent in the country.
While Bogotá and Medellín are known as the major hubs of innovation, cities such as Cali and Barranquilla have seen significant growth in their tech sectors. This in combination with the educational opportunities on offer adds up to a growing pool of technicians and other skilled workers.
Such workers are commonly contracted via outsourcing arrangements to undertake what could be considered “core business activities,” making Colombia well-placed to sweep up contracts that can no longer be met in Mexico.
Meanwhile, Colombia also boasts growth in other commonly outsourced or increasingly in-demand services, such as the contact centre industry. As such, the supply of talent on offer in the South American country will become increasingly interesting to companies forced to look beyond Mexico.
All of these factors add up to Colombia being in a particularly strong position to capitalize on the recent outsourcing ban implemented by Mexico, which could prove a boon to the country’s economy as it looks to battle back from the damage caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Craig Dempsey is the co-founder and CEO of Biz Latin Hub, a company dedicated to providing legal, accounting and back-office services to companies throughout Latin America and beyond.
We look at media sites striving to verify facts during a month of chaotic clashes.
Photo: Oli Pritchard
Colombia’s national protests have spiralled amid escalating violence from both sides: noisy demonstrators facing off with riot cops, while agitators in ski masks – los encapuchados – strike back with petrol bombs while smashing up bus stations and banks.
One motor of the crisis is social media. Videos and photos of the protests spread faster than you can say “Facebook”. And mixed up in that is a huge dollop of misinformation in the form of exaggerations, fake news, recycled news, spurious announcements, and downright lies coming from both sides of a widening political chasm.
But there is also truth out there. And technology provides a way to lift the veil on claims and counterclaims filling the Twittersphere. Specialist media outlets are using forensic analysis of content posted to verify what’s true and what’s not.
Of course, it is still not the full picture; news media can choose which events to analyse which in itself creates bias. And verification results can lag behind the real time events by days or weeks, then be washed away by a new wave of incidents.
But for crucial events – and those forming public opinion – hindsight analysis can help understand the crisis. Here we summarise some recent finding from reputable sources.
ColombiaCheck: Clarifying fake news and controversial cases.
ColombiaCheck, an NGO formed of local journalists dedicated to verifying news stories across various platforms, has reported an avalanche of distorted data. It’s being spread maliciously or accidentally during the protests and includes “images from other years and other countries, videos and photos taken out of context, false audios and photo montages.”
One reassuring aspect of ColombiaCheck is its willingness to name and shame perpetrators from both sides of the political divide.
A crucial area of its current work is detecting fake news seemingly designed to create panic and unrest, often through bogus Facebook live feeds – and may take the form of old video reports manipulated to look like they are happening in real time, which Facebook allows. These frequently come from anonymous Facebook accounts seemingly created during the protests and seem designed to sow confusion among both protesters and police by sending them to non-existent flashpoints.
In one case, fragile peace talks between protesters and authorities in Cali collapsed after fake reports sent to protesters that the meeting was a trap by the police.
Other examples of reports analysed by ColombiaCheck are:
A mash-up photo of a news headline claiming falsely that a left-leaning senator was “paying Venezuelans to assassinate young protestors and blame the police”.
A widely circulated photo of a woman’s body was in fact a murder victim unrelated to the protests. Facebook users had spread the fake rumour she was abducted by ESMAD riot police.
A document widely spread on Twitter claiming falsely that National Police were planning to “go on strike” in June, leaving people to “look out for their own security”.
Video and photos of “ESMAD agents breaking windows” during the Colombia protests was in fact film of police in Venezuela in 2017.
These ColombiaCheck reports reveal the high level of messages designed to misinform with the expected outcome to inflame factions and contribute to the cycle of violence.
The NGO also deconstructs cases crucial to the national discourse, such as the Cali police truck incident early on the protests – May 6 – when protestors in Cali posted shocking reports of coming under live fire from a large group of plain-clothes policemen.
The analysis vindicates the protestors’ claims of being shot at, but also reveals that protesters at blockades are demanding cash from passing motorists. This tactic has been denied by local protest organisers, but is now shown to be true, and surely only adding to tension in the streets.
Photo: Oli Pritchard
The Washington Post – Colombian police have overstepped the rules of engagement.
In its report Killed by Police in Colombia, the respected US newspaper uses audio and visual forensics to pick apart videos of four young protestors killed in the early days of the protests, here are the main findings:
In Cali, on April 28, a 17-year-old youth is shot in the head after kicking a policeman mounted on a motorbike. The cop fires seven shots towards the fleeing youth, according to audio and video analysis. The last shot hits him in the head.
Four days later, in the city of Ibagué, a 19-year-old man is killed by police gunfire two blocks from his house as a street crowd throws objects at an unseen target. Audio from video captures records 10 shots fired in 15 seconds. A week later, National Police accept their role in the shooting and two officers are arrested.
The same date, May 1, a 24-year-old protester is killed in Madrid, close to Bogotá, after riot police shoot tear gas canisters directly at protestors. These weapons are designed to send projectiles in safer arcs and not fired directly. One anti-riot squad (ESMAD) officer has been arrested.
On May 3, another youth was killed in Cali by a single small arms shot fired through a cloud of tear gas. Police would later state the situation followed looting of a supermarket, but the victim, who was distantly related to the city mayor, was attending a vigil for an earlier victim of police shootings according to the investigation.
These cases show that the police in Colombia have “overstepped the rules of engagement” and used disproportionate force, states The Washington Post. It also acknowledges the hard task of “guaranteeing the right to peaceful protests” during violence and vandalism.
The Post also points out that the Colombian police have opened 119 internal investigations, including several related to homicides.
Another structural problem identified by The Washington Post is that the National Police report to the Ministry of Defence which meshes civilian security into a military mindset formed through years of internal conflict with left-wing guerrilla groups.
The New York Times – Police using lethal force against protestors.
The New York Times Visual Investigations Unit has combed through hundreds of on-line photos and videos and cross referenced them with interviews and from reporters on the ground, particularly in Cali the city most affected by protest violence.
The findings – like The Washington Post – show overkill by police and ESMAD agents, and the reckless use of firearms against civilian protesters. One incident backed by videos shows protestors being kicked on the ground then police firing live rounds by their feet. Some were detained, clubbed and threatened with murder.
Another video shows a Cali protester on the ground shot with a gas canister at point blank range, the same day another was killed in a similar incident in the city.
In Bogotá, riot police are filmed attacking medics with tear gas and water cannons, even as the volunteers are assisting injured protestors.
Cerosetenta: keeping track of “repression and death on the streets of Colombia”.
This online interactive dashboard, Cartografia de Violencia Policial is run by media lab Cerosetenta at Bogotá’s University of Los Andes and has been tracking open-source data of violence during protests in Colombia since 2019 and provides the most complete record of filmed events confirmed for date and geographic location.
Despite its name, the site also covers actions by armed civilians and attacks against police.
Cerosetenta is supported by global investigators Bellingcat who give technical support into verification of data, such as time and geographical location, and “crowd intelligence” such as cross-referencing of events from multiple media sources. Events are then categorised into deaths, injuries, shootings where police are present and other forms of aggression.
It also kicks out fake data, such as videos from Chile or Bolivia, or as far away as India, which have been posted as events in Colombia.
An early success for the Cerosetenta team was to investigate – and later to provide legal evidence – after the killing of protester Dilan Cruz, shot by an ESMAD agent during protests in Bogotá in 2019, and one of the triggers for more recent protests.
The website can be clumsy to use, and lacks context surrounding particular events, but provides the most complete record of filmed events verified for date and geographic location.
A posting analysed by Cerosetenta in recent days shows five civilian shooters colluding with a small group of police in Cali and firing repeatedly at protestors, a terrifying event caught close-up on camera by Jahfrann, a video photographer in Cali. It raises the spectre of paramilitarism that has plagued Colombia in recent decades.
But in a twist in the tale, one of the civilian shooters filmed in Cali later revealed himself to the media as “a good person committed to the community” with no criminal record.
The shooter now states he was firing a gun with blank ammunition to “scare off vandals who were attacking a police station”, and was reacting to recent threats against him and his family. He apologised and told the cameras: “Guns and civil war are not the path.”
The interview with the civilian shooter highlights how quickly the narrative can shift during fast-moving events – though his words would sound hollow to families of protestors killed with live ammunition in recent weeks.
According to data collected by NGO Indepaz, at least seven of the 66 people killed in that period in the protests were shot by “civilians.” Another 36 were killed by police or ESMAD, and the rest by persons unknown.
The need for media verification is higher than ever during Colombia’s month of turmoil.
After a month of protests in Colombia, it’s time to take stock of where things are and what might happen next.
Photo: Hans Luyckx
Stages have been erected across Bogotá today as focal points for today’s protests. As such, it’s a good time to reflect on the month since these protests in Colombia started. Numbers have ebbed and flowed and there have been plenty of incidents, alongside a lot of misinformation. What’s happened already, where are we now and what comes next?
Protests in Colombia: Where are we today?
Protests continue. For the past month, there have been gatherings of mainly young people throughout Bogotá and today is no different. Right now, there are groups in Hippies, Héroes and the Parque Nacional. There continue to be daily clashes at Portal de Las Américas. And Usme appears to be the latest scene of confrontation. Various TransMilenio stations remain unusable.
The biggest questions revolve around the degree to which Colombia supports the protests – or not. Here in Bogotá, they have become more and more sparsely attended, but that doesn’t necessarily tell the whole story. We don’t know how many people who’ve stayed home still support the protestors and how many oppose them. Perhaps even more importantly – how many care? Polls show that most people share the general air of unease about the country’s direction, but also that they’d like the disruption to stop.
The police have received a lot of criticism for their heavy-handed response to the situation, especially in Cali. At the moment, representatives of the International Court of Human Rights are being begrudgingly admitted into the country and the International Criminal Court has intimated that Duque could face charges for failing to protect civilians.
Worryingly, despite a noisy and impassioned outcry on social media, it seems that a lot of Colombians remain indifferent to or even supportive of police brutality. A move against Defense Minister Diego Molano was quickly rejected by the Congress, with politicians seemingly unbothered about the effect this might have on their electability next year.
On the other hand, these protests come on the back of sizeable protests 18 months ago in 2019 and stretch back to the marches for peace in 2016. Not to mention ever-swelling shows of support for marches like Women’s Day and Pride. There’s certainly enough support to keep things rumbling on, albeit with reduced numbers. In terms of attitudes towards police, that’s been volatile for a while, with unrest and violence breaking out last year.
Outside the capital, many roads remain blocked across the country and some cities still have shortages of certain goods. There is heavy unrest in various parts of the country, especially in the Pacific region. Cali, Yumbo, Popayán and Buenaventura are all currently volatile.
Photo: Hans Luyckx
Protests in Colombia: What’s happened so far?
The tax reform was rejected, along with health reform, and Carrasquilla, the Finance Minister, resigned. That led to a downgrade of Colombia’s credit rating and it now languishes in ‘junk bond’ territory.
Duque’s administration has been shown to have no political support and many believe he’s essentially a lame duck until nest year’s elections. It’s hard to see any sort of tax reform being pushed through at this stage. He can’t get tricky bills through the senate and no-one seems to want to work with him. Claudia Blum resigned from her post as Colombia’s Foreign MInister, and no one seemed to want that job. Eventually, Vice President, Marta Lucía Ramírez, stepped in – her presidential candidacy appears to have stalled through association with Duque.
It is hard to see how much the Comité del Paro (strike committee) actually represents or speaks for the protestors. Nonetheless, they have put forward a list of demands that are utterly ludicrous and have no chance of being accepted in their current form. That could be a negotiating gambit. But it’s interesting to note that the government has put in early offers of schemes to incentivise youth hiring by businesses. Ironically, much of this was in the now-abandoned tax reform.
A few police officers now have Fiscalía cases outstanding against them in what looks like a token scapegoating. Colombia’s hosting of Copa America has also been scrapped – it’s hard to see how it could’ve taken place in the face of widespread protesting and soaring COVID cases. It probably would have become the scene of ugly demonstrations.
Protests have dwindled in intensity and number, from a high early start to a lower but ongoing presence. TransMilenio stations have taken a fair deal of damage and there has been immense disruption to the service. There was a shortage of goods as the trucker’s strike kicked in, but that seems to have passed in the capital for now.
The most intense zones of Bogotá’s unrest have been in the south, where Portal de Las Américas has been the scene of conflicts for a couple of weeks, with frequent clashes every night between ESMAD and the Primera Línea. The indigenous guard have also shown a presence recently. Usme has flared up as well, with reports of police attacks there too.
Outside the capital, Valle de Cauca has been the centre of much of the unrest. There have been many claims of police and military brutality. But with the heavy presence of armed gangs, it is hard to untangle exactly what has happened. Especially as conflicting reports abound.
It’s certainly true that there were clashes between the indigenous minga and local residents of Cali, in which the residents opened fire on the indigenous people, forcing a retreat and hospitalising eight. Residents have also taken to the streets in counter-protests against the roadblocks and wearing white shirts.
However, all major cities have seen unrest. In Pereira, a young protestor lost his life in a suspicious incident which remains shrouded in mystery. Many people hold the government responsible. In Popayán, a young woman died by suicide after alleging that she had been assaulted by police officers.
Violence has gone both ways, it must be mentioned, with police also injured. Protestors have thrown petrol bombs and acid, and there’s also a particularly worrying assault on a female officer in Cali.
Roadblocks in many parts of Colombia have also affected the delivery of goods. That’s led to shortages of certain things, including groceries, petrol, insulin and other medical supplies.
Protests in Colombia earlier this month.
Protests in Colombia: What happens next?
The most important impact of all this unrest is likely to be seen in 2022, as Colombia goes to the polls in almost exactly a year’s time. With 84% of Colombians saying they wouldn’t consider voting for anyone who supported the tax bill, it’s difficult to see that coming back in any form until a new president is in power. However, economically, Colombia needs to show the international credit rating organisations that it can handle its fiscal responsibilities.
Whoever does come into the Casa Nariño will inherit a tricky situation. The books aren’t balanced (although the economy performed better than expected in the first quarter), so tax income will have to increase or cuts made. Neither are going to go down well with the country.
It’s also difficult to see where negotiations between the nominal protest leaders, the Comité del Paro, and Duque will lead. So far, the administration has held out olive branches which have been rejected by the Comité. The talks appear likely to end with some sort of concession to the Comité, but that’s likely to be limited and nobody knows whether it will then be accepted by the people who are actually protesting. The Comité are probably looking to the future and hoping to attract support from candidates rather than concession from the current administration.
Iván Duque
It’s hard to predict who – if anyone – will benefit from this in the end. It’s certainly true that the ruling Centro Democrático administration looks bad in everyone’s eyes, and it’s likely that the main party will try to distance itself from Duque himself. That’s a tricky act to pull off. Others believe that if the civil unrest continues, Duque may be able to earn political capital by taking hard action against the protestors. This harks back to Uribe’s playbook and only time will tell if society is now less susceptible to such fear-mongering.
Gustavo Petro
Gustavo Petro has stayed away from much of the protesting, only recently turning up in person. Nonetheless, expect a lot of flak to come his way in the next weeks and months. People are already accusing him of stirring up tensions as the establishment seeks to push the blame elsewhere.
Venezuelan sentiment
Rhetoric around vandals and the much-vaunted idea that Colombia will be the next Venezuela has started to pick up steam and we’ll likely see that growing further yet. In addition, anti-Venezuelan sentiment is growing as some of the blame for the more violent aspects of the protests gets thrown towards some of the migrant population.
Fragile rule of law
What’s worrying is that an already fragile rule of law appears to be fracturing. While we don’t see so much in Bogotá, there are reports of vigilante groups, an increased distrust of police and authorities, and ordinary citizens feeling the need to take up arms. Given that Colombia’s road to a long-term peace is already fragile, outside of the political repercussions, it’s hard to know how far these fractures – especially the cases of police brutality and the involvement of armed players will set us back.
It’s hard to know whether there is any appetite for police reform or serious reprisal. There’s not a great public call for reform as of yet and plenty of powerful opposition to it. However, the unpopularity of the police remains high, especially in certain quarters and they are losing support.
Bogotá mayor Claudia López has changed her stance recently, saying that after reflection, she can see that the protestors are suffering and fighting for change. She has been quick to condemn police violence in the past, and there is a chance that she will champion police reform.
This is not just one month of protest
In terms of numbers on the streets, it’s again hard to call. Numbers dwindle, but then surge up again on certain big days and there appears to be a hardcore of protestors that are unwilling to give up completely. As time marches on, it’s unclear how long that will be tolerated, either by the government or by the citizenry.
What is clear is that the roots of these problems are not being addressed and not going away anytime soon. Even if things simmer down for a while, but we’ll probably see a resurgence in the future. Looking at recent events in the context of what is now 18 months and counting of unrest, it’s unlikely that this is the end.
COVID restrictions will be lifted in less than two weeks as authorities try to respond to people’s needs.
Bogotá reopening last September — things were different then. Photo: Jared Wade
Do you remember how it felt eight months ago when Bogotá reopened after the first peak? Well, it’s that time again. Though this time it’s different since fewer people stuck to the rules in the first place and we’re still in the midst of nationwide protests. Oh, and last time the COVID case numbers had fallen significantly.
But, open we will. Bogotá mayor Claudia López announced today that the capital will reopen from June 8. The reason? Economically, people are desperate and the restrictions are not helping. The mayor feels that it’s time to put people’s needs above the COVID restrictions.
“It sounds absolutely contradictory from an epidemiological point of view, to announce a reopening when ICU occupancy is at 97%,” she said. “But looking at the social, economic and political context – with deep institutional mistrust, unacceptable poverty and unemployment that is especially affecting women and young people – it is necessary to do so.”
The hope is that by June 8, the protests will have died down along with the case numbers.
Bogotá reopening: June 8
Here’s what will change:
The night curfew and ley seca will be lifted completely.
Bars and gastropubs can now open until 1am, but they’ll need to have biosecurity measures in place.
Schools, nurseries and universities will be able to fully open again.
Big events like football matches and concerts won’t restart until the numbers go down.
Why the new attitude?
A few days ago, López apologised to the young people of the city, saying she had not fully understood the “magnitude of their anguish and their claims.” She said that she understood people were more worried about hunger and unemployment than they were about COVID.
According to Nicolás Uribe, from the Bogotá Chamber of Commerce, “about 27% of young people in Bogotá neither study nor work; and there are about 585,000 young people for whom the business sector must build opportunities so that they can get ahead.”
The mayor has been recovering from contracting COVID herself and now wants to take steps to rebuild trust. Re-opening now is one of those steps.
Chemicals needed to purify the city’s water are not making it through the blockades, and the capital faces the possibility of running out of drinking water.
In Bogotá we might not be able to drink water from the tap soon. Photo: Imani on Unsplash
Authorities have warned Bogotá is days away from running out of drinking water. A press release from the city’s water company, Acueducto de Bogotá, warned that the chemicals they need aren’t making it through the blockades.
The company needs lime and aluminium sulfate to arrive from Barranquilla to process the capital’s drinking water.
Three water filtration plants serve Bogotá and neighboring municipalities of Gachancipá, Tocancipá, Sopó, La Calera, Cajicá, Chía, Funza, Madrid, Mosquera, Soacha and Cota.
Of those plants affected by the shortages, Francisco Wiesner supplies 70% of the water, and Tibitoc and Dorado supply 25% and 5% respectively.
Demonstrations continue
The challenge is that we’re now in the third week of protests and every new story of state forces misusing power breathes new life into the demonstrations. The latest press release from NGO Temblores says that 39 people have been killed by public forces.
In Popayán, a seventeen-year-old girl died by suicide this week after accusing police officers who detained her during protests of sexually assaulting her. These stories have generated a cry of SOS Colombia both inside the country and around the world.
Government talks with the National Strike Committee will begin tomorrow. Given the way the protests have evolved — with different groups demonstrating against a range of issues — it’s not clear to what degree the committee will be able to speak for all the protestors.
Unfortunately, the blockades are having an outsized impact on the poorer groups in society. Trucks containing some basic foodstuffs are not getting through, which is pushing up prices and causing shortages.
Many figures have called for an end to the blockades, including President Duque and Bogotá mayor Claudia López. Both point out that the blockades stop ordinary Colombians from getting to work and putting food on the table.
But as people rally around a cry of SOS Colombia, the stories of misuse of state force are making the situation worse.
Cali has become the epicentre of Colombia’s protests. With an already heavy presence of armed gangs and high rates of both unemployment and poverty, it was a tinderbox.
Cali protests: ESMAD riot police are accused of indiscriminately firing at protestors. Photo: CRIC
Cali, Colombia’s third biggest city, is well known as the salsa capital of the world. Before the pandemic, the city, which is not far from the Pacific coast, was beginning to grow its reputation as a hub for tourism, sports, and business.
However, the music, colour and cheer belied another story. Cali is in the Valle del Cauca department, which, along with fellow Pacific departments Chocó and Cauca, have borne the brunt of the violence that has proliferated in the vacuum left by the FARC. Coca growing, drug trafficking and violence between armed gangs is rife.
In recent weeks, this hidden side of Cali has made front page news. The extraordinary scenes of looting, destruction, and police brutality have shocked the nation. Road blockages have stopped food and medicine from reaching the city, leaving empty shelves in supermarkets. And public transport is barely working because of the damage to the city’s infrastructure.
What began as a nationwide protest against an unpopular tax reform turned violent, especially in Cali. NGO Temblores, which has been collating data on police brutality, estimate that 40 people have died nationwide during the two weeks of protests. At least 24 of them were in Cali.
Why Cali?
Cali has been hard hit by the pandemic. El Espectador’s analysis of DANE figures shows that 37% of people in Cali didn’t have enough money to cover their basic needs in 2020. That’s up from 22% pre-pandemic.
Plus, 59% of people in Cali are categorised as poor or vulnerable. And Cali’s unemployment rate at the end of last year stood at 19% (up from 12% in 2019). Nationwide it was 14% nationally, up from 9.5%.
In addition to high rates of poverty — and high numbers of people who have fallen into poverty during the past year — Cali has to contend with high levels of gang violence.
Since the peace agreement was signed in 2016, various armed groups have been competing for control of former FARC territories. Valle del Cauca, Chocó, and Cauca have all suffered. From illicit coca cultivation to illegal mining, there’s a lot of money at stake in areas that don’t have much government presence.
Each year, we’ve seen an increase in reports of threats, forced displacements, killings and kidnappings. And the lockdowns and travel restrictions of the pandemic have made it easier for armed players to act with impunity. The pandemic has put pressure on an already fractured society, and in Cali, the cracks are really starting to show.
What about the reports of police brutality?
It would be difficult to deny the instances of brutality and excessive force we’ve seen in the past two weeks, from both the police and the military. There are reports of shootings, beatings, arbitrary arrests, and rapes — particularly in Cali.
On May 4, the Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Marta Hurtado said. “Our office in Colombia is working to verify the exact number of casualties, and establish how this terrible incident came about in Cali. “
She continued, “We are deeply alarmed at developments in the city of Cali in Colombia overnight, where police opened fire on demonstrators protesting against tax reforms, reportedly killing and injuring a number of people.”
Other international organisations such as Amnesty International have also condemned the disproportionate use of force. “Police have used force indiscriminately and disproportionately, and there are alarming reports of sexual violence and disappearances,” it said in a press release.
During Duque’s trip to Cali he said there would be zero tolerance towards any police or military actions that break the constitution. He said, “Already, by the will of the commanders, the work of the Procuraduría, Fiscalía and others, 65 disciplinary actions have been adopted: 27 for abuse of authority, 11 for physical assault, 8 for homicide, 19 for other behaviors.” He also said that 667 people had been arrested for vandalism.
However, it remains to be seen what those investigations will uncover and whether all those responsible will be prosecuted. Moreover, there’s still no commitment to any kind of police reform or even an examination of the structural issues in the police that allow such violations to take place.
What about this standoff between residents and indigenous groups?
On Sunday, violence broke out between residents of Cali’s comuna 22 area and indigenous minga who were passing through.
You’ll find very different reports about what happened in the Colombian press. Some report that indigenous groups attacked local residents. And others report the opposite — that residents attacked the indigenous groups.
What appears to have happened is that chivas carrying indigenous people were trying to travel to support the protests in the centre. Organised groups of people in cars and vans wearing white t-shirts tried to block their way. At some point they opened fire on the chivas. At least eight indigenous protestors were injured, and, from the videos, it looks like they then retaliated.
Residents justified their actions to the press, saying it wasn’t right that the indigenous communities could move freely while they were suffering restrictions and shortages because of the blockades.
We’ve seen other instances of citizens arming themselves and taking the law into their own hands to face protestors in recent weeks. Let’s hope it isn’t a growing trend.
What’s a minga?
A minga is an indigenous word (coming from Quechua minka) that can encompass various meanings – it’s all about coming together for a common purpose.
Most recently, the word has become associated with peaceful demonstrations and resistance. The indigenous communities in Colombia have called mingas to rally against the killings of social leaders and indigenous people, mining, environmental destruction and forced displacement.
One member of the CRIC (Consejo Regional Indígena del Cauca), Leonardo Saavedra, said “The organisational plan that the central area of the Kokonuko people has proposed is to make visible the actions of injustice, […] such as the one generated by the public force and its excessive way of acting and responding to the needs and demands of the Colombian people.”
What’s the government doing?
After initially saying he couldn’t go, President Duque has been to Cali twice this week. He first made a middle-of-the night whistle-stop trip to Cali on Monday night, arriving shortly after midnight and leaving around 4am.
He returned yesterday, and met with local authorities, including mayor Jorge Iván Ospina, local businesses and young people.
Here are some of the announcements he made during his visit:
He said that attacks carried out by state forces during the demonstrations will be fully investigated.
He promised free public university and college for estrato 1, 2, and 3 students for the second semester of 2021.
He committed to a ‘Gran Pacto’ — a process by which young Colombians will be able to make themselves heard, beginning in Cali.
He called for the end of all blockades. Duque said these infringe the rights of all Colombians to access food, medicine, and vaccinations.
Have the ELN infiltrated the protests?
Colombia’s defence minister, Diego Molano, told CNN that some of the violence we’ve seen was committed by organisations linked to the FARC and ELN. “What is happening in Colombia is that groups of organised criminals with connections to organised groups seek to generate instability, and they do it systematically, deliberately, and with illegal financing connected with drug trafficking,” he said.
It’s not the first time the government has blamed the ELN and other armed groups and there’s likely some truth to it. But it’s also not the whole truth.
It’s too easy to blame the FARC dissidents and the ELN for everything that goes wrong. Not only does it make it easier for them to justify the actions of the public forces in killing civilian protestors, it also undermines the protests themselves.
It’s rarely as simple as having “good” protestors and “bad” protestors. And if you break it down that way, the violence becomes the fault of those “bad” players rather than an overwhelming anger at the establishment.
On top of which, there are also claims that other parties — including the authorities — infiltrated protests to deliberately stir up trouble. Such things muddy the waters even further.
What now?
Today, the indigenous minga returned to Cauca where they plan to continue the strike. Aida Quilcué, national coordinator of the CRIC, told El Tiempo: “What brought us to Cali was the killing of young people at the points of mobilisation. We came to complete a task which was partly to accompany them, to minimise the deaths within the framework of mediation.”
It looks like Duque’s visit to Cali has helped calm the situation somewhat. At least he’s shown the leader of the country is not ignoring the problem. The city is working on getting rubbish collection and public transport back up and working. And the Defensoría del Pueblo — Colombia’s ombudsman — has negotiated some humanitarian routes through the blockades, but several routes into the city are still blocked.
Unfortunately, many of Cali’s problems can’t be tackled overnight.
Authorities need to open enough dialogue to stop the protests — and convince people that brutality from public forces won’t go unpunished. Then they need to fix the infrastructure that’s been destroyed or damaged, such as the bus network, so that people can get back to work.
And then they need to find ways to rebuild Cali’s economy, provide jobs, especially for the city’s young people. That’s no mean feat for a government that’s grappling with high unemployment and the economic impact of COVID.
Hospital confirms brain death of Lucas Villa, the protestor who was seen shaking hands with riot police on the day he was shot.
Lucas Villa marching on the day he was shot. Photo: Taken from Twitter
Lucas Villa was shot at the Pereira viaduct on May 5. He has been in hospital ever since, receiving treatment for eight bullet wounds. However, the manager of the San Jorge de Pereira University Hospital, Juan Carlos Restrepo, told reporters this afternoon that there was nothing more doctors could do. The 37-year-old student has been declared brain dead.
According to a joint report released yesterday from Indepaz and NGO Temblores, 47 people have been killed since Colombia’s national protests began on April 28. The two organisations estimate 278 people have been victims of physical violence.
Every death is shocking. These protests are already far more violent than those of 2019 and 2020 combined. And every new act of violence fractures an already polarised nation further.
Personification of peaceful protests
Lucas caught the nation’s attention for many reasons. He was photographed talking and shaking hands with riot police on the day he was shot. He also messaged a friend the day before, saying, “We can all die here, but how can we leave our people?”
This is a sentiment expressed by many who protest, especially after police killed Dilan Cruz in 2019. However, it is unclear who killed Lucas.
Unknown men opened fire on a group that had gathered for a sit in at the Pereira viaduct after a day of demonstrations.
Lucas Villa was hit eight times and two other protestors were wounded. The student at Universidad Tecnológica de Pereira was also a yoga teacher, who just hours before had been seen singing and dancing during the march.
Authorities have promised to find the perpetrators quickly. The mayor of Pereira, Carlos Maya, offered a COP$50 million reward for information that leads to the arrest of those responsible for Lucas Villa’s death.
Yesterday, hundreds gathered for a session of group yoga at the viaduct where Lucas was shot.
— Pereira En Vivo Noticias (@pereiraenvivo) May 9, 2021
Colombia’s civil unrest
What began as demonstrations against an unpopular tax reform have spiralled into an ongoing expression of general discontent. And unfortunately, the violent altercations between police, protestors, vigilante groups, and the military are pouring oil on the fire.
The government continue to label protestors as vandals. There are reports of state actors deliberately infiltrating peaceful protests to incite violence. But even a small number of non-peaceful protestors can do a lot of damage. Ultimately, however, no amount of vandalism begins to excuse the use of lethal force.
Peaceful protestors like Lucas feel they are taking their lives into their hands when they go out to demonstrate against a government they feel is deaf to their pleas.
If the government can’t change their ‘vandal vs. state’ mentality, it’s hard to see how things won’t accelerate further. For now, our thoughts are with the families and loved ones of Lucas and all those who have died in these demonstrations.
Bogotá protests are still going, with students in the Parque Nacional already.
Police and protestors gather in the Parque Nacional. Photo: Oli Pritchard
9.30am: Students and other protestors were gathering already in the Parque Nacional. Others grouped near the Universidad Distrital Jose Del Caldas just down the road. The entire séptima running along the park has been covered in flyers asking thought-provoking questions, and they’re hanging signs denouncing the government and police.
The group was joined by a handful of Misak indigenous people and a healthy sprinkling of unionists. There’s also plenty of traditional musicians and dancers. As usual, there’s drumming, dancing, and singing, but the banners are back, especially supporting the CUT and the Comité del Paro.
Unlike yesterday or even Wednesday, the police presence is very much visible already. On previous days they’ve hung back at the start, only making their presence felt relatively late on or at potential conflict points such as Ecopetrol or outside government buildings.
Today, there was a line of riot shields (not full ESMAD) bizarrely protecting the monument of Rafael Uribe Uribe in the park. Perhaps they are worried about vandalism (which hasn’t affected the monument yet), or simply want to make their presence known. So far it’s hard to say.
The rain won’t arrive for a while, so the party seems set to continue.
The Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá (Bogotá Philharmonic Orchestra) were playing again this morning, at the Plaza de los Artesanos. The musicians want to promote a message of peaceful protests and encourage Colombians to get vaccinated.
Photo: Kike Barona – Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá
Early this morning the UN in Colombia responded to reports of violence and called on the government to ensure the right to peaceful protest.
1pm: The number of students had grown significantly and séptima was briefly closed in both directions.
That didn’t last long, though, and the protest formed in two different groups: dancing and drumming just away from the Uribe Uribe monument and students making signs and placards by the 39.
The dancers and drummers numbered maybe 100 for a long time, but were eventually bolstered by other groups – one coming from the north and the other coming from the south. The northern group blocked the roads, while the southerners brought more drums. It morphed into a kind of mini-Love Parade.
By 2pm, about 500 people were gathered at the Parque Nacional, with smaller groups reported at various points across the city. There were road blocks on Calle 80 with Carrera 120 and Avenida Boyaca with Calle 71.
At 5.30pm, the TransMilenio reports the following stations are closed: Caracas, Caracas Sur, Calle 26, Calle 80, Troncal Suba, and Troncal Américas.
As night falls, the techno-car is heading north on Septima towards Hippies, we imagine. It’s slowly making its way up the road with a large contingent of police in attendance. ESMAD were stepping up their presence as we left the park, and it’s hard to know what will happen next. For now, it’s been quiet and relatively peaceful, but there’s an edge coming into the air.
Simmering social and economic tensions have led to violent clashes. What now?
Heated protests in the centre of Bogotá on May 5. Photo: Hans Luyckx
The nation again woke up to videos of violent scenes after protestors clashed with police and military overnight in violent protests in Colombia.
Today is the eighth day of protests in Colombia, and the disturbing scenes have only served to push more people out onto the streets today. Up until now, the daytime demonstrations have been mostly peaceful. It is at night that things have turned ugly.
From videos of police on motorbikes tasering pedestrians to beatings, shootings, and arson, it is difficult to keep up with all the reports of brutality in the week. Cali has been at the epicentre of the violence. That’s partly because the city is already the centre of three regions hard hit by armed gangs and drug trafficking.
One video showed tear gas being thrown into a bus in Manizales as passengers struggled to escape. Another showed a vehicle circulating and shooting in Bogotá, and in Cali, another showed police firing at demonstrators.
It is difficult to untangle what’s real, and ColombiaCheck is in overdrive. But what’s clear is that civilians are dying at the hands of the police and military – and it isn’t over yet.
How many people have died in the violent protests in Colombia?
According to NGO Temblores, who are working to document the claims of police brutality, there were over 1,400 reports of police violence between 6 am on April 28 and 8 am on May 4. The NGO reports 216 people were victims of physical violence and 31 people were killed.
Colombia’s ombudsman, Defensoría del Pueblo, said on May 3 that it was investigating 19 deaths during the protests. These were in Valle del Cauca, Bogotá, Neiva, Cali, Soacha, Yumbo, Ibagué, Madrid, (Cundinamarca), Medellín, and Pereira.
In addition to the injuries and loss of life, much of the country is at a standstill. Many of the country’s main roads are blocked, as are a number of entry points to the major cities. Buildings and buses have been set alight, and there are plenty of stories of looting and vandalism.
What is the government doing?
President Duque has already withdrawn the unpopular tax reform that sparked the demonstrations. That hasn’t worked. Yesterday, he called for an “open space for dialogue” with public and private sectors, civil leaders, and political parties.
“Faced with these forms of criminality, we have to respond forcefully from a legal perspective, but with the necessary caution when their dark motives are to provoke even more violent reactions and thus spread the flame of their incendiary interests.
Resign Duque! Painted on the ground. Photo: Oli Pritchard
At the same time, the president did commit to investigating the activities of the police and military. He said he would not accept any actions that fell outside of the constitution. The question remains over whether this will really be punished and whether anyone really controls the police.
How has the international community reacted?
The United Nations have condemned the violence. Marta Hurtado, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner, said in a press release yesterday: “We are deeply alarmed at developments in the city of Cali in Colombia overnight, where police opened fire on demonstrators protesting against tax reforms, reportedly killing and injuring a number of people.”
She added, “We remind the State authorities of their responsibility to protect human rights, including the right to life and security of person, and to facilitate the exercise of the right to freedom of peaceful assembly.”
Others, such as Peter Ptassek, the German ambassador to Colombia, have also criticized the use of force. His tweet yesterday said “Peaceful protests are a citizen’s right and a democratic achievement. Violence is not: We condemn it, wherever it comes from. Facts of injuries, deaths of protesters and the police must be investigated. We trust in prompt clarification by the authorities.”
I thought Colombia was in the midst of a third COVID wave?
It is. Although the Bogotá mayor is relaxing rules, COVID ICU occupation was at over 96% in the capital yesterday, and there are almost 100,000 active cases in the country right now.
One concern is that the protests are slowing the country’s vaccination drive, as well as hampering efforts to slow the spread. But as one protestor told reporters, people are more scared of hunger than they are of the coronavirus. Also, vaccine jabs have increased, with a high point this week.
Remind me why people are protesting?
There are a myriad of reasons why people are protesting. The most obvious is that — like many countries in the world — Colombia’s anti-COVID measures have hit the country’s worst off the hardest.
But even before the pandemic, social, economic, and political tensions were high. The demonstrations at the end of 2019were extraordinary and violent as many ‘ordinary’ people took to the streets to express their dissatisfaction. And since then, things have only got worse.
People are unhappy with Duque’s government. Photo: Steve Hide
That’s why withdrawing the unpopular tax reform has done little to quell the unrest. Especially as the killings of civilians has yet again given people an even stronger reason to protest.
What now?
That’s a good question. Leading environmental activist, Francia Márquez tweeted yesterday, “The discontent of the people is not dealt with violence, dialogue is the way @IvanDuque. You were chosen to guarantee the lives of all Colombians, not to order the public forces to assassinate civilians.”
It is not clear whether people will buy into Duque’s idea of an open conversation. Some have already rejected it, and unfortunately he made a similar move during the 2019 protests that lead nowhere. In 2019, the protests simmered down partly because of Christmas. But December is a long way away.
If the authorities cannot win enough public confidence to even begin some form of dialogue, it is difficult to see what will change the status quo. Right now, we can only hope we won’t be reporting on more deaths and injuries tomorrow.
Bogotá’s protests against recent state killings started off in a passionate yet peaceful manner. Here’s how the day unfolded.
Colombia national strike, May 5. Protestors gather to demand an end to the killings. Photo: Oli Pritchard.
9am: Protestors gather early
At 9am, a few people started to gather in the shadow of the Rafael Uribe monument in the Parque Nacional. Their chants of “Uribe, Uribe” were aimed at Álvaro, not Rafael though, and were less than complementary. With transport closing at 3pm, there was a need to get out early – the Bogotá philharmonic orchestra kicked off proceedings in Parkway at 8am.
At half nine the demonstrators were loud but still outnumbered by the groups of police waiting further up the park. Half an hour later, that had changed as the gathering of various anti-administration groups rapidly swelled to hundreds, then up to a couple of thousand. From there it stayed constant, some people staying and others moving away or sitting on the grass.
The atmosphere was deeply passionate, befitting a protest against the killings of young people. But it also stayed positive. This was no wake, but rather a call to arms and resistance. There were chants. Flags and banners were unfurled and everywhere there were drums to keep up the energy. The most common sign by far was a simple Colombian flag, sometimes inverted.
The police, to their credit, have so far stayed at the extreme fringes and not yet intervened in the main demonstrations. It remains to be seen how long that will continue. Last week everything started off peacefully and only later turned ugly.
Now that the unpopular tax reform is gone, the theme of day appears to be calling for president Duque’s resignation, which seems optimistic. It’s unlikely he would consider retiring with a year to go on his mandate and no pressing scandal directly connected to him. An important secondary call is for the reforma de salud to be withdrawn as the tax reform was.
11am: On the march
Around 11am, the protests became more fluid, as some groups headed north up the séptima, seemingly heading for Parque de los Hippies and/or Héroes. There was some chatter among the groups of going into Cedritos again as well. Other splinters preferred to head south towards the Plaza Bolívar as is traditional.
Colombia national strike, May 5. Thousands of people gather near Parque de los Hippies.
There are big groups at the Universidad Nacional, according to our reporters there. The centre and Parque de los Hippies are both getting busier, with thousands at both points. It’s clear that recent police and military action in Bosa, Buga, Cali and other parts of the country has simply led to more people protesting.
1pm: Dampened but undeterred
With thunderstorms overhead, some sheltered from the rain while others continued to march.
Bogotá mayor Claudia López said it was a miracle that nobody had died yet in the capital. “Life cannot continue like this,” she insisted, saying the mayors of the country spent their nights trying to control the violence and their days visiting hospitals.
She went on to say, “Every day we have fewer peaceful protests and more vandalism.” Calling it a vicious cycle, she said that when there is more vandalism, there is more intervention from the police and ESMAD.
She added, though, that it’s not enough to reject the vandalism without also rejecting the abuse of force. The mayor called on the government to find a way to dialogue with the young people who are protesting. “These are our young people,” she said. “These are young people who are hurting, who are attacked, who are unemployed, who are poor, who are in the streets of Bogotá.”
By 2pm, almost 5,000 people had gathered in the Parque Nacional, and another 2,000 were estimated to be by the Universidad Javeriana. Another 5,000 had massed by the Universidad Nacional, 6,000 at Heroés, and 1,500 motorcyclists were converging on Campín. There were groups of anywhere between a few hundred and a couple of thousand reported in various other parts of Bogotá. With transport almost non-existent in places, many people just couldn’t get to the central protests and had to demonstrate locally.
As the afternoon wears on, President Duque attempts to continue the narrative that vandals – and not the police force – are to blame for the destruction.
There’s some truth in that: The Plaza Bolívar was only cleared after an hour or so of stone throwing and a half-hearted attempt to storm the senate building. We hold state actors to a higher account, but it’s fair to mention that in this particular case there was provocation.
Here was the scene as protesters clashed with riot police on the steps of the Colombian capitol building. The police showed markedly more restraint today in firing on the crowd, taking a hail of stones before clearing the plaza. pic.twitter.com/FznAkZCc7F
As the rain cleared, the séptima saw marches both north and south. Some headed to reinforce the centre and others migrated to Parque de los Hippies on Calle 60. The atmosphere there was akin to the day’s start, with drummers, flags and bonfires on the street. The road was blocked to traffic and resistance took the form of a party. It was reminiscent of 2019, when Hippies became a sort of free zone for a few days. Interestingly, the police presence there was limited and non-confrontational.
Late this afternoon, various hospitals called on protestors to respect medical missions and supply trucks. The road closures mean that hospitals in Cali and Medellín are running short on supplies, including oxygen for ICU patients.
6pm: Rain stops play
Police use tear gas to clear protestors from the centre of Bogotá on May 5. Photo: Hans Luyckx
Darkness falls, along with rain, and the protests are dispersing. The city centre has been cleared and other groups are fading away. Even the large takeover of Parque Hippies has been forced away by the downpour. Stories of violence are already emerging.
— JUANCA #SOSColombiaDDHH (@JUANCAELBROKY) May 5, 2021
As with previous nights, we can hear the cacerolazos as we type. The spontaneous pot banging became a way for people to peacefully protest police violence in 2019. The tradition has continued in the last week, both from the streets and from peoples homes, as Colombians make their discontent heard.
So far the use of force seems to be less intense than in previous nights, and we can only hope that continues.
The capital is not past its third peak, but the COVID rules have been relaxed.
Bogotá restrictions: curfew still on but the weekend quarantine won’t be extended.
Speaking yesterday, Bogotá mayor Claudia López announced a surprise relaxation in restrictions. The quarantine has been lifted, and pico y cédula will be suspended, so you can go shopping any day.
The lighter restrictions come in spite of the fact that we haven’t yet passed the third wave and UCI occupation remains above 98%.
Mindful of the fact that Mother’s Day would normally be this Sunday in Colombia, the mayor asked people not to hold social gatherings. The government has postponed Mother’s Day until May 30.
The following restrictions apply:
Schools and universities will stay shut until May 9.
Ley seca will continue, meaning alcohol can only be consumed at home and ordered by domicilio.
The nightly curfew will continue, including at the weekend. Everything will need to be shut by 7pm and people need to be home by 8pm.
There will be no ciclovía this Sunday.
There are still restrictions on travel. While you can travel by air, you may need to explain why you need to leave the city.
The difficulty with a nightly curfew is that nationwide protests show no sign of stopping. And violence has been worse once night falls. Last night at least five people died in Cali in violent clashes between police and protesters. The country’s ombudsman, Defensoría del Pueblo, says at least 17 people have been killed in total since the demonstrations began last week.
The resignation of the finance minister and withdrawal of reforms has not stopped nationwide demonstrations.
Colombia protests: thousands of protestors turned out on April 28
This morning, Alberto Carrasquilla, the man responsible for the controversial tax reform, resigned his position as finance minister. One of his deputies, Juan Alberto Londoño, also stepped down.
Carrasquilla has been replaced by José Manuel Restrepo, currently Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism. The new job is somewhat of a poisoned chalice as the economist will need to formulate a new tax reform. And it needs to be one people can agree on.
Speaking yesterday, President Duque withdrew the current tax reform and committed to coming up with a new initiative based on “principles of consensus.”
He promised the controversial increase in VAT would be scrapped and said it was time to work together to protect the most vulnerable. “The reform is not a whim. The reform is a must,” said Duque. “To withdraw it or not, was not the discussion.”
According to Reuters, the Colombian peso fell 2.15% to 3,834 pesos to the dollar on the news. That’s the lowest it’s been since October last year.
Some politicians, such as senator Roy Barreras, described it as a win for the people. He tweeted: “The people won! Withdrawal from the tax reform is a popular achievement. Now we must stay alert until the health reform is withdrawn.”
No. Protests have continued throughout the country, making today the sixth day of demonstrations. That said, the protests on Wednesday, April 28 were much bigger than on subsequent days. The Central Union of Workers (CUT) announced another national strike would take place on May 5.
Today there have been demonstrations in various cities across Colombia, including Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, Cartagena, Barranquilla, and Ibagué. There are roadblocks in several major routes, as taxis and truckers join the protests. Several TransMilenio stations in the capital are closed and the riot police have already clashed with protestors in several cities.
Plus, as Barreras mentioned, there’s another controversial reform on the table — the health reform. It’s come under fire from all directions, primarily because people say it doesn’t fix any of the fundamental problems the health service faces. We’ll come back to that in another article.
So, did the people really win?
It’s difficult to say. To claim people had won would suggest they had a common cause, and it’s not clear that they did. People are clearly furious about the tax reform, but there’s frustration about environmental rights, the progress of the peace process, the killings of social leaders – the list goes on.
As with the protests in 2019, it feels more like a manifestation of general discontent that unified around the tax reform than a protest with one specific cause. It’s almost easier for Duque to pull back the tax reform than to try to tackle the other reasons people are angry.
Colombia protests; motorcyclists gearing up for a protest.
Plus, there really were elements of this tax reform that really were aimed at helping the worst off. There were also parts that didn’t, but it did include money for social spending and VAT rebates. Moreover, if Colombia can’t pass a tax reform, the country will be in more trouble economically, as it’s currently running a deficit. Its credit rating will be cut from investment grade to junk bond status by various international agencies.
Whether or not the people have won comes down to two factors: What the government can come up with in place of the now-defunct reform. And whether these protests will continue to slide towards violence.
There’s violence?
According to NGO Temblores, over 1,100 cases of political violence were reported between 6am on April 28 and 10am on May 3. It says 26 people have been killed, 142 people have been victims of police violence and nine were sexually assaulted. The NGO accuses the police of deliberately killing at least five people yesterday (May 2).
It reports that the ESMAD riot police have thrown tear gas canisters into buildings and stopped people from getting medical attention.
As we saw in the 2019 protests and the violence last year, when police kill protestors, it is a lot harder to stop the demonstrations from increasing in scale. When Dilan Cruz was shot by riot police, it was only because the majority of marchers were determined to ensure protests would continue peacefully that we did not see large-scale riots.
In September last year, when Javier Ordóñez died after being repeatedly tasered by police, violent protests rocked the capital. Small police stations were set on fire and TransMilenio stations were trashed.
After a year of coronavirus restrictions, people are angry. Peaceful protests in Colombia have escalated to violent clashes at several points already. And if the beeping horns I can hear in the distance are anything to go by, these protests are not close to burning out.
Story updated following announcement that José Manuel Restrepo would be the new Finance Minister.
As darkness falls, protests in Bogotá continue. Here’s what happened today.
The national strike in Colombia started with music and dancing.
Today’s protests in Colombia passed mostly peacefully, though there were some violent clashes as the day wore on. The paro nacional, or national strike, saw students and workers take to the streets to protest various issues, chiefly the government’s unpopular tax reform.
In Bogotá, protestors blocked roads and prevented TransMilenio buses from running early doors. Only about 5% of TransMilenio stations were in operation for much of the day. And at lunchtime, Mayor Claudia López announced the whole service would stop at 5pm.
People gathered early in a number of points across the city. By mid-morning, the séptima was filled with people. Some wore masks and observed social distancing, but most did not.
“We won’t be silent,” during the national strike in Colombia.
At lunchtime, heavy rain in the capital pretty much stopped play.
Countrywide protests
People mobilised throughout the country, in spite of COVID fears. Cali saw the most violence. Protesters pulled down a monument of Sebastián de Belalcázar (a Spanish conquistador), damaged buildings, and set fire to a DIAN office. Cali’s mayor told reporters that one person had died during the demonstrations, but it’s not yet clear what happened.
According to reports, protests in Barranquilla, Cartagena, Bucaramanga, Manizales, Neiva, Villavicencio, Cúcuta and other parts of the country were mostly peaceful. In Medellín, the demonstrations were strife-free to start with, but there were confrontations with ESMAD riot police by the end of the day.
Several cities — including Cali, Pasto, and Medellín — have introduced curfews.
Unfortunately, another protestor died in Neiva. The student, Juan Diego Perdomo Monroy, collapsed during protests in the city centre where there had previously been altercations with police. It’s not yet clear what happened. Some bystanders think it could have been an epileptic attack.
Why are people protesting? Ostensibly, the unpopular tax reforms, along with a number of other serious frustrations — from the progress of the peace process to environmental concerns. After a year of closures, job losses, financial struggles, for many Colombians, the tax reforms are rubbing salt in the wound. Moreover, it has provided a rallying cry and focus for people’s COVID anger.
Clashes with ESMAD
Back in Bogotá, by 2pm — the time the mayor suggested people head home — Plaza Bolívar was full.
And by mid-afternoon, there were reports of violent clashes with ESMAD. In the city centre, protestors set fire to a police motorbike and riot police used tear gas to disperse the crowds. Police prevented more people from entering Plaza Bolívar and further disturbances took place in the Parque de los Periodistas and by the Museo del Oro.
At the end of the day of national strike in Colombia, protestors turned a mobile CAI from the police on the side. Photo: Carl Worswick
In Kennedy, the RCN building was attacked by various protestors, with missiles flying in both directions in running battles along to the Banderas monument. Similar scenes unfolded in several parts of the capital, with violence reported in Suba, Héroes, Banderas, Campín, and in the north exits of the city. The mayor of Soacha also declared a 6pm curfew.
With no TransMilenio and many roads closed or affected, hundreds of people had to walk home, all trying to get back before the 8pm COVID curfew. Occasional shots still ring out and groups of both police and protestors still roam the streets. Now, as darkness — and more rain — falls, we wait to see if either can calm tensions. And whether protests will continue tomorrow.
There’s another national strike — paro nacional — this week, and it’s difficult to see how it’ll pan out.
Colombia national strike: Police prepare for tomorrow’s demonstrations. Photos: Oli Pritchard
You’ve probably seen signs up saying #paroya, or seen memes online that want you to #tumbarlareforma. It’s all part of another Colombia national strike taking place on Wednesday, which could be very big. If you’re confused about what’s behind it all,
So what’s the fuss all about?
There’s a whole smorgasbord of discontent, but the broadly unpopular tax reform (reforma tributaría) has become the main focus in the last couple of weeks. Then there’s the opposition of a lot of Bogotá to the ruling Centro Democrático in general and president Iván Duque in particular.
A smorgasbord of discontent? What else is on the menu?
Following on from the last big protest, it has many roots. Fundamentally, a lot of Colombia (77% according to Invamer) thinks the country is on the wrong path, but can’t always articulate why. Like a patient who received the wrong blood in a transfusion, there’s a vague sense of dread in the air.
Is there anything more specific?
If anything, there are too many issues. Supporting the peace accords is a big factor for a lot of people, although others won’t care. Some want Venezuelans to be sent home. Environmental protection is a common theme. Indigenous rights will be important to many, afro-Colombian rights to some. People are unhappy about corruption, unemployment, and inequality. Expect a heavy dose of anti-uribismo, with not as much pro-Petro. The FARC will be there in their new guise as partido comunes.
What do they actually want?
The reforma tributaría to go away, which is achievable. There’s also a broad wish for president Iván Duque to resign, which is extraordinarily unlikely. He was elected fairly, hasn’t been directly connected to corruption, scandal, or massive incompetence. And there’ve already been points in his presidency when he’s been much more unpopular.
Past those two aims it gets really vague. Protection for the environment, but no suggestion of how. Indigenous people should be given more rights, but no suggestion of what. Corruption should stop, but no concrete proposals this time. Most of all, inequality should end and the poor should have more money, but without anyone paying more tax. Big questions with difficult answers.
Establishments board up their windows in preparation for tomorrow’s national strikes.
Bloody hell, is that likely to happen again?
Probably not, although it’s really hard to predict. There’s a bigger support for the paro now than in 2020, but there’s a pandemic and curfew to complicate matters. It’s really hard to call. The pandemic has magnified many people’s economic woes and feelings of frustration.
So what is happening tomorrow?
There will be large groups gathering at various points around the city, such as Transmilenio stations, parks, and plazas. The biggest are usually the Parque Nacional (Séptima), the Universidad Nacional (Calle 26), Banderas (Calle 6 with 78), Universidad de Cundinamarca (Soacha) and Héroes (Autopista and 80). They’ll all start heading towards the Plaza Bolívar mid-afternoon and arrive in stages late afternoon to listen to a succession of dreary speeches. That’s where it gets complicated.
It’s likely that somebody will start some violence. Could be a police infiltrator, could be a disgruntled anarchist. Either way, the police will take the opportunity to charge in. If that doesn’t happen, likely things will simply dissipate into cafés and the like before getting home.
Who’s behind all this?
The Central Unitaria de Trabajadores (CUT) is the main driving party behind the protests, but as in 2019, they’ll have many people joining them from elsewhere. This creates a certain amount of discord, because CUT have quite clear views which won’t be shared by all the protestors. Expect a certain amount of chaos as certain groups pull in different directions. The ex-guerilla will have banners there, and that’s always divisive.
Do they have broad support?
Yes and no. Seemingly everyone opposes the reforma tributaría, so on that issue the protesters are fully supported. Even Álvaro Uribe agrees with them. On the other issues, it’s more complicated. The peace accords, for example, are heavily polarised – 45% oppose them, 55% support them, according to Cifras y Conceptos. Many Colombians dislike protests in general – Bogotá is tolerant but much of the rest of the country will look at it with eyebrows raised. Then of course there’s a number of people who support the march but won’t turn out because of the pandemic.
Oh yeah, the third wave has arrived, I heard?
You heard correctly. Claudia López wants the paro to be delayed, but it’s the police that will really make the call. It’s a constitutional right, so even in a state of emergency, they’re unlikely to break it up until it inevitably turns violent. A lot of people who support the paro will stay indoors to avoid spreading the virus, and memes are circulating with ways to support the aims while staying safe. Francisco Maltés, the CUT president, says the protest will comply with the measures, but that’s unlikely to happen.
With hospitals reaching capacity, the mayor has announced a new clampdown in the capital. Here are the latest Bogotá restrictions.
Bogotá COVID restrictions: If the latest measures are enforced, playgrounds may be empty this Saturday.
After last week’s warning that we’d see stricter measures if ICU occupancy rose above 90%, it’s hardly surprising authorities have brought in new Bogotá restrictions. What is surprising is that they are looser than predicted.
Speaking yesterday, Bogotá mayor Claudia López said that we’ve reached 91% emergency ward occupation. She added that this is the first time since last April that we’ve faced the possibility of hospital collapse.
The concern is that if the rate of infection and hospitalisation doesn’t slow, hospitals will have to turn people away. On average, there are 225 requests for COVID ICU beds each day, and a further 150 requests for non-COVID ICU beds.
What are the new Bogotá restrictions?
From now until May 9, all commercial establishments, whether essential or not, must close by 7pm so people can be home by 8pm. That includes supermarkets and restaurants, but health workers and transport services will be exempt.
The idea is to have no people in the street between 8pm and 4am each night.
In addition:
Ley Seca will be in place until May 9. That means you won’t be allowed to buy alcohol in person from stores, bars, or tiendas. You can, however, order it by domicilio and get it delivered.
Schools, universities, and kindergartens that had begun to reopen will be closed again. Classes will have to take place remotely for at least two weeks.
The Friday to Sunday shutdown remains in place, so we’ll see total lockdown again this weekend from Thursday at 11.59pm to Monday at 4am. Ciclovia will not take place this Sunday, but parks will open. According to the mayor’s office, parks will only be open on Sunday. You can still exercise for an hour each day and walk pets.
You’ll be able to order home delivery from restaurants until 10pm, but domicilios will not be allowed to work later than that. Pico y cédula is not ending anytime soon either. Cédulas ending in an even number (2,4,6,8,0) can shop on odd-numbered days (1,3,5,7,9) and vice versa.
Vaccination in Colombia continues, but it’s not going to make a dent in the COVID numbers any time soon. Bogotá has given out over 840,000 vaccines to date. Of those, around 630,000 were first doses and 210,000 were second doses.
Protests and gatherings
There’ve been a number of protests in recent months — in part due to the COVID controls and in part due to the economic situation faced by many. And of course, the unpopular tax reforms.
López specifically spoke against protests and said they would be banned to slow the spread. Moreover, she warned they were putting lives at risk. “The marches and gatherings are an attempt on people’s lives,” she said.
Travel plans
If you have a flight booked in the coming weeks, you’ll be able to get to the airport for domestic or international flights. Just make sure you have your ticket handy in case you are stopped.
The mayor says there will be controls at the border with Cundinamarca, and people will only be allowed to cross in cases of extreme necessity. Whether — and how — such departmental controls will be enforced is another story.
Indeed, as with many of these restrictions, it remains to be seen whether people will follow them, and whether police will act against those who don’t. Many bogotanos have become almost numb to the danger of COVID, and need to put food on the table. As we heard people say at the start of the pandemic, people would rather die from the virus than hunge
Can private provision of jabs shut down the COVID-19 outbreak in Colombia? And are we anywhere near herd immunity. And can it ever be reached? Read on for more about Colombia vaccination.
Colombia vaccination is underway. But not enough to prevent a third peak. Photo: Unsplash
Colombia’s deadly third COVID-19 peak is now claiming 400 deaths a day – including many younger people – and intensive care units are at 80% capacity (higher in some places). Meanwhile, the Colombia vaccination program has yet to show much impact.
Here’s a quick Q & A guide to the latest twists and turns in the vaccine saga, and the news that vaccines can be commercialised – but with strings attached.
So how is Colombia’s vaccination plan going? What’s Colombia’s vaccination schedule?
After a slow start, partly because of its own internal bureaucracy, the Ministry of Health has cranked up the vaccination campaign to 700,000 doses a week. So far it’s fully covered 1.3 million people with two doses. Around 3 million have had a first dose, and will have partial protection.
That sounds good. So why are seeing so many deaths?
Most people are still unprotected from the virus. Officially, only 2.7 million Colombians have had COVID. Even if we expand that to 10 million (adding in a generous number of people who never knew they had it, or didn’t get tested), and add the vaccinated persons, that still only adds up to less than 17 million folk in a country of 50 million. Add in the new – and more contagious virus variants – such as the Brazilian and UK strains spreading through Colombia, and you have plenty of possibilities for infection. Plus, there’s lockdown fatigue – few people stay home these days. The situation could still get worse before it gets better.
Maybe the vaccines don’t work?
Vaccines do work. All evidence from early-uptake vaccinators like Israel and the UK is that at some point, vaccination quickly reduces infection and deaths. This is already happening in Colombia among health care workers, many of whom were vaccinated as a priority in February. Daily COVID cases among health workers has dropped from 250 a day in January to less than 20 a day in March.
Vaccination of key health workers in Colombia in February seems to have avoided a third wave of COVID-19 infection in this population group compared to the general population. Data INS.
Good news. So soon all be vaccinated and have herd immunity?
Not so fast. According to the vaccination tracking website Time To Herd, at the current rate, it could take over two years to get 70% of Colombia immunized.
Mother of God! Two Years! Is Colombia the slowest on earth?
More like halfway down the field. Here’s the Time To Herd comparison with other countries. It shows the estimated time at current vaccination rates to reach 70% of population coverage. Remember the figures from April 22 could change daily as new data comes in.
Colombia COVID vaccine rollout: Estimated time to reach 70% COVID vaccine coverage in selected countries:
As you can see, at present it’s an uneven playing field. We would hope that all countries would speed up as more vaccines come online.
748 days to 70% coverage and herd immunity, according to Time To Herd’s interactive map.
Could private vaccines speed up the process in Colombia?
Glad you were paying attention. So far vaccines have been given out in Colombia via health providers connected to the ‘EPS’ health insurers. Distribution has been strictly controlled in phases, prioritising the elderly and at-risk health workers. The big news this week is that the government has given the green light for private and commercial COVID vaccination.
Great news! Where can I buy one?
Whoa, Neddy.The plan comes with strings attached. First, only large commercial entities can buy vaccines. That means big companies can jump the queue for their own staff and vaccinate them directly. Government rules state they can only purchase approved vaccines from the original producer and must give them at zero cost to all their staff.
Confusingly the protocol also states that the private vaccines “can only be given in established health centres” but “cannot utilise EPS health staff network”. So it’s not clear how it could work on the ground. And so far vaccine manufactures are not willing to sell to private companies while country contracts globally are still unfilled.
Yikes. So not coming to the corner shop any time soon.
Not likely. But if private companies do get on board – and the vaccine manufacturers agree to sell – then I would predict some vaccination being done at private clinics. There is already a huge demand from those who can pay. Word on the grapevine is that some Colombians are flying twice to the US to get their jabs in Walmart. In fact, in some Estrato 6 cliques, the artificial antibodies are the new accessory.
Really? Vaccination tourism is already happening?
Yes, in fact some places are offering COVID vaccines as part of a tour package, for example the Maldives Islands or Alaska. The one-shot Johnson and Johnson vaccine – now re-approved after a blood clot scare – will make that an even more popular option as you can just fly once for the weekend.
But that loophole might also close. The US State Department has recently put 116 countries, including Colombia, on their “Level 4 – Don’t Travel” advisory list. So far this hasn’t blocked air travel, but as the US pulls ahead in the vaccine race – and Colombia falls behind – new blockades could start.
What vaccine options do I have if I stay in Colombia?
Colombia vaccinations are given at EPS clinics and local hospitals. Currently Colombia is at Phase Two of the vaccination program, with over-60s being given appointments for their doses.
We checked with the health ministry and they suggested the following:
Ideally, anyone arriving in Colombia is already fully vaccinated.
All foreign residents already in Colombia should join an EPS health insurer which will then include them in the vaccination plan. If you are formally employed, you will already have an EPS. Anyone else can join directly as an independiente (self-employed or retired).
Once signed up to an EPS, you can check your vaccine priority status at a government website called Mi Vacuna where your name should now appear. The EPS in theory will contact you for the vaccine when your phase comes along.
What if I have no plans to join an EPS?
Towards the end of each phase, a call will go out for people to come forward to mass vaccination events where the stragglers in that age group are vaccinated. Colombia’s health minister told CNN that Colombia’s vaccination plan will include “vulnerable and marginalized populations” in the fourth phase of the campaign. In theory, this could include anyone not in an EPS, but there is no guarantee. And right now, Phase 4 will only start in July earliest. Keep watching the local news and social media for these mop-up vaccinations.
Will my international travel insurance cover my COVID-19 vaccine?
Some insurers have said existing policies should cover costs of the vaccine when gets into private clinics, but officially that hasn’t yet happened anywhere. Other insurers are saying that proof of a COVID-19 vaccination will become a prerequisite for getting insurance in the first place. Check with your international insurer.
How safe is the COVID vaccine? What if I don’t want one?
Vaccination is not obligatory in Colombia, but “vaccine passports” are already in the pipeline, and airlines – and insurers – could require proof of the jab, just as now you need a negative COVID-19 test before travelling.
And don’t sit back and rely on others to get vaccinated for you to create herd immunity: it might never happen.
There are several reasons for this. One is the uneven vaccine roll-out in poor countries will incubate new strains which can sidestep the vaccines. The same could happen in rich countries if large groups of vaccine refuseniks are not jabbed, even while ditching the masks and demanding a return to normality.
Perhaps it’s ironic that these two behaviour extremes, a country hoarding excess vaccines for their own people, or individual anti-vaxxers expecting the herd to protect them, will eventually push the goal line further away.
Scientists now say that COVID-19 is here to stay, a background disease that we limit through technology. Your next vaccine could be the first of many.
Colombia’s byzantine taxation system needs desperate reform, but the public don’t think Carrasquilla has the answers.
Colombia tax reform: Finance minister couldn’t reproduce standard price of eggs. Photo by Erol Ahmed on Unsplash
Colombian finance minister Alberto Carrasquilla has announced radical new tax reform – possibly the most ambitious ever attempted in Colombia. It’s attracted heavy criticism already, not helped by the hapless treasurer fluffing his lines when asked the price of eggs. What is it, why are people up in arms and what will happen next? Our handy FAQ should help you out.
Colombians are suffering badly through lockdowns, so why does the government want us to pay more tax?
It’s all about the budget deficit. Colombia currently spends more than it makes, and that gap is increasing. Obviously this can’t carry on forever, so more money has to start coming in at some point. That’s why Carrasquilla wants to expand the tax base. In the short term, it would protect Colombia’s prized investment grade credit rating and in the long term, it sets the country on the path to a sustainable revenue system like other OECD countries.
A credit rating what?
Credit ratings are a badge of honour for countries. At BBB-, Colombia is comparable to some European countries. That makes it an attractive destination for companies moving into the market, but even more importantly makes it easier to borrow money for situations like Covid. Without investment grade status, Colombia will have to offer higher interest rates to raise financing to cover the fiscal deficit. On top of that, foreign companies may well be less likely to invest in Colombia. Put simply, there will be less trust in Colombia’s ability to pay back its debts.
A key part of the scheme is to expand the number of people fully under the tax scheme. With this in mind, the declaración de renta will now cover more people. On top of that, a lot of tax exemptions are being scrapped – notably IVA (sales tax) will apply to more products. There’s a one-off wealth tax for those earning COP$10 million monthly or holding COP$5,000,000,000 in assets, and IVA will be levied on utility bills at estrato 4 and above. There are green taxes that penalise vehicles and single-use plastics and the possibility of intra-city toll booths. It’s a fiscal empanada stuffed to bursting point.
But why pay taxes when Colombia’s so corrupt…
Well, that’s one issue, and not to be ignored. There’s widespread mistrust that the money will get to the right places. Still, 60% of owt is more than 100% of nowt. Also overall, many Colombians don’t pay the tax they are supposed to — income tax evasion is at a whopping 31.6% according to the Colombian tax collectors DIAN. On top of this, the government wants to finance social spending…
Social spending? But all I see on social media are memes joking about eggs and decrying the end of the middle classes
Yes, while some of the money being raised by taxes is to stop the debt ratio increasing, a large part is for social spending and VAT rebates for the poor. The largest part of this is the continuation and expansion of the Ingreso Solidario program to reach roughly 4.7 million households. This hands out money to people in lower estratos (following the SISBEN criteria). It’s not perfect, but has won acclaim. Added to this are schemes to encourage companies to hire workers under 28, support for poorer students to attend university and support for small and medium-sized companies (PYME).
This actually sounds quite progressive…
Well, yes. Much of the proposal is akin to what you might expect from a fashionable centre left social democrat party in Europe. It’s certainly not what the neoliberal Centro Democrático are normally into. It’s no surprise that the Centro Democrático rank and file are unhappy, but criticism has come from all sides, including leftists such as Polo and the Alianza Verde.
So why’s it so unpopular?
Well, even the comfortably off might be feeling the pinch. Relatively high earners often feel that they’re average earners and can have extensive debt or commitments. As we said before, people rarely have much faith that their taxes are well spent. It’s also not perfect – there are exceptions, notably for the army and privileged officials in the civil service and public unis. More importantly, there’s an election next year. Tax hikes are easy pickings for opposition politicians and no one wants to be seen to support tax increases. Finally, it’s so big that there are multiple positives and negatives for almost anyone. No one seems to be looking at their positives.
What have these politicians said?
A Caracol poll on Tuesday found that 84% of voters wouldn’t vote for a candidate who backed the reform as it stands, confirming its toxicity. With that in mind, people are queuing up to distance themselves. The Senate’s second biggest party, the ironically named Cambio Radical, are against it, along with their ally Cesar Gaviria who appears to speak for the Liberals. Juan Manuel Santos’ Partido de la U have decided to vote against it and it seems unpopular within the Centro Democrático, with even Uribe stepping in to complain. The leftist criticisms will come more strongly in next week’s national strike. Wilmer Leal of the greens is asking for more tax on the rich.
Hmmm, so is this going to happen at all?
The tax reform in Colombia will probably pass the Senate in some form. The government will pull out all the stops. There will be lots of shady deals in small rooms in the next few weeks. But this is the 15th tax reform in Colombia since 1995, and they’ve all been significantly watered down, so it might not end up bringing in as much money as the government would like. The question is whether it will be enough for investors to keep faith in the economy. What is almost certain is that whoever is in charge next year will have to have another go at getting people to pay more taxes, so expect to hear more soon.
Starting tomorrow until the beginning of May, you’ll need to be home by 8pm in Bogotá — and the city’s Friday to Sunday lockdown will continue.
Mayor Claudia López told reporters today that we’re at the highest level of ICU (emergency room) occupation since the start of the pandemic. Her concern is fourfold:
Hospitals in Antioquia are close to 100% capacity.
Yesterday saw the biggest ever daily jump in ICU occupation (80% to 84%)
Unlike previous peaks, where authorities were able to delay non urgent operations, this time people with other illnesses also need beds. “We have a double pressure right now,” said López. “Very high COVID ICU and very high non-COVID ICU.”
Finally, authorities believe we’re still two weeks away from the peak.
The situation in Antioquia has reached critical levels. ICU is close to 100% and doctors are having to decide which patients to admit to hospital. Unsurprisingly, López is keen to avoid this scenario in the capital.
One health worker in Bogotá told us: “Hospitals no longer supply enough, health personnel are exhausted, little by little we can see the physical and emotional wear and tear.”
They continued. “As health workers we are tired and we understand that many people no longer want to stay at home. Unfortunately the corruption in this country has almost all of us in increasing poverty: we need to eat, pay rent, healthcare, pensions, etc. For that reason, many people decide to go out into the streets. There is no longer fear of the coronavirus, there are needs.”
What does this mean in terms of COVID restrictions?
Bogotá will continue its existing four-three model, meaning people can go to work Monday to Thursday and the city will shut down from Friday to Saturday. On top of which, the capital is following government guidelines and introducing an 8pm nightly curfew. It will be in place until May 3.
And Pico y Cédula will be in place for the foreseeable future. Though, contrary to initial rumours today, it will not be applied to public transport.
All this will be reviewed again next Monday, unless the ICU occupation goes above 90%. In that case, we can expect an immediate stricter lockdown.
López said she understood the measures would hurt from an economic perspective, but that authorities are trying to deal with it as best they can. “We’re trying to manage the two sides,” she said. “Health and pocket.”
Our new feature will give you a snapshot of a different corner of Bogotá each month. We’ve all been stuck at home more this year, so one writer wanted to capture a taste of different parts of the city. First up? Parkway.
The tela twirlers in Parkway. Photo: Ethan Jacobs
One of the things that’s so interesting about Parkway is its layout. You have this long brick walkway that bisects the neighborhood hot dog-style. On either side of the path are wooden park benches and patches of grass – often balding – where families and groups of friends huddle in concentric parches. The layout can make Parkway’s elongated strip feel more like a never-ending catwalk than anything meant for pedestrian use. Though you know you’ve reached the end if you’ve gone more than a couple of minutes without seeing a susu wayuu or someone in hiking boots.
You have to imagine the area’s residents – and guests – are aware of this; that at some point or another, they have been or will be on display, if only fleetingly. That’s terrifying for anyone who shies from the spotlight, but it’s also beautifully democratic. If you sit on one of the benches along Parkway’s expansive stretch, particularly on a weekday evening or weekend afternoon, you’re bound to see it all.
If there’s an interest group that exists in Bogotá, no matter how far-right, left, orthodox, or secular, they’ve congregated here.
It’s a hotbed for hipsters and hucksters. At just about any hour of the day, you’ll see 20- and 30-somethings dressed in what looks like H&M Seinfeld chic, walking their plegables along the edge of the brick, donning thick, 70s-style glasses that may or may not have been prescribed. Not far away is someone peddling wares. And it seems being artisanal is a prerequisite. Often, the two are the same person.
In their totes, they carry arequipes, mermeladas, potted plants… pot. If you manage to resist those and other tempting trinkets, a meticulously made-up trans woman will be along shortly with bundles of incense, packets of plastic trash bags, or a mystery bag of candy – one for 500, three for 1,000, somehow.
You think to buy some, but get distracted by the highwire act of the slackliners and tela twirlers on either side of the walkway. Though I have no proof, I’m convinced this is where people hone their skills before taking their act to intersections throughout the city, where they’ll thanklessly perform in 30-second windows in front of a captive audience of taxi drivers, SITPs, and Rappitenderos.
It’s a lot to take in, but you feast on the visual spectacle because the marquee is always changing. In a city that can feel like a boundless desert of fragmented concrete, labyrinthine gridded networks of shattered asphalt streets, and clusters of unremarkable graffiti-stained low-rise buildings, Parkway, which certainly has its share of all three, still manages to feel like an urban oasis – at times, deceptively so, having shown its ability to morph into an inferno at the drop of a body. It’s where I had my first cacerolazo. It’s where they stole my bike. It’s home.
As we enter an official third wave, public appetite for lockdown is stretching ever-thinner.
Anti-Covid shops may be one of the few businesses doing well out of a third wave.
A red alert has been announced! A year ago, that sent a shockwave of fear and worry through the capital. Now though, we are all somewhat numbed and deadened to it. Like the boy who cried wolf, mayor Claudia López is struggling to convince people of the necessity of lockdown. As the rationality behind lockdown becomes miscommunicated or poorly applied, more and more people are losing faith, as they are worldwide.
She’ll get little sympathy from here – her communications have been consistently wayward, confusing and irritating. Above all, many have come at the last minute. Also, I have two wolf-like Siberian huskies, and Claudia slapped one of them in the face on Séptima once.
What does any of this language actually mean? What’s the difference between a curfew and a mobility restriction? Why is three-quarters full a red alert? It’s hard to know if we should worry about third waves when the second wave passed largely unnoticed. It’s hard to know what is so bad about a red alert when we’ve had so many. We’re being told that we really, should, must, have to follow the rules this time…but only till Monday.
In fairness, similar stories are being told in cities all over the world. As authorities try to balance the spread of the virus against people’s economic and mental wellbeing, it can feel like a never-ending COVID see-saw. It’s natural to feel frustrated with ever-changing rules about what we can or can’t do.
People aren’t following the rules
Many people are simply ignoring many of the rules. This really runs the gamut – poorer barrio tiendas operating as normal or with lock-ins; rich folk swanning off to fincas or abroad; private, unregulated parties all over the place; street sellers working openly; dog walkers clearly overrunning 20mins; parks filling up; smaller businesses not applying pico y cédula.
This might not be fair to the businesses that have to tow the line, but it’s also the logical extension of hearing repeated warnings of doom and gloom. After a while, the non-arrival of said doom makes people complacent. Of course, the doomsday scenario may not have arrived precisely because of these measures, but that’s by the by. There’s been little in the way of useful communication along those lines.
It’s also not helping that the measures seem ever more bizarre. There’s little rhyme or reason to much of it and contradictory parts abound. I can exercise for an hour; my dogs only for 20 minutes. It’s fine to have a beer with friends in a bar on juernes, but not Friday. Then the rules change week-to-week. Friday night was free last week, this week it won’t be. All of this erodes trust.
There’s little to no enforcement of many COVID rules much of the time. The big obvious places are kept in check by the alcaldía, but smaller places fly under the radar with ease. The police appear to have equally little appetite for enforcing unpopular rules – the parque nacional may have been officially closed last weekend, but plenty of people visited it in the clear light of day.
For now, people are broadly following both the spirit and letter of the law. The question is, how long will that continue, and can we rebuild trust? After all, the number of people reluctant to get vaccinated is already high and rising.
Another red alert has been issued in Bogotá, meaning the extension of lockdown, with some changes.
Empty streets in January.
Bogotá mayor Claudia López today confirmed the continuation of weekend lockdowns until April 19, with some changes from the last time. She also declared a state of emergency as hospital intensive care unit (ICU) occupancy crossed 75%. The third wave has been confirmed.
The Bogotá health system is now under red alert. That means holiday leave has been cancelled and emergency measures are in place to handle an acute shortage of resources. The ICU occupancy is predicted to rise further, says López, which is why it’s necessary to continue with the unpopular 4×3 plan. The idea behind this is to have four days working and three in isolation.
Pico y cédula will continue throughout. Cafés, restaurants and hotels are officially exempt, but it’s fair to say that many smaller shops are ignoring it. Pico y cédula is the only extra measure being applied in the ‘4’ part of 4×3 (Monday to Thursday), apart from universities being asked to close.
Friday to Monday is a different story, however, and slightly different from last weekend. Firstly, it’s been pulled forward 24 hours, so Friday night drinks are off. The lockdown will begin at 11.59 pm on Thursday night and finish at 4 am on Monday. However, this time around parks and ciclovía will be open.
As before, you can go out to exercise for an hour, take pets out, and shop for essentials.
Business owners are already predictably up in arms. Although these two weekends were always likely to have restrictions, the changing of the dates has affected some enterprise’s plans with only a few days’ notice that they will now be closed on Friday night.
The elephant in the room, as ever, is enforcement. With each period of lockdown there is more and more defiance of the rules and less public appetite to follow them. The much-vaunted Plan Cadena, for example, is being widely ignored and the parks were busy last weekend despite not officially being open. A walk in Bogotá’s streets last week showed just as many shops open and people were about as ever.
The capital’s restrictions don’t affect everyone the same way.
Let’s hope Bogotá parks don’t close again as the city tries to minimise the damage of a third spike. Photo: Oli Pritchard
The new restrictions coming into place this weekend are touted as affecting everyone equally. It certainly looks that way on paper, but dig a little deeper and one turns up some unsettling problems. Previous lockdowns have restricted access to public spaces that are vital outlets for many. Specifically, municipal parks.
At the crux of the problem is this: while the restrictions might have been the same for everyone, we all have different resources with which to deal with it. Equally, we’re not all in the same position when it comes to our free time. Neither do we follow the same pursuits.
Parks, closing affects everyone equally, sure. It overlooks, though, the fact that the parks of Bogotá are not used in the same way by all. For those in cramped accommodation, the parks provide a critical venue for large gatherings. Those gatherings now will likely still take place, but indoors — even though any form of gathering is frowned upon right now. They’ll be far less pleasant, and far more likely to potentially spread the virus.
The parks are only closed at the weekend, too. So it’s fine to do your tennis practice midweek, if you’re lucky enough to do the sort of job that allows you time to do so. In a country where many people work hard for six days a week, that’s simply not possible for large swathes of society. Also, tennis is unsurprisingly practised a lot more by richer people than poorer in the first place. The one day the Parque Nacional tennis courts really open up in normal times? Sunday. Ah.
Photo: Oli Pritchard
Of course, bars and restaurants will be open Tues-Fri, which is good news. Again though, it’s for those that have the option for midweek jollies. Of course, these places are also only accessible to those that can pay for them. Parks, on the other hand, are one of the few places all can access for free, where the activities within are also free. Neither is there discrimination at the door – no face check and no implied class barrier.
The message seems to be that the economically active are welcome to go out and carry on as before, even if it’s actually more likely to spread the virus. But to go to the park and simply walk is to be discouraged, as you’re not useful to the economy. Are we all making sacrifices for protection against the virus or are we allowing people to pay for an opt-out?
Let’s not forget, either, the localised lockdowns. They’ve not been discounted this time round, and last time those zones were centered in the south. Of course, that’s been true throughout the localised lockdown periods in Bogotá.
To be clear, I do not think that these restrictions were aimed at the poorer people in society, neither do I think that there’s a viciousness to it. I simply think that no-one in the mayor’s office has bothered to think about the outcomes of their decisions. After all, why should they? Their lives won’t be affected.
Pico y cédula is back – and there’ll be another full lockdown this weekend.
Jenny and Martha (right) at their orange juice stall in Parkway, Teusaquillo. The mother and daughter team are worried by the threat of a new COVID-19 lockdown in Bogotá, having lost three months of informal work in the last year. “We’ve used our savings to pay rent and living expenses, and so far have no help at all from the government, not cash or even any food support,” Martha told The Bogotá Post today. Photo: Steve Hide
As was to be expected, even after slightly muted Semana Santa celebrations, authorities plan to shut down the city again this weekend.
ICU occupancy is now at 67.7% and Mayor Claudia López fears a third wave is not far away. The original plan was only to tighten restrictions if the emergency ward occupancy went above 70%, but the mayor is stepping in early.
Another reason for concern is that at least one person with the Brazilian variant has died in Colombia. A mid-March announcement said that the variant had been identified in an elderly man who passed away at the end of January. He had not travelled to Brazil or Leticia.
With their mobile stalls selling cell phone accessories, Omar and José (right) often find themselves playing cat and mouse with police during lockdowns periods in Bogotá, but try their hardest to keep working informally. The two migrants left Venezuela two years ago to better their chances in Colombia. “We can’t sit around locked up inside, or we won’t survive,” José told The Bogotá Post. Photo: Steve Hide
Bogotá’s April restrictions
From now until April 19, pico y cédula will operate in the capital. If your ID ends in an even number, you can go shopping on odd days and vice versa. The current curfew is still in place between midnight and 5 am.
The following measures will apply in Bogotá from 11.59 pm on Friday (April 8) until 4 am on Tuesday (April 13).
Shutdown: Neither people nor vehicles will be allowed to move around the city unless they are exempted.
No alcohol sales: Ley seca will be in place, but you can get alcohol delivered domicilio.
All the usual exceptions apply, including:
One person per household is allowed out to buy essential medicine and groceries between 5 am and 8 pm
Essential workers can carry on as usual
You can walk your pet for 20 minutes
You can exercise for one hour
You can go to medical, veterinary or vaccination appointments
The new measures will be reevaluated on April 13. It remains to be seen how strictly these measures will be followed or enforced.
It’s estimated that around 80% of Colombians identify as Catholic. As such, it’s hardly surprising that many of the superstitions around Easter have their roots in Catholicism. Constitutionally, Colombia is a secular country, but you only need to look at the furore around the Pope’s visit to see the levels of devotion here.
Many of the normal Easter processions and parades were banned this year because of the coronavirus. The stations of the cross (viacrucis), the climb to the hill of Monserrate and mass celebrations were not allowed. The numbers of people allowed into church services were limited and large family gatherings were discouraged.
Even so, here are some Holy Week traditions and Colombian Semana Santa superstitions you may have come across if you celebrated Easter in Colombia. Especially if you had the chance to celebrate with some of the older generations.
1) Do not eat red meat
You may have noticed that fish is a lot more popular during Semana Santa. This is because Good Friday and Easter Saturday are considered days of mourning. Therefore on these holy days Catholics, avoid red meat as a sign of respect for the pain that Jesus Christ suffered at the time of his crucifixion. Some families also fast on Good Friday and Saturday.
2) Do not bathe in a river or in the sea
This unusual belief has several variations. The myth is that if you swim during Semana Santa — in the sea, swimming pool, or river — you might turn into a fish. A less extreme view is that you shouldn’t swim because this is a time of mourning.
3) Do not have sex
Having sex is seen as one of the most important disrespects during Holy Week. Some people go as far as claiming your bodies could get stuck together if you have sex during holy days. As with the bathing and red meat, it’s likely this grew out of a feeling that it is sinful to enjoy yourself when we’re supposed to be reflecting on the crucifixion.
4) Do not go out after 3pm on Good Friday
3pm on Good Friday is especially important for Catholics as it’s believed this is the time Jesus died. This is why many believers stay at home so as to not disrespect such a sacred moment. One family we spoke to said people used to believe thrashing plants at 3pm would help the plants to thrive.
5) A baby born on Good Friday is considered unlucky
In Colombia, some think that babies born on Good Friday are unlucky. It’s unfortunate since some other countries believe that babies born on Good Friday will become healers, especially if they get baptized on Easter Sunday.
6) Do not sweep the floor or hammer in nails
It’s hardly surprising that superstitions have evolved around using nails, considering that Jesus Christ was nailed to cross. Sweeping the ground is considered as sweeping the face of Jesus.
7) Do not listen to music
Listening to any kind of music that is not religious is seen as disrespectful during Holy Week. Especially rock and metal music. For people who are religious, this should be a time of thought and reflection.
8) Do not climb trees
We’ll finish with another slightly odd nature superstition. According to tradition, climbing a tree during Semana Santa could cause children to become monkeys or wild animals.
Of course, you’ll find different regions and different families have their own Semana Santa traditions. And just as your eyes won’t go square if you sit too close to the TV, you’re not going to turn into a monkey if you climb a tree over Easter. But it’s fun to know some of the myths and legends and understand how they evolved.
Claudia López introduces measures aimed at minimizing an Easter COVID outbreak.
Semana Santa restrictions: the path up Monserrate will be closed from March 28 til April 5
If you’re planning for Semana Santa, be ready for similar restrictions to those we saw at Christmas.
As before, everything hinges on emergency room (ICU) occupancy, which is currently about 65% in the capital. A night curfew will begin this weekend, and stricter measures will be introduced if hospital occupancy rises further.
Mayor Claudia López announced today that the city would follow government instructions. As such, cities like Bogotá with ICU occupancy of 50% to 70%
Curfew from midnight to 5am
Measures apply from March 26 – 29 and March 31 to April 5
If occupancy goes above 70%, the curfew would begin two hours earlier and pico y cédula will be back. You’ll only be able to go to shops, supermarkets and banks every other day.
The path to Monserrate will be closed from March 28 to April 5. And any Easter processions or crowded religious gatherings will not be allowed. The plan is to promote socially distanced religious celebrations, either on television, online or through spaced out schedules.
If you want to leave the city, there’s nothing to stop you. So far, there are no bans on national or international travel. Though it’s worth checking your destination country – the UK, for example, has just banned all unnecessary international travel.
Brendan Corrigan from Wrong Way Corrigan and GetIngles will be discussing the rules Easter celebrations with our deputy editor Oli Pritchard at 9pm on Facebook Live.
There’s a lot more to see in Colombia beyond the classic tourist sites, amazing though they are.
From caiman to capybara, Colombia has nature galore. Photo: Photo by Gaetano Cessati on Unsplash
There are a plethora of spectacular sights in Colombia, from deep oceans to high mountains, filled with deserts, plains, rivers and all sorts of forest in between. You’ve likely heard of the big guns like Leticia, Cartagena and Tayrona, but there’s a lot under the radar too. Our intrepid birdman Chris Bell has been all over, from Tuparro to Mitú, but most of Colombia is accessible to the average traveller too.
Tonight in Bogotá Nights, we’ll be discussing hidden Colombia. If you missed travelling in 2020 and plan to make up for it this year, tune in at 7pm to hear Oli and Brendan discuss some off-the-beaten-track destinations.
Coronavirus restrictions have been lifted in much of the country, though you should still take precautions if you plan to travel. And don’t just assume the place you’re going is lockdown-free. For example, authorities in Santa Marta are considering another strict quarantine as they try to get a handle on their overflowing clinics.
Avoid the crowds
These socially distanced times are a great reason to steer clear of tourist hotspots. If you’re fed up with the numbers in Cartagena, many head further up to Palomino, but that’s pretty paraco and filling up too. Why not swing the other way and head to Coveñas? It’s on the Colombian tourist trail, but there are few foreigners and easy access to the San Bernardo islands, especially Múcura. You can head over to Chocó too, and boat to lesser-known destinations like Nuquí or the Caribbean Chocó.
The Llanos Orientales take up about a third of Colombia, but few people go out there. There’s less tourist infrastructure, that’s true, but if you’re comfortable with Colombian culture and speaking Spanish, there’s so much to see and little to worry about. San José de Guaviare has hit the guidebooks, but only just. There’s plenty of sights, including ancient rock paintings, spectacular rivers and eerie rock formations. Best of all, not many people to share it with for now. We first went in 2014, and every report since has said numbers are growing. There’s also Orocue in Casanare, which necessitates a boat trip and brings you enormous caimans and more capybara than you can shake a stick at.
The signing of the peace deal meant a few places opened up for the first time. While Chris Bell got there first too, anyone can get there now. We went rafting with ex-FARC members in Caquetá, brilliantly run and a chance to see a side of Colombia that had been off-limits for decades. The Estoraques natural park in Norte de Santander is mostly safe now too, with its spectacular rock towers.
This has been a tough year for tourism in Colombia. But if you’re feeling ready to venture further afield, there’s plenty of places to visit.
Colombia has plenty of national celebrations, but also finds the time to celebrate other cultures’ special days, such as St Patrick’s next week. Find out more and tune in to Facebook at 9pm to continue the discussion Live!
Colombia has plenty of home-grown festivals to enjoy, but the Colombian appetite for parties is so big that we import festivals too! St Patrick’s Day is upon us, so we’ll be talking about that tonight at 9pm on our weekly Facebook Live with Brendan Corrigan of Wrong Way fame.
If there’s a celebration you remember from back home, or that you celebrated while living abroad, there’s a good chance you’ll find a place to mark the occasion here in Bogotá. The capital becomes more and more cosmopolitan by the month and even if flights are a pain, you can travel the world (ish) in the city.
Of course, with an Irish host, we’ll be talking about Ireland’s connection with Colombia tonight at 9pm on Facebook. Brendan’s got a lot to say about St Patrick’s Day. That’s usually a lot of fun in Bogotá, as many places that like a tipple or two. Bastille Day for the French features good food and usually some cycling, as Colombians love the Tour. Talking of bikes, there’s usually a bike ride for Kingsday in the Netherlands.
Celebrating foreign festivals in Bogotá
The big daddy of Euro-fests is surely Oktoberfest, though, which sees special brews from various brewers in and around the capital. Happily, it’s celebrated in October, too, which removes the irritation from the name. The English, thankfully, don’t celebrate our national day and there are small events by groups of Scots and Welsh for Burns Night and St David’s as well as the odd other UK festival.
The Americans have it easiest – there’s the Super Bowl in early February which seems to get bigger and bigger here every year. Then you have the Fourth of July mid-year which sees fireworks and the like, before Thanksgiving provides a little respite from the cold November rain. Wey, ya, plenty will celebrate Cinco de Mayo, of course, and that’ll be good eating. Canada Day is probably celebrated and Australia Day is gaining popularity in pockets of Bogotá even as it becomes controversial in the antipodes.
From Asia, the Chinese New Year usually sees Lion Dancers around the country, as well as traditional drummers. Indian food and yoga will be celebrated for Holi and possibly Divali as well as International Yoga Day in June. If it’s cherry blossom season or Golden Week that excites you, see if the Japanese community is up to anything.
Then, of course, there’s a lot of international festivals, such as Halloween and Valentine’s. Both of those catch a little criticism from traditionalists while the rest of the country takes the opportunity for more celebration. Halloween is particularly massive, as Colombians love witchcraft and magic. Many spend a lot of time and money preparing costumes and again, there are usually some themed beers. Love and romance is rarely not expressed in Colombia (see our special from a few weeks back). Women’s Day has exploded in recent years too, including this week. So tune in tonight at 9PM to our live show, or check it out (or past episodes) on our YouTube channel. We’d love to hear your suggestions for festival ideas, days we’ve missed or stories from past events.
8M in Colombia: Thousands took to the streets today to campaign for equality and protest violence against women.
Slogans were painted in graffiti in several places through Bogotá. Photo: Oli Pritchard
International Women’s Day is always a time to reflect on the progress made towards gender equality — and the challenges that still lie ahead. In a year that has seen an increase in femicides and violence against women in Colombia, there were many reasons to take to the streets.
According to a recent report from Sisma Mujer, women in Colombia have borne more of the economic impact of the pandemic than men. This is true in many parts of the world. The report suggests that COVID-19 has pushed labour participation here back by almost a decade.
Economic inequality is not the only issue. The report highlights some other concerning statistics in Colombia:
So far in 2021, a woman has been a victim of domestic violence every 11 minutes
Between March 2020 and February 2021, calls to the domestic violence helpline (155) have increased by almost 85%. There were about 18,000 calls in March last year, compared with almost 33,000 this February.
There were 444 victims of femicide in 2020, according to data from the Fiscalía. Sisma Mujer also highlighted the increased risk of femicide during the quarantine.
As such, it’s not surprising that marches took place throughout Colombia today. In Bogotá, women congregated at the planetarium and the Parque Nacional and marched towards the Plaza Bolívar. Many of the marchers wore purple pañoletas and black clothes in mourning for the victims of femicide in the country. Tonight saw a concert and candlelit vigil for those who have died.
However, the day did not pass completely peacefully. A small group of protestors damaged TransMilenio stations and buses, while others tried to set fire to the San Francisco church. ESMAD riot police were called in at around 6pm.
Bogotá mayor Claudia López blamed about 30 women for the violent scenes.
“This is not a protest nor assertion nor feminism,” she tweeted. “It’s unacceptable that a day dedicated to exalting the struggles and achievements of women in history was taken advantage of by a small group of violent women who believe that to protest is to destroy,.”
COVID-19 vaccination in Colombia began today and Bogotá will get its first vaccinations tomorrow. The health ministry are confident 35 million people will be vaccinated by the end of the year.
Vaccination in Colombia started today. Photo: Minsalud
After a long wait COVID-19 vaccination in Colombia has begun. Today, Verónica Machado, a nurse in Sincelejo, was the first person in Colombia to receive the coronavirus vaccine.
The original plan had been to begin the nationwide vaccination program on Saturday (Feb. 20), but things have moved faster. Sincelejo and Montería began vaccinating today. Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, Barranquilla, Bucaramanga and Cartagena begin tomorrow. And other areas will begin their vaccinations on Friday and Saturday.
The plan is to vaccinate 35 million people against coronavirus by the end of the year. I say people rather than Colombians because foreigners will also be eligible.
Once the program gets underway, the Ministry of Health says COVID-19 vaccination in Colombia can go quickly. It estimates it will be able to vaccinate 100,000 people a day and has set a target of vaccinating one million people in February and March.
When will I get vaccinated?
The first 50,000 doses of the vaccine arrived in Colombia on Monday. These will go to front-line health workers, as will the second batch of 50,000 that arrives on Feb. 24. The following delivery of 100,000 vaccines will be used to give both groups their second dose.
According to Health Minister Fernando Ruiz Gómez, those over 80 years old are the next priority. “First we’ll vaccinate the 350,000 people who use their human talent in healthcare and work in the front line of COVID-19 care. We’ll continue with the 1,200,000 people over 80 years. Once we finish, we’ll continue with those over 60 and the second-line healthcare workers.”
That said, there’s also talk of sending the whole 192,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine straight to Leticia in an attempt to reduce the risk of the Brazilian strain from spreading further into Colombia. However, Brazil has raised concerns over the effectiveness of this vaccine.
Colombia has a platform called Mi Vacuna, which helps you see where you are in the vaccine queue. You can also find information about the nation’s vaccination plan. Let’s hope it works better than the coronapp.
That said, you don’t have to register with Mi Vacuna to get vaccinated. Your EPS provider is in charge of inputting who belongs to what group into the system and also informing you when you can be vaccinated.
Where does COVAX come in?
If you thought COVAX was a type of vaccine, you’re not alone. But it’s a vaccine alliance, made up of the WHO, Gavi, and CEPI. Gavi and CEPI are both global vaccine partnerships that existed before COVID. Its mission is to ensure all countries can access the vaccine, regardless of wealth and it’s supported the development of various vaccines and operates as a trading block to negotiated prices.
Colombia is getting 2,533,600 AztraZenece vaccines and 177,000 Pfizer ones through COVAX. COVAX aims to provide enough vaccines for 20% of the population in every country. Its motto is: With a fast-moving pandemic, no one is safe, unless everyone is safe.
Which vaccines will Colombia get?
Pfizer in Colombia
Pfizer is the first vaccine to arrive in Colombia. According to a Pfizer press release in December, we’ll be getting a total of 10 million doses. The reason Colombia’s been busily acquiring super cold freezers is that the two-shot vaccine needs to be stored at minus 70 degrees Celsius. Colombia plans to use the Pfizer vaccine in urban areas and keep the more forgiving vaccines for rural zones.
AstraZeneca in Colombia
The AstraZeneca vaccine has come in for some bad press recently, but Ruiz defended it this week. “Our Advisory Body and scientific committee have not seen conclusive evidence,” he said of the rumoured side effects. “Our objective is to reduce mortality for this disease and this vaccine gives us peace of mind to proceed.”
Colombia will be getting 10 million shots of the vaccine, enough to vaccinate 5 million people as it also needs to be administered in two doses. Unlike Pfizer, this vaccine can be stored at 2 to 8 degrees Celsius.
Sinovac vaccine in Colombia
Like AstraZeneca, this is a two-dose vaccine that needs to be stored between 2 to 8 degrees Celsius. Colombia’s bought 2.5 million doses of the Chinese vaccine, which is good for 1,250,000 people.
Moderna vaccine in Colombia
Moderna is a relative newcomer to the vaccine market, but the two-dose vaccine has proved effective in tests. Colombia has agreed to buy 10 million doses of this vaccine, which also doesn’t need to be stored in at supercold temperatures.
Janssen vaccine in Colombia
Many have high hopes of the Janssen vaccine because it’s one of the only vaccines not to need two shots. That makes it ideal for rural areas where people are very spread out. Colombia has 9 million Janssen vaccines coming — which will be good for 9 million people.
Sputnik V vaccine in Colombia
No deal has been signed, but the Russian ambassador told press this month that Colombia is negotiating to both buy and produce the vaccine.
What can we expect?
Looking at other countries we can be pretty confident that the vaccine process won’t run smoothly. Colombia’s already hit several stumbling blocks in its negotiations and need for Invima approval. But at least the delay gave it time to prepare. Which the health minister assures people it has.
In the coming weeks and months, we will see more and more vaccines arrive in the country. It will reach a peak in August, when we’re due to get over 11 million doses. Once the vaccine arrives, there’s a limited time window to transport and administer the drugs. Which becomes complicated in a hot country like Colombia with a spread-out population.
In our series about craft beer breweries in Bogotá, we look at Vistalegre.
Grab a pint from Vistalegre.
They may not be as well-known and established as some of the other craft breweries we’ve covered so far, but Vistalegre, in the far north of Bogotá, is one of the best examples here of the grass roots aspect of the industry. If you’re after a brewer who’s had to start with the very basics and make do with what he has at hand, Daniel López is your man.
Daniel’s brewing story is a family one and goes all the way back to his father, Miguel, and his grandfather, Gonzaga, who had a rum distillery in the small Venezuelan town of Caicara del Orinoco. After having grown up with rum barrels and alcohol all around him, Miguel came up with the idea of continuing the family tradition of grog supply and trying a bit of homebrewing when Daniel was about 13. Miguel was working for the World Health Organisation at the time and had stumbled upon a couple of homebrewing books during his travels, so in the early 90s, he and Daniel started brewing in Caracas.
The Venezuelan capital at the time wasn’t exactly brimming with homebrew supplies though, so even when Daniel was able to pop over to the States to bring back supplies, it was still nigh on impossible to get hold of any other ingredients back home. In the early 00s, Daniel’s friend in Ireland managed to find a homebrewing shop over there, from which he was able to get hold of some Cascade hops and yeast. By this point it was finally possible to find malted barley in Venezuela and Daniel was able to get started on his dream.
Daniel’s quick to admit that the first few batches were nothing special, but as he researched the art more and small homebrew supply importers began popping up in Caracas, he improved his craft and started selling beers to his friends. He soon found himself making more money selling beer than he was pulling in at his university job, and founded Old Dan’s in 2011.
As the situation in Venezuela continued to deteriorate, Daniel finally made the decision to up sticks and was able to find some investors to help him set up Vistalegre here in 2016. It hasn’t been an easy ride, but towards the end of last year they finally found themselves getting to where they wanted to be, with a reasonably sized brewery, a cute little taproom upstairs and a growing reputation, only for Covid-19 to hit. Vistalegre has fortunately survived the pandemic, which sadly can’t be said for all Colombian craft breweries, and has had to adapt to a more domicilios-based approach to make up for lost taproom sales.
The beers
While Vistalegre’s beer recipes are constantly evolving, Daniel still makes the same three styles of beer he made 10 years ago in Venezuela – a blonde ale, an amber ale and a smoked porter – as well as a recently added saison. The La AhumadaPorter has deservedly won awards both inside and outside Colombia, including a gold medal in Venezuela and a bronze in Panama. It’s unique, it’s as smoky as it promises to be, and it’s by far my favourite of Vistalegre’s beers.
However, it’s now a seasonal beer at the brewery and won’t be back for a while, so I’d better talk about my second favourite of Daniel’s offerings instead: the Boreal American Amber Ale.
The Boreal is nicely distinct from most amber ales. The sweetness is still there, but the caramel malt provides more of a stout-style ‘burnt toast’ note, rather than the dry biscuity malt hit that most amber ales have. Daniel uses Simcoe hops (much more popular in IPAs and more hop-driven beers), which gives a big citrus and pine edge to the beer, again making it somewhat unique as an amber ale. It starts off surprisingly tart, but this soon subsides and it ends up being an eminently smooth easy-drinker.
Where to get ‘em:
You can currently find Vistalegre beers at Carnivoros and the 2600 Brauhaus, just a couple of blocks from Parque 93. I highly recommend checking out the brewery and taproom though, which you’ll need to organise ahead with Daniel (details below).
Outside of this, it’s all domicilios. Vistalegre currently sells the Saudade Saison, Boreal and Summer Blonde, all of which will set you back $40,000 COP (plus delivery) for a six pack (you can mix and match to your heart’s content), and $144,000 (free delivery) for a slab of 24. Deliveries go out on Thursday and Friday, and you can pay with either cash, Nequí or bank transfer.
To order, simply get in touch through Instagram or hit up Daniel himself on WhatsApp on 310 331 1904
Colombia’s capital ends red alert as intensive care occupancy reaches 81%.
Photo: John Arias Calvo, bogota.gov.co
As the coronavirus case numbers and intensive care occupancy begin to fall, so too do the restrictions in Bogotá. Today, as the COVID-19 intensive care occupancy sank to 81%, authorities announced the end of its red alert.
Like much of the world, Colombia began 2021 with increased lockdown measures, including curfews and localised quarantines. Intensive care occupancy — a key figure for local authorities — had hit 94% in Bogotá and a number of restrictions were put in place to try to reduce the case numbers.
However, Bogotá’s mayor Claudia López announced today the city is no longer on red alert. As such, some of the stricter restrictions will be relaxed.
The localised lockdowns in place in nine areas (Los Cedros, Castilla, Timiza, Fontibón, Garcés Navas, Boyacá Real, Tibabuyes, Suba and El Rincón) of Bogota will be lifted from 11.59 pm tonight.
This Sunday (Feb. 7), you’ll be allowed back out on the ciclovia and parks will fully reopen. But the mayor warns against crowds gathering at traffic lights and, of course, facemasks continue to be mandatory.
Football will return to El Techo and Campín. Thursday and Sunday’s league matches will be played without fans. During the red alert, matches that would have taken place in the capital were shunted elsewhere or postponed.
And from Feb. 15, we’ll see the gradual reopening of the city’s public schools. Private schools can open from Feb. 8. Universities will also be able to start face-to-face classes, up to a maximum capacity of 35%.
But, before you grab your face masks and rush for the outside world, some restrictions remain. We’re still in orange alert.
Pico y cédula will continue for commercial and banking establishments, which includes supermarkets.
Nightly curfews are now a thing of the past, but commercial establishments will have to shut by 11pm.
Certain sectors can only operate within certain times — for example, construction can only take place between 10am and 7pm. Warehouses and shopping centres from 10am to 11pm.
As President Duque announces that vaccination will begin in Colombia on Feb. 20, local authorities are still keen to slow the spread as much as possible. If you have symptoms or have had contact with someone who later tested positive, find out how to get tested.
The latest measures come as a surprise to many, as they are much lighter than had been expected
New lockdown rules in Bogotá. Photo Emma Newbery
The latest round of coronavirus restrictions in Bogotá are set to be much less strict than we’ve previously seen. There are still restrictions, of course, but at least in the short term you should find things generally more open from now.
First up, there’ll be something called a special restriction on movement for the weekend. The curfew from 8pm-4am expires on Thursday at 23:59 and will be replaced with a 10pm curfew for this weekend. After that, no plans as yet for another curfew.
Next, shops can open as normal, and it appears that restaurants and bars also can, as long as they obey all general distancing rules and close at 10 pm. However, parks will be closed where possible, and the ciclovía will not be in operation.
All areas in localised lockdown in Bogotá will come out of their lockdown on Thursday at 23:59, so the city will finish January on an equal footing. Pico y cédula will stay in operation until the 31st of January, however.
The decision to close parks and outside spaces, whilst simultaneously allowing inside spaces to open has attracted understandable criticism from some quarters. On the other hand, there are those that would prefer heightened measures to continue or increase, being as ICU occupancy remains above 90%. Time will tell. And of course, the rules could change again tomorrow.
Smaller areas (UPZ) in the localidades Suba, Engativá, Fontibón, Kennedy and Usaquén where cases are still high, will see a new strict quarantine. The quarantine will come into effect from January 29 11:59 pm until February 12 11:59 pm. See the image below.
Latest COVID restrictions in Bogotá include night time curfew and third weekend of lockdown.
Coronavirus in Bogotá: new lockdown measures were announced today. Photo: Jared Wade
In what’s becoming an all too familiar scenario, Bogotá mayor Claudia López today announced another set of curfews and shutdowns. Following a meeting of city bigwigs and representatives from the Ministry of Health, the mayor told bogotanos that the second peak of coronavirus cases is not yet under control.
Emergency care occupation is hovering around the 92% mark and over 100 deaths were reported today. And while the Ministry of Health touted its vaccination plans this afternoon, there’s still a lot of work to do before vaccination can begin.
Starting tomorrow (Tuesday, Jan. 19), there’ll be a nightly curfew from 8pm to 4am. It will run until at least Thursday, Jan. 28 – and if recent decrees are anything to go by, there’s a good chance it will be extended beyond that.
In addition, this weekend will be the third weekend of total quarantine in the city. From 8 pm on Friday, Jan. 22 to 4am on Monday, Jan 25, only essential services may operate. Ley seca will be in place throughout the city, so in theory, you’ll only be able to buy alcohol via domicilio.
All the exceptions we’ve come to see as normal apply. One person per household can go to the shops. Essential workers — such as healthcare and food services — can go about their business.
Strict quarantine by sector continues
Meanwhile, six localidades have just begun their two-week localised lockdown. Bosa, Ciudad Bolívar, Puente Aranda, Rafael Uribe Uribe, San Cristóbal, Usme, and Tunjuelito will see strict quarantines from Jan. 15 to Jan. 28.
UK government will stop non-essential travel from South America and Portugal on Friday. Residents and nationals will be allowed to enter.
No more travelling to the UK from Colombia. Photo: Artemis Maria Papoutsakis
The UK government today announced a ban on most travellers from South America, as well as Portugal and Cape Verde over concerns of a new Brazilian COVID variant. Portugal was included due to its close connections with Brazil.
The measures will take effect from Friday morning (Jan. 15) and do not affect residents of the UK, whether UK citizens or not. Travellers who have visited Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Cape Verde, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela in the last 10 days will not be able to enter the UK.
UK residents who have visited those countries will have to spend 10 days in isolation upon arrival. Farcically, negative PCR tests won’t be mandatory for entry until Monday. Introduction of compulsory PCR results had initially been planned for tomorrow, but the beleaguered Johnson government was again forced to delay that scheme.
Concern over new COVID variants
Concern over the so-called “Brazilian variant” of COVID prompted Transport Secretary Grant Shapps’ to issue the ban. One fear is that these variants could be more contagious. Another more serious concern is they could render vaccines less effective.
Ironically, flights between Brazil and the UK are currently suspended due to Brazilian government concerns over the Kent COVID variant. How much of this is genuine concern and how much is Britain trying to shake off its ‘plague island’ nickname is hard to say. So far, scientists say they don’t believe the Kent strain will interfere with vaccination, but it’s too early to know if the same can be said for other new strains.
Several countries introduced similar bans when the UK and South Africa first announced new strains had emerged.
Expect more PCR tests
Like Colombia, a number of countries now require negative PCR tests from new arrivals. If you are planning to travel, make sure you understand the entry requirements and get the tests you need.
With the incoming Biden administration in the US also likely to move towards asking for negative PCR tests before flying to the country, it looks as though measures worldwide may get stricter. There is also the possibility of flights being cancelled due to lack of passenger numbers.
Reinaldo Rueda has been announced as the new head coach of the Colombian national team.
Reinaldo Rueda is appointed to take Colombia to Qatar. Photo: FCF Colombia.
The Colombian football federation confirmed today that Reinaldo Rueda will be the new manager of ‘los cafeteros’, Colombia’s national football team. The Cali-born manager’s contract runs from now until after the World Cup 2022 in Qatar. He takes over the seat from Carlos Queiroz, who was pushed out after the embarrassing 6-1 defeat in Ecuador and 3-0 at home defeat against Uruguay last November.
Rueda’s name has been circling around the prestigious job for weeks, but he was still in charge of the Chilean national team. Once he’d reached an agreement to end his contract with the Chilean federation, though, there was nothing stopping him from coming back to Colombia to sign a deal.
It will be his second spell in charge of the national team for the 63-year-old manager. He just missed out on the World Cup 2006, having taken over the team from the legendary Pacho Maturana. However, the team – who were bottom of the table when he took the helm – didn’t qualify.
This time, the outlook for World Cup qualification is better than 15 years ago. Currently, sitting in seventh place, ‘la selección’ don’t yet have tickets for Qatar. But with only 2 points fewer than Paraguay, who are sitting in the safe fourth position, Reinaldo Rueda will have every chance to turn it around.
Rueda began his career with Colombia’s U20s
Rueda, who was never a professional football player, started his managerial career in charge of Colombia’s under-20 team. After unsuccessful spells at Cortuluá, Deportivo Cali and Independiente Medellín he returned to Colombia’s youth setup where he made a name for himself, reaching the final of the prestigious Toulon tournament twice.
He got promoted to the national team in 2004 where he had an acceptable if unremarkable spell. But it was in the coming years that he would really come to fame. He took tiny Honduras to the World Cup in 2010 – their second-ever World Cup after 1982. He repeated that feat in 2014 with Ecuador before he took over Atlético Nacional in 2015.
2016 was a year of massive ups and an even bigger down for Rueda and Nacional. Nacional had already been very dominant in the domestic league in the years before Rueda signed. But with Rueda in charge, they had their most successful year since the 80s, and arguably in history. Nacional won the biggest South American club prize, the Copa Libertadores and reached the final of the Copa Sudamericana. That final never happened after the infamous Chapecoense plane crash in the hills of Antioquia. The tragedy overshadowed what had been an extremely successful year.
In 2017, after winning his second league title with Nacional, Rueda left Colombia. Now, after spells with Flamengo and the Chilean national team, he is back in Colombia for a second chance of reaching the World Cup with his country.
Can he bring joy to the nation and take Colombia to their third World Cup qualification in a row?
New Bogotá restrictions include a citywide lockdown for the weekend, six more areas in strict quarantine and changes to some existing measures.
New lockdown measures in Bogotá. Photo: Brendan Corrigan
The quarantine rules of Bogotá changed yet again on Tuesday night, as Mayor Claudia López announced further restrictions in six more localidades and a citywide lockdown over the coming weekend, on top of the existing measures. We have a timeline of dates and times at the end to help you keep track.
The mayor also asks all residents of Bogotá to step up their vigilance and be extra careful with mask-wearing, distancing and isolation as well as getting yourself tested if necessary. With light enforcement of the rules so far, it’s hard to know if that call will be heeded.
The big news is another citywide lockdown. As our nightly curfew ends on Friday, we will go immediately into strict quarantine for the whole city. That means ley seca, only essential services open and official mobility restrictions for everyone except health workers and carers. It’s not yet clear whether exercise or pet walking is counted as an exception, but that has been allowed in reality in similar previous periods. It’s also to be assumed that you can visit the essential shops, as long as only one person per household does so and you are under pico y cédula (see below).
The strict quarantine by area (localidad) is also changing. While Teusaquillo has had its period of strict measures shortened by a week, Kennedy and Fontibón remain in quarantine for the whole period. Suba, Engativá and Usaquén also stay on schedule. On top of that, six southern localidades will be in quarantine after the weekend lockdown. Those are Bosa, Ciudad Bolívar, Puente Aranda, Rafael Uribe Uribe, San Cristóbal and Usme.
If you’re not sure which localidad you are in or visiting, you should be able to see the division lines on most interactive maps, or work them out with a map like this. If you need fine detail, look here. You will need to go through the menu: ordenamiento territorial; entidad territorial; localidad.
Pico y cédula remains in place, remember that you are restricted from shopping on even-numbered dates if your ID number ends in an even number and conversely not allowed out on odd-numbered dates if your ID ends in an odd number. Passports OR cédulas are accepted. In practical terms, only major shops and banks are really enforcing this, and it doesn’t apply to restaurants or bars.
The timeline for upcoming quarantine dates is given below, correct as of January 12. It’s hard to know whether things will change again. One thing is for sure, you can expect further measures to be announced soon, possibly even before the weekend. Watch this space.
Until Jan. 15: Nightly curfew citywide 8pm-4am (Friday)
From Jan. 15 (8pm) to Jan. 18 (4am): Full lockdown throughout the city (Friday to Monday)
Jan. 18 (4am): Strict lockdown finishes in Suba, Engativá, Usaquén and Teusaquillo. Lockdown begins in Bosa, Ciudad Bolívar, Puente Aranda, Rafael Uribe Uribe, San Cristóbal and Usme (Monday)
Jan. 21 (11.59pm): Strict lockdown finishes in Kennedy and Fontibón (Thursday)
Jan. 28 (11.59pm): Strict lockdown finishes in Bosa, Ciudad Bolívar, Puente Aranda, Rafael Uribe Uribe, San Cristóbal and Usme (Thursday)
Will we get coronavirus jabs any time soon? Or just more hot air? A quick Q&A on the country’s plans to inoculate against COVID-19.
Frontline COVID-19 health workers getting ready for shift in Nariño, Colombia. They should be first in line for vaccination.
With a return to lockdowns and a sharp spike in COVID-19 cases – deaths are again approaching 400 per day – Colombians are growing agitated over when the country will start the much-hyped vaccination campaign.
Part of the pressure comes from news that other countries have started vaccinating but are struggling to hit targets in what is being called a global “race against time” against a mutating virus. And already a super-contagious COVID-19 strain is circulating in Brazil and Chile. It is probably in Colombia too.
Meanwhile, evidence is emerging of long-term health problems facing people who have recovered from the novel coronavirus, such as fatigue, insomnia and depression, and even trigger dementia and cognitive decline. So even if you are immune to viral scare stories, or simply scared of needles, coronavirus is one illness worth avoiding.
Here’s some explanation of where we are with COVID-19 vaccination in Colombia and what might happen next…
The national vaccination plan put out last week by the health ministry (MinSalud) states it will prioritise older people (over 60), front line health workers, and those with existing medical problems such as diabetes, high blood pressure or lung disease. Next in line are teachers and “at risk” workers. Healthy people between 16 and 59 years will be low priority. Note that MinSalud is initially aiming to vaccinate around 70% of the adult population to achieve herd immunity. This suggests that not every adult will get jabbed under the current plan. The vaccine is voluntary and in theory offered for free or very low cost.
What if I already had COVID-19?
Best to still get vaccinated, according to doctors, vaccine immunity will likely last longer.
Colombian medical control authorities (INVIMA) have approved the Pfizer vaccine, while Astra Zeneca, COVAX and Janssen products are pending. The first three require two injections a month apart, and the Pfizer product is further complicated by the need for specialised freezers at minus 80 degrees, limiting its use. The other three need just fridge cold. The Janssen vaccine requires a single dose, making it ideal for remote areas.
So how will people get inoculated in Colombia?
Mostly through the existing health system. People registered with the EPS insurance scheme will be called to vaccination appointments at their local walk-in clinics. Since the EPSs already have citizen’s health data, they can schedule people in accordance with their health priority. This system supposedly avoids mass gatherings. As a complement to the system, MinSalud will launch a centralised app and website, Mi Vacuna, allowing people to register and verify their turn for the vaccine, and maybe even challenge their prioritisation.
Sounds perfect! What can go wrong?
Actually, a lot. Anyone familiar with the “public-private” EPS health system knows it has many faults and was already overloaded even before COVID-19. And the current rise in cases will bring it closer to collapse. Can it also cope with mass vaccinating? Unlikely.
A recent example of EPS melt-down has been the COVID-19 testing fiasco; clinics have been unable to meet demand or have sent test results to patients many weeks late. This rendered the test-and-trace system useless, which in turn created more contagion and lockdowns. MinSalud is now under scrutiny for its EPS vaccine plan and under pressure to set up a more robust system.
What happens to people not already in the health system?
In theory, people outside the EPS health system arecovered for emergencies and preventative health services, often through local hospitals knows as “ESEs”, though in reality access is not guaranteed. MinSalud has now declared the “non-insured poor population” can register with local authorities to join the vaccination plan, and this includes migrants legally in Colombia.
President Duque recently announced that irregular migrants – which means at least a million Venezuelans – would be excluded from the vaccination plan. MinSalud has since suggested that the UN and NGOs to assist with migrant vaccination.
Should I now get health insurance in Colombia?
This is recommended and could be essential if you want to get vaccinated. Indeed, if you are here medium to long term, you need insurance or EPS to get a visa.
Remember that Colombia is only aiming initially for 70% coverage, therefore MinSalud will prioritise vaccinating people already registered in the health system who can be assessed for existing heath conditions and side effects. Most importantly they are more likely to get the second dose a month apart. Anyone skipping the second dose could increase the risk of creating virus resistance to the vaccines.
Anyone foreign resident here can join an EPS as an independent and pay the monthly fee directly
What if I live in a remote area?
You might be overlooked. Most mass vaccination strategies first target denser urban areas, which also in Colombia is where people are more likely to be registered in the health system. Historically, childhood inoculation coverage has always been lower in rural and conflict areas. MinSalud claims it will make extra effort for the countryside, but probably the towns will come first.
Rural health post in Colombia’s Guainia department. Will the COVID-19 vaccine reach these remote corners?
Can I buy the vaccine privately?
Top-end medical clinics will probably offer the vaccine at high cost. The Colombian medicine control authority INVIMA has already approved the Pfizer vaccine for commercial sale. One precedent is the boom in private labs offering quick efficient testing services – but at a high cost – in the wake of the EPS testing flaws. Whatever your ethical views on queue-jumping, these VIP clinics will be a good bet for those who can afford it.
What if I don’t want the vaccine?
No worries, the vaccine is not obligatory. And you’re in good company: a recent survey showed that 45% of Colombians don’t trust the vaccine. COVID-19 conspiracies continue to rule social media with recent fake news on “mass vaccine deaths.”
Anti-vaccine fake news is already spreading on social media in Colombia: The text says“1,000 vaccinated people found dead” in the UK. Actually, the photo is from Lima last March and not related to COVID-19 vaccines.
The survey showed that many people are worried by possible side effects, a valid concern given the rushed roll-out and lack of data on its effectiveness on new mutations, how long it will last, or even if inoculated persons can still spread the virus or not.
Looking for a COVID-19 test in Bogotá? All the info you need below, from prices and times to links and medical advice.
How to get a coronavirus test in Bogotá: Waiting for a test in the Marly branch of Colcan. Photo: Jared Wade
As COVID-19 shows no signs of going away, you may be wondering how to get a coronavirus test in Bogotá. The vaccine is still a long way away from reaching non-priority people, and cases are on the rise. Whether you need a PCR test for travel, have a nasty cold that you want to check out or have had contact with an infected person, here’s all the info you need for COVID-19 tests in Bogotá.
There are four basic options on the table. You can go to a private clinic, order a visit from a private healthcare provider, go to your EPS or visit one of the temporary drop-in tents set up by the state. We’re trying to give the pros and cons of each option and to keep this updated, but things are often open to change, so it’s worth checking with each provider to confirm prices and hours etc.
What the test involves
First of all, you need to think about whether you need to get tested at all. This might sound frivolous, but actually a lot of people don’t necessarily need to be tested and thus can avoid putting strain on the medical system. If you’re going abroad you may need to get tested, depending on country (and remember visitors from overseas need to take a test). If you’ve had contact with infected people it’s probably a good idea even if you don’t have symptoms. However, you can simply self-isolate for 14 days. The most common symptoms include: fever, dry cough, loss of taste and/or smell.
The second decision is whether you want to leave the house or not. You may find it hard to get around, or you may be worried about infecting others as you travel. EPS generally recommend house visits, private clinics will do so at a small cost. Waiting for a house visit reduces infection chances, but will increase overall time.
What is a PCR COVID test?
You need to think about what type of test you want to take, too. The two most common are PCR and antigen (antígeno), with antibody testing coming a distant third. Remember that false positives and false negatives are always possible so still exercise caution, especially if symptoms persist. Both the PCR and the antigen tests are up the nose with a swab, mildly uncomfortable but no worse than plucking a nose hair. Certainly nothing to be afraid of.
PCR is generally needed for travel and is a more accurate test, especially in the early stages. However, it’s more expensive and takes longer to return results.
The antigen test is quicker and not always as reliable. It’s generally only recommended if you have symptoms or seven days after you’ve had contact with someone who’s tested positive.
The antibody (anticuerpo) test is also an option, though much less useful for most people. This is a blood test that will tell you if you have had COVID previously, through checking your immune system’s response. It takes about one to three weeks for your body to develop antibodies after you’ve been infected. While of great use to research, this isn’t useful for most people.
Overall, there’s plenty to think about and you need to factor in time too. If you had contact or initial symptoms a week ago and you won’t get results for another week, you’re best off just self-isolating anyway. And remember, the vaccine might take a while, but it is coming.
How to get a coronavirus test in Bogotá? Here are your options.
Getting tested at private clinics
Pros: Possibly no appointment needed, relatively fast to get seen.
Cons: You have to travel to them, not cheap.
We recommend Colcan, especially the branch on Calle 49 between Caracas and 13. It’s the biggest branch and is open every day from 6am (7am Sundays). If you’re getting a test in order to travel, or if you think you are not infected, the Marly TransMilenio station is right next to it. Official turnaround times are 24 hours for the antigen and between 24 and 72 for PCR.
Experiences have varied – our editor received PCR results in 24 hours one time and four days the next for COP$220,000. Other contributors waited as long as 100 hours, but that was over the Christmas peak. Our sub-editor received antigen results within two hours for COP$100,000 in late November. Expect same-day antigen results if you go in the morning, one to three days for PCR, but it depends on numbers. Waiting times have varied between 20 and 90 mins. You will have to complete a questionnaire in Spanish. You can walk in off the street, or drive-thru appointments can be booked here.
Synlab Colombia handles the airport testing, which is superfast. They offer a guaranteed 24 hours for processing the PCR and just two hours for the antigen test. You can schedule a test here. However, it’s pricier – COP$150,000 for the antigen and COP$280,000 for PCR. Note that those fast processing times only apply to the airport branch.
Getting tested at home – Private home visits
Pros: Easy to book and no travel needed.
Cons: Not immediate, more expensive.
This is much more convenient, but you can’t easily pick a date or time. They come on the day that they are able to.* At-home testing is slightly more expensive than walking in off the street – around COP$250,000 for the test and COP$30,000 more for the delivery. Once the test is done and your nose is stinging a bit, the results come in similar times.
Colcan also offers a delivery service in conjunction with Vitalea, at around COP$4,500 for delivery on top of the prices above. Synlab offer a domicilio delivery (315 3686 943) There are other options out there too via delivery services, but expect an extra charge depending on time location etc – we’ve seen anything from COP$245,000 to nearly COP$400,000 quoted.
Getting tested via EPS
Pros: Possibly easy to organise, cheap or free, can get doctor’s note for work.
Cons: Possibly a long wait.
As all EPS are different, prices will vary, possibly dramatically. We know people who have used Sura and Colsanitas, which were similar. They couldn’t get attention at the medical centre, but you arrange a visit to the house. Sura sent someone later the same day, Colsanitas five days later.
Ring or go to the website of your EPS and see what they say. It’s entirely possible that this may depend on your plan, your EPS provider and other factors such as location. The test was free for both our correspondents. Processing times seem to be slightly longer than the private clinics. You may need to be persistent – we’ve heard of EPS call centres trying to avoid booking appointments and claiming you should self-isolate instead.
Getting tested at mobile testing tents
Pros: Free, no appointment
Cons: Could be a long wait, hard to get to, slow processing
One of our writers did this early on, when demand was high. These are testing tents set up by the local government in conjunction with the ministry of health (MinSalud). You’ll need to check here to find out where they’ll be on a day by day basis. The processing times are given as 72 hours to six days, so expect a longer wait than other options. It is totally free though.
If you’re thinking about how to get a coronavirus test in Bogotá, you have a lot of options. And of course, if you’re experiencing serious symptoms, seek medical advice.
*We have taken endocrinolab out of the article, due to concerns over privacy.
As cases continue to rise, mayor warns that the new strain may have arrived in the capital.
Another curfew imposed in Bogotá, will the streets be this empty again? Photo: Artemis María Papoutsakis
Just days after Bogotá introduced the first new measures to counter the second wave of the coronavirus, Mayor Claudia Lopéz has announced a curfew and other further restrictions.
The city is on red alert as the emergency room occupation reaches 86%, and from tonight, mobility in the capital will be restricted for four days. The Ministry of Health announced the movement of people and vehicles in public spaces will be restricted in any city with an emergency room occupation above 85%.
López acknowledged that it’s a difficult start to the year, but said, “We are faced with possible phenomena such as the new strain and that is why we must take extreme measures to protect ourselves.”
She warned the numbers of cases are rising faster than anticipated and also that a higher viral load is also being detected. In addition, López raised the possibility that the drastic rise in numbers could reflect the presence of the new strain that was first identified in the UK.
New restrictions in Bogotá
There’s already a citywide ban on alcohol sales for the weekend and localised strict quarantines in place in Suba, Engativá and Usaquén. The new rules aim to shut the city down and prevent further spread during the upcoming holiday weekend.
From 11.59pm tonight until 4am on Tuesday, the city will see a total restriction on mobility. As yet the announcements aren’t clear on what will be restricted, but the TransMilenio will continue to operate.
To summarise:
Mobility restriction from 11.59pm tonight (Jan. 7) to 4am on Jan. 12
There will be no ciclovía on Sunday and Monday (Jan. 10 and 11)
Parks will be shut from Saturday, Jan. 9
A citywide nightly curfew will begin on Jan. 12
Kennedy, Fontibon, and Teusaquillo will also enter strict quarantine on Jan. 12
Quarantines will remain in Suba, Engativá and Usaquén
Pico y cédula will continue until the end of January
If you are either returning to or leaving the city, you won’t be stopped. Local authorities are asking you to do a seven-day voluntary isolation. They recommend you don’t stop for food en route, wear masks, and go straight to your destination. You’ll need to keep your bus/plane/toll booth ticket as proof in case you get stopped.
Total lockdown… Again
The mayor told bogotanos that this weekend will be similar to the first isolation drill. Let’s hope it won’t be like that first drill which began as a four-day measure and continued for almost six months.
What that means in practice is that health personnel and essential workers will be exempt. But for the most part, we’re being asked to stay home and not go out.
You’re allowed to go out for an hour of exercise, though group exercise is not allowed. Children should be accompanied by an adult, and one adult cannot be responsible for more than three minors.
Supermarkets, pharmacies and stores will continue to operate, as well as food delivery services — though pico y cédula is still in place
You’re allowed to go out for medical reasons, whether it’s for an appointment or to buy medicine
El Dorado airport will function as normal, as will other transport services in and out of the city
Bank and notary services will still operate
The fine for breaking the rules is one monthly minimum salary (just over COP$900,000).
Nightly curfew in Bogotá from Jan. 12
Once the holiday weekend has passed, the total restriction on mobility will be lifted. However, we’ll then see a nightly curfew to prevent people from going to bars and restaurants.
From Tuesday, Jan. 12 to Saturday, Jan. 16, the curfew will be in place throughout the city. Between 8pm and 5am every night, bogotanos will not be able to move around the city.
In addition, Kennedy, Fontibon, and Teusaquillo will also enter strict quarantine from Jan. 12 to 21. As with previous lockdowns, that means only essential workers will be able to go about their business.
One person per household will be allowed to go out for essentials — such as shopping and banking. One hour of exercise will be permitted per day, and alcohol will not be on sale at weekends in those districts.
The mayor’s office warned that one in three tests in Bogotá are coming back positive. With vaccination some way off, it remains to be seen what impact these restrictions will have on the city’s health and economy.
Bogotá quarantine: Suba, Engativá and Usaquén will return to strict lockdown at midnight.
Strict quarantine to return to sectors of Bogotá this week. Photo: Jared Wade
The number of coronavirus cases and deaths are beginning to rise again nationwide, especially in the capital. As bogotanos return to work after the Christmas and New Year festivities, authorities have introduced new measures to try to control the number of cases.
Colombia has signed vaccine agreements with AstraZeneca and Pfizer, but it will be some time before the vaccine can be rolled out nationwide. In the meantime, 259 people died from coronavirus in Colombia on Dec. 29 — the highest number in recent months. Emergency room occupancy is at 77.6% in Bogotá, and acting mayor Luis Ernesto Gómez has announced a return to strict quarantine for three districts.
Gómez met with representatives of the Ministry of Health this afternoon and agreed the localised quarantine measures. That said, the government only agreed on the condition the move could be re-evaluated next Tuesday.
In addition, the city will see a ban on alcohol sales for the upcoming holiday weekend. Beginning at 6 pm on Friday, Jan. 8, you will only be able to buy alcohol by domicilio until 5 am on Tuesday, Jan 12.
Pico y cédula will remain in operation throughout the city until at least Jan. 15. The restriction, which forbids those with odd-numbered IDs from shopping or banking on odd days and even-numbered IDs on even days, does not apply to hotels and restaurants.
Strict lockdown in Suba, Engativá and Usaquén
Starting at 11.59pm tonight (Jan. 4) and finishing at 11.59pm on Jan.17, Suba, Engativá and Usaquén will return to the strict lockdowns we saw earlier on in the pandemic. As with previous lockdowns, only essential workers will be able to move freely and one person per household will be allowed out. Be aware that pico y cédula still applies.
There will be a total curfew between 8pm and 5am
No alcohol sales at weekends
Only one hour of exercise permitted per day
Domicilio services will be able to operate freely
According to the alcaldía, these three districts have seen big increases in the numbers of positive cases. Each recorded an increase of over 50% in case numbers between Dec. 5 and 18.
Travel concerns
Many people, including the mayor of Bogotá, have travelled both nationally and internationally during the holiday period, raising concerns about additional coronavirus spread. Gómez tweeted that between Saturday and Sunday, approximately 700,000 people entered Bogotá. “This corresponds to a population equal to that of Cúcuta returning to Bogotá, which increases the risk of contagion,” he said.
As a result, authorities ask people arriving in the city to enter voluntary isolation for at least seven days.
After some legal wrangling, Colombia will now also require a negative PCR test from anyone arriving into the country. International passengers — including infants — will have to provide a negative PCR test that was carried out within the last 96 hours. Those who do not have the test can take it here, but will have to quarantine until they get the results.
Story updated following Gómez’s meeting with the Ministry of Health.
Bogotá mayor Claudia López has just announced further holiday restrictions. Starting at midnight tonight (December 22), all partying in public space will be banned until midnight on December 27. The same measures will return at midnight on the 30th until midnight on January 3. Along with this, there’s a complete ban on the sale of alcohol as well as its consumption in public.
This comes on top of the augmented restrictions on opening times, the use of fireworks and of course pico y cédula which will be with us until mid-January. Various members of The Bogotá Post team have been out and about since the announcement. Most report that pico y cédula is being half-heartedly applied this time – so far at least. Only time will tell how effective these measures will be – like many countries, Colombia likes to have fun at Christmas. After a rough year, it’s likely people will push the boundaries of these regulations.
López reiterated the rules governing indoor gatherings too, such as wearing masks, a limit of ten people (all family members) and no excess of alcohol. It seems extraordinarily unlikely that this will be enforced in any serious way, but ‘fiestas’ are banned in private places as well as public. It’s likely that this will only be properly policed for all-night raves though, not family gatherings or barn dances.
With the new rules being announced so suddenly, it would be wise to plan for the possibility of further changes. Just because something has been ruled out doesn’t mean it’s not possible – ley seca was discounted by the mayor as recently as this weekend before today’s U-turn. Check our website for the latest.
Christmas celebrations and lights in Colombia will be different from previous years. Photo: Jazid Contreras
If you’re planning your New Year and Christmas celebrations, here are the rules you need to know about.
For months, the numbers of coronavirus cases in Colombia had seemed to have hit a status quo – they weren’t decreasing, but they weren’t increasing dramatically either. This week, no doubt post velitas and as novena celebrations take place throughout the country, we’ve seen a spike in numbers. This Friday even saw a record number of confirmed cases per day in Colombia, however, the testing capacity has also increased substantially since quarantine ended in August.
The issue with novenas is ninefold. Whole families – including elderly – want to gather for the traditional prayers, food, and celebration. And normally, each of the nine nights of celebration takes place at a different house. Often with different people.
As a result, many local authorities have announced restrictions to try to slow the spread and reduce intensive care occupancy. If you’ve been out on the streets in recent days, you will probably have noticed the increase of people doing their Christmas shopping, and hospitals are already feeling the pressure.
Rules and recommendations
Here are the COVID Christmas restrictions in Colombia so far:
Bogotá: Mayor Claudia López has asked people to celebrate novenas virtually and suggested that those who want to get together in person on the 24th should isolate for eight days beforehand.
Celebrations will be restricted close family only, with no more than 10 allowed. Mask wearing and distancing remains obligatory. And bars and restaurants cannot sell alcohol after 10pm.
Medellín: With intensive care occupancy at over 80%, Mayor Daniel Quintero announced this week that the city of eternal spring will be shut down on December 24, 25, 26 and again on December 31, January 1 and 2. He said the curfew (toque de queda) would likely only be at night time and could start earlier than the 24th and promised more details on Monday.
Atención: Medellín tendrá toques de queda preventivos los días 24, 25 y 26 de diciembre de 12:00 a.m. a 6:00 a.m. cada día. Y nuevamente, el 31 de diciembre, 1 y 2 de enero en el mismo horario. Recomendación, no visitar familiares, no compartir copas, no dar abrazos a vecinos.
Cali: With intensive care occupancy over 90%, Cali’s mayor has already reintroduced pico y cédula in the salsa capital. There’s also a curfew in place between 11pm and 5am every night until December 23 to try to get the numbers back under control.
Cartagena: Normally famous for its festive street parties, this year there will be no public gatherings in the walled city. Gatherings can’t exceed 10 people. Visiting the beach and swimming in the sea is restricted. Eleven neighbourhoods with particularly high numbers of cases already have curfews and alcohol bans in place.
Manizales: Public parties are banned in Manizales, along with the traditional public slaughter of pigs and subsequent lechona-making. There’ll be a curfew on the 25th and January 1st between 1am and 10am. (That’s effectively the night of Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve.)
What to expect
If we learned one thing during Colombia’s long lockdown, it was to be prepared for sudden changes. So don’t be surprised if, for example, Bogotá suddenly bans alcohol sales or implements a curfew around December 24 or 31. López has already warned that stricter measures will be put in place if cases continue to rise.
Stock up on essentials now and try to keep any plans you do make flexible. Obviously, if you have symptoms or have contact with someone who’s tested positive, stay home. With a vaccine in sight, nobody wants COVID for Christmas.
Colombia enforces controls on alcohol sales as intensive care occupation rises.
No more alcohol after 10pm, new coronavirus measure in parts of Colombia. Photo: Jared Wade
Starting tonight, new rules mean that bars and restaurants in certain parts of Colombia, including Bogotá, will have to stop selling alcohol at 10 pm.
Many countries in Europe and parts of the United States are re-implementing heavy quarantine measures to try to slow new outbreaks of the virus. For the most part, Bogotá, which was locked down from mid-March to September, has adapted to the biosecurity measures without additional restrictions.
However, Bogotá, along with 12 other areas, will now ban alcohol sales after 10 pm in an attempt to stop a rise in COVID-19 cases. The rules will also apply to Norte de Santander, Valle del Cauca, Antioquia, Quindío, Risaralda, Tolima, Caldas, Nariño, Santander, Casanare, Bolívar and Cauca.
A regulation passed today by the Ministry of the Interior and Ministry of Health restricts alcohol sales and consumption in areas where the intensive care occupancy is above 70% — or less in metropolitan areas like Bogotá.
Authorities are nervous because occupancy in the roughly 11,300 intensive care beds has been rising. Currently, the occupancy rate nationwide is 57%.
According to a decree from the mayor’s office, intensive care occupancy in Bogotá hovered around 48% between the end of September and the end of November. In the last 16 days, however, it has increased to almost 53%, which is why authorities are introducing new measures.
Cali has gone even further. It’s just issued a red alert and reintroduced pico y cédula restrictions. The city, which reports a 90.5% intensive care occupancy has also announced ley seca (prohibition of alcohol sales) and a curfew.
The controls on alcohol sales will be revisited on December 21.
The new restrictions come just one day after Congress passed a tourism bill, aimed at reactivating the entertainment sector. The bill gives tax breaks to bars and restaurants and is now awaiting presidential approval. These businesses were particularly hard hit by Colombia’s long lockdown, and will still be hoping to recoup some of their losses — albeit in a socially distanced way — during the festive season.
We caught up with Idartes’ Mauricio Galeano to find out about their plans for reactivating theatre and dance in the city.
‘Yo nunca vi televisión’ at Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, Photo: Idartes
If you’re running out of ways to keep the kids entertained at home, check out tonight’s streaming of 31 minutes, ‘Yo nunca vi televisión’. The puppet show brought more than 4,500 people to Bogotá’s Teatro Jorge Eliécer Gaitán last year, and you can stream it — potentially even to your television — for the next five days.
The world premiere of the popular humorous show will cover the launch of a giant pizza into outer space. Tickets cost COP$31,000. It’s part of what Mauricio Galeano, Idartes’ deputy director of cultural facilities, describes as phase three of Idartes’ pandemic activity — ticketed shows that they hope will help to reactivate the sector economically.
Galeano started by assuring us that, “In 2020, the public venues of Idartes — Teatro Gaitán, Teatro Media Torta, Teatro el Parque and the Bogotá Planetarium — haven’t stopped their activity.”
Throughout the pandemic, they’ve continued with a program of “home edition” which you can find on Idartes’ website and social media. “Up to now, we’ve had nearly 122 artistic groups, from theatre to dance and music, and more than 97 events,” Galeano said.
Idartes has even created a project for people who don’t have internet access called “Cuéntame al oído”. People who sign up get a phone call during which a narrator reads stories or poems aloud. Between 2,000 and 2,500 people have enjoyed these connections, which have been particularly valuable at a time when so much is internet-based.
There are also science capsules from the planetarium, as well as open source content to help artists engage more with digital creation.
1,200 shows planned for Christmas
It’s fair to say this Christmas is not going to be a normal one, as families try to incorporate social distancing into their traditions. It’s worth watching out for some of the cultural events.
“Through this process of reactivation and reinvention, Christmas becomes a very important moment,” Galeano tells us. There are over 1,200 events planned across the city, with parties on December 24 and 31.
The great thing about digital content is that you can watch it at your convenience. For example, if you haven’t yet seen Burning Caravan, you’ll find musicians from France, Chile, and Colombia performing on stage and connecting virtually. Tickets cost COP$25,000 and it will be available throughout December.
Another performance Galeano mentioned is Camilo, a show about the insurgent and intellectual rebel Camilo Torres. You can watch Teatro La Candelaria’s hour-and-a-half show online for free.
With exciting programming already lined up for the first part of 2021, Galeano is also looking forward to the gradual reopening of venues.
German style biergarten Hopulus is the latest in our line of craft beer reviews.
The outdoor biergarten. Photo: Hopulos
It’s not very often we come across Purity Rule puritans making traditional German-style beer in the craft beer world, but that’s at least how one might superficially describe Hopulus. Part photography gallery, part German bakery, part brewpub, and part biergarten, Galería Hopulus is a swanky little establishment nestled in Bogotá’s leafy La Cabrera neighbourhood. It’s hard to know exactly where to start with this multifaceted little gem, so let’s just start by saying it’s yet another family-owned craft brewery, run by CEO Felipe Santander and his German frau Julia Santander (CFO).
It’s worth popping in to Hopulus just to talk beer with Felipe, to be honest. The guy’s an absolute wealth of knowledge when it comes to German beer, whether it be historical brewing methods or why all Cologne breweries seem to have red branding. Felipe got into brewing at the age of 25, when he was working for Siemens in Nuremberg. That part of Germany, Franconia, famously has the largest density of breweries in the world, making Felipe fell in love with the idea of micro-brewing, soon getting round to doing it himself. He did some courses at the prestigious Doemens Academy in Munich, where he crossed paths with a 22-year-old Venezolana called Emily.
Back in Colombia, Felipe started on the same 30L equipment all us homebrewers are familiar with, toiling through seven batches a night in order to fill up his massive fermenters. He was about to start Hopulus as a solo-brewer when two weeks before production he was emailed a CV by Emily’s mentor, Alexis Bolívar. Alexis had been working for Venezuela’s biggest brewer, Polar, for 18 years (they’d even sent him to hone his craft in Germany 10 years prior), and was now looking for a job across the border. Now Santander and Bolívar make German-style craft beer in Bogotá.
As I mentioned in the intro, Hopulus is also an art gallery, funded by the beer, specialising in photography. Felipe invites photographers from all around the world to exhibit their work at the brewery. He has a Hopulus-branded 4WD for camping in the Colombian wilderness on week-long photography trips, and hopes to get the company’s name on as much adventure photography as possible, in the same way that Red Bull does with extreme sports. In fact, Felipe took the Hopulus-mobile out into the Llanos Orientales with the Colombian winner of the 2020 World Wildlife Photo Award, Gabriel Eisenband, only a couple of weeks ago. Gabriel’s work is set to go on display at Galería Hopulus later this month.
The beers
Hopulus currently makes two lagers (Helles and Keller) and two ales (Koelsch and Hefeweizen). The Keller is a dark lager, traditionally from Nuremberg, and Felipe roasts the malt himself on a tiny little coffee roaster in one kilogram batches, the day before brewing. Rare as that is though, I thought I’d talk a little more about the Hefeweizen, as craft brewers tend not to bother with this style nearly as much as one would expect, considering their popularity and ubiquity in Germany. For me, this is by far the most German type of beer, and was my first taste of a foreign ale-style back when I was a young buck in Australia – ‘hang on, this beer tastes like bananas!’ Yes, it’s supposed to, and Hopulus’ Hefeweizen properly delivers on it too. This flavour comes from the yeast and is intensified through ‘yeast management’. Felipe reckons it’s so nutritional that the Germans have it for breakfast. There’s a nice little tartness, as one would expect from a wheat-driven beer, and while I’m no German beer connoisseur, I’d say this beer stands up well against its German cousins.
How to get ‘em
The best way to get hold of any of these beers is to pop into Galería Hopulus in person, take a look at the stunning photography on display, then hope there’s a free table in the beer garden out the front. Just like everything the man does, Felipe’s designed the spot to replicate a traditional German biergarten, down to the stress-reducing gravel floor, which, like sand at the beach, ‘stops you from going fast’, he says. He also says, ‘the moment you walk into our beer garden, your feet sink into the ground and you’re forced to slow down, relax.’ Can’t argue with that I guess, stress like this must be combated. I highly recommend putting this to the test with a plate of their pork knuckle, which I can vouch for first-hand.
You can find Galería Hopulus at Calle 81 #8-60. It’s open from 12pm to 8pm Tuesdays to Thursdays, noon to 10pm Fridays and Saturdays, and 10am to 6pm on Sundays.
If you’d rather stay at home though, message Felipe on 321 241 5504. Delivery costs $5mil and they go out Tuesdays and Fridays. They sell all their beers in cool-looking, easy-to-hold tubes, and these’ll set you back between $30mil and $35mil, depending on the beer. They also do loads of traditional Germanic food, such as apple strudel and pork knuckle.
For more info, check out the brewery on Facebook or the ‘Gram.
Survivors of sexual violence raise their voices and work together for justice with Mujeres Gestionando Paz.
Photo: Mujeres Gestionando Paz
It’s 2.30 pm on a January afternoon in La Dorada, Las Caldas. The air is hot in this central Colombian town which is home to many displaced people. About thirty women, some carrying children in their arms, meet on the second floor of the town’s main shopping mall. All of them are part of the grassroots organisation Mujeres Gestionando Paz and are here to participate in its 2020 general assembly. “So girls, what were the advances of 2019?” asks Ludirlena Pérez, the leader of the association.
Mujeres Gestionando Paz is an NGO that brings together women who were victims of sexual violence during the armed conflict. The women have come together to raise their voices against the way the violence they suffered has been made invisible and to fight against the many stigmas surrounding sexual violence. In doing so, they hope to become agents of social change within their communities.
Ludirlena, herself a victim of sexual violence, explains that the organisation’s mission runs even deeper. It’s about finding peace through forgiveness and reconciliation. “What is forgiveness?” she asks. “It is for me to be able to face the deepest wounds that I kept inside for many years, and refuse to continue to give my life to the perpetrator any more as I start to fully live it for myself.
“What is reconciliation?” she continues. “It is to understand that something is bad in this society, but also to say that we are going to be part of the needed change.”
Sexual violence has long been – and still is – a taboo topic in Colombia. During the armed conflict, it was perpetrated by all the armed groups, from guerrillas to the army and paramilitaries. The Unidad de Víctimas registered 27,000 cases of sexual violence. Nevertheless, grassroots organisations working with women throughout the country estimate that this figure could reach two million.
Researcher Anne-Kathrin Kreft, whose work focused on the way women mobilise themselves politically in response to sexual violence, says that this type of violence is the ultimate manifestation of patriarchal culture, targeting women as women.
Anchored in social and cultural discrimination towards women, during the conflict this violence was used as a way to sanction women who transgressed gender norms, terrorise and silence communities while re-affirming the domination of women by men.
For a long time, sexual violence has been invisible and so taboo that victims did not feel able to seek help or speak about what had happened to them. Indeed, it was not even on people’s radar. After a massacre or confrontation, Medicina Legal only registered the number of dead. By not registering sexual violence, it effectively silenced the suffering of these women.
That was until women began to raise their voices and share their stories. Together they demanded justice and challenged the social representations of women – and Mujeres Gestionando Paz was created.
A lifeline after sexual violence
Mujeres Gestionando Paz was formed in 2009, when three women who had survived several acts of sexual violence during the conflict came together. Two of them, Ludirlena and Dolly, tell me that after being raped and enduring the violence surrounding it (torture and humiliations often accompany the act), they had fallen into depression. They had both retreated into silent worlds and tried to kill themselves.
Their lifeline came in the form of another woman who was able to speak out about what had happened to her. “If she is able to do it, why couldn’t I?” they said. This thin fragment of hope set them free from the social prejudices which made them feel responsible for what had happened. They became aware that their persecutors were the only culprits and decided to face and challenge society.
They started to build connections with women in the town who had also been victims of sexual violence. Together they created a caring space, where those women would find the strength to speak out and regain their dignity as human beings.
My body, my territory. Photo: Mujeres Gestionando Paz
It’s hardly surprising there’s a feeling of tremendous impunity around sexual violence since 98% of the cases reported to the ordinary judicial system remain unpunished. The group have been documenting cases and passing them to the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, which, as a mechanism of transitional justice, represents a great hope of justice for victims of sexual violence. en
“But, how do you manage to motivate women to speak when there are still threats from armed gangs and such strong social stigmas?” I ask, intrigued. “How do I come to them?” repeats Ludirlena, “I come with my life testimony. As a survivor of two acts of sexual violence. I can be part of any setting and openly say what I experienced. And I can have a strong credibility. Already three surgeries, scars for life that speak for themselves. It has not been easy. But nor has it been impossible.”
She explains how she understands reconciliation. “It is to understand that prejudices and stereotypes against women are woven into the very fabric of society, and yet be able to stand up and say that we are going to be part of the needed change.” It’s no wonder that all the women tell me what a great leader Ludirlena is.
Nevertheless, she is not a typical leader. “I don’t want followers,” she says, “I want leaders.” And that is what makes Mujeres Gestionando Paz stand out. Women learn about the law, learn that they are worthy of respect and that their voices should never be silenced.
Inspiring leaders
And Ludirlena always delegates the work of the organisation. She sends the ‘lideresas’ as representatives at public events in Manizales or Bogotá, to talk to mayors and public officials. Having these meetings and conducting workshops with other women encourages them to lead their own projects and support themselves economically.
Over the years, the organisation has impacted up to 5,000 women in La Dorada and the surrounding municipalities. In 2019, Ludirlena was granted both the Confa and Cafam prizes for her strong activism in making sexual violence more visible and the positive impact she has had in the community.
Today, Mujeres Gestionando Paz is expanding in two directions: First, they aim to empower more women by enabling them to speak out. Second, they will go beyond the defence of women’s rights. They want to help young people who are addicted to drugs in the difficult neighbourhoods of La Dorada and organise soup kitchens.
Although the organisation has achieved a lot, Ludirlena is still frustrated by the lack of political will and economic resources. “Look, I could need COP$20,000 to conduct a workshop that might save a life. But I don’t always have that money. What are those COP$20,000 for ? To buy pens and paper and pay for travel, which are the very basics. And it depresses me that we don’t have it. It makes me sad because we have knocked on many doors, and the doors are only interested in the tangible. I feel like women are orphaned here, abandoned by institutions and society.”
But social change is brewing as women all over the country begin to raise their voices. They are demanding justice for past wrongs – seeking acknowledgement of what has happened and the end to impunity – and are acting to build a peaceful society where women can live violence-free lives.
Justice is not a tangible thing. It’s a shared value that enables us to come together peacefully. Then, how should we act to be part of this social change and build justice together?
Thousands of families without homes or water as category five Hurricane Iota devastates Colombia’s Caribbean islands.
Photo: TECHO Colombia
For 24 hours, the 5,000 inhabitants of the Caribbean island of Providencia had no electricity and no way to communicate with the rest of the world. Now, as news and images of the destruction emerge, authorities and NGOs are working to provide aid.
One person has died, one is missing and 98% of Providencia’s infrastructure has been destroyed. Many were left without electricity or drinking water after the hurricane reached its full strength in the early hours of Monday morning. Caribbean residents were already reeling from the effects of hurricane Eta, which struck less than two weeks ago.
The wind reached over 230km per hour in the eye of the storm, just 8km away from Providencia. Hurricane Iota was the worst to ever hit Colombia, and the first category five hurricane the country has seen. Category five is the strongest and most damaging hurricane.
Hurricane Iota wreaks havoc
In San Andrés, roofs were blown off houses and roads and power lines destroyed. The flooding and wind damage left 60% of the island without power.
The devastation was even worse on the smaller island and popular tourist destination of Providencia. According to El Espectador, 80% of houses on the island were destroyed and the remaining 20% damaged. The hospital is too damaged to use, making it difficult to treat those injured in the storm.
David Sánchez Campos, executive director of TECHO Colombia, reminded us that the whole Caribbean coast has been affected. “San Andrés and Providencia have been the most impacted,” he said. “But barrios in Cartagena, Barranquilla, the community of Nuevo Magdalena, as well as in el Chocó have also been affected.”
TECHO, an anti-poverty NGO that operates in Latin America, is one of several aid organisations working to get aid to those who need it. Sánchez explains the first step is to work with Defensa Civil and Cruz Roja to provide essential supplies for families. “Then we are trying to handle reconstruction assistance, both temporary housing and permanent housing.”
Photo: TECHO Colombia
Sánchez said it’s impossible to know the full extent of the damage at this stage. “In Cartagena we have more than 600 families directly impacted, because their community is still under water. At the moment we identified about 2,000 families directly affected, because there’s rain in the entire country.”
How you can help
The full extent of the damage will become clearer in time, but several NGOs are working to provide food, hygiene kits and emergency housing in the short term.
Donate to TECHO Colombia Fundación Un Techo para mi país Colombia / Bancolombia / Account No. 039-596442-48 / NIT 900.117.515-1
Donate to Solidaridad Por Colombia Fundación Solidaridad por Colombia / Bancolombia / Account No. 16700010132 / NIT 860.071.169-1
Donate money, equipment, food, clothes or time to Red FiProvidence
Specialising in unusual flavours while never being too gimmicky, 3 Cárites has a well-founded reputation in the Bogotá craft beer scene
Photo: 3 Cárites
If you’re after a craft brewery in Bogotá that’s a bit more fun and not afraid to try something slightly unconventional, 3 Cárites could be for you. Founded by Mexican expat Sergio Rodríguez Consejo, this is one of Bogotá’s longer-running and more recognised craft breweries, the bottles having been available in restaurants and bars all over the city for the last five years or so. The brewery’s well-known for its slightly more eccentric/experimental range of beers, and anyone who’s been here for a while and likes their crafties has surely put away a couple bottles of Sergio’s fiery-hot chilli Catrina or his ginger APA.
Sergio’s story of how he ended up in Bogotá brewing beer is not exactly dissimilar to that of many of his peers (minus the Mexico part). Originally a salesman for a telecom company, he was sent from his native Mexico City to Bogotá to run their new office roughly a decade ago. Eventually he decided he actually fancied doing something he liked. While he really liked cooking, he figured that at 31 years of age he was probably a bit long in the tooth to become a chef (yes, that depressed me too), so with an eye on an industry with much less competition (in 2012 this was definitely true here), he decided to try his hand at brewing.
Sergio didn’t go half-heartedly either – he spent the next two years homebrewing Saturday and Sunday of every weekend. He then won 3rd prize at the first Craft and Homebrewing Competition in Colombia with his Ginger APA, and decided after that to open up his own brewery in 2014. He soon had a brewpub round the back of El Lago, which lasted for about a year, before he moved his enterprise down to the famous craft beer community on Calle 45 and opened ‘Cervecistas’, which did good business until unfortunately becoming one of the many casualties of the pandemic lockdown this year.
3 Cárites also built itself a reputation from being on tap at Mono Bandido, one of Bogotá’s more cherished craft beer pub chains (3 Cárites was their first ever guest beer when they opened up), and Sergio often used to brew with them. Now you can find his beers in 5-6 Mexican restaurants around town, including the trendy Insurgentes up in Chapinero Alto. 3 Cárites is now a four person operation, with three Colombians involved in day-to-day operations. José David is Technical Director and helps Sergio with the brewing, Miller helps out with admin and sales, and Sergio’s wife Paola is Sales Manager.
One thing that remains very close to Sergio’s heart is the art/hobby of homebrewing, which he’d love to see more of here. With that in mind, 3 Cárites currently sell homebrew kits, which Sergio insists anyone can use without any prior brewing knowledge. For $300,000 COP, you’ll get enough malt extract, hops and yeast to make around 18 litres of American Pale Ale, as well as the 18L fermenter, bottles and caps required. This month and next, they’re planning to release kits for making Stout and IPA as well.
The beers:
3 Cárites do five regular beers and 2-3 seasonals right now. The core range includes the IPA, Ginger APA, Blonde Ale, Stout and a blonde ale named Catrina, made with habanero chillies. As I touched on right at the start, Catrina’s almost certainly Sergio’s most famous beer, and certainly his most recognisable. Loaded with one particular strain of habanero Sergio likes (a LOT of trial and error with fermentation went into the genesis of this beer), this beer leaves a pleasant but noticeable heat on the palate, as you’d expect. Catrina’s husband Catrin, a Chipotle APA, came out this month for Day of the Dead, as well as Catrina Reloaded, which is basically Catrina but with seven different types of chillies and apparently not too spicy, according to Sergio.
My favourite of 3 Cárites’ offerings though, is the Ginger APA. This American Pale Ale is unique for a variety of reasons. For one thing, it’s not at all hop-driven, which sets it on its own as an APA, regardless of reason number two, which is that it tastes like ginger beer! It’s extremely crisp and refreshing, and whilst the ginger is not exactly hidden away or especially subtle, it’s still very pleasant. I was astounded to find out that only about 150g of ginger goes into the end of a 300L boil – I’d easily put a higher percentage of ginger into a Thai curry without batting an eyelid. Like the habanero in Catrina, the ginger lingers on the palette, but once again, this is not a bad thing. The Ginger APA is definitely still a very sessionable beer.
Where to get ‘em:
As I mentioned earlier, you can find 3 Cárites in loads of bars around the city, as well as in Mono Bandido and a handful of Mexican restaurants. Outside of that though, the only current option is domicilio.
3 Cárites currently charge $6,000 COP for bottles of their core range, $8,000 for seasonals and $25,000 for growlers. This month they’re also doing Catrin and Catrina ‘husband and wife’ growler combos for $40,000, as well as various other daily deals.
You can order through Instagram, Facebook, or contact Paola directly through WhatsApp on 320 849 7627. Delivery depends on location and they try to get you the beers within 24 hours.
Some Republicans might consider emigrating and seeking a life more open to freedom away from BIG GOVERNMENT. Colombia’s a good option.
A satire piece on what could happen in Colombia after the US election results. Photo: Jon Tyson on Unsplash
With the electoral victory of Joe Biden returning the Democrats to power in the United States, it seems entirely plausible that a number of US patriots might consider leaving the country rather than live under a mildly less capitalist government. After all, patriotism means having the courage to flee high taxes.
These plucky warriors of freedom are simply too individualistic to be contained by the Deep State, and with the defeat of the Chief Trumpeter there’s nothing to stop the Dumbocrats from selfishly inflicting universal healthcare, fair policing and sensible drug policies on the country. Well, nothing except the underdog Senate led by McConnell, which has the limited power to democratically block everything they decide to. Still, cast your eyes far and wide at places where you don’t have to worry about the state.
If you think about it, these freedom junkies can easily escape the nanny state by living in Colombia. The state is weak even in the big cities and governmental control disappears entirely in large swathes of the country. Head west to the Chocó or areas of Cauca and you’ll be able to live away from prying eyes. Go unto the Llanos and live your very own Manifest Destiny, president of your very own chigüiro smallholding.
Tax evasion is commonplace and you can even skip sales taxes by buying from markets and street sellers. Of course, you’ll have to do your own checks regarding the safety of what you eat and the supply lines that bring it to you. Still, better to put money in the pockets of cartel leaders and unscrupulous producers rather than those meddling state bureaucrats.
There’s little restriction on the God-given right to run a monopoly either, so you’ll have to rely on companies like Bavaria to provide high-quality products at a decent price. So-called ‘craft’ beer brewed for university snowflakes hardly gets a look-in, although finding a manufacturer to produce beer as poor as Budweiser will be a challenge.
You’ll have to live with vaccines for other people, even if you can probably avoid having to protect your own children with a few jabs. Colombia has a pretty good record of vaccination and takes it relatively seriously. There are other obstacles as well. Colombians are so freedom-loving that they sometimes allow women to have abortions and LGBTQ+ people to marry. That can be mitigated by simply moving to a place with judges who are machista enough to refuse to sign the paperwork. The state can’t make a judge follow the law, remember. That also applies to police, to the military and plenty more folk besides. FREEDOM!
Of course, there are some downsides of all this freedom to consider. You’ll need those guns, for a start. A lot of Colombians mean it when they say that “might makes right.” If you want to be away from state control, you’ll do well to be heavily armed. Without well-run state schools, education can be lacking in the populace around you. No proper state health service exists, so best get brushing up on your first aid skills or setting aside a heap of money for the things you can’t treat yourself (like cancer or rabies). Rubbish and squalor are likely to become issues, with limited pick ups run by a firm of vultures rather than a fairly priced subsidised system. You’re responsible for the roads around you, so it might be necessary to invest in a 4×4, made in Colombia, of course, to avoid import duties.
Work for yourself, because you sure as hell don’t want to be working for a basically unregulated feudal landlord who pays off the police and military to avoid paying workers correctly. You could organise, if you have a change of heart and go all castrochavista, but you might then find yourself swinging from a tree. Colombia remains in the world’s most dangerous ten countries for worker’s rights, remember.
It might be hard to walk past dirt-poor people at first, but you’ll toughen up fast. Remember, you had all that money robbed off you by the government when you were growing up, and for what? Fire protection, NPR and infrastructure. Public schooling and a functioning police force. Count up all those stolen taxes through your life and technically you’re poorer than the family living in a shack.
Finally, remember not to talk politics. It turns out that many Colombians regard the consequences of a weak state as being somehow negative. These people seem to think that corruption, violence, and a lack of basic services are not prices worth paying to live on your feet not your knees. These mamerto snowflakes don’t realise that to respect people, you have to kill people.
Luckily, outside the big cities, there’s plenty of people that’ll agree with you. They’re the ones in the gated-off mansions that have a big heart logo outside. They also don’t want Colombia to turn into another Venezuela — or worse, another Sweden. All that efficient public transport, tolerance and equality? No, thank you!
Fiestas are coming back to Bogotá – here are some picks for this weekend.
Over the past few months, life has started to return to the city. Restaurants and cafes are decidedly open, and plenty of craft breweries are swinging back into action.
Events are back in Bogotá after quarantine but with precautionary measures. Photo: Jared Wade
No doubt many of you are looking at the shutdowns in Europe and wondering whether — or when — Colombia will follow suit. But at least for now, as long as you’re careful, there is fun to be had in Bogotá this weekend. Not only that, but entertainment and tourism have been particularly hard hit during the lockdown, so you might be helping some of your favourite venues and artists to survive.
Whatever you decide to do, make sure to reserve in advance and remember that space is often limited for Coronavirus reasons.
After more than six months, Smoking Molly is opening its doors for a night of blues. The talented Leo Parra will pay homage to four iconic bluesmen: B.B. King, Robert Johnson, John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters. If you’ve been missing live music, here’s your ticket to the deep south.
The Caravana in Salitre has been running car concerts since the start of October. There are two top DJs performing on Saturday. At 5pm, Medellín’s hip hop star Nanpa Básico will perform to a car park full of fans and at 10pm, singer-songwriter Santiago Cruz will take the driving seat. Obviously, if you don’t have a car, you’ll need to persuade someone who does, but if you like a bit of Colombian carpool karaoke, it’ll be worth it.
Salitre Autoparque
Nanpa Básico from $58,000, 4pm; Santiago Cruz from $82,000, 10pm
Billed as the battle of the queens, this is X-factor, Colombian style. The popular Paola Jara, who’s won fame with her passionate ranchera music will sing off against vallenato queen Ana del Castillo. It ain’t cheap, but if you’ve been saving your pesos and missing those Colombian sounds, perhaps this is the battle for you. If not, you can watch and vote from home for a mere $30,000.
There’s live music at A Seis Manos this weekend. On Saturday, SON432 will take to the stage with their mix of Latin rhythms, funk and reggae. Entry includes empanadas and a beer or gaseosa and the energetic band are sure to fill the spacious venue with some groovy sounds.
The unique New Orleans style steampunk bar also continues to bring us live music. There’s salsa from Pibo and his rebels, who perform every Friday and Saturday at Revellion.
The seventh edition of Open San Felipe will see 25 spaces open their doors to the city’s art enthusiasts. The streets of San Felipe will be closed to cars on November 6, 7 and 8, so you can wander freely and soak up the cafés, music and street art.
Organisers promise they’ve got plenty of biosecurity measures in place, so you can expect masked and socially distanced art, but art nonetheless. Old favourites like SKETCH and SGR Galaria will take part, along with some of the newer spaces.
We’re particularly excited about Casa 73-22, a new gallery-cum-event and co-working space which opened just before the start of the capital’s lockdown. This weekend you’ll find an exhibition by Luis Luna Matiz, a contemporary artist who’s been working between Bogotá and Villa de Leyva for the past 15 years. His artistic investigations into Colombia begin in pre-Columbian times and he explores ideas of identity, national icons and culture. His work has been shown throughout Colombia and around the world.
When the music’s over
If you’re wary of attempting a full-on fiesta, why not climb up Monserrate? You can expect a fair number of people on the way, but the police are fining people without face masks and lesser-known walking routes are decidedly less safe at the moment.
On Sunday, for $50,000, you could join La Sinfonía Del Pedal on a motorcycle-accompanied 100km cycle ride up to Sumapaz. Or head to the Festival de la Vida Sana at the Museo del Chicó (Carrera 7 #93-01). For $5,000, you can fill your day with all things healthy and take part in over 20 planned activities.
If you simply want to pretend things are the way they’ve always been, Usaquén has seamlessly transitioned to the open air. Streets are filled with open-air market stalls and several restaurants have tables outside.
Obviously, if you have symptoms or have had contact with someone who’s been diagnosed with COVID, don’t risk it — stay home until the symptoms have passed.
In the run-up to Halloween we speak to some of Bogotá’s sorcerers and practitioners of black and white magic – including a man who says he is the son of Satan.
Halloween Colombia: El chamán llanero talks about witchcraft. Photos: Juan Pablo Contreras Ríos
As people cry out for love, money, health or happiness, sorcery promises to help them. In Bogotá, witchcraft is more alive than ever, and witches and shamans promise to achieve the impossible.
“I attract the loved one, humiliated at his feet. I recover engagements, marriages and lovers. I destroy all kinds of witchcraft and I have a unique technique on the power to flirt sexually,” promises the so-called maestro de la brujería when you enter his white magic office. “I give chance numbers and lotteries, but I also make deals for luck and love.”
Nothing is out of reach for the maestro, a man of short stature, slim build and black hair who is slightly cross-eyed. He says the clairvoyance of his third eye helps him perform treatments without causing pain or harm. He begins by lighting incense and asking for his patient’s date of birth, with a picture of Jesus Christ behind him. He scatters a series of cards with images of the zodiac and starts his astral reading. He meditates a little and proclaims a series of prayers and incantations. He then tells his client what steps to follow and asks them to pay his receptionist and schedule their next appointment. He then invites the next person to come in. He performs the same procedure about five times a day.
However, the maestro de la brujería is not the only one who promises to help you keep an impossible or lost love, nor is his technique the only one on the market. Many people in the capital believe in sorcery, and there are plenty of people to provide that for them. In the vicinity of Caracas with Calle 58 we found Luis, a young Venezuelan man. He covers up his real work by handing out fliers for prostitutes, but those in the know can ask him to do magic – specifically, Luis makes voodoo dolls. Away from the bustle of the street, Luis explains what’s needed in more detail.
“You should bring me some thongs or boxers from the person to whom we will tie the voodoo doll,” he says. “It’s also necessary to get some fluid such as semen, urine, blood and several hairs. The doll is stuffed with herbs and pieces of underwear so that the work stays as you desire.”
For Luis, the most important thing when making a voodoo doll is to communicate with the fifth dimension. He says he can understand mystical concepts when in this state of consciousness and spirituality. He uses tobacco and charts to make contact with spirits and entities not present on earth.
A man who claims Satan is his father
Moving to the south of the city, we meet Ramiro López, known in the world of black magic and satanism as el chamán llanero (the shaman from the Llanos). The 53-year-old claims he works with his father: Satan. He is dedicated to doing evil, and his small office space has a strong musty smell. It’s loaded with satanic images, haunted dolls, beheaded heads and statues of Satan. A pair of coffins hang from the ceiling in homage to Lucifer, who he claims has given him everything in life.
“The devil and I are not two, we are one,” he says. “He is me and I am he. He lives in me and I live in him. I am the devil himself; I am Satan and I am Lucifer. I am proof that the devil exists. And to me, Jehovah is a son of a bitch, Yahve is a bastard, and Jesus Christ is a fool.”
El chamán llanero clearly loves luxury and extravagance, on his desk lie two latest model iPhones and the keys to his Jeep. He also loves philosophy and says he bases his beliefs and doctrines on thinkers such as Heidegger, Hegel, Jean-Paul Sartre and Arthur Schopenhauer. He tells me that he hates people and fears nothing except human brutality. Indeed, the only living things he loves are animals – he has a dog named Shakira.
We move to a room at the back of his office where there are several statues of naked demons, a red and opaque light, and another pair of coffins. This is where he performs satanic rituals that require more space and harmony with the impressive figures and statues of bloody bodies.
He has a very good memory for poems and literary fragments, but he also remembers the first time he claims the devil appeared to him when he was only four years old and under a fruit tree. He promised he’d be king if he did evil and destroyed the world.
“The one who is against me goes badly, the pestilence comes, and they die, misery and disease comes to them. If she is a woman, she will prostitute herself, and if she has daughters, they will prostitute themselves too. Death comes with me.”
The hundreds of people who come to his office are willing to pay more than ten million pesos for his services. He says many women desire beauty, while men desire money or sex. The latter is not a problem in Ramiro’s life. Although he has a wife, he says that fornicating is one of the sins that satisfies him the most and even recruits women who make love in front of him to satisfy his sexual desires.
Whether they practice black or white magic, there are basic beliefs that unite el chamán llanero, el maestro de la brujería and Luis. It’s an unknown world where love ties, voodoo dolls and tarot cards are tools to heal the spirit, attract fortune, and in some cases, do evil. Magic is a universe full of colours and nuances – and it’s also a popular money-making business.
Bogotá is dominated by motorised transport – but is that a good thing?
This morning, there’s a protest on Calle 13 by bus operators. They’re up in arms because of a newly-installed bike lane. I’m hardly surprised – every time I write something mentioning that it might be nice if bike users weren’t risking their lives, we receive a barrage comments from moaning drivers. It’s not just cyclists, either, pedestrians need protection too.
Traditionally, Bogotá is a city that caters more to cars than to pedestrians, is that changing? Photo: Piqsels
Of course, this is nothing strange – bicycle infrastructure annoys people the world over, or at least it annoys a vocal minority with plenty of power. The protests invariably come from motorists, usually private car drivers. Remember, this might be a large group in other countries, but is still relatively small in Bogotá – 86% of city journeys are not by car. It’s also true that there should be bus infrastructure to match the bikes – why not have dedicated lanes for buses? It would squeeze out the drivers, but that’s the idea.
The sick irony of this is that those motorists have incredible amounts of their own infrastructure. Just look at any street in Bogotá and think about how much space is given over to car drivers – main roads obviously, but also petrol stations, parking spaces, parking blocks, signs and signals, access roads.
Whose convenience is more important?
At the heart of the debate, though, we have to think about who we want to use the city, and who we want to benefit. Imagine two cities. In city A, motorists have to drive extremely slowly in certain zones. They are inconvenienced, but on the other hand, kids can happily play football in the street and everyone can cross the road without fearing death. In city B, motorists get to their destinations much quicker – up to a whopping ten minutes earlier. However, every pedestrian is massively restricted. Well, you don’t have to imagine one of those cities – it’s the reality of B(ogotá). Once travel restrictions ease, you can jump on a flight to Europe and you can visit A(msterdam) easily.
Ah, you’ll say, but Bogotá is not Amsterdam. That’s true, but Amsterdam of yesteryear wasn’t like Amsterdam either, back in the day. There was a concerted effort to change the layout and operation of the city, in response to growing numbers of dead children on the roads. Today, Amsterdam is hailed as a livable city and a pleasure to stroll about in. And guess what? There are still plenty of cars about, they just don’t have unfettered primacy. Sounds like the best of both worlds to me. Not just Amsterdam, but countless cities have done similar – Tokyo and London to name just two that I’ve lived in.
La misma calle en Amsterdam antes y ahora.
Si Amsterdam hubiera dicho 'No podemos hacer eso aquí', todavía habría sido una ciudad de autos. La diferencia fundamental entre las dos imágenes: voluntad política. pic.twitter.com/bWcmrqHcBr
There are solutions the world over to these problems, proven and tested. Bus lanes function as bike lanes in many British cities; some cities pedestrianise zones of the city; mass transit exists world-over. There are few reasons why these couldn’t be implemented in Bogotá. This city is full of people who fundamentally like cyclists and cycling. Car-free days already exist. Closing the Calles on a Sunday brings thousands of people onto the streets and whatever you may think of the pedestrianisation of Bogotá city centre, it’s been a roaring success. Car usership only makes up around 15% of city travel and there are already hundreds of kilometres of cyclepaths, even if not perfect. With a metro coming, there’s no reason not to make the city much more pleasant to live in. The conditions are good to sow the seeds of a city not ruled by the internal combustion engine.
The car lobby is powerful and loud. But they don’t represent the majority of people, particularly not in Bogotá. This is not the USA, however much some people would like it to be. And remember, US cities rarely trouble the quality of life indices – European, Asian and Oceanic cities dominate. Cutting down (not eliminating) private car usership would free up urban space for parks. It would promote small businesses, as shoppers on foot tend to make more purchases. It would cut pollution, not only from the cars themselves, but from fewer traffic jams. That lack of traffic jams would help everyone move about more smoothly. I remember 90s London – it was a horrible place to move about in, congested and clogged. The congestion charge changed everything. If we can change, you too can change.
Witches and sorcerers are not just for Halloween in Colombia.
Voodoo dolls aren’t only being used during Halloween in Colombia, it happens all year. Photo: Juan Pablo Contreras Ríos
People will bet everything to achieve their dreams and desires. That includes turning to magic and witchcraft, stars, angels, or even Satan for answers to many of life’s mysteries.
Magic becomes much more than just spells in Harry Potter’s Hogwarts when we enter the world of different prayers, rituals and voodoo dolls. We find people desperate to make someone love them or find a lost ‘guaca‘ (hidden treasure). The unknown transcends the dimensions of reality. Some people believe they can communicate with the stars, angels, otherworldly beings – even demons. Witches, soothsayers and shamans go out into the streets every day, looking for people who are unafraid of witchcraft and want to achieve their desires, no matter what. That’s how magic in many forms is scattered throughout the country, just like any other business.
Colombia has long been linked with stories of witches and shamans living in the remotest of the towns. Some people say they are mysterious people with the ability to become animals to move from one place to another. Others say that they are people with an unpleasant appearance and bad odour, accompanied by black cats. Still others believe they are parts of demon cults who make sacrifices on October 31. Whether these are myths, horror stories or simple superstitions, the practice of witchcraft continues in Colombia.
Voodoo dolls and rituals
Workers report chilling finds during their regular cemetery cleanups. Thousands of voodoo dolls or mystical items that are supposed to prevent a person’s soul from resting in peace are said to lie under the tombstones. But such haunted objects are not only found in cemeteries, abandoned houses or sewers. Items that people believe will keep the spirit of a person roaming the earth can be found everywhere.
And while the dead may wish to return, those who are alive desperately cry out for love, money and sex. These are things the sorcerers and shamans of Colombia promise to achieve with just a few sessions of esotericism and magic. Sorcerers promise that if you give them money, you’ll get it all back – plus more than half again with the help of a few baths and prayers. In the case of sex and love, those seeking a cure for unrequited love need to provide clothes and locks of hair to tether them to the person they desire.
There are also sorcerers and promoters of white magic too. Blue leaflets distributed at certain TransMilenio stations promise to teach rituals that will protect you from undesirable people. For example, water, vinegar, milk, perfume and five steel nails are the main ingredients for a very basic spell that protects you from other people’s bad intentions. But before you rush out to buy perfume and nails, we should warn you that there’s no proof these concoctions will give the desired results. On the contrary, potions that promise to cure diseases, ensnare a lover or take you to a higher plane should be approached with caution – you don’t know how your body may react. We’ve all heard the tales of tourists taking yagé or ayahuasca, sometimes with lethal results.
Some people try to kid themselves it’s only white magic. But if you believe in it, wanting to cast even an apparently harmless spell to make someone fall in love still goes against the will of the other person. And that’s before we look at the sorcerers who claim to work with Satan and use black magic to cause even more pain and damage. The magic may not be real, but the intention behind it is, and pretty ugly too.
Witches and sorcerers are not just a Halloween gimmick in Colombia. People believe in them, pay for them, and reach out for them in times of need. The streets are full of places that offer tarot readings, contact with angels, love bonds, and even curses. The real danger is that turning to witchcraft to solve your problems means you don’t learn how to handle them on your own as you believe something supernatural is going to do it. Just think of the risks of missing medical treatment for a real illness because you use witchcraft instead. And why it is necessary to take the romance out of falling in love by trying to speed it along with potions? There are many things you can do for yourself and it is not worth risking with magic
Wicca Cervecería is one of the capital’s newest breweries and they’re ready to bewitch you before Halloween with a new brew hot off their cauldron at 2600 Brauhaus tomorrow.
Wicca Cervecería.
Double double toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble. Fillet of a fenny snake, In the cauldron boil and bake. At Wicca Cervecería, you’re unlikely to find snakes, fenny or otherwise, as they launch a collaboration beer – Tábata – this Saturday at 2600 Brauhaus.
The Bogotá beer scene has a good habit of encouraging co-working and Tábata is the result of Wicca teaming up with Brauhaus and Chelarte. You’ll need to reserve a table (COVID) and you can do that with Wicca, or either of the other two breweries. It’s $60,000 a person which includes dinner, a glass of Tábata and a cocktail.
Double toil and trouble, though, is a pretty apt description of their founding. The brewery sprang up in quarantine, as Leiddy Rincón, Geraldine Reina and Jennifer Ramírez all found themselves adrift. Previously, Leiddy had worked for Season Beer, Jennifer at Baloo and Geraldine for Gigante. As the pandemic took its toll, they all ended up with lots of spare time. Leiddy and Jennifer are founder members of the Comunidad de Mujeres Cerveceras, and got to talking about the idea of clubbing together to make some beers.
They needed a name, though, and had always been fond of calling the Comunidad de Mujeres Cerveceras ‘brujas’, or witches. That name wasn’t well-received with other members of the collective, but between the three of them, there wasn’t a problem. In the end, though, Wicca seemed like a more elegant compromise and thus the brewery was born.
Jennifer says she remembers thinking, “If we don’t do it now, we won’t do it.” Leiddy chimes in to point out, “We had an advantage, that we had experience and we knew a lot,” before Geraldine finishes “…And people knew us, they knew that they could trust us.” It’s fascinating to listen to the coven together, as the conversation flashes from one to the other in quick succession.
Geraldine was right to say that people trusted them – because their first batch of beers was a runaway success. They’d budgeted to sell around 35 beers on the first weekend, hoping to sell the others later. Orders soon poured in as the word spread, and they sold 91 packs (364 beers) in the end. That’s a whole order of magnitude more. It looks like the runes auger well for these witchy women!
The beers
Wicca have kicked things off with four regular beers, as well as the special Tábata. Tábata is highly unusual, as it doesn’t have hops. Instead, flavour comes from a blend of camomile, juniper, rosemary, marjoram, lemongrass and bayleaf. It’s a tradition going back to medieval European beers that predate hop cultivation and also can be sourced locally here in Colombia, making it more eco-friendly.
Remarkably, the regular beers all clock in at 5%, making them considerably more session-able than many Bogotá offerings. They have a standard IPA (Ancas de Rana) as well as a Cream Ale (Agua Lunar) and an American Amber Ale (Sangre de mis Enemigos). The one we want to talk about though, is the fruity Catherina Sour (Locura Colectiva).
Locura Colectiva is about as close to a ‘gateway sour’ as it gets, in terms of drinkability and tartness. The beer is loaded with hibiscus after fermentation, which apart from giving it its delicate flavour, also means it comes out of Wicca’s psychedelic medicine bottles a lovely grapefruit pink colour. “We wanted this colour for our flagship beer, exalting the colour everyone associates with women,” says Geraldine.
Our other beer writer, Tristan Quigley, pronounced it an excellent specimen of its genre in Colombia. He is a big sour fan and tasted it in the heat of the Llanos, where admittedly any lighter sour beer worth drinking should perform well.
Locura is tart enough to quench the thirst and keep it interesting, yet pleasantly sweet at the same time. “I can see this beer converting a lot of open-minded beer drinkers who may have originally bristled at the very idea of a sour beer,” he said.
How to get them
Wicca sell via social media, so there’s Instagram, facebook or simply WhatsApp (302 3181010). Beers come in 4-packs at $45,000 incl delivery in Bogotá or Cali. They send orders out on Wednesdays and Fridays, so time your requests well.
Tábata is a 750ml bottle and can be ordered in a fancy presentation box for $80,000 or on its own for $49,000. The presentation box features a set of three potions and a souvenir glass in which to mix them, as well as a booklet on potion-making and the beer itself.
With various videos showing motorists flagrantly endangering cyclists, it’s time for the alcaldía to protect vulnerable road users.
More cyclng lanes are being built around Bogotá, but it often remains a hazard.
A cyclist is going along a road, just getting to wherever they’re going. A truck arrives and smashes them off the side of the bridge for unknown reasons. There are a few videos like this doing the rounds at the moment. The common denominator is a motor vehicle taking an enormous risk with someone else’s life. The consequences are not suffered by them, of course, but by the vulnerable users they endanger. The cyclist in one of the videos died.
As we ease out of lockdown, we have the potential for a great deal of toxicity on the roads. New bike lanes have sprung up, meaning there are more cyclists on the road than before. That always enrages motorists. The existence of those bike lanes means that anyone (perfectly legally) not using them will suffer abuse and intimidation. Added to that is an increase in the number of private car users as people eschew public transport in fear of COVID-19. This — and a generally higher level of tension — could lead to increased confrontation as the groups begin to encounter each other on the asphalt.
Early signs were encouraging. Building a bike lane on Séptima was an inspired move that Claudia López can take enormous credit for. It was a hard call and not popular with the motorati, but she got it through (with the odd bump) while everyone was looking the other way in CoronaChaos. It’s a rare example of a bike lane on a useful street and with half decent infrastructure. It’s not perfect by any means, its middle-of-the-road position makes it a headache to enter and exit, but it’s a big step in the right direction.
The mayor now needs to go even further to support cycling, though. Plenty of resources are used to get pet journalists to write puff pieces about cycling in Bogotá, but there’s little critical assessment. Séptima’s new bike lane is a good start, but more needs to be done to counter violence against cyclists. For months, cycling groups have denounced the levels of attacks on cyclists in the city.
The dangers cyclists face in Bogotá
The standard crime here is not half-inching a bike chained to railings or unattended. It’s holding up cyclists at knife or gunpoint. It’s a problem that stretches back to the Peñalosa days, but has not decreased under Claudia. Indeed, it’s risen with COVID-19.
Then there is the deliberate misuse of bicycle infrastructure. Motorbikes regularly enter bike lanes and plenty of 4x4s hop over the bumps with impunity. Parking in bike lanes is another issue and others are unusable because of street sellers.
Added to that are the increases in aggression from motorists. With growing numbers of both bike and car users, more and more conflicts have arisen. Climbing up to Patios at weekends has become genuinely irritating, as cars frequently blare horns and attempt to bully cyclists out of the way. All this on a road richly thicketed with signs proclaiming that cyclists should take priority, that motorists should care about the lives of others and so forth. And therein lies the key to what the local government should do. It’s not about meaningless and easy ‘education’, but people being prosecuted.
It’s a radical idea in Colombia, but let’s just enforce the laws and norms we already have, rather than blaring on about the need to educate ourselves and wasting public money on awareness campaigns. It’s often said that drink-driving was stopped as a major problem in the UK after some innovative and hard-hitting advertising. They had an effect, sure, but what really got people on board was the police simply stopping drivers right left and centre and throwing out fines, license points and prison sentences as much as possible. It’s one of the few times, anywhere in the world, that motorists have had any sort of consequences attached to their actions.
So come on Bogotá, if you’re serious about making this into a cycling capital, you need to protect us. Stop this hemming and hawing about the need for everyone to obey the rules and start prosecuting dangerous behaviour in control of a motor vehicle. Fine cyclists for jumping red lights if you like, but for god’s sake get a grip on the people who are causing serious accidents on the roads as well.
At the same time, put police patrols on cycle lanes. There’s no secret to the modus operandi, just station police jackets in known hotspots. Resist calls to rescind existing cycling infrastructure and fine people who invade bike lanes. All of this is relatively cheap (especially factoring in money recovered through fines) and effective. It might not be popular at first, of course, but cities should be designed for people, not motors and you will reap the benefits in time.
Whether you know them as Pola del Pub, The Irish Pub or just El Irish, the founders’ decades of experience shows through in these beers.
Pola Del Pub’s Nitro Coffee Milk Stout. Photo: Tristan Quigley
Pola del Pub AKA El Irish AKA The Irish Pub is one of the capital’s oldest craft beer providers. El Irish first popped up in the Zona T in 2001, serving pints of Guinness to rolos who had no idea just how lucky they were. There’s sadly no Guinness now, as official distributors sadly stopped selling to Colombia many moons ago, but that hasn’t stopped El Irish from remaining one of the most reliable locations to find a high quality pint in Bogotá. There are now four more pubs across the city, as well as the original in the T.
El Irish had always offered alternatives to Bavaria on their taps, but it was only this year that they started their very own craft brewery. They rebranded to Pola del Pub and now make their own versions of five craft staples. Of course, this is not a case of a bartender trying hand at brewing – Berny Silberwasser founded the Bogotá Beer Company (now part of beer giant Bavaria), Palos de Moguer and Cervecería Colon. Head brewer Charlie Suárez has been brewing for around 20 years now, after originally starting off in the industry as a brewery security guard. The third partner, Tomás Delfino, is one of the only certified beer cicerones in the country. So it’s hardly surprising that the first cans coming out of Pola del Pub tasted like they’d been making them for decades. The first batch of IPAs sold out the same night they arrived from the brewery in Tocancipá.
According to Tomás, the main objective for Pola del Pub is to improve the overall quality of Colombian craft beer. He sees the industry as one in which so-called competitors work together in order to raise the overall standard of their collective market. As he sees it, “The more people try craft beer, the more they’ll fall in love with it and the better it is for everyone involved. There’s room for everyone [in the market].” This isn’t just hollow sentiment either. Before the pandemic hit, the pub in Quinta Camacho boasted 24 taps of local craft beer. They currently only sell their own beers at this stage of the city’s ‘re-opening’, but plan to reintroduce the other crafties as soon as possible.
The beers
Pola del Pub currently makes five core beers: Rubia, American Pale Ale, Witbier, IPA, and Nitro Coffee Milk Stout. They’ve also got a seasonal out right now – a refreshing and creamy White IPA to mark the 19th anniversary of El Irish. I haven’t had cause to try the Rubia or Witbier. (I’m sure they’re great, but just look at the other four types they offer). I can vouch for the four American-style beers 100%. Both IPAs are loaded up with citrus- and tropical-note hops (Calypso and Asacca to name a couple) and APA hits a dangerously sessionable balance of biscuity maltiness and refreshing citrus late hops. That leaves us with the Nitro Coffee Milk Stout, which deserves its own paragraph.
As someone who only half-jokingly thinks nitro carbonation should be a legal requirement of dark beers, and who seeks out Guinness whenever he leaves Latin America, I was always going to struggle not to love this beer. Funnily enough, its very existence is partly because Tomás and his partners were sick of copping stick for being an Irish Pub without Guinness, and so decided to make their own nitro stout. I’m glad they did.
Of course, this is not just some Guinness rip-off either. The beer contains coffee from local microroasters Colo Coffee and is brewed with whole Colombian vanilla pods. Tomás laments the fact that most core beer ingredients need to be imported, so they always use as many Colombian-made products as possible. For anyone who hasn’t brewed a Milk Stout before and is wondering how that works, it’s also brewed with lactose, which provides a thicker, creamier body and a hint of sweetness, as it doesn’t ferment with brewing yeast.
How to get ‘em
Obviously the best way to get hold of these beers is to pop into your closest Irish Pub and sit outside in the sun. Each location has ample outdoor space, making it the ideal place for pandemic beers. There are pubs in La Candelaria, Quinta Camacho, Usaquén, Cedritos and Zona T (addresses below), and they’re open every day from 12pm to 1am. They also serve typical Colombian pub fare, i.e. pizzas, burgers, empanadas, to go with the food.
If you’d rather stay in though, just hop on their website and they’ll have chilled cans with you in less than an hour. The cans are American pint-size (473mL) and come in biodegradable packaging. They also sell whole kegs, which come with everything you’ll need to serve the beer, including the glassware. Cans are currently all sold out, but will be back available again in about two weeks.
La Candelaria: Carrera 3 #12-37 Quinta Camacho: Carrera 10A #70-48 Zona T: Carrera 12A #83-48 Usaquén: Carrera 6A #117-45 Cedritos: Carrera 7C Bis #139-82
Protests will take place throughout the country today, in spite of COVID-19 concerns.
Colombia national strike: The Minga Indígena in Bogotá this week. Photo: Hans Luyckx
It’s eleven months since the dramatic national protests of 2019 and just six weeks after the demonstrations following the police killing of Javier Ordóñez that ended violently. This week, Colombians again take to the streets to demonstrate their discontent.
Protests will take place throughout the country, including Bogotá, Medellín, Barranquilla, Armenia, Manizales and Cúcuta. The Bogotá demonstrations will gather at the usual meeting points such as the Universidad Nacional, the Parque Nacional, Parque Olaya, Parque de la Sol, La Sevillana and Héroes from around 10am.
Who’s striking?
Today’s paro nacional — national strike — will be joined by Fecode, the national union of education workers, and the minga indígena. Fecode began a 48-hour strike yesterday with various workshops, online forums and conversations. The minga indígena includes around 7,000 indigenous people from Cauca and nearby, activists, Afro-Colombians, and campesinos who arrived in Bogotá on Monday and will leave today.
Why are people protesting?
Many of the concerns that drove people to protest 11 months ago have only intensified since then. The six-month coronavirus lockdown has had a drastic economic impact, increasing unemployment and putting pressure on the country’s health system.
The International Crisis Group recently reported that at least 415 social leaders have been killed since the peace accord was signed, stressing that the violence has only increased during the pandemic.
People on the streets today will protest against many issues, including the economic and social situation, police violence, social leader assassinations and rising unemployment.
COVID concerns
Some, like Bruce Mac Master, the leader of ANDI (Colombia’s business association), have criticised the protests because of the increased risk of coronavirus contagion. On Monday, President Iván Duque tweeted about “the importance of preserving health and avoiding gatherings that put Colombian lives at risk.”
In contrast, Bogotá’s mayor Claudia López thanked the minga participants for their compliance with both biosecurity and security measures. She later called on the government to support the indigenous marchers to guarantee a “biosecure return to the reservations.”
The term minga comes from an indigenous Quechua word: mink’a. It encompasses a sense of community and common purpose. A minga can be called to bring people together towards a goal, in this case, to demand a right to life, territory, democracy, and peace.
The Minga Indígena during the 2019 national strike in Colombia. Photo: Steve Hide
Last year, the Guardia Indígena of Cauca created quite a stir when they joined the protests. The presence of some indigenous groups added weight to the demonstrations and also strengthened the peaceful nature of the protests.
This year, the groups have stayed in the Palacio de los Deportes during their three days in the capital. They travelled from various parts of the country to demand a meeting with President Duque — a demand that was not met in Cali, although Interior Minister Alicia Arango arrived and was ignored.
The minga want the government to fulfil its obligations under Colombia’s peace agreement. They protest against the continued killing of social leaders and the increasing violence in many rural areas.
Metalheads Sergio and Richard from Cervecería Tomahawk are reopening this week in Cedritos
Photo: Tomahawk
Years ago, Sergio Cabrera and Richard McDaniel were just two metalheads, headbanging at various dingy metal venues in Bogotá, like La Tienda Metalera on Séptima and Bogotá Grind Death Fest. They crossed paths at one of the two venues – Sergio’s not sure which anymore – and became good friends. Richard showed Sergio his homebrewing and almost a decade later, the two of them now find themselves in charge of one of the capital’s biggest and most successful craft beer operations, with a staff of eight and a capacity of 2,500 to 8,000 litres a month.
A very American-influenced brewery – Richard hails from Fort Myers, Florida, and Bogotano Sergio has spent a lot of time in Texas – Tomahawk specialises in ballsy IPAs and brutal, gothic, stylised artwork, which features on each bottle. After years running a not-for-profit Metal radio station called Metal a la Carta, which at one stage had 30,000 listeners around Colombia and over 600 volunteers, Sergio’s a gifted organiser who created the country’s biggest craft beer festival, Festival de Cerveceros Artesanales de Colombia.
The festival is now in its seventh year, and Sergio managed to bring famed author and brewing expert John J Palmer out here last year to judge beers. They also collaborated with him on an Imperial Pastry Stout, which is still available online in one litre growlers. They’ve also got 200L of it aging for over a year an old Jack Daniels barrel that also previously housed rum and premium aguardiente, and will be released in 200 special edition 750ml bottles next month.
The beers
Tomahawk currently sell the aforementioned Imperial Pastry Stout, a Summer Ale, an American Pale Ale, a Black IPA, an American Stout and three fruit infused IPAs – one with mango and pineapple, one with lulo and feijoa, and this month’s new ‘frutos rojos’, which has a great zombie cartoon on the bottles for Halloween.
The one I’m going to focus on here is the IPA con Mango y Piña, because a) there’s nothing else like it in Bogotá and b) I absolutely adore this beer. When you open this beer, you may as well be sucking on a mango pip, as far as the aroma goes. It smells more like a fruit juice than a beer. Unlike most traditional American IPAs, the fruity aroma and taste come from actual mango and pineapple pulp, added to the fermenters around four days in, rather than fancy Californian and Australasian hops.
That’s not to say there aren’t any fancy US hops in it – the Cascade and Chinook late/dry hops float nicely over the fruit – but Sergio and Richard felt it best to take full advantage of the biodiversity Colombia has to offer, rather than solely relying on the hops it doesn’t. The natural sugar in the fruit means more for the yeast to turn into alcohol during fermentation, so this IPA has a much lighter malt bill to offset that, meaning it’s much lighter than many IPAs and perfect for a hot day.
How to get ‘em
Tomahawk have reopened this week in Cedritos (Carrera 19 #138-06). The bar’s upstairs and down, with plenty of room and a nice high ceiling, making it very comfortable for beering and dining during these dark times. They do great food from a range of cuisines (I’d recommend the lamb gyro or choripan artesanal myself though) and each one is matched with one of their beers. A pint will set you back $10,900 COP for the Summer Ale, $12,900 for the APA and $14,900 for pretty much everything else. Reservations can be made online (see right below). They’re open from 5pm to midnight Thursday through Friday, and on Sunday afternoons between noon and 6pm.
If you’d prefer to stay home, however, Tomahawk also has a very slick website. Their beers range from $7,500 for the Summer Ale to $8,500 for the IPAs, although this decreases by up to a couple of thousand pesos if you buy by the case and they’ve got a discount on. They offer same-day, cold delivery if you order before 3pm and you can pay either by card with PayU or EFTPOS on arrival.
The Bogotá Post is going live on Facebook at 9pm again tonight, this time talking about Colombian sport.
Tonight on Bogotá Nights, our Sports Editor Freek Huigen joins Brendan Corrigan and Oli Pritchard to discuss the sporting side of Colombia. Write in to tell us what you like to watch or do in the capital, an underrated sporting capital. You might even learn some sporting terms in English!
As dark as the 80s and 90s often were for Colombia, it threw up plenty of sporting heroes, so we’ll talk about the likes of Colombia’s second favourite Valderrama, El Pibe himself, as well as Lucho Herrera and El Scorpion himself, René Higuita.
And of course, there’s plenty you can join in with – Bogotanos love to play sport as well as watch. It might have been COVID-cancelled this year, but the Bogotá Media Maratón is a big deal most years, the ciclovía is always packed and a tejo board is always popular. Find out where you can go and what you can do.
Gigante is the small brewery that’s big on flavour. They’ve reopened and are ready to go.
Cervecería Gigante founder Will Catlett in the bar. Photo: Gigante
Cervecería Gigante is the creation of Californian Will Catlett, who moved to Bogotá seven years ago and started up an Italian restaurant in La Candelaria. He became interested in brewing, with the basic idea to ‘make good beer and share it’. Will started home brewing and selling at small events, and at the end of 2015, this idea turned into a small Bogotá craft brewery ironically called Cervecería Gigante. He now works with two other brewers, Kristian and Juan Cuervo, and has been joined on the business side of things by Irishman Andy Connolly. Whilst the beers are essentially the same three styles Will was making back in the day, he and Andy now have a stylish gastropub on Plaza Lourdes in Chapinero, which they’re reopening today in this new, post-lockdown city.
The pub had only been open just over three months when Bogotá went into Covid quarantine, during which they’ve been hosting ‘Sunday Sessions’ – guest DJ performances at the bar, which they broadcast live on Facebook. Live original music is something Will believes has always been lacking from Bogotá’s craft beer scene and he’s hoping to give these musicians a physical audience now that we’re allowed out again.
Will’s culinary background has remained an influence on the business and Gigante offers American-style bar food to go with the beer, the marquee item on the menu being gourmet sausages that Will himself makes. Currently on offer are mango and jalapeño, Louisiana Cajun, pork and apple, and pork and leek. He also does his own corned beef and pickles, as well as a range of deli-style sandwiches.
The beers
The three core beers that have given Gigante its reputation on the scene since the very beginning are the Sequoia Red IPA, Cloudkicker Porter and Mokarran Pale Ale (formerly known to long-time clientele as the Citra Pale Ale). Gigante also have two seasonal beers right now: Tunjo Kölsch and Beithir Scotch Ale.
I’m not a big fan of strong ales and at 9.3% abv, I’d be lying if I said the Beithir Scotch Ale jumped off the beer list at me. However, this one is right on the money. Unlike many strong ales, it hides the alcohol seamlessly behind a complex mix of wood (from a touch of smoked malt), prunes, caramel, toffee and vanilla. Being named after a mythical Scottish dragon fits the raw power of the beer, but I happily polished off two on the bounce the other night whereas many other versions of this style would have me fighting my way through one.
How to get ‘em
A week ago I would have said the best way to get these beers is via WhatsApp (message Gaby on 3187904617), Instagram or Facebook. However, now you can pop into the bar and order them off the menu yourself on calle 63A #10-46! Gigante will be temporarily open Thursday through Sunday, from midday to 9pm, starting today.
If you’re still a bit reluctant to leave the house though, you can still get the beers delivered straight to your door. A six pack costs $40,000 COP and a slab of 24 is $145,000. They also do 20L kegs for $220,000 and 50L for $500,000
Keep your fridge well stocked even if you’re not going out, as craft beer pioneers Chelarte continue to offer an excellent domicilio service.
One of Bogotá’s best-known craft breweries is Chelarte, which up until the pandemic hit, had its own bar just off Parque 93, in the city’s north. Camilo Rojas discovered his love of beer when he went on exchange to Germany in 2005, although it wasn’t until he took a fermentation class as part of his Chemical Engineering and Microbiology degree at Los Andes that he found his calling in craft brewing. He then took inspiration from a book by the President of American brewery Dogfish, Sam Calagione. That drew American style craft beers to his attention, but he had to rely on his States-based sister to bring him hops, yeast and even IPAs so he could see what they actually tasted like!
Camilo then started putting on parties to see how his beers fared. At one of those, he met Andrés Correal, now his business partner, who was importing German beers at the time. They properly got started in 2012 and immediately discovered the struggle they faced. As Camilo tells it, ‘People saw beer as red, blonde, black.’ He hated this attitude to beer and wanted to do something different. So he put names on all their beers to give them a more personal feel – ‘you call people by their names.’ To find the names, Camilo and Andrés looked back through the history of brewing, all the way to Ancient Egypt, and found that up until very recently, beer brewing was historically the domain of women.
The beers
There are now six ladies who find themselves featured on Chelarte’s bottles: Pamela, Raquel, Carmela, Zenaida, Naari and Débora. Respectively, that’s a Summer Ale, Pale Ale, Brown Ale, Oatmeal Stout, IPA and Double IPA that Chelarte currently brew on a regular basis.
IIPA
Camilo likes his IPAs to be easy-drinking and lower than most on bittering hops. Débora is exactly that in double-IPA terms (translation: malty and fruity, full of citrusy flavour). Packed full of Mosaic, Columbus and El Dorado hops, she’s very tropical, with a hint of pine and peach coming through on the nose. Débora on the bottle has tatts all down her arms and Camilo describes her as ‘a bit crass and rebellious’. He chose her name because it sounds like ‘devour’ in Spanish and because just like the beer, it’s ‘different, strong and stands out’. As with any well-crafted Double IPA, her 8% abv doesn’t leave its mark on the taste.
How to get ‘em
The best way to get these beers is by contacting the brewery through WhatsApp, on 310 561 2862. Otherwise, go to their website.
Chelarte have made a concerted effort to keep as many of their bar employees on staff, so they’re now doing most of the deliveries until there’s a physical bar to drink in again.
The four original beers (Pamela, Raquel, Carmela and Zenaida) are $5,500 a pop, while Naari and Débora will set you back $8,900 and $10,500 each, respectively.
There’s a $20,000 minimum order and delivery is free if you find yourself within 5km of their bodega on Calle 77 and Av Caracas. Otherwise it’ll vary depending on how far away you are. They try their best to do same-day deliveries whenever possible.
Applying for a visa in Colombia? Here are some simple rules to follow.
Photo: Wikimedia
Visa applications are difficult in every country in the world. Foreigners have to navigate ever-changing mazes of rules and paperwork. And at times, those rules don’t seem achievable or justifiable.
I — and many close friends — have unintentionally fallen foul of the visa rules before, and it’s a horrible feeling. Especially if you want to live in Colombia long term, it can feel as if the ground has been pulled from under your feet.
That said, there are some things you can do to make the process easier.
1) Don’t act entitled
The first thing to understand when you’re applying for a visa in any country is this: You are not entitled to a visa. Even if you meet all the requirements, you’re still not actually entitled to a visa.
So when you deal with the visa office, be nice. You may be beyond frustrated and feel like you’ve jumped through so many hoops you could join the circus, but shouting and acting like an entitled foreigner is not going to get you anywhere.
There are plenty of stories of exceptions being made in certain circumstances. Or of individual visa officials bending the rules either for or against certain applicants. And officials are granted discretion to make individual decisions based upon their interpretation of specific cases. But there are also plenty of cases where the visa office stuck to its guns.
No matter how annoying the red tape and how jobsworthy the official, the only real way to be sure you can get a visa is to work within the system. Talk to any Colombian about trying to get a visa for a two-week holiday abroad if you want a reminder on how hard it really is to get a visa. Or talk to one of the many Venezuelans trying to live in Colombia who have it a lot harder than rich foreigners with jobs and money.
You’ll find the basic rules on the Cancillería website, and you’ll likely be asked for additional paperwork. It is not always easy to figure out which visa you should apply for, but it is safe to say that if you can’t fulfil the requirements listed there, you’re going to be rejected.
You can find more information about each visa type and the documentation you’ll need here. If you plan to live here long term, it is worth understanding the rules. You could, for example, unintentionally invalidate your future R visa application if you leave the country for more than six months during the five years normally needed.
Some common points:
V visas are generally easier to qualify for than M or R visas because they are not designed for long-term residents.
The M independent workers visa does require a certified degree in the field in which you are working. Unfortunately, that means that if you are a dolphin trainer with an economics degree, you probably ain’t gonna get an M visa. And last we heard, the Ministry of Education was taking up to four months to certify those degrees.
If you want to bring in money for an investor visa, you can’t get the documentation you need from the Banco de la Republica if you are a tax resident in Colombia. Anyone who’s been in the country for 6 months counts as a tax resident, no matter what their visa status is.
Let’s be honest, some of the requirements are tough. And they don’t all feel logical or justified. But if you’re going to campaign against them, at least be clear on what it is that should be changed and why. Half-baked social media campaigns against the Ministry of Foreign Affairs — especially when it was perfectly justified in rejecting a visa application — just contribute to anti-foreigner sentiment and makes the ministry less likely to consider sensible revisions to the rules.
It’s also true to say people get pushed into states of semi-legality when faced with seemingly impossible rules. Their visa takes too long to process, so they leave the country and come back as a tourist. They sign up to a course so that they can qualify for a student visa. They go for the V visa rather than the M because it works in the short term. Sadly, that’s the way of red tape everywhere in the world: If it’s not possible to operate 100% within the rules, nobody can ever be whiter than white.
That said, I have lost count of the number of visa conversations I’ve had with people where they tell me “It’s not fair.” They have lived here for five years and only spent 18 months of that time on a tourist visa, so why won’t the visa office give them a resident visa? Because you need to be here for five years on the same M visa to qualify. Many of these regulations are very clearly stated and can be found on governmental websites in seconds.
Other times a foreigner will tick most of the boxes for a workers visa, but then can’t meet the income requirements. Incidentally, those income requirements are high — to qualify for an M visa as an independent worker you need to earn 10 minimum wages a month (which is about 9 million pesos).
Or, here’s another common refrain from visa applicants: It says on the website that my visa should be for three years and I only got one year. Not true. Your visa could be granted for up to three years, but you could be given anything from six months to three years.
It isn’t always fair. The rules themselves are not fair. At least if you understand them, you give yourself the best shot at being approved.
And if you don’t understand them all, that’s fine. It is a complicated system by nature. And one that is unreasonable in many, many ways.
But submit applications based on hearsay and WhatsApp advice from friends and that’s your problem — not the ministry’s. If you love Colombia and want to stay here, consider getting professional advice to help you through the process.
3) Allow plenty of time
Colombia is a country of red tape. We’ve just seen that the Ministry of Education could take up to four months to certify your degree certificate, and that’s before you factor in the time and effort involved in getting your university to send you the apostilled documents you need.
I emailed Migración Colombia a month ago after failing to get an answer by phone or on their website. According to the automated reply, it could take up to 35 working days before I get an answer. Luckily, I have a while before I need to submit my application.
If you’re applying for your visa just a week before it expires, you might as well put in your application for a salvoconducto now. Everything is taking longer in our new reality, and the usual five-day turnaround from the visa office could now be as high as 30.
4) Be willing to provide additional papers
Not only do you need to be ready to upload all your documents into an unwieldy online application, you are also likely to be asked for extra paperwork.
In fact, it is unusual for your visa to be approved without a request for additional documents.
Bank statements that show you have an income level suitable to support yourself
Further information from your accountant or employer
Supporting documents
I once had to scan in three years’ worth of receipts from The Bogotá Post and then shrink the file to meet the maximum upload size. Luckily, we’re a volunteer-run paper that can’t afford to spend much.
5) Get people’s names
This is probably the best advice I’ve ever been given in Colombia. Sadly, different officials can and will give you different instructions. If you have the name of Official #1 who told you you needed to get a letter from the international dolphin trainer’s association, life will be a lot easier.
When you go back to the visa office and present said letter to Official #2, who says you actually need three signed photos from the dolphins you trained, you will be able to stand your ground. Not only that, but you’ll find the advice you’re given is more likely to be correct when the person you’re dealing with knows you have written down their name.
A note on independent workers visas
Independent workers visas (a Tipo M visa issued for professional “actividades independientes”) have been a hot topic ever since the rules changed in 2018. As part of the new ‘V’, ‘M’, and ‘R’ visa system, the Cancillería require independent workers applying for an M visa to provide a degree certified by the Ministry of Education.
Now, I firmly believe that the Cancillería is wrong to demand that degree. I think the rule was shortsighted and may have had unintended consequences. It has hit many journalists and other freelance workers here because they don’t have a degree in the area they are working in.
It came as a particular shock to many who had already spent years in Colombia on a TP-7 visa, which was the old (and now eliminated) version of the current M visa for independent workers and has most of the same requirements — except for degree certification.
I understand the government only wants to give visas to qualified independent workers, but I would argue that there are plenty of other ways that freelancers could prove their capabilities and experience. Many journalists, for example, never got a degree in that field and their main qualification is the bylines that show they have been publishing stories, reports, or multimedia content.
On a practical level, the change in the law was not managed well, as the Ministry of Education was not prepared for a sudden influx of degree certifications. Hence the four-month processing time — or more.
And the requirement to demonstrate you earn over nine million pesos a month is extreme. That’s more than double (or triple) the amount you need to live a very comfortable life and excludes a large number of applicants.
On a legal level — and talking purely about journalists — the requirement is likely unconstitutional, according to many legal scholars, because journalism is not a regulated profession in Colombia and so you shouldn’t need a degree in order to practice it.
Both the Asociación de Prensa Internacional de Colombia (APIC) and the Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa (FLIP) have tried to get this rule changed. Not only is it unconstitutional, they argue, but it restricts the freedom of the press. If long-term journalists rely on favours from visa officials, it is difficult for them to report on Colombia objectively.
But while I continue to oppose that rule, I don’t dispute Colombia’s right to stipulate what type of foreigner they wish to allow to live in their country. And I don’t support the people who take their individual cases to social media and cry wolf when they clearly didn’t comply with the visa requirements in the first place.
There are a number of parts of the current visa system that are beyond unfair and difficult to justify. They leave people who love Colombia and would contribute to its economy and continued growth unable to qualify, or people who bought homes they are unable to live in. But if you are applying for a visa, the best thing you can do is understand the rules, follow them. Then you’re in a strong position to challenge decisions that are actually unjust.
As the craft beer revolution in Colombia gathers pace, more innovative and interesting venues are popping up too. La Embajada gives you the element of gunpowder to go with your Non Grata ale.
Non Grata’s bar in Tejo La Embajada.
I must admit, as a craft beer lover and someone who also gets a kick out of occasionally slamming a fair few Pokers down the hatch whilst chucking a metal tejo at triangles of gunpowder on a bed of clay, never did I think the two could mix. Daniel Lozano at Cervecería Non Grata vehemently disagrees.
Of course, after half an hour of chatting over their Jack el Destripador Bourbon Ale, it seems almost obvious. ‘Craft beer is hands-on. Making it with your hands gives it a connection to tejo, which is also hands-on, but also ancestral,’ says Daniel. Well when you put it like that… Sign me up for a petaco.
Of course, pretty much everything about Non Grata and Tejo La Embajada, the brewery’s bar and tejo centre, is ‘outside the box’. While he might look more like a brewer now, four years ago Daniel was a clean-cut investment banker with an industrial design degree, doing 9-to-5 with Andrew Cárdenas, one of his three future partners in beer and tejo. ‘You’d be working on an excel sheet,’ says Daniel, ‘then suddenly you’d get a message saying “beer with beetroot, my house this Saturday?”’
Along with three other partners, Sebastián Otero, Simón Aguía and Juliana Acero, Daniel and Andrew seem to have dedicated as much time to breaking stereotypes and social/cultural barriers as they have to making beer.
Cervecería Non Grata’s logo is that of a fox. The reason for this, other than it looking very sharp indeed, is the two distinct connotations the word ‘zorr@’ has in Spanish. While the masculine version has more or less the same meaning as its English counterpart – clever, cunning and always having fun – any foreigner who’s made the mistake of calling their better half a ‘zorra’ can tell you that it in no way means ‘sexy’ or ‘cute’ like it might in English. ‘Zorra’ in Spanish basically means ‘slut’. The folks at Non Grata see this as a grossly sexist linguistic injustice and are attempting to redefine the word in a more fun, unisex sense. All of them, including Juliana, are zorros – they’re clever and they have fun making beer.
Embajada de Tejo isn’t just a tejo place with fancy beer. One of the fundamental ideas behind it is making tejo more accessible for women. While Daniel adores tejo, he’s the first to admit that its male-dominated, urinal-within-view-of-everyone, traditional form isn’t exactly welcoming to women. Of course, this doesn’t mean La Embajada wants to overhaul Colombia’s pastime completely – Daniel has a close relationship with the owner of San Miguel (his favourite traditional tejo cancha) down the road, and the two venues happily send punters between the two, depending on what they’re after. Embajada simply offers an alternative atmosphere. As Daniel says, ‘For the first time, a tejo had waitresses, for the first time, a tejo had a bar. For the first time, a tejo had a restaurant, where you knew the food would be alright.’
For lots of tejo customers, it’s their first introduction to craft beer, so Daniel sees it as a big responsibility for him.
The Beers
That brings us to the beers. Non Grata currently make three core beers. The aforementioned Jack el Destripador (Jack the Ripper in English) does exactly what it says on the bottle – takes your face off. It’s a strong ale (8.8% abv) that gets a lot of its flavour from the inclusion of American Oak chips that have been soaking in Jack Daniels for two weeks prior.
They also brew what I might argue is one of the best IPAs you can find in Colombia, the Mandaripa. As the name suggests, this IPA is towards the citrusy and fruity, rather than bitter end of the genre’s spectrum.
The beer we’re going to focus on here, however, is the Ismael Cream Ale. This beer is absolutely unique in Bogotá. Made with corn and tasting half like a cream soda, there is nothing else remotely like this beer anywhere in the country. It may just look like any old beer when it’s out of the bottle, but this beer is smoother than a New York crooner and dangerously drinkable. At 6.2% abv, you’ll want to be keeping tabs on how many you slam back. Just like with the modern take on tejo and the fox logo, there’s a little bit of purposeful subversion in this beer too – corn is the only cereal native to the Americas, so to kind of ‘get one back’ for the founders of brewing giant Bavaria allegedly chasing down traditional chicha producers many moons ago, Non Grata wanted to use corn in their beer as a way of subverting international beer norms. Move the letters of ‘Ismael’ around a bit and you’ll see it’s an anagram of ‘el mais’ (corn).
Where to get ‘em
La Embajada is thrilled to finally be reopening this week. You can find it nestled in with all the other tejo joints on Carrera 24 #76-20. They’re open 5pm – 11pm Thursdays and Fridays, 3-11pm on Saturdays and 3-7pm on Sundays. You’ll need to make a reservation, which you can do through Facebook Messenger or on Instagram.
They do delicious modern takes on traditional Colombian food (Daniel especially recommends the lechona), as well as a few more contemporary American BBQ favourites. If you’d rather stay at home, you can also order domicilios of all the beers, as well as the food, online at www.tejolaembajada.com
They do deliveries Thursday to Sunday, and they’ll waive the $4,000 COP fee on any orders over $100,000.
In a new series focusing on craft beer in Bogotá, we look at Tierra Santa
Tierra Santa brewer Julian Salamanca in front of his delivery van. Photo: Tristan Quigley
Another brewery based on a joint expertise in brewing and food is Tierra Santa, currently based up on the hill of Juan XXIII, just above Calle 65 in Chapinero Alto. Cousins Julian Salamanca and Daniel Duarte started brewing in 2014. Julian is a chef and has worked in restaurants all over Latin America, whilst Daniel actually has a university-level ‘Brewmaster’ qualification from Germany. The pair had a well-loved bar in a majestic old house in Quinta Camacho from 2016 to 2018, before moving to Chicoutimi, Quebec, to further hone their brewing skills. They then returned to Bogotá and reopened in an expansive semi-outdoor bar on Las Aguas in the Candelaria, which they were forced to leave early on in lockdown. They’ve compensated for that by launching a brand new ‘Arroz chino’ which aims to fill the gap in the market that Bogota has always had when it comes to good quality non-chain Chinese food. Julian’s just had a gigantic Texas-style smoker installed in the kitchen and he does a mean smoked, Chinese spare-rib. There’s also plenty of typical Texas BBQ fare on offer.
The beers
Tierra Santa are currently entirely keg-based and sell one-litre growlers of Golden Ale, IPA, Saison and American Pale Ale. They also sell one of the only Nitro Stouts in the Bogotá market, although that’s awaiting a re-release in cans, expected some time in September, along with a summery Blanche, brewed with Earl Grey tea.
The two beers Julian takes the most pride in are the Nitro Stout and IPA. Nitro carbonation doesn’t lend itself to being put into the growlers he’s currently selling, so here’s a bit more on the IPA. This is a traditional American IPA that does exactly what any good IPA should do. For one thing, this beer is not lacking hops, with Mandarina Bavaria, Azacca, Amarillo and Simcoe hops, to be precise. However, the bittering hops are still nicely balanced with the body, while the late and dry hops add a piney, citrus tang that hits every corner of the mouth. It’s a beer that would appeal to all craft beer drinkers. Easy-drinking enough that you can put a few back, but with enough character and flavour to not forget you’re drinking it.
How to get ‘em
Growlers cost $25,000 COP per litre, but go straight down to $20,000 each if you’re getting more than one. Tierra Santa also offer a $2,000 discount on all refills. The Chinese food costs $25,000 for a kilogram or $50,000 for the same amount in a combo with a couple of Nitro Stouts. Delivery is $7,000, but free on any orders over $50,000. Julian delivers on Tuesdays and Fridays, and all orders made before 8pm will make the next day’s rounds.
Because of the rapidly changing post-lockdown rules, information is subject to change at short notice, keep an eye on brewers’ social media to find out the latest.
In a new series focusing on craft beer in Bogotá, today we look at Mela’s
Mela’s is serving
One of Bogotá’s most exotic and exciting breweries is Mela’s in Cedritos (Calle 140 #13-86). Its brewer Alejandro Manotas fell in love with beer when he moved to France to learn French after high school and found himself travelling to Munich constantly to see his girlfriend. He learnt how to brew at Munich’s famous Löwenbräu and returned to Colombia to study business at the Rosario University in Bogotá.
During his degree, Alejandro found himself focusing every project on brewing and starting a brewery. One of his professors, Juan Carlos Tafur, was curious about the obsession with brewing and soon became his business partner. Mela’s was officially born during his second semester of 2016, Alejandro and Juan Carlos brewing the beer in the former’s living room. ‘It looked a bit like Breaking Bad’, says Alejandro. ‘We were making 200-300 litres a month. It was a complete disaster.’
Mela’s today is one of Bogotá’s biggest craft beer success stories, with a capacity of 13,000 litres a month and causing no more damage to living rooms. It takes its name from the nickname of Alejandro’s late mother, Carmenza, who tragically lost her battle with cancer last year. A keen eye may also spot the number 62 (year of birth) and a pair of wings at the bottom of the brewery’s logo, as well as in various spots on the cans. ‘She’s our brewery’s little angel’, says her son. ‘She was all the fun in the family.’
The beers
Mela’s currently sells four year-round beers: The Atomic Imperial Double IPA, Villeto Manfur Golden Ale (made with panela), Mela Lulada and Beer 4 Breakfast Stout. They also make alcoholic seltzers and have their Melo Salpicon, a sour Berliner Weiss with watermelon, returning this week. Alejandro insists on brewing beer that he wants to drink, rather than worrying too much about what the market expects.
Let’s talk about the Lulada though. Alejandro loves how sour fruits match with salt and prefers to use local fruits in his beers, so he came up with this traditional recipe as an homage to his native Cali’s trademark lulada. It’s a kettle sour that’s low on Mandarina Bavaria hops, loaded with lulo – there’s a whopping 70kg of lulo pulp per 700 litres of beer – and even has a bit of Himalayan rock salt thrown into the mix. While sours aren’t everyone’s thing, this one perfectly hits the spot and is near unbeatable on a hot day.
How to get ‘em
Mela’s have reopened their bar in Cedritos (Calle 140 #13-86) since lockdown eased up. They offer food as well as their beer, and you can pop in from 12pm to 9pm Thursday to Sunday. They’ve also got a gastropub in collaboration with Conosur in Usaquen (Calle 117 #6-64).
There are also three ways to get hold of these beers at home: through the website at www.melascraftbeer.com, on Instagram (@melasbeer) and through Facebook (Mela’s Craft Beer). You can pay by card on the website, otherwise it’s a Davivienda bank transfer, Nequi, or even card or cash on delivery.
The golden ale is $8,500 COP per can, seltzers are $6,500 and all the rest go for $9,000. There’s a 15% discount on cases of 24. For $15,000 you can even buy a 250g tub of ice cream made from the beers, which is around 4% abv. Very soon they’ll be releasing 60 bottles of Double Ice Bock (23% abv) for $50,000 each. Delivery is $7,000 – $10,000 in Bogotá, depending on distance, and they do same day drop-offs for any orders made before 4pm.
Because of the rapidly changing post-lockdown rules, information is subject to change at short notice, keep an eye on brewers’ social media to find out the latest.
Colombia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs says international insurance necessary for V visas to avoid burdening the health system.
Colombian visa application has changed a bit.
Colombia’s coronavirus lockdown was a worrying time for many, with economic, social, and health concerns keeping them up at night. Some foreigners have faced an additional worry: their visa situations.
Now, as the country continues its gradual re-opening, so the visa and tourist exceptions that allowed people to stay legally while the borders were shut are reaching an end.
Migración Colombia — the entity which issues your cédula de extranjería, processes permiso de ingreso (often thought of as a tourist visa), and issues salvoconductos — reopened on September 21, with limited appointments available.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, or cancillería, is still yet to open its offices, so applications for Migrant (M), Resident (R) and Visitor (V) visas, continue to be processed online.
We asked the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ press office to answer some practical visa questions to provide advice both for foreigners currently in Colombia, and abroad.
Has COVID-19 changed the Colombian visa system?
Since 2017, Colombian visa authorities have had the discretion to request other documentation to understand or clarify the sort of activities that visa applicants will carry out in Colombia. The types of visa can be found here.
In January, before the pandemic hit Colombia, the Colombian Ministry of Health issued a decree which aimed to provide extra resources for the country’s social security system, in order to prevent it from being evaded or abused. Ever since, the Ministry of Foreign affairs has been checking V visa applications for evidence of international medical insurance, including during the pandemic, for proof that applicants will not be a “burden” for the country’s health service.
“The pandemic has revealed the weaknesses of health services at a global level,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. “For this reason, as a self-protection measure, medical insurance is being requested.”
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs can also request proof of academic qualifications — or equivalent proof of license to carry out a profession — at its own discretion for M and V Visas. This requirement was introduced in 2018 for independent worker M visas, and the ministry has recently begun to also request the extra documentation for some contractual employment visas.
This proof of academic qualification must be apostilled (officially certified by a qualified representative that the document is legally recognised) in the country where it was issued. Although universities and colleges do not typically offer this service, applicants can send their degree to an official apostille service and expect to pay around £80, €90 or U.S. $105.
This apostilled degree must then be translated into Spanish and stamped by a government-recognised official translator. In Colombia, this service tends to cost approximately COP$200,000. It must then be certified by the Colombian Ministry of Education.
When Colombia reopens its borders, will visa applications be processed as normal? Will people be able to enter the country on (V) visas?
The Colombian government has recently extended the health emergency until November 30, 2020, via a decree issued at the end of August.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that tourists will be allowed to enter the country on V visas “when conditions — such as the reopening of airports and the entire tourist industry — permit.”
For those wishing to enter on a permiso de ingreso y permanencia (visa on arrival), the ministry explained that the conditions under which foreign visitors will be allowed to enter the country will be decided as soon as national lockdown is lifted, which happened at the start of this month.
People who are here as tourists have one month from October 1 to either legalise their status or leave the country.
Applicants wishing to change their type of V visa — which applies to academic exchange programmes, studies or postgraduate programmes, as well as temporary workers — were prohibited from doing so in April, meaning they can only apply to renew the same visa type.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs told The Bogotá Post that the virtual process is working “very well.”
How long are visas taking to process?
Once paid for, the turnaround time for visa processing — according to the cancillería website — is five business days. This may be extended up to 30 calendar days in the event that additional documentation, or an interview, is required. If this is the case during lockdown, however, waits beyond 30 days can be expected. We know of various cases that have been in process for weeks, so don’t expect it to be fast.
For foreigners outside of Colombia who have had their visas in limbo during lockdown, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs re-opened all Colombian visa processing on June 24. This can be done online via a Colombian consulate in the applicant’s country of residence. Some Colombian consulates are now offering in-person services, but the Ministry of Foreign Affairs recommends checking online first.
Colombia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs offices will remain closed until further notice from the government.
I couldn’t leave the country because of lockdown, how does that affect my tax status?
According to Colombian law, if any foreign person stays longer than 183 days (6 months) in Colombia per calendar year, they are considered a fiscal resident and should declare their income if they earn over the specified buffers per tax year, which change annually.
Up until now, the government has not issued any decrees indicating any exceptions to this law, according to a Medellín-based tax advisor, who preferred to remain anonymous.
Anyone who earned over COP$47,978,000 in the 2019 tax year must now declare their income to the National Directorate of Taxes and Customs (DIAN) to be assessed on whether or not they must pay taxes in Colombia.
Income declarations began on August 11, and will continue until October 21.
In a new series focusing on craft beer in Bogotá, we look at the latest addition to the 45, Madriguera
Madriguera’s new bar is ready for you. Photo: Madriguera
Francisco Herrera, Oscar Cortés and Teddy Acuña all went to school together at Colegio De La Salle, in Bogota’s north. Teddy went off to Portland, Oregon after high school and upon his return, the boys reunited and started brewing. Five years ago they started Madriguera, selling kegs of craft beer to a few bars and pubs around the city. A couple of years later, they decided to cut out the middleman and open up their own bars.
Starting with an upstairs terrace bar in Quinta Camacho, they soon opened a second location on the Septima and 59, only to have it bought out by BBC shortly after. They were about to open a new second location on Calle 45’s craft beer strip this year, only for a certain pandemic to set their plans awry. As we move into post-pandemic planning pleasures, the 45 location is ready to open on Calle 45 #19-58 from 2pm today (September 17). The Quinta Camacho location remains closed, unfortunately.
Madriguera have taken 2020 as an opportunity to evolve, however, and have released all their beers in slickly designed cans this year. Each of the beers has its own animal character on the can, originally one for each partner in the company, though now more of a marketing signature.
These furry friends aren’t the only things that set Madriguera apart though – the brewery is now one of the most prolific of its kind in the city and many other brewers use their impressive set-up for their own beers. Madriguera aim to produce beers that aren’t overly abundant in the current market – their Suricate Rampante is one of the very few NEIPAs available in Colombia and they’re one of the only brewers to offer a cider. They also have a passionfruit and strawberry sour available in cans. Once the pandemic is over, they also intend to restart their initial plan to make around six collaborations a year with brewers from different parts of the country.
The beers
Madriguera’s core range includes the Rey Mapache Golden Ale, Suricata Rampante, Oso Sempiterno American Brown Ale, Conde Cortés American IPA and Liebre Rebelde New World Cider. They also offer seasonal beers, which right now are the Wild Rum Stout and Ugly Sour. They did manage to knock out one inter-city collaboration before the pandemic hit, which is worth going into a little more detail on here…
Brewed with Cali’s Cervecería Antaño, the Nanay Cucas Baltic Porter is a beer like nothing that could ever exist outside of Colombia. There are two main ideas behind it; one is to make a porter that’s lighter than normal and easy to drink. The second idea is what makes this beer so unique – Oscar adds actual cucas from Cali (small brown cookies made with panela and spices) and liberales from Bogota (sweet, sugary cake rolled into scrolls) to the beer during fermentation. The result is an easy-drinking porter that manages to avoid being sickly sweet and hides its 7.4% abv remarkably well. As Madriguera’s Peruvian GM Eric Marcelo says, ‘the idea is to not just have one pint, but maybe a couple.’ Job well done.
How to get ‘em
The bar is open from the 17th September, 2-9pm. The location is Calle 45 #19-58, easily reachable from Transmilenio station Calle 45.
Madriguera offer four-packs at $36,000 COP, as well as 1L growlers for $26,000 and various combos. They also sell reheat-at-home barbecue fare, including brisket and wings. Delivery in Bogota is $8,000 and to Cundinamarca it’s $20,000. You can also save yourself the fee and pick it up yourself from their brewery in 7 de Agosto, at Carrera 17 #70A-56. They offer same day delivery if you order before 11:59am.
You can order everything online at madriguera.com.co and payment is online through PayU.
With more than a dozen dead in the streets, Bogotanos grapple with injustice and tragedy.
More than a dozen people were left dead this week in Bogotá during protests against the police killing of Javier Ordóñez, and the city is now in mourning.
People here are grappling with a sense of injustice and tragedy – at levels that that rarely envelop the capital.
Massacres have become a near-constant occurrence this year in the more rural and less-populated regions. But what many, including the city’s mayor, are calling a Bogotá massacre has left people in a state of shock and outrage, stoked by social media images of police firing live ammunition into crowds.
While official statistics are often difficult to verify, the city is saying that 10 people were killed by gunfire over two days. Another 72 were injured by firearms.
In the aftermath, some are taking to the streets to display their condemnation and yell in the face of the police they hold accountable for it all. Others are more pessimistic than ever and have no idea what to do.
Some continue their daily lives, enjoying a stretch of beautiful weather after nearly six months of mandatory quarantine or watching national team star James Rodríguez make his debut in the English Premier League.
On Saturday night, the protest and the general vibe in the streets of Bogotá was mainly one of calm — at least in the two areas I visited. It felt more like the extended national strike last year than the chaos, disorder, and state-sanctioned criminality on display earlier in the week.
Candlelit vigils
In Parkway, there were candlelit vigils for those killed and heartfelt speeches in front of the CAI police barracks that had been set ablaze on Wednesday. There was also a monitor showing cultural videos and a biblioteca popular (“people’s library”) full of books free for the taking.
I saw several cops having real, extended conversations with citizens. Others appeared genuinely moved by one protestor’s gripping call for justice and eulogy of the citizens killed by their coworkers.
Over near Torre Colpatria and Parque de la Independencia, there was a small, primarily women-led protest. They called for justice and brandished the cops on patrol as killers and rapists. Some rocks were thrown, a small fire was lit, the police launched tear gas at one point, and a large armored truck arrived, parking ominously in the middle of the avenue.
What I saw seemed to be a small – although loud and passionate – demonstration against a thoroughly massive and overwhelmingly armored police presence.
Sunday afternoon has played out similarly so far. Demonstrators marched down the Séptima through Chapinero to the famed Plaza de Bolívar. The Plaza has been barricaded off in recent days and hosted a memorial for this week’s victims this morning. Riot police and uniformed officers have been standing guard here for days and were not letting marchers enter this afternoon (at press time).
I watched today’s events unfold on social media with an uneasiness that something awful could happen at any minute, an attitude that’s shared by many I spoke to.
Mayor calls for cacerolazo
Mayor Claudia López spoke at the memorial in the plaza and continued on to Parque Verbenal in the afternoon for a forgiveness and reconciliation concert featuring the Bogotá philharmonic orchestra.
Days earlier, she called for a candlelit vigil and a cacerolazo protest where citizens would gather to bang pots and pans, the traditional way Colombians condemn unacceptable governmental behavior. Because cacerolazos are typically impromptu affairs, lightly organized by civic groups, it is strange for such a thing to be arranged by the authorities themselves. It almost seems a contradiction of terms.
But this is the public stance that López has taken in the wake of tragedy. She has called, at least publicly, for justice, reform, and action. She is standing against a national police force controlled by the federal government of her political rival President Iván Duque – the same national police force she claims failed to obey her commands on Wednesday evening.
We will see in time how her positioning against the police, her call for reconciliation, and her pledge for reform translates into meaningful change. And we will see how her cacerolazo gesture resonates with those she governs as they mourn a tragedy that López characterized as the worst the capital has suffered since M19 took over the Palacio de Justicia in 1985.
Ultimately, the overriding sense from this weekend seems to be one of shock. There is anger. There is silence. There are speeches. There are couples and friends sitting around pub. And there are others cycle around the same streets where so many died this week.
It seems this is about all anybody knows how to do right now.
I find myself in the same situation. With no way to change what already happened – and slim hopes for any of the promised reform to come any time soon – I can’t offer anything.
So I will only share what I saw on Saturday.
Here are a few photos from the night to showcase what the streets now look like as Bogotá continues to try to comprehend an unthinkable tragedy.
One demonstrator in Medellín reports being kicked by riot police as Colombia’s nationwide protests continue.
Photo: Sophie Foggin
Over the past three days, hundreds have gathered in Medellín’s city centre to protest against police brutality in Colombia and other issues. The demonstrations were sparked by the violent police killing of Javier Ordóñez in Bogotá on Tuesday evening.
Violent demonstrations erupted in Bogotá, leaving a total of 10 civilians dead and spread throughout the country. In Medellín, the first demonstrations, marches and sit-ins took place on Thursday and have continued since.
Anger and a desire for change
On Thursday, September 10, hundreds gathered in Medellín’s Parque de los Deseos, marching towards the city centre where the protest was scheduled to end at Parque Bicentenario.
The atmosphere, said 20-year-old communications student Estefanía Romero Toro, was one of indignation over Ordóñez’s killing. “There was lots of anger, a desire to change things,” she added, explaining that the mood also felt very tense, because of the heavy police presence.
For protestors in Medellín, the recent police abuses come on top of a long already-existing list of grievances towards the government.
These comprise the killings of social leaders, the recent wave of massacres, the labour reforms that form part of President Iván Duque’s paquetazo, and the socio-economic situation of the country in general, Romero explained.
“The country is in a socio-economic-political crisis,” 25-year-old NGO-worker Santiago Rodríguez told The Bogotá Post at another march the following day. “Which has deepened because of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
“Since the signing of the peace agreement, social leaders have been being killed systematically, by para-state forces doing the dirty work,” he added. “And this intensifies when the public forces, which are supposed to be the ones looking after us, start killing citizens.”
The first intervention of the ESMAD riot police took place approximately 20 minutes into Thursday’s Medellín demonstration, reported a representative from the Chucho Minga human rights collective, who was present but preferred to remain anonymous.
“That was the order of the unified command post from the start,” the human rights representative said. “To dissolve everything.”
“Even though I identified as being human rights personnel, one of them kicked me in the back,” the human rights representative furthered, adding that four of her colleagues were also assaulted by members of the public forces.
Several people were wounded, she said, two of whom had serious injuries.
“Throughout the entire march route, the ESMAD constantly cornered us,” Romero said, explaining that riot police had enclosed protesters from one block to the next, gassing them.
Photo: Andrés López
At around 5pm, the carabineros arrived, enclosing protestors in the Parque del Periodista.
“If we left, we were exposed to the police, who would capture us and violate us,” stated Romero. “I identified as press and the ESMAD just didn’t care… their tone towards us was one of mockery,” she continued.
“Enough’s enough”
The following day, another group of a few hundred demonstrators congregated in Parque Bicentenario to march towards a police station in downtown Medellín.
“Today, the environment is calmer,” said 25-year-old NGO-worker Rodríguez, although local shops and metro stations had shut early, preparing for the worst. “This demonstration is more about demanding rights, but not using violent action.”
“We hope that the ESMAD, who are always the ones generating violence, don’t intervene, so it doesn’t turn violent,” he said.
Photo: Megan Janetsky
While the mood started off peaceful, protesters began kicking and knocking over barriers when they arrived at the police station, amid shouts of “killers.” And authorities were quick to react with tear gas and flash shots, dispersing crowds less than an hour into the protest.
“They know they have the power, they know they have the weapons, and that they can use these weapons to attack us, not even to maintain control,” said communications student Romero. “They don’t respect human rights.”
The objective of the demonstrations is to negotiate a reform of the country’s police system, which Rodríguez explained is governed by the military, meaning it combines with armed forces under the Ministry of Defense.
“These days, their lack of quality, integrity and humanity is evident,” said Romero. “Enough’s enough. The police are killing us.”
Yesterday afternoon, Colombia’s Defense Minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo issued a statement in which he claimed the ministry has been working towards the “modernisation” and “transformation” of Colombia’s police forces as part of the 2019 Policy of Coexistence and Citizen Security.
At the time of writing, demonstrations continue in the city of Medellín. So far, no citizens have been killed in the city’s protests.
Protests and violence spread from Bogotá to other Colombian cities as the Colombian government admits fault and suspends police officers.
Several CAIs were set alight during the police brutality protests in Bogotá. Photo: Jared Wade
Overnight, as a second day of protests following the police killing of Javier Ordóñez continued in Bogotá, similar scenes also began to play out across Colombia.
While the violence and destruction was not as extreme as the events seen Wednesday night throughout the capital, demonstrations and chaos also erupted in cities including Medellín, Cali, Barranquilla, Manizales, Cúcuta, Villavicencio, and Armenia.
This morning, Colombian Minister of Defence Carlos Holmes Trujillo reported that the official civilian death toll from the two days of protests and violence now sits at 10, with seven deaths in Bogotá and three in Soacha.
Holmes Trujillo also revealed that a woman had died after being hit by a stolen public SITP bus overnight on Thursday amid more chaos and outrage over the widely shared video recording of police officers repeatedly tasing Ordóñez, who later died in a hospital, after restraining him on the streets of Bogotá.
In total, over 400 people have been injured across Bogotá, Cali and Medellín, including 194 members of the police forces, and 209 civilians, according to the government.
Trujillo called the events two days of “systematic and coordinated vandalism,” which affected 60 police facilities, including many CAI stations across the city that were set on fire. In addition, he reported that 91 vehicles were vandalised, as were 33 TransMilenio busses, 44 SITP buses, 25 motorbikes, 22 institutional vehicles and one private lorry.
A quiet day before more demonstrations
On Thursday, as the capital reckoned with its deadliest night in recent memory, it initially seemed as if things had calmed down.
During the day yesterday, our team reported limited police presence and plenty of Bogotá city officials around the areas of Parkway, Villa Luz and Verbenal, where a vigil was held for a protester who had died.
In remembrance of the people who were killed in Verbenal. Photo: Brendan Corrigan
With few large demonstrations seen during the daylight hours, Bogotá’s Mayor Claudia López stated that she would not issue a curfew for the city. But she did call for all residents to be in their homes by 7pm, if possible, in order to “avoid tensions and shared living problems” as well as traffic jams.
López also unexpectedly halted the city’s TransMilenio service at 8pm, forcing many residents to walk home. The public transportation service relied upon by millions of commuters every day will be shut down again tonight at 8pm, the city announced.
While day two of the protests was less violent and tragic than the night before, the public outcry this week has pushed authorities to take action.
This morning, Holmes Trujillo issued a formal public apology from the Ministry of Defence for the legal violations and disregard for regulations committed by the police officers involved in Ordóñez’ death.
At lunchtime, he went further, announcing investigations into misconduct and the suspensions of at least seven officers. The two police officers captured on video restraining and repeatedly tasing Ordóñez before he later died in the hospital are among those suspended and, according to a Reuters report, will be fired.
Meanwhile, calls for structural police reform have continued – from protestors, the media and Bogotá’s mayor herself.
Mayor López said that the misconduct that led to Ordóñez’s death is not an isolated case of violence, but rather there is a “deficit of confidence and legitimacy in police and security bodies.” She said that this can only be remedied through constitutional reform that must be carried out by the president and called for “justice, action and reforma!” on Twitter.
A 2019 report by the Bogotá NGO Temblores listed a total of 34 extrajudicial killings at the hands of the ESMAD riot police at social demonstrations over the past two decades.
Last year, 18-year-old Dilan Cruz became a symbol of civilian resistance and protest after he was shot and killed by a “non-lethal” riot control projectile launched by an ESMAD officer during last year’s Paro Nacional.
Mixed political reactions
Mayor López, who spent part of yesterday in hospitals visiting civilian and police officers who were injured on Bogotá’s streets the night before, insisted that violence is not the answer to addressing police violence.
“If we react with more violence, we end up with more problems,” she said in a statement during her usual Thursday night broadcast on Canal Capital. “In Colombia, violence has never solved anything at all. Let’s not lose sight of this.”
Gustavo Petro, leader of the leftwing Colombia Humana political party, called for a national strike. “The trade unions should get together and summon a national strike against the repression,” he tweeted. Petro insisted that the only way to “rescue democracy” is to go out onto the streets in protest.
Former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe, from his finca in Córdoba, where he is under house arrest for witness tampering, called for a “government-enforced curfew, armed forces in the streets…deportation of foreign vandals and the capture of intellectual authors.”
Bogotá boiled over dramatically this week, but where does the blame lie?
Photo: Jared Wade
“Ni esto, ni esto,” says the meme. On one side a civilian is surrounded and being attacked by police; on the other the roles are reversed. It seems like a reasonable point, but it masks a problematic fact: these are not equal situations. Ten civilians have now died in clashes with police in recent days. Those confrontations took place after a man died following a police intervention. In November a young student was shot and killed by a member of the police. Outside Bogotá there are cases like that of Anderson Arboleda. This is all on one side. Let us not pretend this is a battle between two equally pitched sides. Invariably the authorities attempt to pin this on ‘bad apples’ in the force, but that masks an uglier truth.
I don’t condone violence as a first option, but neither am I going to rush to condemn those that damage police property after years of mistreatment. Violent actions bring their own problems – one of those deaths was caused by protesters in a hijacked bus. But this is far from comparable to what figures in authority are doing, as we see video after video of them firing at civilians. Ignore the attempts to compare bad apples with bad oranges. The sentiment behind these acts of violence is very much understandable. If the authorities won’t listen to words, people will take action instead.
Let us also not ignore the language being used – police procedure in the deaths of civilians are called tragic accidents. Injuries to coppers and damage to property on the other hand are intentional vandalism. I’ll bet pounds to pesos that there are some in the crowd who just want a tear-up, but that doesn’t mean they are the majority. Is it any surprise that ordinary people feel ignored and unrepresented when they are talked about in these terms? Already the usual suspects such as María Fernanda Cabal are claiming that these were organised protests, that they are financed by narco-money. There are many that seek to delegitimise these protests, to silence this howl of rage.
What is the role of the police in society?
The police’s role in society is to uphold the rule of law. It’s difficult to see how that is served
by repeatedly tasering a man who long ago stopped offering resistance. It’s difficult to say you are protecting the public when you shoot young men as they run away from you. The police are held to different standards than criminals for two reasons. First because one cannot claim to uphold the law while breaking it. More worryingly, because their impact is more severe. In these clashes, they are causing much more harm than the protesters, as the families of those who died know all too well.
Many, if not most, Bogotanos have a personal story about police malpractice. Early in my time in Bogotá, I was with friends in Primera De Mayo and a fight broke out on the street. Soon enough there was a guy on the floor being kicked, and when the cops broke it up I handed the fella his bag which he’d dropped. The police then took me to task for getting involved, despite clearly only trying to help the guy get his stuff back. It was an insight into the often confrontational nature of Bogotano policing. Many officers see the civilian population as the enemy.
Mistrust of the police is also ingrained in many rolos, even if they continue to show a remarkable level of faith in going to the police when they have a problem. This is often only done as a point of order though, and many crimes remain unrecorded. That same night in the Primera de Mayo, my friend found a cellphone on the floor. I naively suggested giving it to the police, which earned me a round of laughter. Instead, we waited in a nearby bar for a call and returned it that way. The assumption was that police would have simply stolen it.
On a personal level, I have found the police I have dealt with to be, in most cases, reasonable and helpful. They have helped me with aggressive dogs in the neighbourhood, given me a lift when I had a mechanical problem on my bike, petted my dogs, and talked about the zone we live in. This is connected to my privileged lifestyle as a middle-class white man, but I’m certainly not arguing that every police officer in Bogotá is irredeemably bad. It’s also true that we are talking about systematic problems and large minorities here, not one or two isolated cases.
Corruption goes further than bribery
I’m often told that the Bogotá police are corrupt. That’s certainly true of some – I’ve been stopped with the probable intention of bribery myself and plenty of friends have similar stories. However, we must be careful with this – corruption is not just bribery. Rather, the corruption of the force here in Bogotá is in the more literal sense, that the police no longer function in their intended role.
Incompetence is the order of the day, whether on a personal level or an institutional one. Forget the minority that ask for bribes, focus on the majority that do little work, even as crimes occur in front of them. Training is almost certainly of little quality, and organisational control is woefully lacking. There appears to be little or no consequence for acting in a brutal manner against civilians. All of these ingredients combine to make a toxic stew.
And that toxic stew is systematic and historical. Like the Met Police in my home country, major reform is now needed. Respect and trust of the police has been eroded to such an extent that events like this will continue without systematic change. While many still excoriate vandalism, it’s notable that even such bastions of the establishment as El Tiempohave called the anger ‘justified’ and called for systematic change.
A line regularly trotted out is that we should not judge the force on its few bad apples. However, we are talking here not of a few bad apples but of a critically poisoned grove of trees. If the rot is not stopped, then eventually we will instead be talking of the few good police in the city as the unusual ones, not those who are corrupt. There is precedent from other countries, and there are possibilities for change. After all, however loud the Twitterati shout, most Bogotanos still have some faith in the police, or at least the hope that they will treat them well. Many police may see civilians as the enemy, but the general populace don’t necessarily see the police in the same way. For the sake of sanity and the rule of law, let’s hope that this relationship can be rebuilt.
Incinerated buses are towed away, over 50 CAIs have been damaged and police ready themselves for more protests.
The TransMilenio bus that was set alight last night in Bosa.
Colombian President Iván Duque has called for “calm and serenity” following violent protests last night that left at least seven Colombians dead in Bogotá.
This is the head of state’s message to the nation following a night of unrest and chaos on Wednesday as citizens across the capital protested the death of Javier Ordóñez, who died after being violently restrained and tased repeatedly by police officers — an incident caught on camera and quickly shared across social media.
After the city witnessed yet another incident of police violence, outrage erupted on streets throughout Bogotá. Amid clashes with law enforcement, people set fire to dozens of small police stations (known as CAIs) and set more than a dozen public city buses ablaze.
Today, in the aftermath, a number of CAIs are nothing more than burned-out shells, and many of the more than 130 TransMilenio buses that were vandalised remained in the streets. At least 14 were set alight, according to authorities, and five TransMilenio stations were also damaged.
In addition to the deaths, more than 175 people have been injured, both police and civilians, according to the Secretaria Distrital de Salud. The agency said 66 people were injured by firearms.
As night falls on Thursday — and as officials still work to clean the streets from last night’s wreckage — the city is already braced for more demonstrations and more violence.
Cacerolazos and candlelit vigils have already begun, and at least 15 demonstrations have been planned. Bogotá Mayor Claudia López stopped short of ordering a curfew, but she recommended people get to their homes before 7 pm.
Demonstrations against police violence and injustice are also taking place tonight in Cali, Medellín and Barranquilla.
While many are calling for only peaceful protests, so far these demonstrations have taken on a very different tone from the ones held daily for weeks late last year.
With the destruction from last night still evident all over Bogotá, we will soon find out if Thursday night’s protest will also turn tragic.
All photos: Jared Wade
Not much was left of this Transmi bus in Bosa that was torched last night.
Images from the CAI in Brasilia, Bosa today.
What is left of the CAI in Ciudad Berna.
The burned remains of the CAI in Oneida, Kennedy
In La Soledad, police seemed to be preparing for tonight.
In tonight’s episode of Bogotá Nights, Brendan and Oli discuss what they like about living in Colombia, as well as their take on the events of the last few days.
Oli (left) and Brendan (right) are discussing the latest news in Bogotá in the third episode of Bogotá nights
Bogotá Nights, the new English-language radio show run in collaboration with Fenalprensa goes live again at 9 pm tonight. Hosts Brendan Corrigan of Wrong-Way fame and the Post’s own Oli Pritchard will discuss the things they like about living in Colombia, as well as what’s been happening over the past few days. Comments from the public are warmly welcomed, so drop us a line.
Top of the weekly news will obviously be the recent rioting over police brutality, but there’s also sports and corruption, so plenty on the agenda. We’ll also be mentioning what’s going on with the current rules concerning going out and getting things done.
As for the main part of the show, it’ll be a discussion on the reasons to live in this fine country. Both presenters are frequently asked why they would want to live in Colombia as opposed to their home countries (Eire and the UK), and they’re going to share some of their reasons tonight. Oli’s list includes opportunity, small shops, and even the weather, whereas Brendan will talk about altitude, barrio life, and the unpretentiousness of Bogotá. Write in to let us know your favourites!
Seven die overnight as protests over police brutality spread across the capital.
7 civilian deaths reported after a night of violent protests against police brutality. Photo: Anonymous.
Violent protests rocked the capital last night as anger over police brutality spread through Bogotá. By the morning seven people had been killed and almost 150 injured. Five of those deaths were in Bogotá and two in Soacha.
A vigil for Javier Ordóñez who died on Tuesday night after being repeatedly tasered by police boiled over into violent protest. Videos circulated on social media of two policemen tasering the 43-year-old lawyer as they held him on the ground.
It is not an isolated incident. Bogotá’s mayor, Claudia López said yesterday that there have been 137 reported cases of police abuse this year alone. And just 38 of those have been investigated.
“We reject this case of police abuse and all the cases that have been presented throughout the year,” she said. “Javier’s case is not an isolated case, these cases of violence and police abuse are recurring behaviour.”
It is not only the police abuse of power that is being called into question. It’s also their use of so-called non-lethal force.
In May, 24-year-old Anderson Arboleda died after being beaten by police in Cauca. Last year, 18-year-old Dilan Cruz died after being hit by a tear gas canister fired by riot police.
As the city awakes to scenes of burned-out buses and TransMilenio stations, the mayor’s calls for police reform may seem like a distant hope to those who want change.
How much damage was done last night?
In total, over 50 police CAIs were damaged in Colombia last night, mostly in Bogotá but also in Cali and Valle de Cauca. Many were set on fire, including Villa Luz (where the vigil for Javier Ordóñez took place), La Gaitana, El Rincón, Porvenir, Techo, Tintal and Britalia.
Windows were smashed in the TransMilenio stations of Ciudad Jardín, San Mateo, Terreros, Bosa, and Portal Suba. Over 130 TransMilenio and SITP buses were vandalised or set alight and this morning stations in Soacha were closed due to the damage to the vehicles and road.
What now?
After more than five months of stricter lockdown measures than many cities around the world, tensions are running high. We’ve seen an increase in marches and peaceful protests in recent weeks as citizens grapple with months of lost income and stress.
López has called for calm, stressing that violence won’t achieve anything. “Destroying Bogotá will not fix the Police. Destroying us won’t fix anything. Let’s focus on achieving justice and structural reform for the security forces,” she tweeted in the early hours of this morning.
Meanwhile, the Minister of Defense Carlos Holmes Trujillo said that an additional 1,600 uniformed personnel would support the police in Bogotá along with 300 soldiers. He offered a reward of COP$50 million for information that leads to the capture of those responsible for the deaths.
Such a significant increase in military presence may reflect the fear that authorities cannot pour oil on troubled waters. In fact, with so much anger directed at the police, attempts to forcibly quell the violence may only fuel the fire.
Videos of Javier Ordóñez being taser-ed by the police have sparked protests throughout the city.
Police brutality caused riots in Bogotá. Photo: Anonymous
Bogotá saw another wave of anti-police protests this Wednesday evening after Javier Ordóñez died following police use of tasers. The incident happened in the early hours of the morning, and anger grew throughout the day. With limited response from authorities, tensions at what began as a vigil outside the Villa Luz police CAI in Engativá boiled over into violent protest.
The protest became increasingly violent and riot police ESMAD arrived. Other groups headed to their local police CAIs and by sundown there were reports of violent and persistent protests throughout the city.
What happened to Javier Ordóñez?
Javier Ordóñez, a lawyer who had been working as a taxi driver during the pandemic, died on Tuesday night after being repeatedly tasered by police in Engativá.
Police had originally stopped Ordóñez for violating the quarantine restrictions. Video footage shows the 43-year-old father of two asking police to stop as they held him down and tasered him for several minutes. He later died in hospital, leaving sparking a wave of anger at the excessive use of police force.
Protests spread across city
Details are hard to come by, but the protests spread from Bogotá to other parts of the country. In the capital itself, CAIs were set alight in Parkway, Techo, Gaitana and Villa Luz, as well as a TransMilenio station in Bosa. It seems that others may also be ablaze, but the true extent of the night’s events won’t be known until the morning. What is clear is that anti-police feeling is still running high following the protests nearly a year ago. Young student protester Dilan Cruz was killed by police during those anti-government protests.
Claudia López has proposed further controls on police, and spoke of serious reform. She said that it is time to stop speaking about isolated incidents and bad apples and committed to change. Critics question the level of control she holds over the police.
It’s understandable that many people are suspicious of authority, as they have witnessed enough instances of police brutality. It’s fair to say the police command a fair share of fear but little respect in Colombia as a whole. Last night’s video raises serious questions about the excessive use of police force and supposedly non-lethal weapons. The question now is, is there a way back from this situation?
The Transmilenio station Bosa was set on fire. Photo: Anonymous
Coronavirus is still dominating the news, but sports are back on as well around the globe, including the Tour de France. And it is a feast for the Colombian cycling fans as the Colombians are looking good. What can we take away from the first week of the Tour de France 2020?
Egan Bernal is holding the white jersey for best youngster at the moment, but he is in the tour 2020 for the yellow jersey and nothing less. Photo: Tour de France
We are still cycling
In the week before the start of the Tour de France 2020, there were doubts about whether it could still happen. Cases of coronavirus were surging in France and until a day before the start there was no clarity over whether the race was going to happen or not. The UCI tried to abolish the rule that a team will be disqualified entirely when two of its members (cyclists or staff) test positive, but the French government stepped in and said that was not acceptable. They threatened to cancel the event if they didn’t keep that rule in place, so the sword of Damocles is hanging over the peloton.
The rest day was the first peloton-wide coronavirus test round which was possibly one of the most tense moments in the peloton. The results weren’t immediately released, so team busses getting ready to get to the start was proof that a team had not been disqualified. None of the 166 riders still in the race had tested positive, although four teams saw one member of staff being sent home after testing positive.
In most of the images of the Tour so far we have seen the majority of fans wearing facemasks, but a lack of social distancing on the climbs and in the towns is a common picture. And as many fans are also not wearing facemasks while energetically cheering the riders on, this remains a concern in a country that has been heavily hit by the coronavirus. With a sudden ending of the race still hanging above their heads (if the French government thinks a surge of the virus requires stricter measures), as it stands all 22 teams are still racing.
Egan Bernal could win it.
From those four, 2019 winner Bernal is the favourite for the yellow jersey. As leader of Team Ineos, chosen ahead of other Grand Tour winners Chris Froome, Geraint Thomas and Richard Carapaz. Bernal has got an experienced team around him. Michal Kwiatkowski and Jonathan Castroviejo have both escorted the Tour de France winner five times in Ineos’s (formerly Team Sky) Tour de France reign. Now it is up to Bernal to continue that. He hasn’t looked entirely at his best in all stages, as he looked like breaking a couple of times in the first Tour week, but good enough to still be one of the main contenders
Four Colombians in the top 10
It is almost a Colombian Tour de France, as Egan Bernal is not the only escarabajo at the top of the leaderboard. 4 Colombians are the absolute general classification leaders of their team and all four are still in the race. Bernal, Nairo Quintana, Rigoberto Urán and Miguel Ángel López are all sitting comfortably in the top 10 already. Nairo looks sharp in the year he finally left Team Movistar. He is now cycling for the small French team Arkea. The lack of good domestiques who could stay with him in the mountains, does make it harder for him, but he seems to be with a team who fully supports him now.
Rigo Urán is team EF-Education First’s call for the victory. It looks like Rigo had a huge say in putting the team together as he has got two young Colombian riders next to him who can support him in the mountains. Sergio Higuita and this year’s Dauphiné winner Daniel Mártinez are not quite good enough yet to go for the win this year, but could well be in the years to come.
Then, ‘Superman’ López is Astana’s leader and chance for victory. It is only his first Tour and though he has mostly been with the best riders he has fallen behind a few times and is an outsider for the podium. Astana also brought Harold Tejada to help López and the young relatively unknown Colombian has looked good in the mountains. Esteban Chaves also left a good impression. Not quite good enough for the top spots, but at times he is showing his 2016 form. The Bogotano might challenge for a stage win in the next weeks.
Colombia vs Slovenia (and maybe France)
The general classification of the Tour 2020 seems to be between two nations. For Slovenia, Primoz Roglic is the big favourite to win the Tour. The current race leader has got a strong team behind him at Jumbo-Visma. They have looked quite strong in the mountains and very strong on the flat so far.
Besides Roglic, the nation has also got the hot young prospect Tadej Pogacar lurking in the race for a podium spot. Pogacar has already won a stage in the mountains and is looking like one of the strongest riders in the peloton so far. It looks inevitable that this year’s Tour winner will come from Colombia or Slovenia, but France has got two riders in the top 4 as we speak. Guillaume Martin and Romain Bardet have been good so far, but nobody really sees them as contenders for the yellow jersey (except maybe.. the French)
Everton Football Club has today announced the signing of James Rodríguez on a two-year deal with the option of a third year, after agreeing an undisclosed fee with Real Madrid. The 29-year-old becomes Everton’s second Colombian signing, joining towering centre half Yerry Mina, who joined the club in 2018.
James had been linked with a move to Goodison Park ever since Carlo Ancelotti became their manager just before Christmas last year. The Italian first recruited James to Real Madrid from AS Monaco in 2014, on the back of his breakout World Cup performance. He then took him to Bayern Munich on loan in 2017, after the playmaker had fallen out of favour with current Real Madrid manager Zinedine Zidane, then in his first managerial stint at the club.
Born in Cúcuta and raised in Ibagué, James’ talent quickly stood out. He joined Envigado, and made his debut in the league for them at 14 years old. He joined Banfield in Argentina where he became the youngest debutant and goalscorer of the club. He spent only two years in Argentina before FC Porto signed him in 2010 for his first European challenge. James had no trouble making it into the first team. When manager Pékerman took the helm of the national team in 2012, he quickly made James one of his key players.
James Rodríguez in his best days, at the World Cup 2014 in Brazil. Photo: FCF Colombia
The Colombian didn’t disappoint and when Falcao had to miss out on the 2014 World Cup because of his ACL, James stepped up. He pulled the team forward and took the golden boot along the way, punctuated with the goal of the World Cup – a spectacular volley into the top corner against Uruguay. After two successful seasons in the Spanish capital, the second culminating in a Champions League title, stories of indiscipline and a party lifestyle started coming out. His next season in Spain was irregular and a loan spell at Bayern Munich didn’t improve his form. After only eight appearances this year with the Spanish champions, transfer rumours became more persistent than ever. In the end it was his former manager Ancelotti, the manager he had most excelled under, who persuaded him to join Everton.
No number 10 role
It will be interesting to see how James fits into Everton’s system this season, as Ancelotti has almost exclusively used a 4-4-2 set-up since he took over at Everton, meaning no ‘number 10’ role that Rodríguez likes to be utilised in. Ancelotti played him mostly as an inside forward on the right wing during their time together at Real Madrid, then gave him time on both wings and also slightly deeper and more central at Bayern. The former could be an option for Everton, as their current right wing options are the inconsistent and over-30 Theo Walcott, and academy product Anthony Gordon, who shows exciting potential, but isn’t ready to start most matches this early on in his career. As for being deployed in a deeper, more central role, that’s beginning to look unlikely as Everton unveiled Brazilian ball-winner Allan at Finch Farm on Saturday, and are also expected to announce the signing Watford box-to-box midfielder Abdoulaye Doucouré later today.
Wherever Ancelotti ends up using the left-footed playmaker, he can pretty much be assured a starting spot somewhere between defence and the front two of Richarlison and Dominic Calvert-Lewin every week, just as long as he stays healthy, which has admittedly been an issue for him over the last few years.
This signing represents a huge step forward for Everton in terms of ambition and the goal of getting into Europe as soon as possible – James is arguably the highest profile star the club has recruited since possibly Gary Lineker back in 1985, the season before they last won the league. The team struggled mightily in midfield last season and bringing in two, possibly three first team reinforcements to support their young forward line is a clear indication that the higher ups are willing to back their world class manager.
The Toffees are planning to move into a brand new, state of the art stadium at Bramley Moore Dock in 2022, which should bring in even more money and further enhance their international reputation. It is likely today’s signing will also lead to a huge bump in shirt sales, especially here in Colombia. Everton’s crosstown rivals Liverpool have suddenly become the fashionable English team for Colombians to support over the last couple of years, so it will be interesting to see how many of them switch allegiances across Stanley Park this season.
As for James Rodríguez, this move signals an ambition to play football and prove himself in arguably the world’s toughest league, rather than be content to sit on Zidane’s bench at the Estadio Bernabeu for more money.
Restaurants and cafés are now allowed to open from Thursday to Sunday. Here are some pictures of a newly re-opened Chapinero.
After nearly six months of lockdown, Bogotá’s cafés and restaurants are eagerly reopening. With the harshest obligatory isolation restrictions lifted — and a few days of sunshine in the often-gloomy capital — many customers are cautiously returning to support their favourite businesses. If you’re not sure what to expect, here are some scenes from Chapinero.
Reservations
Restaurants and cafés in Bogotá are now permitted to operate at 25% capacity from Thursday to Sunday. Those with outdoor seating have it a little easier when it comes to maintaining social distancing requirements, but most establishments are blocking off tables and otherwise reconfiguring their setup to manage the numbers.
Some are also collecting names, cédula identification numbers, and phone numbers of their customers. Don’t be surprised if you are asked to share more information than you might need on a job application to sit down for a coffee.
While we haven’t seen a lot of sophisticated contact tracing in the capital thus far, these measures presumably could help the restaurant inform other diners if a patron tests positive.
QR codes
One way that several of the higher-end establishments are looking to manage it all is with QR codes. These digital hieroglyphics are now all over the place on exterior walls in Chapinero, Zona G, Quinta Camacho, and Usaquén to help locations take reservations or even your personal information. While this is not ideal for anyone without a smartphone — are anyone who has run out of data — you may have to scan a code before entry.
On Thursday, the trendy café and popular lunch spot Masa in Zona G asked even patrons walking up to a completely empty dining area to scan the code first to “make a reservation” before granting entry. The Pub in Quinta Camacho had a similar policy.
Or you may just be asked to scan a code to see the menu. This was how the Zona G steakhouse El Día Que Me Quieras is operating. They asked for your name and phone number along with your order, and the waitress said the QR code menu design was so that they didn’t have to pass around physical “cartas” that could potentially carry the virus from person to person. When serving food, the restaurant also wrapped certain dishes in plastic and offered up cutlery in a little bag — closer to what you would get on a plane than a restaurant — all in the name of biosecurity.
Masks
Unsurprisingly, the majority of people are wearing masks. Employees and servers may even take your order in full face shields and head-to-toe biosecurity onesies. You can take your mask off to eat or drink, and some places provide little paper bags to store them as you dine. In a few establishments, customers were encouraged to put their masks back on (or pull them up) when staff came to the table. You’ll also usually find plenty of hand sanitizer gel and shoe spraying at the entryway.
Open days and open windows
Most of the places we spoke to plan to stick to the Thursday to Sunday rule. Though some places will open all week. As with many aspects of the lockdown, we will likely see varying levels of compliance and inconsistent enforcement.
In general, from talking to a few employees, most restaurant owners weren’t optimistic about previously mentioned plans from the mayor’s office to shut down some streets to make space for tables.
Places that have terraces are already using them as much as possible, and other venues are getting creative about opening up depending on the weather and number of customers who show up.
Millions of bogotanos, and especially small business owners, will continue to suffer the economic consequences of the lockdown for some time to come. And it remains to be seen whether these current reopening measures will stay in place or fade into the background if case numbers and deaths spike again.
But for now, for a city of 8 million people who have been largely forced indoors for almost half a year, the current feeling is largely that it’s just nice to be outside and returning to some semblance of normal. Even if it is a “new normal.”
Listen in at 9 pm tonight for the second episode of Bogotá Nights, a live English-language radio show from The Bogotá Post.
Oli Pritchard and Brendan Corrigan will host the second edition of Bogotá Nights at 9pm tonight
The Bogotá Post team has launched its first ever radio show, “Bogotá Nights,” which will take place via Facebook Live every Thursday evening from 9-10pm.
The show is broadcast by Debate Opinión, the radio channel of news agency Federación Nacional de Prensa (Fenalprensa), who approached The Bogotá Post to collaborate on producing audio content in English.
The show is hosted by Oli Pritchard, Deputy Editor of The Bogotá Post and a teacher of journalism, media, and English at Bogotá’s Universidad Externado — who has lived in Colombia since 2012 — and Brendan Corrigan, a broadcast journalist, blogger, and podcast host who has called Colombia his home since late 2011.
Pritchard and Corrigan aim to present an unapologetically realistic and nuanced view of Colombia to their listeners, covering the week’s developing news, as well as topics such as tourism and travel in Colombia, sports, and common misconceptions about the country.
Brendan and Oli introduce themselves, discuss the new rules in Bogotá and what's coming up on future shows
Posted by Bogota Post on Thursday, August 27, 2020
The first episode of Bogotá nights aired last week.
“Colombia is many things, but it’s never boring,” Pritchard said.
The first show, which was broadcast live on August 27, discussed the coveted economic reopening scheduled for September, reflecting on Colombia’s five-and-a-half month quarantine and its economic and mental health impacts in the country’s capital, where both hosts are based.
Thanks to the Facebook Live format, audience members can interact with the show and ask questions, as well as watch the hosts live on camera while they broadcast — a format that both hosts admit they are getting used to.
Although they had originally designed the show for an audience of mainly foreign immigrants in Colombia, Pritchard and his co-host were pleasantly surprised to see a mixture of Colombian and foreign listeners tuning in to the first episode, largely reflecting the demographics of The Bogotá Post readership.
“There’s a lot of questions being asked by the foreigner community at the moment,” said Pritchard, explaining their doubts over topics such as flights and visas that have sprung up over lockdown.
And regardless of the pandemic, he believes that now is a great time to be discussing Colombia via radio. “Colombia’s currently a lot higher in international interest than it has been since I’ve been here,” he said. “Over the last three years or so it’s been an absolute sea change.”
“I’m happy to tell more people about the reality of the world, whether that happens to be through a radio show or through print articles,” Pritchard added, explaining that for him and the editorial team behind it, The Bogotá Post is a labour of love. “I just have an overwhelming compulsion to tell stories.”
To listen to them, as well as those of his co-host Corrigan, listeners can tune in on Thursday evenings to “Bogotá Nights” via Facebook Live on the Debate Opinión page.
It’s fair to say that Colombia’s coronavirus shutdown has been devastating for its economy. Unemployment reached 20.2% in July. The national federation of traders, Fenalco told El Espectador that 31% of traders have closed and a quarter of traders reported that sales had dropped between 80% and 100%
The new reality for businesses in Bogotá. This café has only got around 25% of their tables available. Photo: Otto Berchem
We spoke to several entrepreneurs and small business owners who shared some of the difficulties they have faced, and also voiced optimism. Their resilience and versatility shone through in all the interviews. Many had more than one string to their bow and so been able to temporarily refocus during the lockdown.
For example, Alejandro Ospina Marulanda, co-founder and CEO of Café Banna said that they have shut down the tourism side of their business completely and focused instead on online coffee sales. Café Banna promotes direct and fair trade with Colombian coffee farmers and during lockdown. They have increased the number of coffee lines on their site and launched a new brand of cocoa. “We’ve grown our sales online by 3,000% – which is great,” he said.
Curry Masala’s Xiomara Sánchez and Nadeem Javaid told us that they’d been able to keep their Parkway curry house in operation in part thanks to their other company which imports products from the Middle East. That and their savings allowed them to continue to pay rent, utilities, and staff.
And Smoking Molly co-founder Santiago Zuluaga said their three brands — live music venue cum restaurant and bar Smoking Molly, local burger chain Smoking Burgers, and sandwich bar Brooklyn Deli — had all been affected in different ways. Though he added, “It’s no secret that the COVID-19 situation has taken its toll on the whole restaurant and hotel and entertainment industry.”
He told us that brands like Smoking Burgers which already had an established delivery service had been badly affected, but not as much as fine dining establishments, some of which have seen 90% drops in revenue. Still, he said, “Smoking Burgers has had a 60% reduction in revenue since April. So it was a real big hit.”
Paola Andrea Osma, CEO and founder of BeautyDreams who specialise in eyelash extensions and semi-permanent eyebrows, echoed this sentiment. “In reality, having more than four months without income will affect any company, no matter how small it is. Economically, we have been very affected. But we have survived.”
Bogotá businesses take opportunity to grow online and launch new initiatives
Several businesses spoke of online successes during the lockdown. Valentina Quintero M., General Manager, Leloko, a petshop focused on cat products, said that 90% of their sales had migrated to digital media. “This allowed us to question ourselves and see how to move the experience that we previously had in the physical store on to our digital channels.”
Ospina said Café Banna is looking at ways to function in a new normal where people stay at home more. That includes a pop up shop in Chapinero or Quinta Camacho where people can see products and then buy them online. “We’re also taking a course in how to sell online,” he said. “MercadoLibre is supporting a lot of businesses that have a social or environmental impact to sell more to their platform.”
Online options are limited for businesses that rely on in-person contact. For example, Zuluaga said their music venue Smoking Molly had been closed indefinitely. “We tried to operate virtually in March and April and it didn’t work out. So we have had to close down since May. It’s been really hard.”
He is concerned about how the new phase of restaurant opening will work, but true to form Smoking Molly will try to inject some live music into the New Reality. Before the pandemic, the band might not get on stage until 11 pm, but now they’ll need to perform and be closed by 11 pm. “We have to modify that so it fits the current situation and it’s going to be a bit tricky,” he said. “The type of events we’re going to be booking have to be a bit more calm, more jazz, blues – just one or two musicians on stage.”
Speaking of trying new things, Quintero has used the lockdown to launch a new brand called Babagú which specialises in dogs. “With this, I hope to have a greater share of the pet market since we were 100% focused on cats,” she said. “Now our customers can buy products for dogs and cats on our website.”
Resilience, optimism and concern for city’s New Reality
In spite of the difficulties, many of these business owners are positive about entering a new phase and say they have put biosecurity protocols in place to encourage customers to return.
Quintero says the new reality will involve constant change. “The road has not been easy, but the pandemic has shown us that the challenges are achievable and that every day we must adapt to the circumstances.”
Sánchez and Javaid are hopeful they can serve curry on their terrace. “Thanks to our clients who have not abandoned us, we’ve been able to survive this test.”
“With respect to the coming months, we are always optimists,” said BeautyDreams’ Osma. “All of this is motivation to be stronger every day and to be better and to make a difference.”
Zuluaga is more cautious. “I think it’s good news, but it’s not like from September onwards everything is going to be great and restaurants and venues and bars are going to be able to sell again and things are going to be just fine and we’re going to be back again and nothing happened,” he said.
While Ospina is looking forward to being able to visit the farmers and coffee producers again, which he says is central to their work. “I am optimistic,” he said. “We’re trying to do our best.”
Six months after the last official match was played in Colombia, football returns with Junior de Barranquilla vs América de Cali for the Superliga.
Colombian football set to return on September 8. Photo: Freek Huigen
After six months of football drought in Colombia, the league is finally set to return. The Superliga is first up with a match between 2019 champions Junior de Barranquilla and América de Cali.
The last games were played in the second division on March 12 before the coronavirus crisis put all professional football in Colombia on hold. All the big European leagues and almost the entire world came to a standstill due to the outbreak of COVID-19.
Colombia may have been quick to follow the rest of the world in shutting down the beautiful game, but it has been slow to blow the starting whistle again. Germany was the first major league in the world to restart in May. Since then, leagues throughout the world have gradually been getting players back on the pitch. But Colombia stayed behind, partly due to the country’s August peak of coronavirus cases, but also due to a power struggle within the league federation Dimayor.
Now the quarantine is over and the problems within the federation seem behind us for the moment, the Colombian ministries of sport and health have struck an agreement on the return to football. It won’t quite be back to normal yet, as fans won’t be allowed in the stadium and a strict biosecurity protocol will be in operation. But at least Colombian football is back.
On September 8, the first leg will kick off at 7.30 pm in Barranquilla’s second stadium Romelio Martínez. The return will be on September 11 at 7 pm in the Pascual Guerrero stadium in Cali.
After that, the league will restart from where it left off in March, but more details have yet to be announced.
On the evening of Thursday, August 27, three young people were killed in the rural town of Andes, in Southwestern Antioquia. One of the three male victims was just 14 years old. This was the latest in a wave of similar violence in Colombia, four of which took place over the penultimate weekend of August. Many of the victims were under the age of 18.
According to an August 25 report carried out by peace and development NGO, Indepaz, 46 massacres have taken place in Colombia over the course of this year, killing a total of 185 people. The country’s most affected departments include Antioquia, Cauca, Nariño, and Norte de Santander.
Why are the massacres happening?
In a recent Facebook Live discussion broadcast by the Centre for Memory, Peace and Reconciliation, Indepaz Director Camilo González Passo, put the recent wave of massacres down to “systematic action” to “dispute control over territory.”
“Those who are armed are the principal protagonists, but there are always determinant forces behind them, who are accumulating wealth and power,” added González, who explained that they run illegal businesses such as drug trafficking, mining, and logging.
These illegal armed structures include demobilised FARC dissidents, members of the ELN, demobilised members of the AUC paramilitary group, and other illegal armed groups, Gimena Sánchez, Director for the Andes at the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) explained.
Sánchez blames the intensification of violence in Colombia on President Iván Duque’s “inability, unwillingness and at times obstruction in advancing implementation of the 2016 peace accord.”
“In particular, its disdain for transitional justice, lack of implementation of the rural land reform, alternative to illicit crops and the Ethnic Chapter,” she continued.
“The Duque government is prioritizing the Venezuelan crisis over the internal humanitarian and peace ones in Colombia,” she explained. “This makes it more difficult in terms of funding and actions for the international community attempting to advance addressing those issues in-country.”
What effect are these massacres having on local populations?
Part of the goal to control territory involves instilling fear and panic into the population, said Reverend Juan Carlos Osorio, leader of the Network of Craftsmen of Peace, Mercy and Compassion, who works with communities in Southwestern Antioquia.
“Fear paralyses you,” he said. “When people are scared, they no longer go out to walk. When people are scared, they no longer meet up. When people are scared, it generates mistrust. When people are scared, the social fabric is destroyed.”
Is massacre the right term to describe these murders?
While President Iván Duque has controversially refrained from using the term “massacres,” instead referring to the incidents as “collective homicides,” Indepaz defines the term “massacre” as the collective intentional homicides of three or more defenceless people, at the same time, in the same place and in the same way.
“Massacre is a term that has been being used colloquially and by journalists,” Colombia’s Minister of Defence, Carlos Holmes Trujillo, told Blu Radio in an interview.
Reverend Osorio disagrees. “When I heard the President referring to what had happened as a ‘collective homicide,’ I immediately thought of the term understatement…which is about dressing up reality,” he told The Bogotá Post.
“Words construct reality,” he added. “And I think this is what the president was trying to do, build a reality that is different from what the facts overwhelmingly reflect.”
Has the COVID-19 pandemic compounded this violence?
Defence Minister Holmes Trujillo told Semana that this criminal phenomenon has been happening in Colombia for many years.
But WOLA’s Sánchez claims that these illegal armed groups have taken advantage of the pandemic and the lockdown restrictions to advance their military and economic agendas. “Narcotrafficking and illegal activity can only be taking place to the extent that it is due to corruption or such forces looking the other way,” she said.
Reverend Osorio also raises questions of corruption, given that Colombia has had one of the world’s longest and strictest lockdowns.
“How is it possible that, with so much institutional control from the police and the military [during lockdown], that they can move around so noisily?” he asks. “It’s also about asking the police authorities why their presence has been lacking,” he added.
What is the government doing to combat it?
On August 22, President Duque claimed he had launched an elite police unit to pursue the “delinquents.” And five days later, Defence Minister Holmes Trujillo announced the creation of a Special Unit for the Identification, Location and Judicialisation of Perpetrators of Collective Homicides, reported El Espectador.
The minister later told Semana that Colombian government was also prioritising ridding the country of illicit coca crops, because of their links to violence, killings of young people and social leaders, and deforestation.
What is civil society doing in response to the massacres?
Reverend Osorio and his colleagues at the Network of Craftsmen of Peace, Mercy and Compassion are focused on advocating for peace during this year’s Semana por la paz, which is due to take place virtually from September 6-12. Last year, the network offered a diploma course for social leaders in development and social transformation.
Osorio and his team are also pushing for public policies to create opportunities for the country’s rural youth population. He believes they are particularly at risk of becoming involved with illegal armed groups due to a lack of educational and labour opportunities, which has worsened during the pandemic.
“Young people will always be fresh meat for many illegal groups’ death projects,” he said.
And in rural areas of Antioquia, collectives of young people such as the Movimiento de jóvenes del suroeste and the Red de jóvenes Suroeste 2050, who recognise that their lives are in danger, are mobilising in response.
On the last weekend of August, the Red de jóvenes Suroeste 2050 organised a candlelit vigil — as well as performances, art installations and music — which took place in municipalities across Southwestern and Eastern Antioquia, in towns such as Concordia, Támesis, Pueblorrico, and Jardín, to honour the lives of those massacred.
Movimiento de jóvenes del suroeste is organising and collecting funds for a vigil for peace next monthin Venecia, Antioquia, which will involve painting a mural, and carrying out a memory ritual and a candlelit vigil for the family members and friends of the young people who were murdered.
“We aim to make the pain we feel as young people about the violent events that have occurred in our country visible,” Red de jóvenes Suroeste 2050, whose representatives preferred to remain anonymous for security reasons, told The Bogotá Post. “It’s a cry of disagreement with the state’s absence in the peripheral or vulnerable areas of the country.”
“We fight so that violence doesn’t become our landscape,” the collective added. “It’s not normal.”
What does this mean for peace in Colombia?
“Colombia has always been multiple conflicts rolled up into one,” said Sánchez at WOLA. “This post-2016 peace situation is particularly complex because of the fragmentation and re-organisation of illegal groups after the demobilisation of the FARC. Also, in terms of the ELN, the Venezuela situation has complicated things further since the group operates on both sides of the border.”
“Unfortunately, unless Colombia takes its obligations to former fighters more seriously we will see more killings of demobilised and recidivism,” she added.
“The ELN-Colombia conflict will worsen, with civilians bearing the brunt of the violence, as long as Duque refuses to agree to humanitarian minimums and to heed calls by the UN and the Pope to establish a ceasefire. The illegal armed groups linked to paramilitary structures and narcotrafficking will continue to grow.”
The rules have changed, meaning that a lot of things are going to be possible for the first time in a long while.
Cyclists enjoy the sunshine and new freedoms as Bogotá starts to lift coronavirus restrictions. Photo: Oli Pritchard.
Now that we’re no longer under obligatory quarantine, there’s lots to look forward to in the coming weeks. For many people, this is a return to normal life, and crucially, to earning again. A lot of things that had been banned are now allowed again, which means there’s a clamour to return to find out what this New Reality will bring.
Restaurants and maybe even bars!
With restaurants already open and serving beer, the simple pleasures of going out for a meal are firmly in sight. Sure, there are limitations and it might not be easy to do. But Bogotá has plenty of sun and few mosquitoes, so dining al fresco might end up being quite fun. And it’s certainly a huge leap forward, both for customers and for the restaurants that have been haemorrhaging money.
Cielo abierto
Not only restaurants, but all kind of things will potentially operate outside. Why go to a five-star gym when you can enjoy exercising under all the stars of the night sky? There’s plenty that could be done outside, even here in ‘la nevera’. If this is managed well, it could be a really fun project and allow an even greater range of things to happen. We’ve already seen Yu-Gi-Oh nerds in the park, so it’s already underway.
Ciclovía is on the way back as a key part of Cielo Abierto. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Leaving Bogotá
Fresh though the weather might be in Bogotá, it’s nice to get out of the city and down a few hundred metres to enjoy some steamy tropical heat. And there’s plenty of tempting options just a short bus trip away. Of course, there are some national flights running too, and even international flights on the way soon. With the tourism industry in tatters, you’ll be doing a good thing too.
Non-essential shopping
While it’s been easy enough to get hold of essential items, it’ll be nice to be able to shop for non-essentials too, especially as online retailers have been taking great bites out of the market. A lot of Bogotá life still happens face-to-face, and getting that back up and running will make the city much more functional.
New ventures
The train of economic consequences has run through a lot of businesses, many of which have already folded. Some will be looking at the next few weeks as a vital period to re-establish themselves. Alongside them come new enterprises and ventures. New bars are already being fitted on the 45, for example, and Colombia’s boundless enthusiasm for projects means that more will soon follow.
With our Brave New Reality now firmly in place, let’s all wave goodbye to this list of irritations…hopefully!
Half empty streets is something we probably will miss. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Having been asked to write up a list of things that I wanted to see continue even after the strict quarantine had ended, I was given the prize of writing about the things I’ll be happy to see the back of. Many of them are already melting faster than a snowman in Cúcuta.
Worry
There’s been many things to worry about in recent months, being stopped by the police on your way to the shops was one. Although there was a soft-touch approach from the police in the end, you never really knew what rules they might enforce – and when. That’s hopefully a thing of the past, as it’s unlikely that things will get tougher from here on in. We appear to be on solid ground now. Random ley seca is hopefully not going to descend at the drop of a hat, for example.
As a fully paid up snowflake liberal, I just don’t like seeing people in camo jackets wandering around my neighbourhood. Hopefully, it’ll be back to something approaching normality now and we can leave the threat of jackbooted thugs to other countries.
Zoom meetings
Well, they’re probably not over for a lot of people, but the end may well be in sight now. Quite a few people will be back into offices over the coming weeks, as Bogotá switches to the allegedly famous 4×4 model. I for one am looking forward to the possibility of working face to face again.
Curfew
With the lifting of quarantine by area, so we have no more curfew. It’s already been nice to step out after eight in the minty fresh area and not be confronted by silence. One of the nice things about the last few months has been an increase in community feeling and Bogotá is lovely in the cool evenings.
Online shopping
I imagine a lot of people will continue with this, but I for one am looking forward to getting back into shops and being able to pick things up and see exactly what I’m looking to buy. Plus, of course, it means more opportunities to channel money back to small enterprises rather than big outfits. Some local tiendas have done well out of lockdown but many non-essential shops have suffered.
The lockdown in Bogotá was tedious and lengthy, but there were silver linings among the clouds. Our columnist looks at five things we should hold on to in the brave new reality.
Empty streets might now be behind us. Photo: Oli Pritchard
As the city starts to emerge from over five months of lockdown, there are a few positives worth noting. For starters, the ICU system in Bogotá didn’t collapse. That’s a positive. Other than that, here are some of the things don’t want to see slide back to the way things were. After all, the benefits of a less traffic-clogged city are plain to see, if nothing else!
Bogotá without traffic jams and chaos is a much, much nicer place, as everyone notes every Christmas. The months of lockdown have been much the same. Air pollution never drops as much as you might think, but visual and aural pollution have decreased a lot. Crossing the road has gotten easier and there’s a sense that the city is currently concerned about who’s here, rather than who’s passing through to somewhere else. There’s a danger here that with the return to offices there’ll be a return to cars. Fingers crossed all round that doesn’t happen.
2. New bike lanes
With a decrease in motor traffic, there’s been an increase in cycling. And thankfully, this one is definitely here to stay. We had our doubts, but happily, we were proved to have been a little too paranoid and the temporary bike routes have been painted in. That’s a real result in a car-obsessed city. The demand is there – bike shops have faced incredible demand as some of the TransMilenio commuters have moved to pedal power rather than gas guzzlers. Let’s hope that Bogotá can take advantage of its cycling culture for once.
3. No chit-chat
With masks on, it’s much harder to engage in frivolous and needless social interaction. Also, the increased biosecurity levels in shops have helped this. In general, there’s a lot less casual friendliness going on, which is making life a great deal simpler. Shop queues whistle by as customers shuffle off worriedly rather than enquiring as to the local gossip. Maybe I’m a grump [Maybe? -Ed], but a little more efficiency in daily life would be no bad thing from my point of view.
4. Exercise
With limited options for getting out of the house, there’s been a noticeable uptick in daily joggers around here. That’s got to be a positive in a country with rampant levels of diabetes. In general, it’s probably a good idea to stick with the exercise, especially at a time when we’ve been reminded of the limitations of the EPS system. Even when bars open, you can still get out for a jog midweek, especially if there’s no commute to deal with.
5. Local shops for local people
With tiendas being somewhat more flexible about pico y cédula, they’ve provided a valuable service for people getting their timings wrong or unexpectedly needing a last minute item. These cornerstones of local life would be sorely missed if they disappeared, so maybe it’s worth popping in if you’ve only a few items on your list.
As Bogotá enters a ‘New Reality’, here’s what the new ‘new normal’ might look like.
Domestic flights open on September 1. Photo: Artemis Maria Papoutsakis
Colombian authorities have announced what amounts to a shift change in coronavirus measures. Some parts of Bogotá that thought they’d be in strict quarantine until the end of the month will instead have restrictions lifted at midnight tonight. Moreover, come September, restaurants can open (with restrictions), intercity transport will be allowed and we’ll even see domestic flights.
As with many of the new measures, some rules feel as if they change as fast as they are announced. And of course, it remains to be seen which rules are actually enforced. So bear with us, but here’s what we know right now.
Look after yourself
Bogotá mayor Claudia Lopéz is talking about a “New Reality” and President Duque sees it as selective isolation, but both are singing from the same hymn sheet on this one. The new phase of coronavirus measures is all about self-care and self-protection. Don’t go out if you have any coronavirus symptoms. Wear masks, maintain distance, and wash your hands.
The sanitary emergency will be in place until at least November 30, but from September we will have fewer restrictions on normal life.
The four by four model: Monday to Thursday, Thursday to Sunday
Here’s where it starts to get murky. Bogotá’s ‘New Reality’ as explained by mayor López involves a four-days-on, four-days-off timetable. The idea is to reduce the number of people who are out and about — and reduce the number of people using public transport by allowing sectors to follow four-day weeks.
There aren’t eight days in the week, which is why certain activities will overlap on a Thursday. And following some successful lobbying from other groups, there are a few other exceptions.
Here’s the plan:
Monday to Thursday: The first four days are all about production. Manufacturing, wholesale and activities that don’t involve customer contact
Wednesday to Sunday: Shopping for non-essential goods and hairdressers get in early. Big chain stores can open every day as long as half their products are considered essential goods.
Thursday to Sunday: Restaurants will be able to operate for this four-day weekend (more on that shortly). We’ll also see parks, ciclovía, and other outdoor activities opening up. Gyms will be allowed to operate outdoor activities, though it’s not clear what days this will happen.
Every day: Essential activities, such as the production and transport of food and medicine. Construction (one of the first sectors to return to work) can operate from Monday to Saturday after 10 am. Offices and professional services can operate every day apart from Thursday, providing 70% of staff continue to telework.
The essential activities are much the same as we’ve seen for a lot of the lockdown, but the list does seem to have been expanded. Launderettes, for example, have now made it onto the everyday essentials list.
Before you get too excited, pico y cédula will still be in operation in grocery stores, shopping centres and notaries. So you’ll still have to restrict your essential everyday activities to every other day.
Restaurants, bars and clubs
Bars and clubs will remain shut and on-license alcohol sales are not allowed in public venues until December 31. This is one of the areas where the rules seem contradictory. Mayors can request permission for alcohol sales in certain venues. And in Bogotá it looks like bars that serve food will be able to open and serve alcohol — but only until 9pm. So the new reality may herald a new wave of gastropubs in the country. That or a lot of prominent empanada sales.
Restaurants can open indoors at 25% of their normal capacity. And, starting on September 3, we’ll see the start of the city’s Cielo Abierto plan. From Thursday to Sunday every week until the end of December the city’s restaurants will be able to operate in the open air. This can be on patios and extensions, in outside spaces and streets constructed for this purpose or plazas. It may also take the form of drive-throughs and food trucks.
Smoking Molly boss Santiago Zuluaga told us that restaurant owners — almost all of whom have faced severe losses over the past five months — are hopeful but worried about the new measures. “We’re worrying a little bit because we see that it’s not really organised and it’s only really a 25% increase in the capacity in the restaurants and it’s only Thursday through Sunday,” he said. “It’s understandable and it’s not a good idea to just open everything. But I don’t think there’s going to be a major difference.”
Is this the new normal? Photo: Otto Berchem
Clubs, along with swimming pools, theatres, cinemas and casinos will not be able to open in the New Reality. Churches were originally on the banned list, but concessions were made to allow pilot projects in which families can attend religious ceremonies from their cars.
Schools and universities
While educational establishments such as pre-schools, schools and universities can open for four days a week, the Ministry of Education has said this will be a very gradual process which will only begin in October.
It will start with pilot projects with limited numbers of students in classrooms. And each school will need to request a reopening date.
Transport and flights
Domestic flights will reopen from September 1, with 14 routes. El Dorado will run at 12% of its normal capacity and the hope is to gradually open more flights. The country’s roads will be open and intermunicipal travel will be allowed.
In Bogotá, TransMilenio operations are going to have to expand a little to accommodate the increase in passenger numbers. Previously, they could run at 35% capacity, that’s now been increased to 50%.
Windows on all public transport must be kept open, masks must be worn and passengers are not allowed to talk on the phone. Hard to see that last one being followed.
Leaving the country
Consular services will open for Colombians, especially those due to study abroad, and are included on the list of everyday activities. Colombia’s borders will stay closed until October 1, but humanitarian flights will continue to operate.
In summary: Bogotá’s New Reality
No more strict quarantine by sector
Pico y cédula will stay
Restaurants can open in a limited capacity from September 3
Domestic flights will operate from September 1
Before you get too excited, remember all of this is conditional on public health — the whole idea of selective isolation is that if cases rise, those areas may be closed down again.
This time the authorities mean business. The police have already enforced this quarantine more than the past six weeks.
Military police on Carrera 13. Photo: Oli Pritchard
The city’s new wave of strict quarantine measures seem to be the real deal this time around. With seven sectors of the city under cuarentena estricta, this final fortnight follows six weeks of sector-specific lockdown. Up until now, the implementation of these heightened measures has been fairly lax and it was widely thought that this one would be similar. However, the first morning of the new regulations – applying to barrios such as Teusaquillo and Usaquén for the first time – has seen police enforcing the rules.
In the Parque Nacional, a high-profile and easily visible spot for flaunting the rules, police moved around 10 am to send a load of mountain bikers home, then cleared the upper reaches of the park. There isn’t a time limit on these restrictions, other than the post 8 pm curfew, but it appears that mid-morning matters. After the cyclists were given their marching orders, other exercisers were commanded to jog on and even dog walkers told they were ‘bad owners’.
Police send exercisers home
Eventually, even people on the séptima were sent home and the only cyclists continuing on the cicloruta were commuters. This is a sea change from the previous laissez-faire approach. This time it’s not the alcaldía half-heartedly attempting to keep order, it’s police motorbikes, cars and horses getting involved with sirens. They’ve set down a marker already, and only time will tell if they will continue in the same vein.
Usual street vendors absent from Calle 53. Photo: Emma Newbery
Elsewhere in the city, various people have reported fewer street sellers hawking their wares, even for a Sunday. As before, mask-wearing is being stuck to very well. Our reporter in Galerías clocked up 68 people with masks covering faces, only five with neck-masks while talking on the phone or drinking coffee and nobody unmasked. She also commented that there wasn’t a single street seller by the shopping centre.
Usaquén quieter than usual
In Usaquén, our man on the street says it’s quieter than usual. He saw police stopping two separate groups for cédula checks. Hardly super-unusual, but not something he’s seen before in the neighbourhood. In south Chapinero there are few people on the street and a single shoe-shiner waits forlornly for trade that refuses to pass him.
It’s not all heavy-handed, though. Lourdes in Chapinero seems to be fairly busy, and there are plenty of people on the streets. Joggers have crossed over from Usaquén to get their exercise in and things seem to be roughly normal.
One of our team described San Luis as ‘deserted’ — though it’s not usually bustling on a Sunday — and reported a police checkpoint on Carrera 24 with 63. It’s hard to know for sure, but police presence seems to have stepped up. Military police were also on Carrera 13 near the Ecopetrol building and one reader said motorcycle police were moving séptima vendors on.
Motorcycle cop was warning/dispersing street vendors on the 7ma.
Overall, it’s going to be hard to judge fully until we hit the working week. Many businesses are loth to open on a Sunday, even less so when there’s a holiday following. Tuesday will give us a lot more information about the state of play, but the suspicion has to be that this lockdown may well be stricter than before. It’s certainly true that there has been a statement from the police today, but what that signifies is as yet unknown.
Mayor announces widespread measures to restrict movement and activity in the Colombian capital.
Another round of strict quarantine measures announced in Bogotá. Photo: Otto Berchem
It’s been a week of will-she, won’t-she for Candelaria, Teusaquillo, and Usaquén dwellers. On Monday, the health minister announced that Friday would see the start of strict quarantine in these areas. But Bogotá mayor Claudia López refused to confirm the new measures until this evening.
Indeed, today’s announcement went much further than had been thought. Antonio Nariño, Chapinero, La Candelaria, Puente Aranda, Santa Fe, Teusaquillo and Usaquén will all go into strict quarantine from August 16 to August 30. The mayor said that this will be the last localised quarantine.
Several zones such as Chapinero and Antonio Nariño, which have already had two weeks of strict lockdown, will be locked down again. The strict measures are currently already in force in Barrios Unidos, Engativá and Suba, running until August 15. López said that Barrios Unidos had high numbers of cases, but it would not be fair to force a further two weeks of quarantine on to its residents.
Earlier in the day, the mayor had announced a series of measures to reactivate the economy. These included extending tax payments for restaurants, hotels, and other industries; exempting theatres and museums from property tax completely until 2022; and reducing municipal taxes (ICA) for impacted companies.
What’s the difference between a strict quarantine and a normal quarantine?
Putting aside the question of how strictly any of the quarantine in Bogotá has been enforced so far, for many people who have been staying at home, the strict quarantine is not so different. There are basically fewer exceptions, so activities that had been allowed to re-start should shut down again.
In theory, the rules for the strict quarantine are the same as the initial lockdown in the city: Only essential workers and essential errands are allowed. In practice, based on what’s happened so far, many non-essential shops may not be obviously open, but a knock on the door might prove otherwise.
One big difference is the curfew. Between 8pm and 5am, the area needs to be shut — no commercial establishments, no discreet socialising, no movement. For example, a few people told us they couldn’t get an Uber into a strict quarantine zone after 8pm.
We can also expect ley seca to be enforced at the weekends. So alcohol will not be on sale in major supermarkets from Friday to Sunday.
Exercise is not allowed, though there’s little to stop people crossing into other zones for their daily jog or cycle. One person per household will be allowed out to do the shopping.
Pico y cédula will be enforced throughout the city until the end of August. And facemasks continue to be compulsory in public spaces.
How many cases are there in those areas?
It is difficult to calculate how many people live in the affected zones because the borders of the strict quarantine don’t necessarily marry up to the official borders of those areas. But it does seem that the additional strict quarantine zones are in areas with high numbers of confirmed cases.
Zone
Confirmed cases
Estimated cases/population
Usaquén
7,466
1/67
Chapinero
3,289
1/42
Santa Fe
3,199
1/34
San Cristóbal
7,603
1/53
Usme
6,444
1/71
Tunjuelito
4,307
1/46
Bosa
12,732
1/52
Kennedy
20,417
1/53
Fontibón
6,079
1/65
Engativá
12,486
1/71
Suba
17,526
1/69
Barrios Unidos
2,626
1/92
Teusaquillo
2,368
1/64
Los Mártires
2,387
1/41
Antonio Nariño
2,252
1/49
Puente Aranda
5,631
1/46
La Candelaria
669
1/36
Rafael Uribe Uribe
8,696
1/43
Ciudad Bolívar
11,310
1/62
Fuera de Bogotá
1,771
–
Sin Dato
6,852
–
Source: bogota.gov.co and Veeduría Distrital
Is the rolling strict quarantine working?
As with many things related to the coronavirus, it’s difficult to say. Especially as López pointed out in her press conference, it takes two weeks before any measures impact the numbers.
What we do know is that ICU occupation has hovered around the 90% mark for several weeks. This map shows that some hospitals are at 100% capacity, but others are around 80% — some even lower.
López assured viewers in tonight’s Facebook live presentation that the social distancing, sector-specific quarantines and face mask wearing had all helped to reduce the impact of the virus.
One big challenge of the rolling quarantine is that people tend to live and work in different parts of the city, meaning that businesses could be closed for workers who are allowed to work and vice versa.
The idea of these localised shutdowns is to reduce the total number of people in circulation.
Even though the stricter measures have not been heavily enforced, in this respect at least, the zone-specific measures have curbed the numbers of people in circulation.
Authorities know that after four months, it is no longer feasible to close down the whole city. But the latest announcement — which will impact over one million people — shows these restrictions are still a major weapon in their COVID-19 armoury.
In an unprecedented move, Colombia’s Supreme Court has put Álvaro Uribe Vélez under house arrest while it decides whether he should stand trial for bribery and witness tampering.
Photo: Wikipedia
Senator and former president Álvaro Uribe Vélez will be confined to his home for up to a year, while the Supreme Court investigates charges of witness tampering and procedural fraud.
What actually happened?
Colombia’s Supreme Court has made history by putting former president and now senator Álvaro Uribe Vélez under house arrest. Uribe Vélez is accused of witness tampering and procedural fraud. Note that he hasn’t been found guilty of those crimes, only that the five judges have essentially decided that there is enough evidence to move forward with the case.
And in moving forward, they’ve ordered the house arrest as a medida de aseguramiento — or assurance measure. Given that he’s facing charges of interfering with justice, the idea is that he’ll be less able to do that if he can’t leave his house. It is the first time that this measure has been taken against an ex-president.
La privación de mi libertad me causa profunda tristeza por mi señora, por mi familia y por los colombianos que todavía creen que algo bueno he hecho por la Patria
So Uribe Vélez’s under house arrest but he hasn’t been convicted?
Exactly. Uribe Vélez will be confined to his house, beginning immediately and it could last for up to one year. Various bits of evidence still remain to be processed before we even get to a trial.
What is Álvaro Uribe Vélez accused of?
This is a bit of a tangled web, so bear with us. Back in 2012 and again in 2014, Polo Democrático senator Iván Cepeda clashed with Uribe Vélez, accusing both him and his brother of founding a block of the AUC paramilitary group, allegations that stretch back years.. He presented testimonies from ex-AUC combatants.
Cepeda was then himself accused of witness tampering. But the tables were again turned in 2018, when the Supreme Court ruled that Uribe should be investigated.
A lot centres around the former paramilitary Juan Guillermo Monsalve, and even more centres around the actions of Uribe Vélez’s lawyer, Diego Cadena. Cadena has already been charged with trying to interfere with Monsalve’s testimony as well as other testimonies. Both he and Uribe Vélez say he did so of his own accord. To understand more, check out La Silla Vacia’s rundown of what happened and who’s who.
Note that the Supreme Court is not investigating whether Uribe Vélez was connected to the paramilitary group, it’s investigating whether he tried to interfere with witnesses who might have said he was.
What happens next?
Uribe Vélez continues to deny the allegations against him. He is likely to decamp to his home in Medellín, as he can choose which house he wishes to be arrested in.
In terms of the case, this is really just the beginning. The Supreme Court now needs to investigate further and make a final decision on whether to take Uribe Vélez to trial.
2020 has rocked the world’s economies like no other year in recent decades, especially in Latin America. Measures taken by different governments to counteract the spread of COVID-19 mandated millions of people to stay at home and thousands of businesses had to close their doors.
Now, as lockdown restrictions in certain parts of the region begin to ease, the impact of the pandemic on the business ecosystem is becoming evident, unveiling – among other things – stories about those companies that survived the storm and even increased their profitability.
In a survey conducted by Biz Latin Hub, 56% of executives and business owners in Latin America expressed their concern about the negative impact of the pandemic on the region’s economy. However, a crisis can also be an opportunity to become stronger, and in fact, more than half of the respondents were cautiously optimistic about the future and Latin America’s ability to bounce back.
Opportunities for online businesses in the region
While the pandemic had some serious consequences for Latin America’s economy, it meant an increase in profits for multiple businesses that were already prepared to offer their services or products through e-commerce platforms. As people were prevented from going outside, there was only one way to continue doing business: Using the internet.
In countries like Mexico, for example, online sales of laundry and home care products saw a 403% increase in March this year. Mass-consumption products acquired through e-commerce platforms increased by 114% due to the pandemic outbreak. Likewise, 44% of Argentinians expressed their intention to buy online products, and in Brazil, April sales on e-commerce platforms increased by 28%.
The experience that companies have had in the last few months indicates that businesses that are able to operate online may have been more resilient to the impacts of COVID-19. “We are facing an extraordinary moment. While some businesses are struggling with lockdowns, delivery services, e-commerce usage, and other market solutions are rising,” says one of the respondents in the doing business in Latin America survey.
Furthermore, financial entities in Brazil are implementing fully online procedures to continue doing business in the country, as claimed by one of the respondents: “All banks in Brazil – including the financial company I run – are structuring their system to sign all contracts online, so the COVID-19 situation is increasing our business opportunities in the finance sector.” Likewise, one of the respondents in the survey suggested: “Colombia needs to focus on the sectors with growth potential and job creation (services, IT, and software, etc.).”
Growing markets in Latin America drive a call for digitization
According to the survey carried out by Biz Latin Hub, despite the current challenging times, more than 45% of the respondents expressed they expect Latin American economies to recover and grow in the future. Furthermore, more than 57% of the participants in this survey already own a business in Latin America and expressed a desire to expand further into other countries in the region.
The Biz Latin Hub survey also reflects the fastest growing business opportunities in Latin America. Out of the total of the respondents, 23.8% work in the area of professional services and consulting, 8.8% operate in the technology and telecommunications sector, 6.3% work in the medical industry, and 6.2% are dedicated to the import/export of products. The remaining 54.9% work in different industries, related to natural resource extraction, manufacturing, tourism, logistics, financial services, among others.
Increasing amounts of foreign investors are looking to expand their business to Latin America – a region with an incredibly dynamic market and a population of more than 626 million people whose access to mobile phones will reach 80% in 2025. Business opportunities in Latin America are countless, even for those who have not yet decided to build an online business brand.
Tech ecosystem overview in Latin America
Companies in Latin America are increasingly relying on technology and innovation to offer their products and services to a broader audience. The Fintech industry is a great example of this, as this sector is positioned as one of the most attractive industries for foreign investors.
Financial entities that offer their services with the help of technology are considerably increasing throughout Latin America. Countries like Mexico, Chile, and Colombia lead the rankings of countries with most Fintechs startups in Latin America. Furthermore, the governments of the region have promoted the creation of regulatory frameworks to define the operating rules for this sector.
In 2019, the Mexican Chamber of Deputies unanimously approved the ‘Fintech Law’. This new legislation seeks to regulate Fintech companies and promote financial inclusion throughout the country. Likewise, Chile announced that it plans to process a Fintech law before the National Congress in mid-2020, despite the pandemic and the quarantine decreed throughout the region.
Furthermore, although the e-commerce sector in Latin America is not as developed as in other regions like Europe or the United States, online sales through e-commerce platforms saw an exponential increase in recent months. Its use is expected to grow even more, as more people now understand how to access products or services through the internet.
The future is digital
So far, companies that may achieve greater success during current global health and economic pressures are those that have been resilient enough to adapt and rely on technological advances to continue doing business. This way, they can overcome all challenges that prevent them from reaching their clients in Latin America, a market with great potential for foreign companies looking to expand in the region.
‘There will be weeks when we’ll see challenges’ says President Duque as he announces that the nationwide compulsory isolation will continue for another month.
Colombia’s new normal: Social distancing and empty streets.
As the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Colombia approaches 270,000 and the number of deaths passes the 9,000 mark, President Iván Duque has announced that the country’s mandatory isolation will continue until August 30.
The isolation was supposed to finish on August 1, but those living in cities like Bogotá, Medellín and Barranquilla which have been implementing stricter lockdowns in recent weeks will not be surprised to hear of the extension.
“We’re not talking about a national peak,” said Duque. “The peaks have presented themselves at regional levels. Some have passed, some will come in the coming weeks and months.”
Duque’s presentation that focused on the administration’s achievements — both by comparing Colombia with other countries in the region in terms of numbers of deaths per million people and in terms of the health supplies that have been delivered to various regions and cities. In doing so, he sought to head off those who are critical of the length of the country’s isolation measures.
What’s all this about the regional measures?
It’s all about the regional measures. Today’s announcement does not extend the lockdown for everybody, rather it extends the timeframe in which the government and local authorities have the power to act and shut down certain sectors, cities or towns.
Essentially it follows previous moves by continuing to relax the lockdown in areas with limited numbers of cases and tightening restrictions in places with high ICU occupancy and high numbers of cases or deaths.
Locations with no or limited cases of COVID-19 will continue to open, but with restrictions on big gatherings such as clubs and concerts.
Locations with low and medium COVID-19 cases will continue with pilot schemes, and controlled re-opening or closing organised by local authorities and the ministry of health.
Areas with high numbers of cases will continue to see severe measures, increased testing, and additional courses of action such as strict quarantine of affected sectors.
So, for example, we’re unlikely to see any changes to Bogotá’s sector-specific rolling quarantine. There’s also the promise of more distanced activities, such as drive-in movies. That said, we’re likely to see continued restrictions on alcohol sales so don’t get any ideas about any socially distanced drinking.
What does it mean for flights?
International flights were supposed to start again in September. Today’s presentation did not address whether the extended isolation will stop this from happening, but the Minister of Health did say that we may have to wait until mid-September before we see a reduction in the numbers of cases in Bogotá. No doubt there will be more announcements in the coming days.
Cone, but not forgotten: the strange case of Séptima’s invisible cycle lane.
There was a cicloruta on the séptima in the past months, but that seems gone now. Photo: Oli Pritchard
Claudia López has an unfortunate habit of making promises that end up not being entirely completed. ESMAD has been as active as ever, new TransMilenio routes are breaking ground and pico y cédula is nominally active. Her quarantine measures are much more impressive on paper than they are in real life, with widespread disobedience – notoriously, even she has broken her own rules.
Will the same thing happen, then, with the ciclorutas? The measures were brought in temporarily to help lighten the load on public transport, widely recognised as a coronavirus danger zone. Cities worldwide are looking towards bicycles as green alternatives to public transport, and Bogotá is no exception. With a relatively high level of infrastructure in place, the world-renowned ciclovía and a population very receptive to bicycles, things looked rosy and the mayor duly announced that the new cycle routes would be made permanent.
So far, so good, and cones went up to demarcate the area for bicycles. Commuters flooded in and it looked to be a roaring success. Every day as I crossed on my morning run, there were plenty of cyclists and cars didn’t even seem particularly angry about having less space. Worryingly though, no paint was laid. I put this down to pressing priorities elsewhere and celebrated the focus on cycling. Then last week, the cones disappeared.
On the Séptima, the cicloruta has, for some unclear and probably boneheaded reason, been put in the middle of the road. This is a bad decision on a number of levels and there are many good reasons why other countries have never seriously considered this model. For starters, it’s hard to get on and off a centrally-located bicycle lane. And that’s exactly what happens here – the cicloruta runs down from the north past the Javeriana until the Parque Nacional, where it crosses calle 39 and abruptly stops.
This leads to a really confusing situation where cyclists whizz down at relatively high speed only to find themselves suddenly trapped with three lanes of traffic between them and the pavement as cars and large vehicles pull into their lane to make a left turn across them. For an inexperienced cyclist taking to two wheels because of the pandemic, this must be quite a frightening position to be in.
I spoke to an Alcaldía worker hanging around at the junction, who claimed the cicloruta still existed, just without cones. He didn’t see any need to try and enforce it though, or to try and avoid the potentially disastrous situation up the road. In his words, he was “following instructions”. That’s what Nazi war criminals say. Maybe it does exist, maybe paint trucks will arrive to formalise the lane. But maybe it won’t. After all, this does happen here.
It’s a sadly common trope in Colombia to see things appear on paper and then not materialise in reality. Like some Orwellian nightmare, we are told something is happening despite the evidence in plain sight. It was somewhat surreal to be told that the cicloruta in fact still existed even as I saw buses and trucks pull into that space.
There are now major doubts about the ability and desire of the mayor to bring plans to fruition, so cyclists of Bogotá have good reason to fear that these ciclorutas might go the way of pico y género and be quietly scrapped. Let’s hope that López doesn’t live up to her nickname of Fraudia this time.
As Chapinero joins seven other sectors in exiting two weeks of strict quarantine, we evaluate the effects of the increased lockdown.
Plenty of people in the park. Photos: Oli Pritchard
The cuarentena estricta for eight sectors of Bogotá was lifted today, as per the schedules listed. But how much changed over a fortnight of heavy lockdown? Well, not much at all, in truth. If you were in the Parque Nacional on Sunday afternoon, you would have seen a festival of picnickers and strollers. Footfall wasn’t affected much in the zone as a whole, but at least free testing was made available.
The Parque Nacional served as a useful petri dish – a high-profile, clearly visible landmark of Bogotá. It’s split between Chapinero and Santa Fe, both of which were under the same regulations. Although in the first days there were far fewer people than normal, by last weekend it was at more or less full capacity. Like people, parks do bounce back. Ice cream sellers were out in force and there were plenty of family and friend groupings.
The official line on exercise was that it was banned throughout the area under quarantine. In reality, there were joggers, tennis players and footballers throughout the park. Masses of mountain bikers and a few real cyclists charged up and down the hills, straight past the home of the mounted police with nary a word. The ciclovía was largely operational.
Tennis players hop over the tape
Playing football in full view of the authorities
Mountain bikers ignoring the quarantine
Elsewhere in the zone, there was limited adherence to the stricter regulations. Lili Pink continued to keep their doors open, for some reason, but about half of the local papelerías closed. It seems that essential services include lingerie but not photocopies. Carrera 13 stayed largely open for business, as did most restaurants and all the tiendas. The dry cleaners and tailors shut their doors, but were open if one were to knock on the door.
It’s worth noting that those dry cleaners are about 50m from the police station, so it’s hard to believe that this is fully clandestine. The police continue to play a complicated role in this pandemic – they abandoned the Parque Nacional completely towards the end of the first week, giving it a quite sketchy feel. A few people reported seeing police cars pulling over more people throughout the zone, but there didn’t seem to be any more boots on the ground.
Of course, it was made yet easier by the fact that strolling across county lines was no problem at all. So, although my local hardware store was closed, a five-minute hop across the Caracas solved that problem quickly. It seems a little unfair and somewhat counterproductive – many people continued to go out and get stuff done, but they simply had to cover a bit more ground and create more opportunity for infection.
So in the end, cuarentena estricta had some effect, but probably less than had been hoped for. After a day or two of adaptation, people reverted to how they had been before, but some more businesses shut their doors. The real effect may be more subtle: Further erosion of respect for the rules and less obvious reasons to follow the rules.
As the number of coronavirus cases in Bogotá climbs towards its peak, more and more people are interested in getting tested. We find out how it works.
One of the coronavirus test locations in Bogotá. Photo: Otto Berchem
I live in Chapinero Alto, just near all the no-longer-visitable restaurants of the Zona G and firmly in the centre of a strict quarantine zone. Once derided as posh and upper-class by my Bohemian and salt-of-the-earth friends down in Teusaquillo, my fiancée and I now find ourselves unable to venture past Calle 100 to the apparently pristine gomelo fiefdom of Usaquén.
However, lepers that we may be for this fortnight in Chapinero, we do have access to free COVID-19 tests! Last week I decided to take full advantage of this dubious perk. Each day, the Chapinero local council tweets out a list of free testing facilities in the neighbourhood. You can see today’s list below:
Last week there were many more, including in the Carulla supermarket on calle 63 and barrio Juan XXIII’s salon comunal, both within walking distance for me. On Wednesday I popped down to Carulla at around 8.15 am, only to discover a line stretching halfway to Usme and then some. So I hiked up into Juan XXIII and joined the hillside line in about 90th place. I stood in line for the best part of two hours, advanced about two metres in that time (I’m genuinely not sure whether they had actually started testing anyone by then) and then gave up and slunk back home in time for work. No dice.
The next day I decided to get up a bit earlier to see if I could beat the foot traffic. I headed off to Carulla again, this time at about 7.45 am, a good 45 minutes before testing was due to start. This time there were even more people in the line! I raced back up the mountain to Juan XXIII and this time managed to nab 44th spot in the line. Two hours later, I was outside the testing room, being interviewed by a little woman in astronaut gear. She filled out a form with all my personal details, asked me if I’d had any symptoms (for those asymptomatics worried about wasting their time in the line, only to be turned away at the end, this did not seem to be a prerequisite for the test), then gave me the form and sent me to wait by the door. Ten minutes later I was inside, being interviewed by yet another person with a form. I was given both forms back to hand to the nurse/doctor administering the test, who instructed me to sit down and keep my mask down.
The test is pretty straightforward and takes about 15 seconds. You slip the mask down past your nose, the tester slides a cotton bud up a nostril, keeps going until it’s slightly uncomfortable, twists and removes. Done. It’s definitely uncomfortable, but based on what certain friends have told me, there are far less pleasant tests involving cotton buds out there. The person administering my test informed me that in seven days (yes, you read that right) I would be able to jump on the Min Salud website and check my test results. I was also told I would be phoned if I had tested positive.
So here we are, a week after my test and still no phone call yet. I mistakenly thought yesterday was seven days after the test and attempted to access my results on the Min Salud website. I was unsuccessful. Not because I had only waited six days, but because there seems to be no link whatsoever to test results on the Min Salud website. After a quick google, I found the right page and put in my details, only to be told that there was no record of me on file.
Coronavirus test in Bogotá: Might have to wait a bit for the test result.
Let’s put that down to my getting the days of the week wrong and try one more time.
As coronavirus continues to grow in the capital, mayor Claudia López has announced stricter rules as of Monday.
Quarantine in Bogotá will return in phases. Photo: Alcaldía de Bogotá
Coronavirus is coming. As the numbers of coronavirus deaths and cases continue to mount both in Bogotá and throughout the country, mayor Claudia López has announced stricter rules beginning next week. From Monday, Chapinero along with seven other localities will enter a fortnight of heightened and tightened lockdown. This is in response to the UCI occupancy rate in Bogotá rising as high as 85% this week.
This means a complete ban on any activity from 8pm to 5am, total restriction of movement in each respective localidad and the prohibition of alcohol sales. All businesses will have to close, except those providing necessary items such as food and medicine. On paper, it seems close to the rules originally brought in for the simulacro and that lasted for the initial lockdown weeks.
What are the new restrictions?
Exceptions are largely the same as in previous periods of strict quarantine, so you’re fine with food and pharmacy shopping (only between 5 am and 7 pm) and you can go to the doctor (including EPS and private services) as well. Anyone looking after vulnerable people is also exempted. Again, it’s expected that only one member of each family will be allowed out. Exercise and dog-walking are not mentioned, so it’s unclear at present what these restrictions will be. As usual, there remains a lot of false information out there.
How this will be actually enforced is hard to see. There’s been a widespread lack of adherence to the existing rules in recent weeks, and enforcement has varied widely between more and less affluent zones of the city. Locking down several sectors at once will require enormous numbers of law enforcement, surely leading to a corresponding lack of safety in other zones. 850 extra law enforcement have been announced, which will hopefully make enough of a difference.
There are also questions over things like deliveries. Will it be possible to order alcohol from one sector and have it delivered across the border to one in lockdown?
Which sectors are being shut down?
Bizarrely, the schedule for locking down localidades has been mapped out already, suggesting that it won’t be responsive to actual case numbers. That said, the schedule is for the next six weeks, so it’s likely to be open to extensive change. Also, the first localidades to be locked down are not those with the highest case numbers – Kennedy leads the list but is in Group Two, Suba is second but in Group Three. The whole city has been placed on orange alert, so it’s possible that we will see some localised zones on top of this. However, with limited uptake of the CoronaApp, it’s hard to get precise details.
Also, only fifteen localidades currently are in the schedule, so it’s unclear what will happen in Antonio Nariño, La Candelaria, Sumapaz, Teusaquillo and Usaquén. For the moment, they are all considered low-risk and thus not being scheduled. Given the high number of previous cases in Usaquén (1,620, twice that of Chapinero), it’s likely to face some sort of lockdown, and Teusaquillo has a similar rate to Chapinero so also stands a good chance of lockdown. Sumapaz might yet avoid it due to its tiny population density as the only fully rural localidad.
A small carrot has been offered alongside the stick of lockdown, as López also announced that vulnerable families will receive guaranteed handouts while in lockdown. Like previous efforts, it’s limited, as this applies only to 550,000 families and is just COP$240,000 – less than a third of the minimum wage. With so many people blocked from earning, this is unlikely to go far.
When are the lockdowns?
The full schedule of localised lockdowns can be found on the website of the mayor’s office (along with the full rules for lockdown), and currently looks like this:
Group one lockdown (Monday, July 13 – Sunday, July 26)
Chapinero
Ciudad Bolívar
Los Mártires
Rafael Uribe Uribe
San Cristóbal
Santa Fe
Tunjuelito
Usme
Group two lockdown (Monday, July 27 – Sunday, August 9)
Bosa
Fontibón
Kennedy
Puente Aranda
Group three lockdown (Monday, August 10 – Sunday, August 23)
Series of Facebook Live conversations offer a chance to understand the work involved in historical memory.
Efforts for peace continue during coronavirus. Photo: Indepaz
The coronavirus lockdown has put so many things on hold, including many aspects of the country’s fragile peacebuilding efforts. However, the Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica (CNMH) are continuing their work to document, analyse, and preserve first-person accounts of Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict.
Individual and collective stories make up our understanding of history. And the conversation series co-hosted by CNMH and Universidad Distrital’s IPAZUD gives the public the chance to hear more perspectives of what happened during the conflict and what it did to people’s lives.
And on June 18, Possibilities for reparation was led by Sebastian Londoño, Director of Memory Construction, CNMH.
Today (July 3), at 3pm, Fabio Bernal, Director of Colombia’s National Museum of Memory, will discuss the museum-in-progress and its preservation of historical memory as a form of symbolic reparations.
The session on July 16 at 3pm will be led by Marcela Rodríguez, Director of the Human Rights Archives. And the final forum will take place at 7.30 and 10.30 AM on July 30, with Universidad Distrital Radio Station, LAUD, Revista de la Mañana program in conversation with Darío Acevedo Carmona, Executive Director of the Centro Nacional de Memoria Historica.
First forum: “What have we learned about paramilitarism in Colombia?”
Mediated by Andrés Hernández, IPAZUD’s Coordinator for the center’s Conflict and Memory section, and led by Jenny Lopera, the forum examined the work of peace-building through testimony collection. Lopera explained that part of the Truth Accords’ remit was to work towards reparations, partially by involving armed conflict victims as participants in the process.
While we speak a lot about the FARC, paramilitary activity is another pillar of the country’s unrest, taking root in the 80s and morphing into the armed gangs we see continuing to fight and terrorise rural Colombia today.
Hernández defined peace “as a full concept rather than as the absence of war.” In other words, peace-building does not happen overnight. It is a complex and ongoing process that requires many considerations and institutional commitments.
Without going into the details of what can at best be described as a partially failed demobilisation of the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC) in 2004, one aspect is very relevant to today’s peace-building. Over the past decade, the CNMH have worked to collect testimonies from the ex-combatants – and have collected over 18,000 testimonies from demobilised paramilitaries.
Nicolas Otero, one of the Center’s researchers and a testimony collector described the process as complex and evolving. “Historical memory isn’t singular, but one that’s in a constant process of being constructed,” Otero said.
Alberto Santos, another researcher who participated in the forum, described his experience working on a quantitative report on the effects of paramilitarism in Colombia. Over 9,000 ex-paramilitaries participated in the unprecedented project, which found that 52% of them had been victims of the conflict before being recruited by paramilitary groups. Santos went on to describe the significance of the report’s findings, which helped the Center construct a better understanding of the targeted socio-economic characteristics of paramilitary recruits – those with little financial means and few options.
According to Otero, part of the testimony collection procedure is an official recognition of what took place and an acknowledgment of the violence. He described the interview methodology of listening rather than interrogating, which helps to frame the process as one of participation and empowerment.
“For example, the procedure puts horrific events of violence – violations of human rights, violations of international humanitarian law on display. Victims demand recognition, that they are recognised as victims, as human beings, as Colombians and as subjects with rights.”
IPAZUD (Instituto para la Pedagogía, la Paz y el Conflicto Urbano de la Universidad Distrital) is the Universidad Distrital’s Institute for Pedagogy, Peace, and Urban Conflict. The research center focuses on education and Colombia’s conflict with particular attention to the effects of the armed conflict on the city of Bogotá.
The virtual forum series represents a new partnership between CNMH and IPAZUD in a joint effort to offer educational opportunities for the public to engage with historical memory and its implications for the future. Each forum will feature one of the CNMH’s four areas: The Truth Accords, Memory Construction, Colombia’s National Museum of Memory, and the Human Rights Archive.
It is possible to continue doing business in Colombia, even during these uncertain and challenging conditions.
Nobody expected a worldwide pandemic during the first half of this fiscal year. And as countries around the world grapple with the impact of restrictions designed to slow the spread of the virus, the future of global business is unsure. Particularly here in Colombia with its closed borders, new temporary trade and restrictive travel policies.
Here are eight challenges and actionable solutions for those who, despite the difficult conditions, want to continue business in Colombia.
Opening a bank account
Despite the novel coronavirus pandemic, companies are still able to open a corporate bank account in Colombia, but it does depend on the bank.
Solution: Banks are working towards implementing fully online procedures to open a corporate bank account in Colombia. Many banks now accept digital copies of required documents to open a corporate account. Banks like Bancolombia, Banco de Bogotá, Itaú, AV Villas, Davivienda and BBVA, accept digital signatures for documents and online processes.
Minimizing costs & outstanding payments
It’s a crucial time for companies and entrepreneurs to do everything they can to manage business risks by minimising costs and receiving outstanding cash payments.
Solution: Try to negotiate rent, utilities, printing and cleaning contracts, and any other regular expenses you may be incurring that your company is not utilising or is unable to utilise at this time. Based on current observations in Colombia, companies may be able to negotiate between a 10-30% discount on these expenses.
Be persistent in following up on outstanding payments. Your legal representative can send a letter of demand to those who owe money to the company. Note that in Colombia, it is difficult to enforce contracts that are not written in Spanish. If needed, prepare English and Spanish versions of contracts.
Avoiding visa costs
Colombia’s decision to close its borders means that individuals doing business in Colombia on temporary visas are unable to leave, even though their visa may be expiring. Normally, people who stay in Colombia for more than 183 days must start paying taxes.
Solution: People stuck inside the country due to these unforeseen circumstances (force majeure) can apply to extend their visas through a residency waiver. This ‘residency waiver’ stops visitors from becoming eligible to pay tax. Waivers can be obtained on a case-by-case basis through a request to the DIAN.
Keep in mind that Decree 941 gives Colombian authorities 35 working days to respond to requests of this nature. Find out as soon as possible if you or your staff are eligible for this waiver and apply as far in advance as possible.
Hiring staff
With Colombia’s borders closed until June 30, companies cannot obtain working visas for foreign nationals currently outside of the country. This is challenging for companies in the middle of their hiring process. There are two ways to tackle this challenge and continue doing business in Colombia.
Solutions – Option 1: First, companies doing business in Colombia can choose to try and find local staff under their own initiative. However, for those facing a language barrier, or with little knowledge of the local workforce and expectations from employees and the government, this can prove difficult.
In addition, if you haven’t yet incorporated your business in Colombia to hire your own employees, this first option is not possible. Under the current circumstances, companies cannot incorporate in Colombia.
Likewise, nobody can request a tax identification number – a crucial element of the company incorporation process in Colombia, also known as a RUT – before the National Tax Authority, DIAN (Dirección de Impuestos y Aduanas Nacionales). The DIAN is not accepting requests for a RUT during this time.
Solutions – Option 2: Companies may hire local talent through a Professional Employer Organization (PEO) based in Colombia. This eliminates any need to travel to Colombia for hiring purposes.
A PEO in Colombia can support companies by hiring locally and alleviating language and bureaucratic burdens for the employer. By partnering with a PEO through a ‘co-employment model,’ the PEO becomes the ‘Employer of Record’ for the hired personnel in the eyes of the Colombian government.
The PEO can hire staff on behalf of the company and can also ensure the hiring company is fully compliant with local employment regulations for that employee. A PEO in Colombia will handle the relevant paperwork and manage payroll and social contributions for a company’s employees in Colombia. A PEO can be the best option to help your company continue business in Colombia remotely.
Forecasting cash flow
The Colombian peso (COP) has depreciated significantly. With a fluctuating currency, companies cannot easily forecast their cash flow and run the risk of generating lower income amounts.
Solution: To prevent unpredictable cash flow and avoid any further volatility of the peso, it is best to create a compensation account. This is a corporate account established in Panama, in which companies can receive and hold US Dollars. Though the account technically sits in Panama, the compensation account is considered to be Colombian for administrative purposes.
Additionally, be aware that companies may review exchange rates set in a contract if the rate fluctuates by more than 20% of the agreed amount.
Renewing your commercial license
Companies that continue business in Colombia must renew their commercial license each year. Due to the pandemic, these renewal deadlines have changed.
Solution: Due to current restrictions on business and government institutions running at low capacity, the Chamber of Commerce extended the deadline for companies to renew their commercial license from 31 March to 3 June.
Tax declaration deadlines have also been extended. These extended deadlines differ for each company depending on their tax identification number. Information about the deadlines specific to your company’s identification is available on the DIAN website.
Notice that companies can also carry out their General Shareholder Meeting online in order to fulfill their annual obligation.
Changing administrative processes
Public Notaries, which play a big part in company incorporation, liquidation, and other procedures, may require physical presence from the company owner/legal representative.
Solution: Despite the possibility of a few administrative processes requiring a physical presence, many of the mandatory procedures set by the Chamber of Commerce can be carried out online.
Government institutions are implementing online and digital processes in order to improve the ease of doing business in Colombia. The country is investing in technology and innovation to achieve this. The company’s legal representative, with appropriate credentials, can fulfil most of the administrative needs of the company online.
Dealing with delays
Dealing with institutions can be hard, especially during a worldwide pandemic. Be patient, expect some delay during this time, and where necessary, operate with a local legal representative to avoid further setbacks.
Yes, it is possible to continue business in Colombia
Despite the COVID-19’s interruption to the economy, there are solutions to avoid it fully halting your business operations. Whether you are having trouble hiring staff, opening a bank account, forecasting your cash flow, minimizing costs & outstanding payments, renewing your commercial license, avoiding visa costs, or changing administrative processes, there are solutions.
If you’re missing this year’s Pride celebrations, why not join in tonight’s virtual drag show?
The drag show will be virtually this time. Photo: WikiCommons
This is usually the weekend when fun-loving bogotanos get to choose between sweaty headbanging at Rock al Parque and slightly less sweaty rainbow flag waving at the city’s Pride march. This year, the only way to participate in either event is through your computer screen.
Idartes have organised a series of online events and activities that you can join and watch from home. And the people behind a new physical and virtual LGBTQ+ space in Chapinero have picked today to launch their first podcast — a virtual underwear party with Mis Amigas Drag.
Cristina Rodríguez, Maritza Tamayo and Carlos Medellín tell me that Mis Amigas Drag al Desnudo has an “undress code” and will be the first of many online events, and eventually physical ones too. Whether it’s lectures, dances, DJs, the idea is to create a space that recognises the importance of identities, bodies, sexualities.
There’s a voluntary COP$5,000 donation that goes to Red Comunitaria Trans. Aside from that if you want to take part, all you need is a willingness to shake off your inhibitions and dance the night away via zoom. The organisers assure me that you don’t have to strip down to your undies, though they say the idea has gone down well with instagrammers who are already posting pictures.
Cristina explains it’s more about being who you are and being proud of who you are: “There are different types of bodies, it’s not that you always have to be a perfect person with a beautiful body.”
More broadly, Carlos says, “The idea of the body and identity come across in a thousand different ways, but it doesn’t have to be a vision that is vulgar. It can be something that we talk about honestly.”
In Colombia, coronavirus conspiracy theories are growing online. Is there an antidote?
Frontline doctors face threats while working in the covid-19 front line.
A voice audio drops in my WhatsApp: “Dear friends and family, gather close to hear this important message”.
The voice is firm, female, confident, middle class with a touch of paisa accent, like honey on rust. Soothing. The message is anything but.
“Doctors called my mother to the clinic for asthma control, but they are looking to kill her for 30 million pesos. Please, stay away from hospitals. Never go to the doctor, watch out, they are injecting people with coronavirus to kill them.”
The voice continues calmly: “It’s all part of a plan to reduce the population. All over the world families have had to give their quota. Don’t let it happen to you.”
This perfectly produced fake news from a seemingly educated and articulate source is just a small part of a social media infestation that in some corners of Colombia has converted hero health staff into villains.
It’s called the Cartel de Covid and plugs into a wide range of genuine public fear and frustrations wrapped in culture war zeitgeist that somehow coronavirus is at best an invented crisis, at worst a murderous scam.
Find the flower arrangers
The narrative reached its zenith this month when a doctor in Soledad, Atlántico, was sent two funeral wreaths after a patient he was treating died of COVID-19. The doctor is now under protection and an investigation is underway to find the flower arrangers.
Meanwhile, the COVID-19 death scam trope keeps trending. Last week’s was a video of protestors outside a Bogotá clinic chanting “Here are doctors in the Cartel de Covid” organised by a bereaved family who said their “grandma went in fine but got coronavirus and died.”
How did we get here?
Unpicking the Cartel de Covid conspiracy tells us something about Colombia, its health system, our collective behaviour, how we test and treat COVID-19, and quite a bit about the virus itself.
And like most urban myths, it has roots in facts: This one being the unusually high number of COVID-19 patients in ICU (intensive care beds) in Cali. In fact, city hospitals were reporting twice as many patients in the ICU than the national rate.
Of course, there could be many legitimate medical reasons for this, many of them in the interests of the patients. But for local politician Abraham Jiménez it had to be money.
“While a normal bed for a COVID-19 patient costs 15 million pesos, an ICU bed costs 29 million,” announced the Cambio Radical senator, demanding a government investigation to uncover possible price gouging by the city health facilities.
The script was written: Hospitals were cashing in on sick and dying COVID-29 patients.
Sick of corruption
In Colombia, there are many good reasons for people to believe this. The complex public-private health system is rife with corruption, stories of which are drip-fed to a public already worn down by daily tramitología battles while trying to deal with their local privatised health clinic.
Some scams happen on a spectacular scale, such as with the infamous Cartel de Hemofilia lead by a local governor and health secretary who conspired to defraud the state of billions of pesos by creating a fake cohort of haemophilic patients.
But these big-scale embezzlements or desfalcos were headed up by politicians and back-room state officials. In contrast, the Cartel de Covid conspiracy aims its ire at front-line medical workers.
The “29 million-pesos ICU bed” calculation has warped into the “30 million cash” sum pocketed by medical doctors for every sick and dying patient they infect. In fact, it has doubled to 60 million pesos in recent days.
The irony is many medical workers in Colombia never even receive their regular salary, let alone a cash bonus for killing their patients.
Invisible menace
Another factor in these nutty theories surrounding COVID-19 lies in the illness itself, and the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes it. It’s new and startlingly strange; a vascular disease that spreads like a respiratory one (an early error was comparing it to flu) that scientists are only beginning to understand.
What we do know is that COVID-19 is a truly invisible menace with a long incubation period (14 days) and an ability to spread through symptom-free carriers (80% of infected have mild illness or nothing at all).
And while in its early days, the coronavirus outbreak could be tracked from patient to patient, Colombia long ago reached “community spreading” stage whereby its stealthy advance makes it pop up seemingly randomly. This just feeds the “granny got sick at the clinic” narrative – rather than believing granny got infected by dad who works in the market.
Testing times
Then there’s the testing. Nasal swabs sent to centralised labs for PCR testing are highly accurate but take days or weeks for results. The much-hyped blood drop rapid tests give feedback in minutes, but many false negatives, especially early on in infection.
Discordant results between these types of tests is fertile ground for conspiracy theorists.
“I tested negative last week – but now the hospital says I’m positive. They infected me,” is one story circulating. This follows the proliferation of paid-for rapid tests in private clinics that are happy to take your money but unlikely to explain the finer points of validation studies, viral loads, sensitivity and specificity. A bad test is worse than no test, as the virologists say.
Meanwhile, local health authorities are scrambling to scotch on-line theories that even the rigorous PCR tests – free to patients – are somehow a scam.
These unscrupulous posts “persuade people not to be tested, which causes yet more cases because those who are infected delay the isolation processes and it is easier to infect people,” wrote Cúcuta’s Health Secretary in their local paper this week.
Testing is vital for identifying at-risk patients and treating them on time. If no-one tests then vulnerable folk – mostly the elderly, but also with underlying health problems – turn up late and die.
Bully-boy doctrines
The fearful messages and lockdown rules emitted by authorities nationwide have been amplified and twisted into the bully-boy doctrines imposed with extreme prejudice by the country’s myriad armed gangs.
“Anyone with COVID-19 will be killed,” is one message from pandilleros in the Pacific port of Tumaco, writes a friend. In some barrios the locals throw rocks at medical teams trying to trace and track positive cases.
“We need to urgently put out messages to confront these attacks on the medical mission,” says my contact there.
In some barrios, people are too terrified to report anyone sick or seek help at the hospital. The result is empty wards for mild cases but overflowing critical beds as desperate people take the severely sick only as a last resort. And often too late.
It happens at all social levels; Estrato 6 families have threatened elite clinics with lawyers if they test sick a sick relative.
And it happened to my own family when an aunt was hospitalised in a private clinic on the coast. She clearly had COVID-19 symptoms. No test was done. She died and was laid to rest with a traditional family funeral. We watched in Bogotá on Zoom.
“Why the hell didn’t they test her for COVID?” a doctor friend asked, puzzled.
“Maybe the clinic was scared to report a coronavirus case,” I suggested. “They didn’t want protestors outside with waving placards. Bad for business.”
So keeps turning the vicious circle: Delayed medical assistance means more hospital deaths which in turn reinforces the Cartel de Covid rumour that has taken root. Front-line doctors now face furious family members barging their way into wards to remove the sick and dying, arguing that “doctors are making money from each body they cremate.”
Victims to victimisers
As if medical staff didn’t have enough problems already.
Since the start of the outbreak, the shortage of PPE – personal protection equipment – has caused rifts between front-line medical staff and health authorities and governments across the globe.
Colombia is no exception, and doctors and nurses’ unions have clashed with the government.
First, there were the state’s clumsy decrees attempting to force medical staff to work on COVID-19 wards (the legal moves failed). Then medical unions revealed the government was bucking its duty to provide masks, gloves and other protective material (it palmed that off onto workplace insurers then failed to follow up).
Then there were pay disputes, mass sackings, promised COVID-19 bonuses that never materialised, and the usual shenanigans that show up in Colombia when workers claim their rights.
“The health minister turned us from victims into victimisers,” states Herman Bayona, president of the Colegio Médico de Bogotá, writing in Las 2 Orillas this week.
Strict lockdowns across Colombia have created fear, and also a backlash against authorities
The minister’s comments have “questioned the ethics and professionalism of the doctors, making them seem like the determinants of criminal and corrupt behaviour”.
“Doctors are being attacked and sent death threats as part of a political power struggle,” affirms a close friend who works at high level in the medical profession. “The state doesn’t want doctors to denounce the government for its wrongdoings”.
Whacky WhatsApp
This plays to a counter-conspiracy theory: That behind the “Cartel de Covid” rumour runs a deep state plot to scare medical staff and soften the ground for any upcoming failures.
But that makes no sense. Colombia has done better than most to protect and prepare the population – and risk the economy – with some of the strictest lockdowns on the planet. Why bring it all down with some whacky warbling on WhatsApp?
The fact remains that even as Colombia enters its most critical phase of the coronavirus outbreak – deaths are over 2,000 and rising fast – the Cartel de Covid rumours could mean sick people stay home, doctors don’t work, no-one wants a swab, and clinics cover up COVID-19 deaths.
In effect, the country is fighting viral attacks on two fronts. We need to win on both.
Justice for George Floyd, Justice for Anderson Arboleda: Black Lives Matter in Colombia
Illustration of Anderson Arboleda. Illustration: Dani Sanjuan @danidsanjuan
On May 19, police in Cauca are alleged to have beaten 24-year-old Anderson Arboleda, who later died from his injuries. The reason? Arboleda had been suspected of breaking the department’s strict quarantine curfew. Just six days later in the United States, Minneapolis Police Officer Chauvin killed George Floyd by kneeling on his neck for eight minutes and forty-six seconds. As the United States and the rest of the world turn their attention to #BlackLivesMatter, Colombian artists and activists have highlighted the case of Arboleda: a horrific death of a young, Black, Afro-Colombian, unarmed man at the hands of police.
Bogotá saw a major Black Lives Matter protest on June 3, when various groups gathered in front of the U.S. Embassy to protest police brutality and the deaths of black people transnationally. One group burned a U.S. flag; others carried signs with slogans such as “ACAB, #BlackLivesMatter”, “Justicia para George Floyd,” and “Anderson No Murió, Anderson Lo Mataron. ACAB.” The signage highlighted the global nature of police violence, an issue that was central in the paro nacional as many criticised the government for its harsh treatment of protesters.
Similar demands were seen following ESMAD’s killing of 18-year-old Dilan Cruz. But unlike the national strike, the June 3 protests centred Black and Afro-Colombian voices and highlighted Colombia’s violent form of anti-Blackness.
Media silence
ChocQuibTown’s Goyo, the first major musician to denounce Arboleda’s killing, wrote “Racism is when police murder a young [Black man] in Puerto Tejada supposedly for failing to comply with the quarantine. And this isn’t reported by big media outlets. Is this not enough to outrage a country?” J Balvin quickly followed suit, publicly demanding an investigation. An illustration of Arboleda surrounded by a wreath (echoing the viral, memorialising portrayals of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery) has circulated on Instagram. “Por qué en Colombia No Lo Ves?” reads the post.
Aurora Vergara, Director of the Center of Afrodiasporic Studies at Universidad Icesi, told La Silla Vacia, “It’s not recognized that the foundation of the Colombian nation we know today derives from a system of slavery. And this doesn’t allow us to recognise that in 169 years the conditions of these human beings that are descendants of those that were enslaved have not changed much.” While Colombia’s history of slavery and development of race is distinct from that of the United States, Colombia’s own history of racism can be seen in police brutality towards Afro-Colombians and the assassinations of many Afro-Colombian social leaders.
Vergara continues, “For Colombia, George Floyd leaves the messages that racism kills, and it kills in different ways.” She cites the fact that Black men in Chocó, have the lowest life expectancy in the nation. Afro-Colombians overall see a lower life expectancy and an infant mortality rate three times the national average.
These inequities in health connect to a widespread devaluing of Afro-Colombian lives, exacerbated by poverty, the armed conflict, displacement, and access to government services. While Afro-Colombians represent a quarter of the population, they make up almost 80% of those living in poverty. More than 30% of Afro-Colombians have no water and sanitation services. The Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) argues these statistics can be attributed in part to disparities in land access. WOLA’s 2015 report on Afro-Colombians also found that many Black workers were regularly exploited for their labour, and ESMAD’s efforts to negotiate labour disputes have ended in violence wreaked upon those same exploited workers. “Colombia is officially a plural-ethnic country, but it is not treated that way,” wrote the authors.
Afro-Colombians remain invisible
Colombia is home to the second-largest Black population in Latin America, but Afro-Colombians remain largely invisible in media, politics, and other positions of power. Only recently has “Afro-Colombian” been seen as a political and racial category; in 1993, when Afro-Colombian was introduced into the census, only 1.5% of the population checked its box. The United Nations reports that many Afro-Colombians historically identify with their geographical community, making political organisation difficult.
The lack of Afro-Colombian recognition continues in even leftist social movements. On June 15, more bogotanos returned to the streets. These protests, which made their way to El Centro, had #BlackLivesMatter wrapped up in a large list of demands. Some called for better government support for families and individuals barely making it through the pandemic’s economic consequences. Others repeated demands to end corruption at the national level, echoing calls seen during the paro nacional. But groups of protesters, including members of Proceso de Comunidades Negras (PCN) and Matamba, a Black feminist organization, maintained their focus on Black lives, demanding justice for Anderson and other Afro-Colombians. Like previous marches pre-pandemic, many denounced ESMAD and local police’s violent responses. Photographers captured a gang of neon yellow-clad police officers kicking and surrounding a young person on the ground. Government forces launched tear gas and detained several on the streets.
Mayor Claudia López condemned the actions of protesters for violating strict quarantine rules. “It’s evident that those who called these protests in the middle of a pandemic have more interest in destabilising health and democracy and protecting it.” Right-wing US officials have cast similar critiques on Black Lives Matter protests; US-based protesters have responded with signs reading, “We are risking our lives because our lives are at risk.”
The question remains as to whether or not future anti-government, anti-brutality movements in Colombia will centre Black lives. Already, the June 15 marches saw many protesters launch a race-neutral attack on the government, failing to name disproportionate effects of violence on Afro-Colombian communities. At its core, the Black Lives movement in Colombia questions the nation’s self-conception through a homogenous, mestizo, multicultural identity. As protesters and Afro-Colombian scholars alike have noted, ignoring race and ignoring Blackness allows violence against Afro-Colombians to continue unchecked by both the political left and right.
Smoking Molly, Carlos Reyes and La Pole Artesanal want to help keep the city’s music scene afloat with tonight’s livestream.
The past three months have been dominated by duel health and economic fears. The lockdown restrictions have left many people unable to work temporarily, while others have lost their jobs completely.
Unsurprisingly, hotels, restaurants, bars and clubs – which still may not be able to open for some time to come – have been hard hit. While home deliveries make up for some restaurant trade and we’ve heard of a couple of tiendas starting to serve beers on the street, it’s not easy for venues like Smoking Molly, a blues, rock and jazz bar/restaurant in the Macarena to domicilio that live music vibe.
It’s not only the bars and clubs themselves that suffer, it’s also those who supply them. How many of the city’s fledgling craft breweries will still be here when we reopen? And how many artists, musicians and chefs have now joined the ranks of the unemployed?
That’s why it was great to hear from Smoking Molly boss Santiago Zuluaga about a virtual Johnny Cash tribute tonight at 8pm. It won’t be led by a boy named Sue, but by a man named Carlos Reyes. Reyes is a bogotano musician who often graces the Smoking Molly stage and we can expect a great mix of arrangements.
“Our business and our industry have taken a really hard blow, especially the artists,” Zuluaga said. “So we’ve been having conversations about how we can keep the scene going and the wheels going.”
He thinks it’s really important to keep the creative momentum. “Right now we’re having a bad time, but we’re partnering up with the venues, the music entrepreneurs and the artists to produce these types of things.”
Tonight’s broadcast is a collaboration between craft beer makers La Pole Artesanal, Carlos Reyes and Smoking Molly.
Reyes speaks of the necessity using broadcasts like this to keep the community together. “Although it is necessary to migrate to the digital world through these broadcasts, we must not forget that the live scene is something that we built together during many years and constitutes the essence of this community.”
So if you’re up for a bit of Folsom lockdown blues, log in tonight at 8pm and hear Johnny Cash all over again.
There’s a clear discrepancy between what is officially allowed and what is actually happening in Bogotá at the moment.
Police aren’t enforcing the quarantine rules in Bogotá. Photo: Bogotá.gov
Pico y cédula is here at last! After so long waiting to catch up with more innovative areas of the country, rolos can finally start worrying about ID. It’s more welcome than the disastrous attempt to implement pico y género, not least because it’s not going to be enforced. Yes, you read that right. It’s not being enforced by the police, but rather left to shopkeepers and security guards to check.
This immediately begs the question: Why? Kind-hearted souls might say that it’s because López wants to avoid the pico y género scenes of trans people being harassed by coppers. In reality, it’s likely much more worrying: The police are not following López’ orders, or at least being openly selective about which they follow.
Claudia López says you can’t exercise after 10am, but there are plenty of people doing exercise in the parque nacional daily, often just yards from the police and park authorities alike. Farcically, this weekend saw alcaldía officials bellowing that tapabocas were obligatory as streams of runners and cyclists sped past without. They proclaimed the 10 o’clock limit even as people were passing them at near midday.
Tennis players are playing on the supposedly closed courts – they tell me with assent from the parkies. Again, it feels like there’s an unwritten code being followed – the authorities step in at times, but rarely obviously following the official regulations. Small tiendas are not asking for cédula numbers, nor are the police bothered about it. In reality, this is no pico y cédula, just a token block on people entering some places like banks and supermarkets. #quedateencasa, but if you go out we won’t do anything. A warning with no teeth and with such little enforcement, is it any wonder that people are ignoring the rules?
Of course, the unanswered question here is: Who’s making those rules? Are the police acting independently, or do they have an unofficial nod from somewhere? If the latter, does that come from the Palacio Liévano or Nariño? Without knowing what the rules actually are, everyone is in a difficult position. Unwritten rules are hard to read.
We hear that bars are looking to be opening in August, according to the mayor’s office, but they’re already open here, not clandestinely but clearly. This follows the trend so far established in earlier weeks. Ferreterías and papelerías opened in my zone long before official permission. Well, I say before official permission, but there’s obviously permission from the police, just as I was having a fine Imperial Stout in clear view of a CAI on Saturday. It seems that the decretos of the politicians are not the most important rule.
It’s no bad thing, in my eyes. Watching what the people will accept and adapting to that seems like a fair, democratic model that strikes a balance between allowing people to go about their business and avoiding a heavy outbreak of coronavirus.
After all, the two extreme positions are both unmanageable. Zero restrictions would mean an overwhelming of services that would lead to a massive death toll. On the other hand, completely shutting everything down would make life untenable for many. The absurdity of those two extremes forces us to consider a balance between them – call it intelligent isolation, call it gradual opening, call it plan acordeón if you like.
It’s about deciding where to draw the line, basically, and following public will isn’t a bad way to do it. And so far, it’s been successful. Bogotá has had deaths, there are plenty of cases – and they are increasing. But we’re far from a Guayaquil or Manaus at time of writing, and the hit to Colombia’s GDP projection is bad, but better than other countries. There’s also been relatively little social unrest, given the impact this has had on the lives of millions.
What is worrying is the implication that the police are ignoring the mayor’s office, and that this is happening so openly. Worse yet, it’s not clear exactly what rules are being applied, or why. At the moment, we’re all still fumbling in the dark and that’s not helpful for anyone. It might be a good idea to follow public will, but that needs clarifying so we all know where we stand.
Countries around the world are grappling with the technological and privacy issues generated by coronavirus tracking applications – and Colombia’s CoronApp is unlikely to win any prizes.
The CoronApp is available on all devices.
It’s been a bumpy ride for Colombia’s CoronApp. Launched on March 7, the mobile application was initially meant to allow the government to track COVID-19 outbreaks, as well as educating the public on the virus. But it’s faced a number of false starts and criticism from public watchdogs around its data policies. Here’s what you need to know.
The state messaging was coming from seemingly everywhere: “Download CoronApp, save lives.” It found us through television broadcasts, interruptions on YouTube, graphics on social media. Bogotá musician Juan Camilo Ruiz Gonzalez, 23, first heard it on his own cell phone soon after the lockdown began in March. But like 40 million other residents of Colombia, he has not downloaded the app. For many, it may be a matter of access. But for Gonzalez it’s a question of trust. “The truth is I never trusted this type of government app, because I feel they have other intentions apart from what they stipulate, and the terms and conditions always end up being vague,” he said.
In a large marketing campaign through April, Colombians were promised that using the CoronApp would help the government build an accurate map of the behaviour of coronavirus in the country. Colombian president Ivan Duque told the public that by downloading the app, the government would be able to “geo-reference and follow-up” cases of COVID-19.
Three months after the app’s launch, and the software has been plagued with issues. The public is confused about what CoronApp actually does. As of today, it is unclear whether the government is able to either geo-reference or follow-up cases of coronavirus. And now Colombian tech leaders are saying the app was poorly thought out and developed on the fly without proper privacy protections for its citizens.
Who created the CoronApp?
CoronApp has roots in an app designed by the National Institute of Health ahead of Pope Francis’ visit to Colombia in 2017. Fearing an illness outbreak caused by the high numbers who gathered to pay respects to the pope, the institute developed ‘Health Guardians’ for people to report if they felt ill.
Fast-forward three years and Colombia, in the midst of a pandemic, quickly reinvents the Health Guardians’ source code with four clear goals: educate the public about coronavirus, offer a self-diagnosis test, provide a QR code mobility passport and implement a digital contact tracking system. According to El Espectador, as of June 7, the National Digital Agency had invested COP$510,318,794 in the development and maintenance of the application. The agency did not respond to The Bogotá Post’s question about how much it has spent on marketing and promotion of the app.
Log onto CoronApp today and — after accepting the terms and conditions — you’ll be able to access the latest government messaging and information on COVID-19. Users are also asked to enter their names, ages, identification numbers, symptoms, prior medical history and previous movements, as well as providing the app access to track their location through bluetooth.
Nobody argues that the educational aspect of the app is important. Victor Cortés, CEO and co-founder of technology website Contxto, says every citizen should have this information easily available to them. “Misinformation or the lack of information is definitely an important factor for increasing not only contagions but deaths worldwide. In a region where education is a luxury, such as Latin America, many people ignore or are sceptical about the potential harm of the virus — or even question its existence. So, in that respect, I do believe it is fulfilling its goal.”
However, the contact tracking aspect, which was meant to give both users and the government geo-located information about where the virus was spreading, has not lived up to its promise.
Contact tracing fail?
The initial idea of the app was that users would self-report if they weren’t feeling well, along with their symptoms. CoronApp would exchange bluetooth signals with nearby phones that run the same application. With that data provided en masse, the government would be able to build a map that showed — and potentially stemmed — outbreaks in certain areas. “By collecting the data of your symptoms we can locate the sources of contagion, help stop the virus and save lives,” the app says.
But there were problems. First of all, any sort of worthwhile tracking requires the buy-in of a large proportion of the population. Only 9.6 million of the population of 50 million have downloaded the app, as of June 7, of which 5.8 million are active users, according to El Espectador.
And barriers lie in Colombia’s internet penetration. According to the latest MinTic report, only 61.3 % of the population has mobile Internet access. “Access to the internet is still a latent problem in Colombia,” Cortés says. Compared to Chile’s 82% and Argentina’s 93%, Colombia is still lagging behind its regional peers, he said. While 72% of the population own a smartphone — a trackable device — if a large proportion of the population can’t be tracked due to connectivity issues, that raises concerns about the effectiveness of the app.
Plus, there’s always a degree of uncertainty surrounding the validity of crowdsourced data. And bluetooth may throw up ‘false positives’ from people who may live in the same building but have no contact. To date, it does not appear that the government has been able to use the contact tracing feature in any way. El Espectador reports that the INS is using the CoronApp bluetooth functionality to track down contacts that a COVID-19 confirmed person may have had.
If a person is exposed to a high risk of COVID-19 or has severe symptoms, they should be notified through the application and asked to activate a button called “Commuter history”, which is disabled by default. However, whether they activate it is their choice — another barrier to effective contact tracing.
The app has gone through a number of iterations since launch using different models, and different partners. But public watchdogs warn that each iteration comes with a varying degree of data security that the public needs to know about.
Data insecurity
After the tide of advertising pushing users to download CoronApp came the backlash from public watchdogs analysing the government’s data policies. According to analytics company Cifras & Conceptos, the imprecise wording of CoronApp’s terms and conditions could allow any authority to request the data held by the app.
It points out that any use of technology needs to respect citizen data so as not to open the door to abusive surveillance systems. “Are we willing to give our sensitive data to the government to make the fight against coronavirus more effective?” it asks. The organisation notes that the pandemic could normalise the use of mass surveillance instruments like government access to geolocation and bluetooth signals from citizens’ cell phones — where we’ve been and who we’ve interacted with.
For Gonzalez, it’s hard to see any benefit to giving the government his data. “I understand that they are trying to control people so that they do not leave home when they have symptoms, but the truth is that I don’t see any positive reason in my life to use it. I have no guarantee that they will help me, and that lack of transparency in their policy security gives me zero desire to enroll. Instead, he fears that his sensitive information could be given away, or even sold on.
The government’s access to the population data has pros and cons, Cortés says. On one side, he can see the advantage of understanding the danger zones with accuracy, so real and effective countermeasures can be implemented. “Yet the fact that security of the data doesn’t seem to be a priority for the app developers/government (either deliberately or by negligence), sends a clear message to the population.”
Cortés points out that we’ve seen a couple of huge data breaches in the past years from Latin American governments including Mexico, Ecuador, and Brazil. “If security isn’t a top priority for governments, it should be left to the citizens to decide whether they’re willing to risk their data (though most of them never actually stop and ponder that).”
The questioning is not limited to Colombia. All over the world — from Israel to Singapore and Australia to South Korea — governments are developing technology-based solutions to the pandemic and citizens are questioning what they are giving away for public safety. In China, the government is fighting the pandemic with a QR code, a feature in the CoronApp that has been a recent source of controversy in Colombia.
So, do I have to download the CoronApp?
While CoronApp is not currently mandatory, as the country begins to reopen, some municipalities are saying that citizens will only be able to move around if they install it. The app includes a feature that allows a 24-hour mobility QR code ‘passport’ to be generated for those reporting no symptoms and no contact with those at risk of COVID-19.
In Bogotá, an order that would have cops to give those without CoronApp authorisation a COP$1 million fine was quickly repealed after it was met with a fiery backlash over data insecurity two weeks ago. However, in Medellin, authorities are piloting a system that requires shoppers to download and use CoronApp in three malls.
It remains to be seen whether CoronApp becomes a failed experiment, or a useful tool in the fight against the pandemic. What is clear is that the government has a long way to go before it can convince enough people to use the app. Whether it achieves this by gaining the public’s trust, or by forcing them to use it, remains to be seen.
Millions of Colombians are struggling to put food on the table and keep roofs over their heads. Government aid initiatives are reaching some – but not all – of those in need.
Food packages are being handed out by the government, but not everybody in need has had access to the much needed aids. Photo: Alcaldía de Bogotá
It has been almost three months since the Colombian government declared a national lockdown in an attempt to curb the spread of COVID-19. Some white-collar workers were able to transition into remote work, but much of the population suddenly found itself with no source of income.
Restaurants, bars and tourism have been hardest hit, but for workers, it is the informal sector — from street vendors to domestic workers and anyone without a contract — who have suffered most. Not to mention the homeless, displaced and migrant communities.
Unemployment, which has skyrocketed since the lockdown, has reached 23% in Colombia’s 13 major metropolitan areas. There are programs in place and the government has promised help in terms of food, money, and tax rebates, but it seems that the aid is not reaching the 30 million Colombians nationwide who are considered economically vulnerable.
Ingreso Solidario
Like many countries, Colombia has set up a system of subsidies for those who are worst off. However – and perhaps unsurprisingly given the scale of the problem – distributing aid has not been straightforward.
Announced in April, the Ingreso Solidario aims to give over 3 million families three payments of COP$160,000, a total of COP$480,000 per family. The idea is to reach people who are not covered by existing programs such as Familias en Acción, Protección Social al Adulto Mayor, and Jóvenes en Acción.
The first payment was announced and released in mid-April, the second on May 21, and the third will be made available in mid-June. To date, over 2.4 million families have benefitted. The government cross-referenced databases from various ministries, including the Sisben (Colombia’s public healthcare system), the Health Ministry, the Housing Ministry, and the Ministry of Labour to identify families who live in extreme poverty.
There have been a host of database anomalies, from mismatched names and ID numbers to benefits for people who are dead or nonexistent. Another challenge has been ensuring people who may not have access to the internet and may not have bank accounts can claim their cash. None of the people we interviewed had received the benefits.
Given the lockdown will soon enter its third month, COP$480,000 is a little over half the monthly minimum salary of COP$877,803 and comes to about COP$5,000 per day.
Are people receiving the help they need?
Fredy Laguna Urquijo, a bus driver in Soacha, lost his job in February just before the pandemic hit. Then, as lockdown began, his situation worsened. In nearly three months, Laguna says he and his wife have only received two small forms of official aid. First, the city of Soacha gave the family one payment of COP$50,000 in early April. A few weeks later, the city’s relief initiative, Ayudas Soacha, granted them one grocery bundle. They have not received any other aid since.
According to Laguna, the city of Soacha recently launched an additional food relief program that involves the distribution of groceries via neighbourhood councils. He shared the local rumours that the president of the neighbourhood council has only given the groceries to those in his inner circle. This has left Laguna with no additional relief, scrambling for alternatives as he may have to move out of his home now that he can no longer pay rent.
“Truly, the help the government is offering… the President says that this week we’re going to hand out vouchers of this much or that much…but in the end, we don’t see those vouchers anywhere,” Laguna said.
Private initiatives also appear in several places. Photo: Emilse Cruz Villada.
Confusion around registration and eligibility abound, though the government has tried to curb it. There’s additional information online and detailed descriptions of how families can access the funds, plus alternative payment systems such as Movii, Daviplata or Nequi for those who do not have bank accounts.
Another Soacha resident Mario Abril Cruz, an independent construction worker who has slowly been able to return to work, had a similar story to tell.
“I’m not sure what the requirements for the Ingreso Solidario are but I think most people would say that some really needy people have not received this kind of aid. And on the other hand, some people with a higher quality of life have received some kind of aid. I have the sense that the government’s databases are outdated,” Abril said.
There are other programmes in place, including expanding Familias en Acción which offers support to families with children under the age of seven and departmental and city programmes like Bogotá Solidaria en Casa and Ayudas Soacha. The government has set up IVA or VAT refunds and postponed the deadline for income tax filing through December in an effort to offer businesses some temporary relief.
In an effort to reduce layoffs, the government will subsidise workers’ salaries with 40% of the national minimum wage if the company they work for has lost at least 20% of its business since the lockdown. As of May 25, about 663,000 people have registered for emergency unemployment benefits.
Is there more aid on the way?
After the sanitary emergency was extended through the end of August, a group of senators proposed a much wider initiative that would expand the reach and impact of the Ingreso Solidario programme. The proposed Renta Básica de Emergencia, or Emergency Basic Income would give over 9 million Colombians three monthly minimum wage payments.
The proposal would benefit households outside of the formal economy, including those who operate micro-businesses or identify as independent workers. And unlike Ingreso Solidario, it does not exclude those who are already receiving other government aid.
The estimated cost of the fund would come to COP$20 trillion, or 2% of GDP, which opponents argue is too costly, especially in light of the economic hit that the country has taken during the pandemic.
The legislation is currently in a third committee in the Senate and the whole process could be put on pause due to the scheduled closing of the congressional session. Semana opined that though the measure is unlikely to pass, it has been successful in sparking an important conversation in the national fight against poverty.
In the meantime, Abril and Laguna are hopeful that the situation will eventually improve. And many other vulnerable Colombian families who count on their daily earnings to make ends meet will need to rely on a hotchpotch of national, local and NGO assistance.
Despite local and international warnings about the spread of coronavirus among vulnerable prison populations, Colombia has seen brutal outbreaks of the virus in at least nine of its detention facilities.
As parts of Colombia enter phase two of quarantine and the country begins to open up, the virus is still raging in its prisons. Massive overcrowding and inadequate sanitation have made it difficult to control the spread of COVID-19. These conditions are nothing new, but the virus is exacerbating them yet further. Colombian senator and human rights activist Iván Cepeda recently described the situation as a “humanitarian catastrophe” in an online discussion.
In early April, Human Rights Watch issued a call for Latin American prisons to “act immediately to avoid an entirely foreseeable health disaster.” It called out Colombia in particular, where on March 21, 23 inmates were killed and 83 were injured in La Modelo prison in Bogotá after prison populations across the country organised protests of unsanitary conditions, overcrowding and lack of access to water and COVID-19 protection.
Two days after the riots the government issued an emergency decree to allow the country’s prison authority, Inpec, to isolate or transfer the prisoners, make budget transfers and speed up the contract process. It did not allow for the speedy release of prisoners, nor did it make provisions for the many who are being held pre-trial.
Local lawyers, educators and politicians slammed the decree as too little, too late. “COVID-19 doesn’t wait, it requires action now,” said lawyer Yani Vallejo, a specialist in criminal procedural law. Speaking at a Facebook Live titled Prison Genocide in Colombia at the end of April, Vallejo said the decree was effectively useless. Indeed, since the decree was issued, the number of infected prisoners has risen dramatically. At Villavicencio prison, at least 878 inmates have tested positive for the virus — almost half of the prison’s residents.
Cepeda agreed that the decree didn’t provide a resolution for vulnerable prison populations. “Villavicencio is the blueprint of what is going to happen in the country,” he said.
Detainees being held at police stations who were still technically innocent should have been released to their homes, lawyer and criminal law lecturer Diana Restrepo said. “Throughout Colombia, families have been separated by quarantine. Imagine what it would be like to be the family of those in prison,” she said.
According to Andrew Coyle, Emeritus Professor of Prison Studies at King’s College London, up to 60% of people being held in Latin American prisons are awaiting trial and have not been convicted. That’s why activists were calling for their temporary release at the start of the outbreak. It would have both reduced overcrowding and reduced the risk for those individuals.
Overcrowded and inhumane
According to the World Prison Brief, Colombian prisons are more than 45% overcrowded. The official capacity of the prison system is 80,928, however as of April 30 the prison population was at 118,079. Little has changed since this 2015 piece was written.
El Tiempovisited the hardest-hit Villavicencio prison in Meta in early May — when the number of confirmed cases in the prison was just 421 — and described serious overcrowding. It said the prison was holding 1,773 inmates and 185 staff, despite the fact it was only built for 874 people. There, it described grim conditions in Cell Eight, the epicentre for the virus in the prison.
“This cell is a succession of gloomy bedrooms, with no doors and little ventilation,” the newspaper reported. Eight prisoners were sleeping in rooms built for four, and up to 18 slept in poorly-ventilated rooms built for 10. Newer inmates were forced to find room to sleep on the floor, in the halls or the bathrooms.
As of June 2, the prison had 878 confirmed cases of COVID-19, Meta governor Juan Guillermo Zuluaga tweeted. This represents more than 45% of the prison’s reported population. At least three inmates have died after contracting the virus in the prison, El Tiemporeports.
Buenas tardes, hoy recibimos 50 pruebas negativas y 1 positiva de #Covid_19 para el Meta, que corresponde a la ciudad de #Villavicencio. Además, reportamos una persona en hospitalización general en todo nuestro Dpto. Por favor no bajemos la guardia y sigamos cuidándonos. pic.twitter.com/9fpEipMYAT
— Juan Guillermo Zuluaga (@JuanGZuluaga) June 2, 2020
While the prison has had no new cases since May 21, Villavicencio mayor Felipe Harman wants more tests. Today he tweeted, “I urge the INS to take second samples, at least random ones, to be sure of the contagion situation in Villavicencio prison.”
En la ciencia no se decretan resultados. Insto al @INSColombia que determine segundas muestras, al menos, aleatorias para verificar situación de contagio en la cárcel de Villavicencio.
Esta situación debe manejarse con mayor sentido de responsibilidad.
Many have taken to the Meta governor’s Facebook page to express their frustration and concern. Gloria Guerrero said she had family members in the prison and begged the governor to “please do something.” However others feared that now the prisoners had been exposed, it would be unsafe to release even low-risk offenders back to their homes, as they may carry the virus. “They did nothing in the prison and let everyone catch it,” Nancy Daza said, adding that releasing prisoners now would be “chaotic” for Villavicencio.
Others raged that the government hadn’t acted sooner, despite warnings from local and international bodies. Nubia Mondragon wrote that the government was warned of what was happening but ignored it. “Today it’s just meetings and meetings and nothing – just words.”
Outbreaks throughout the country’s prisons
Other prisons around the country have also been hit with the virus, many of them due to infected prisoners being transferred from Villavicencio. This week saw another 86 confirmed cases in Cartagena’s Ternera prison, taking the total to 241. This represents about 10% of the current 2,385 inmates.
Further south on the border with Brazil, 143 out of 183 inmates had tested positive for coronavirus at the Leticia prison as of May 20. This represents 78% of the prison population there. A guard initially tested positive for the virus on April 24 after returning from Brazil, El Espectadorreported. Over the following weeks, the number of infected people has shot up in the prison, with at least one death.
Bogotá lockdown extended until June 15. Photo: Rainier Latchu
Bogotá mayor Claudia López confirms the capital will not lift its isolation measures at the end of this month.
With just days to go until the latest expected end to quarantine, Bogotá mayor Claudia López has announced the capital will continue the current lockdown until June 15.
Last night, President Iván Duque gave the country more details on what phase two will look like, including allowing children, young people and the over seventies to go out at certain times.
He also set out how the nation’s professional sports activities will restart. As long as they comply with health protocols, 17 individual sports disciplines will be able to restart. Individual football training can resume on June 8 and if things go well, the league could be re-activated in August behind closed doors.
What Duque did not elaborate on was the health minister’s earlier comments that the lockdown would continue in certain cities – including Bogotá. Today López confirmed this, tweeting a letter from the country’s health minister.
The letter confirms that, following discussion between the ministry and the mayor, the current mandatory lockdown in Bogotá will continue until June 15 without any additional openings. Bogotá entered quarantine on March 20, a few days earlier than the rest of the country meaning that by mid-June the city will have been shut down for almost 90 days.
There will be increased screening and health surveillance, and we can expect to see more text messages and online adverts encouraging us to use the Coronapp. The idea is that the app will help authorities to track and trace outbreaks of the virus.
Corabastos market, already the focus of media attention after reports that marketholders were charging for handwashing facilities, will come under even more intense scrutiny. Health surveillance in the market and the surrounding area will be increased.
Details announced on how Colombia’s phase two of quarantine will work amidst rumours that hotspots will remain locked down.
An update on the confirmed coronavirus cases in Colombia. Data source: INS
President Iván Duque gave more detail last night about how the second phase of the quarantine will work, but a number of questions remain unanswered.
The main one on the lips of many bogotanos is: Are the local rules going to end on May 31 or will the current measures in the capital continue into June? The Health Minister, Fernando Ruiz Gómez, told Blu Radio yesterday afternoon that in the case of cities – Cartagena, Cali, Barranquilla, Bogotá, Tumaco, Buenaventura and Leticia – with a lot of confirmed cases, the lockdown may continue until at least mid June.
Before we have a look at what’s happening in those cities, here’s a quick recap of what we know about phase two.
Healthy adults who are under 70 are allowed to exercise for two hours a day, beginning on June 1.
Local authorities will need to define times for more vulnerable members of society to go out:
Children aged between 2 and 5 will be able to go outside three times a week for 30 minutes a day, while young people aged 6 to 17 can go out three times a week for an hour.
The over 70s and those with conditions such as diabetes, obesity or heart problems can go outside three times a week for 30 minutes each day.
Duque was adamant that relaxing the quarantine did not mean social activity could restart. “We are recovering a more productive life, but I want to be emphatic that we are not reviving social life or much social interaction,” he said.
Schools, universities and nurseries will not reopen. Neither will bars, restaurants or clubs. Restaurants will continue to operate delivery services, but we won’t see the socially-distanced dining that is picking up in Europe.
The idea is to have as much remote work as possible. The government would like to see 80% of people working from home.
Intercity transport will not restart in June and the country’s borders will remain shut, except for the humanitarian flights that have been operating for stranded tourists and Colombians alike.
Face masks continue to be obligatory in public spaces.
The Ministry of the Interior has already intervened in Cartagena and Leticia, which suggests we’ll see more targeted shutdowns in phase two – allowing parts of the country to open up, while restricting activity in areas where there are a lot of cases.
Coronavirus in Colombia per department. Data source: INSCoronavirus in Colombia per city. Data Source: INS
What’s going on in Bogotá?
As of today, there are 8,045 confirmed coronavirus cases in Bogotá. Over a quarter of the cases (2,090) are in Kennedy and a further 774 are in Suba, which explains the locations of many of the orange zones.
While Bogotá does have the highest number of cases, it also has more medical facilities than many parts of the country. Bogotá’s department of health announced on May 26 that 42% of the capital’s 668 COVID-19 ICU beds are occupied. The district secretary of health warned that if this figure hits 50%, the health alert level will be raised from yellow to orange. And if it reaches 70%, the city will reintroduce severe quarantine measures.
With 280 ICU units in use for COVID-19 patients, that means the city will move to orange alert if another 54 spaces are taken. And if 188 more ICU spots are needed, the city will need to go into lockdown again.
We know from those who are out on the streets that people are already starting to return to their normal lives, raising the question of how – and whether – any additional controls would be implemented. And of course, the ongoing question over how long businesses and workers can survive if their activities continue to be restricted.
What about Cartagena?
After Bogotá, Cartagena has the second highest number of deaths in the country. So far there are 2,342 confirmed cases in Cartagena and 114 people have died. Given its popularity as a tourist destination, it is not so surprising the city has been hard hit. But what tourists often forget about the charming tourist city is that it also has one of the highest poverty rates of the country.
Cartagena’s pico y cédula measures which began on May 11 have been extended until the end of the month. Cartageneros are allowed out between 6am and 4pm only on the day that corresponds to the last digit of their ID card – cédulas for most and passports for foreigners without cédulas. For example, today (May 28), only people whose ID ends in a 4 or 5 are allowed out to do the essentials such as shopping or banking. There are some reports that the quarantine may be extended further – even after the rest of the country enters phase two.
The challenge is that these severe measures are not being adhered to, as evidenced by the fact that the police shut down 600 illegal parties during the holiday weekend.
— BG. Henry Sanabria Cely (@PoliciaCtagena) May 26, 2020
With cases skyrocketing and internal political squabbles causing the resignation of two key officials, the Ministry of the Interior has stepped in, closing six parts of the city completely (Nelson Mandela, Olaya Herrera, Pozón, La Esperanza, San Fernando and La María). There will be increased health measures and increased police and armed force presence throughout the city, especially in those coronavirus hotspots.
Those are all barrios with high poverty rates. According to a report released in 2017, 75% of Cartagena’s poverty is focused in 40 barrios – where 78% of people live in extreme poverty and 80% don’t have access to running water.
And Amazonas?
We will be writing more about the Amazonas in the coming days. As we reported at the start of May, the region has been badly hit by the virus.
With only 49,000 inhabitants, the department has more cases per million people than anywhere else in the country, by a long way. The Amazonas has 702 deaths and 21,608 cases per million people. The next on the list is Cartagena with 125 deaths per million and 2,561 cases.
Source: INS
Its porous border with Brazil, where the virus is rampant, has left the region vulnerable — and limited healthcare facilities have compounded the problem. On May 14, the Ministry of the Interior announced it would shut down the whole region until May 30.
Health minister, Fernando Ruiz Gómez, visited the region on May 3 and on May 22 a team of 22 medical volunteers arrived to assist the already understaffed medical facilities. The sharp rise in the numbers of deaths has lead the Minister of Environment to consider building a crematorium in Leticia.
Residents, however, have accused the government of failing to meet their needs. In an open letter “from the population of the Amazonas to the Colombian public” says that, for example, only 375 of the promised 500,000 face masks have arrived and only one thermometer.
Conocí esta carta abierta de habitantes del Amazonas a los colombianos. Hay denuncias incomprensibles y deja una cruda sensación de impotencia ante la gestión del Gobierno. #Recomendada@MinSaludCol
Recicladores and rubbish collectors are on the frontline too.
The informal recyclers who depend on waste for their livelihoods are at a high risk of infection. Photos: Vishwas Vidyaranya
Colombia generates approximately 11.6 million tonnes of municipal solid waste annually which is equivalent to 31,700 tonnes per day. The majority of this waste ends up in landfill sites, due to the absence of waste processing plants in most of the municipalities. The operations and management of landfill facilities and end disposal sites have often been controversial in the country.
The infamous landfill of Doña Juana in Bogotá receives over 6,900 tonnes of waste daily and had a major slope failure in the last week of April, right in the middle of the health emergency. This resulted in a spillage of over 60,000 tonnes of waste causing an environmental and health risk to the neighbourhoods in the south of the city.
The average recycling rate in the country, however, is about 17%, thanks to the informal recyclers who make the biggest contribution to this.
The current COVID-19 pandemic has put health and sanitation workers on the frontline because waste management is a critical service. The informal recyclers who depend on waste for their livelihoods are at a high risk of infection. Several studies have indicated that the virus can stay on surfaces for several days which makes the job of waste collection more challenging in these times.
Recyclers at risk
The collection of ordinary waste is mostly carried out by licensed operators who have adequate protective gear and training. Recyclables, on the other hand, are dealt with manually by the informal sector who often lack such protective equipment or training. This, along with the social and economic hardships, has made them highly vulnerable.
The government has declared a state of emergency due to the pandemic and the ministries have passed legislation and guidelines for managing waste collection, transportation, and final disposal.
Hazardous waste, hospital waste and waste collected from houses of COVID-19 patients have separate collection systems and disposal systems. Such wastes are considered biohazards and need to be incinerated.
The government has also prohibited recyclers from opening the black bag household waste under any circumstance to prevent and mitigate infections. This is often ignored, meaning the risk to recyclers from the informal sector who manually collect the recyclables is still high and depends a lot on waste management practices by citizens.
The waste management situation in the country has had its deficiencies even under normal conditions and the pandemic has only pushed it further. In several small towns and municipalities, there is a lack of sanitary end disposal systems and incinerators and hence management of municipal and hazardous waste, especially, is challenging.
While the system faces its own challenges, it is also important for citizens to do their bit and ensure that the front-line waste workers are not at risk due to our mismanagement. Here are some things we can do to ensure the system and more importantly, ensure the recyclers are not at risk:
Separate your waste and dispose of it separately:
Black bag for ordinary waste (food scraps, multi-layered packaging, coffee grounds, soiled plastic and paper packaging from food delivery, etc.)
White bag for recyclables (Plastic and glass bottles, clean paper, metal cans, etc.). Remember that recyclable materials must be clean and dry.
Store your recycling bags for a longer duration before disposal. The virus can stay on surfaces for up to 3 days or more and hence waiting will reduce the risk of infection to the recyclers.
All PPE such as masks, gloves, etc. should be placed in a plastic bag, which in turn, must be placed inside the Black bag and disinfected with alcohol before disposal.
Let us do our bit and ensure that the people who are putting themselves at risk and keeping our cities safe and clean are not put at risk due to our waste management practices at homes. You can also support them additionally by donating PPEs such as masks, cut-resistant gloves, and disinfectant products to your local recyclers.
Refer to the International Solid Waste Management’s guidelines for further recommendations if needed.
Authors:
Diana Mazorca is a waste management professional working with the authority for public services (Superintendencia de Servicios Públicos).
Vishwas Vidyaranya is the Technical Director of VIC SAS, Bogotá. He is a sustainability expert with over a decade of international experience in water and waste management systems.
Diana and Vishwas are also members of the International Solid Waste Association and its Young Professionals Group in Colombia.
Although many are working from home, some people have been working throughout the emergency. We spoke to a bicycle messenger, a key worker on the frontlines of the COVID response.
The bicycle messenger saw its business thrive during the lockdown. Photo: Rocket Couriers
One of the most distinctive sights throughout this seemingly never-ending quarantine period has been cyclists suddenly appearing in great numbers. The rappitenderos are most visible, with their gaudy orange bags, but among this rag-tag bunch of casual workers there are still plenty of professional messengers still working.
One of these is Mateo Cabrera of Rocket Couriers, who is still maintaining essential logistical services throughout the lockdown. It wasn’t easy in the first days, due to confusion over the rules, but then demand rose quickly. “Various clients we work with sell cleaning products, and they started to get a lot of orders given the situation and we already knew that the decree allowed us to work, depending on what we transported. This boosted our work enormously, right up to today.”
Of course, the new rules have meant big changes. “The team is equipped with facemasks and we comply with all the biosecurity standards to keep both our messengers and our clients safe. We keep at least two metres distance at all times and spend as little time as possible making pickups and drops. Before handling any packages we apply antibacterial gel.”
Although you see Rappi bags in many parks around Bogotá as they wait for work, Mateo’s team are working only on pre-orders. “We can be sure that our messengers are in the street for the shortest time possible, especially because they can make the deliveries so much quicker now. We’re working only on orders that are placed the day before, so we can organise the routes and riders much better”
The rules have been changing recently, and that’s reflected in what Mateo sees in the streets. “The changes in the decrees are much more permissive now, so people are going out and returning to their normal daily activities. People are treating the rules much more lightly.” That’s not necessarily a positive thing, as he explains: “I think it’s exposing more people to the virus and the only thing that it’ll achieve is making the quarantine and isolation last for longer.”
As the regulations relax, so the cars return to the streets. “Every day the traffic gets a little worse, now the streets are at about 70% of what they’ve always been. We’re starting to see traffic jams and congestion again, especially near the 68, Boyacá and Séptima.” It’s clear from his words that we are not far off returning to the chaos of before.
For now, though, things are good for Rocket Couriers. “My business and I have had work, sometimes too much, and that means that we can be calm. We’re generating income and paying the bills without too much worry. I’m hopeful that people are starting to see the bicycle messenger as a good way of making deliveries because of our efficiency, speed and commitment. Thanks to this situation, at last we’re becoming more visible, which before was a bit complicated.” Given how many other small businesses have suffered, it’s good to hear a positive story.
He isn’t impressed by the government’s measures to contain the virus. “For my part I haven’t seen that the government is interested in the welfare of messengers, nor of the food delivery workers like Rappi or Uber Eats.” As he points out, they’re doing an important job. “As key workers, we’re the ones that have moved around the city important items like food, cleaning equipment, medicine etc. We’re ghosts in the streets; the people everyone needs but no-one acknowledges.”
Driving through the neighbourhoods in Usme, an Orange Volkswagon delivers one hundred brightly-coloured boxes labelled “Basic Groceries” to elderly residents. “I feel happy that you have kept us in mind, because there are many of us elderly folks, and aside from that we are also the heads of our households,” a woman on the video says, blinking away tears. “And we don’t have anyone to help us.” An elderly man pulls his face into a gap-toothed grin, saying, “Thank you. You are the type of people that Colombia needs.”
These aren’t just elderly folks: They are recyclers, workers who make their living from collecting and recycling waste throughout the city. During the nationwide lockdown, they have been confined to their homes and cannot make daily wages.
Marce la Recicladora “the Recycler” decided to help. A young YouTuber who frequently posts educational videos about recycling and upcyling in Bogotá, Marcela is the first “recycler” to go viral on social media. She’s coined the term “reciclamores” – a combination of the words “recycle” and “love” in Spanish – to refer to her recycling coworkers and anyone who consciously recycles their waste.
“We have listened to the needs of our reciclamores; almost all of them need basic groceries to get by during these days when they cannot leave to work,” Marce explains in a video on her YouTube channel, which holds over 28,000 subscribers. From these calls to action, a project called “Recycling Love” was born.
Recycling Love delivers essential groceries to elderly recyclers who have no income during the national health emergency generated by the pandemic. One month ago, Marce and her team delivered the first 100 packages to struggling recyclers in the northwest of Bogotá.
Now, they have a larger goal: Deliver 500 packages to elderly recyclers in need. And this time, they have the British Embassy to back them up.
“The Embassy works with a number of different good causes throughout the year, and on this occasion–actually by popular vote amongst our staff–we chose to work with Marce la Recicladora” explains the British Ambassador to Colombia Colin Martin-Reynolds CMG. “Not only is she an admirable campaigner, who has given a voice to this often-marginalised community, but she also promotes sustainability, which is a cornerstone of our work here in Colombia.”
The British Embassy has created the #UKCoRUNaThon, a running fundraiser in which proceeds will be donated to Marce the Recycler’s “Recyling Love” campaign. Participants can donate the suggested COP$50,000, roughly 10 pounds, or an amount of their choosing through the Embassy’s Vaki page. It has already received funding for 100 grocery packs, and is motivated to raise more money tomorrow.
So where does the jogging come in? Participants are asked to run for recyclers by jogging or walking one kilometre tomorrow, Friday, May 22. Whether from Colombia, the UK, or elsewhere around the world, all contributors are encouraged to upload photos or videos of their socially-distanced marathon in support of the Recycling Love project and raise awareness about the fundraiser.
As Martin-Reynolds explains: “With Colombia being our home – and Bogotá our home city – we wanted to start off by doing something to support vulnerable communities right here in the capital. And at the same time, we wanted to raise money by doing something fun whilst we are all in lockdown, something to bring us all together, albeit virtually – Brits in Colombia, Colombians, Colombiaphiles in the UK, the more the merrier!”
Grab your running shoes, put on a mask, and run one kilometre tomorrow in support of elderly recyclers – after you donate to the project of course. If running outside isn’t your cup of tea, you can take a page from Captain Tom Moore’s book and walk laps around your garden or apartment. Those who are averse to exercise are welcome to donate, as well – jogging isn’t compulsory to contribute to a deserving cause.
President Duque announces that Colombia’s quarantine will be extended until the end of the month and the country’s sanitary emergency will continue until the end of August.
One of the side-effects of the quarantine in Colombia is that animals have more space in the city. Photo: Brendan Corrigan
The hopes of many Colombians who’d wanted to return to work next week were dashed today when President Iván Duque announced another extension to the national quarantine. Colombia’s compulsory quarantine will now run until May 31 and the sanitary emergency will continue until August 31.
The president said that this would gain the authorities an additional week in which to implement “fundamental measures.” Duque says that the country will be able to enter a new stage of isolation in June, one which will require more “discipline and coordination.”
Some key points about the “gradual and responsible” process of reopening the country announced today:
Limitations on public transport will continue, operating at no more than 35% capacity.
The majority of schools, colleges and universities will be closed throughout June and July. At-home classes and study will continue until July 31. The ministries of health and education are working towards the safe opening of educational establishments in August.
Those who are older than 70 should continue to stay at home, but from June 1 there will be more possibilities to go out at certain times.
More spaces will be opened for children aged 1-5, but still under careful controls.
Domestic workers will be able to return to work.
Restaurants will continue to operate delivery services.
Different measures will be implemented in different cities or departments, depending on individual situations, managed with local authorities.
Face masks and social distancing measures will still apply.
Colombia’s borders will remain closed and both domestic and international flights will continue to be grounded until at least June 30. Intercity transport also continues to be prohibited.
The president stressed that those who don’t need to go out should continue to stay home, and where possible, to work from home. He said that, “Perhaps we will have one of the longest periods of mandatory preventive isolation in the world, but we have been doing it responsibly, gradually.”
Colombia now has 16,935 confirmed cases of coronavirus and 613 people have died of the virus which has changed our sense of normality across the world. Bogotá began its quarantine on March 20 and the whole country entered lockdown a few days later.
Some sectors have been gradually allowed to return to work, under strict protocols, but with such a large informal economy, many workers are struggling to put food on the table. This week saw new restrictions introduced in certain sectors of Bogotá where an ‘orange alert’ was declared and residents were told to stay at home.
Those who fear for the country’s economy will be unsurprised by a note today from Capital Economics that said Colombia’s downturn could be worse than feared. Citing double-digit falls in productivity in the retail, entertainment and industrial sectors, analyst Quinn Markwith wrote, “We are sceptical about the prospects of a speedy recovery later in the year even once the virus is under control.”
President Duque announced that the quarantine in Colombia will be extended until May 31. Photo: Presidencia.
As Colombia’s largest airline Avianca files for bankruptcy protection, we answer your questions about what it means.
Photo: Creative Commons
What happened to Avianca?
Avianca is the latest airline to cry mayday because of the financial impact of the novel coronavirus. With the majority of its flights grounded since mid March, Avianca says its revenue is down 80%. Even before the pandemic struck, the company was in a fragile state financially.
On May 10 the company released a press statement saying it had initiated voluntary reorganisation proceedings, filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in New York. “Avianca is facing the most challenging crisis in our 100-year history as we navigate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said CEO Anko van der Werff.
It is completely shutting down its operations in Peru and has already announced it will sell 14 of its 153 planes.
Avianca employs over 21,000 people in Latin America, 14,000 of whom are in Colombia. The company, which celebrated its 100th birthday last year, says it serves over 50% of the domestic market in Colombia.
Last year’s complex restructuring saw United Airlines and Kingsland Holdings agree to loans that totalled $375m and gave the company the cash it needed to continue operations.
The company missed a $66 million debt repayment over the weekend, and in a note downgrading its rating for the company, Fitch said it “will not pay the coupon payment of its senior secured bonds due 2023.”
So, are they actually bankrupt? What is Chapter 11 bankruptcy?
The word bankruptcy here is misleading because Avianca’s not throwing in the towel and selling its assets to cover its debts. What it’s doing is opening the way for a court-supervised reorganisation. The business can still continue to operate – and when restrictions ease, its flights will be able to take off.
Now it will need to negotiate with creditors and get the court to approve its plan on how to move forward. It passed the first hurdle on Tuesday when the court approved its initial proposals to preserve wages, continue flights and honour obligations to travel agencies.
“The Chapter 11 process is a responsible way for Avianca to protect and preserve the Company as we navigate the severe impact of COVID-19 on the airline and travel industries,” said van der Werff.
The next court date is June 11. Once it has agreed on the short term measures, the next step will be to hammer out a longer term plan with its stakeholders and creditors. If it can do this (as it did in 2003), a newly structured Avianca will emerge – with existing shareholders likely to be wiped out and creditors likely to take a severe hit to their loan terms.
What does that mean for my flights?
Right now, once the coronavirus restrictions are lifted, you should be able to fly as normal. Avianca even have a dedicated website to assure customers it will keep on flying: aviancawillkeeponflying.com
If you have a voucher with Avianca because of a cancelled flight, you should still be able to use it. Though you’d be forgiven for trying to use it sooner rather than later.
The airline also says that it will allow fee-free changes to any flights before October 31 and that its lounges and frequent flyer benefits will continue to operate.
Will the Colombian government help them out?
Avianca had been in talks with the government even before its Chapter 11 filing, and says those discussions continue. Avianca says it is in discussions with the government in Colombia and other key markets.
Given Avianca’s importance to Colombia’s air traffic – a key part of the country’s economy – analysts expect the government to step in to help the airline out. Some foreign governments have already provided bail-outs for airlines, with the USA’s $25bn rescue package of low cost loans and direct grants seeming particularly generous. Colombia does not have the same resources, and finance minister Alberto Carrasquilla says he does not want the government to take an ownership stake in the company, suggesting that aid will come in the form of loans – or loan guarantees.
If the government proceeds with financial aid, it would be acting in the face of substantial political and public opposition. Avianca’s holding company is domiciled in Colombia, it is mostly owned by international investors, and its four largest debt obligations are held by foreign investment funds and banks. Though public resources are being badly depleted by the pandemic and resulting recession, the government could decide that it needs its flagship carrier in working order as it seeks to reactivate the economy.
What about my LifeMiles?
LifeMiles is a seperate company, and is not part of the bankruptcy filing. You can continue to accrue miles and use them to book travel just as before. If you have Elite status, that status will be extended until January 2022.
LifeMiles, which is part of the Star Alliance frequent flyer program, has also stated it won’t expire any miles until the end of this year.
They’ve already been through trauma. Now COVID-19 is a ticking time bomb for Medellín’s most vulnerable.
“My friends, hello!” shouted a voice from the street. “Does anyone have any food to spare?”
“The local government hasn’t helped me. I really need your help,” a man walking the streets of Medellín shouted up to residents in their apartment blocks, begging for money.
Beatriz Ochoa, who is considering going to a homeless shelter. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
Hearing these desperate pleas for food and money has become the new norm in the city of Medellín, since the nationwide lockdown was imposed to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus.
This is how Jaider Borja, aged 22 and Andrés Ayala, aged 29, now secure their next meals. That is, on the days they don’t receive meal donations from groups of volunteers at local NGOs such as Fundación Visibles and Everyday Life, which oversees the audiovisual documentary project Everyday Homeless.
Borja and Ayala, who live on the city’s streets, are both displaced from Medellín’s Comuna 13, one of the city’s lower income barrios, which has been transformed in recent years by an influx of tourism.
Before the first coronavirus case arrived in Medellín and the country’s government imposed obligatory lockdown in March, Borja and Ayala used to recycle to earn money to buy food, much like the other 40.5% of the city’s homeless population, according to statistics published in November 2019 by Colombia’s National Department for Statistics (DANE).
However, since quarantine was imposed, both young men have stopped recycling.
“Collectors are now paying half price for the same amount of material,” Borja told The Bogotá Post, explaining how the pair used to earn between COP$20,000 to COP$30,000 per day for spending around six hours recycling.
As a result, the pair have decided it’s just not worth the risk anymore, despite claiming they are “not scared” of catching COVID-19. “We have high defences,” said Ayala.
They live in a makeshift shelter on a patch of grass by a bridge that crosses over Medellín’s autopista, the main road running through the city, along with Ayala’s pregnant girlfriend, another friend and their pet dog, Rocky.
Borja with their pet dog, Rocky. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
To gather drinking water, Borja makes the daily trek up to Cerro Nutibara – which stands 80m higher than the rest of the city – where there is a stream.
“We’re waiting for the government’s help,” Ayala said.
Local government strategy
The local government’s response is led by the Secretary of Social Inclusion, Family and Human Rights, Mónica Alejandra Gómez and her team. The department has designed a three-point plan to protect Medellín’s homeless population during the pandemic and assure us that tests will be issued to those who show symptoms of COVID-19.
The transient nature of the homeless community and lack of an extensive support system present many challenges. The local authorities want to stop people – some of whom have lived on the streets for many years – from moving around, for their own safety.
Gómez says that a number of people are already staying in the city’s two care centres, both of which are full. Visits are restricted and strict rules mean members are not allowed to leave the centre.
“We provide them with the attention they need so that they can spend this quarantine period in the best conditions possible,” she told The Bogotá Post, via WhatsApp. This includes continuing to offer basic facilities such as showers, food and daily activities at each centre.
But for 63-year-old Marco Aguirre, who has spent seven years of his life living underneath a bridge next to the river which runs through the city, the idea of being shut in a shelter and not able to leave is terrifying.
Marco Aguirre is scared by the idea of being trapped in a shelter. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
His views were echoed by some – but not all – of our interviewees. Others were tempted by the idea of the security these shelters seem to offer in unpredictable times. Which is why Gómez has opened up the Carlos Mauro Hoyos coliseum and the Florencia coliseum as temporary shelters, where the same confinement restrictions will be applied. The Carlos Mauro Hoyos coliseum has an approximate capacity of 2,600 and is equipped to receive 500 vulnerable families during the pandemic, Gómez tweeted.
The local government has also pledged to continue to provide the homeless population with primary healthcare, which involves taking their temperatures and looking out for potential respiratory coronavirus symptoms. In the event of a suspected contraction of the virus, Gómez says that all the necessary strategies for isolation will be enforced according to national guidelines.
The government has also supplemented existing campaigns to encourage self-care among the homeless population, providing extra facilities to encourage them to wash their hands as much as possible.
Reactions from the homeless community
Aguirre doesn’t plan to join those in the temporary shelters. Before lockdown, he worked as a gardener at Fundación Remar, an NGO that works with the homeless population, which provided him with enough to get by. With his work on hold, Aguirre spends his days cooking for the eight people who have been living under the bridge with him since he got there.
“We’re like family,” he said, adding that since the pandemic, lots of new homeless people have also arrived to shelter with them. The group, many of whom were also recyclers but have stopped working because of the reduced pay, are living off food donations.
The group who shelter under a bridge say it feels like a family. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
Ayala, who lives in a makeshift shelter, also said that it would be difficult for him to take refuge in one of the government’s new temporary shelters because of the large cart he pushes around for recycling.
“They wouldn’t let me in with it,” he said, worried that leaving it outside would mean it would be taken. Rocky the dog wouldn’t be allowed into the shelter either, he suspects.
Andres Ayala is worried that the shelter would not allow him in with his recycling cart. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
Despite the fact it would prevent her from seeing her daughter and niece, Beatriz Ochoa, a 53-year-old diabetic lady who has been homeless for 20 years, seemed interested in checking out the shelter, since her work selling bin liners has dried up.
Impossible to work
And Ochoa is not alone. 76-year-old Francisco Javier Ocampo used to work recycling at the Minoristafruit and vegetable market.
However, after local mayor Daniel Quintero Calle became aware of several cases of coronavirus among those who worked there, on April 14 he ordered the market’s closure, leaving Ocampo jobless.
“I didn’t use to like asking for food,” said Ocampo. “But now I have to.”
“I was at the day care centre,” he added. “But they kicked me out to give priority to the people that need it most.” These include disabled members of the homeless community, who would be more vulnerable if they caught the virus.
Francisco Ocampo said he had to leave the shelter to make space for those who were more in need of help. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
Besides homeless people, the sudden disappearance of customers is also affecting the city’s street sellers. Some of them used to be able to make enough to be able to pay for a room by the night, in one of the city’s informal hostels, but not anymore. Now, they too have been forced to sleep on the streets and beg for food.
In Medellín’s low-income neighbourhoods, where many have also lost the opportunity to go out and work since the start of lockdown, families – who have been left hungry and without medicine – are hanging red flags from their windows as a plea for help.
Many families have hung red cloths in their windows to show they need food. Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
Revictimisation
“The more vulnerable the person is, the bigger the risk they could suffer,” said Gómez, recognising that the coronavirus pandemic is particularly traumatic for those Colombians whose lives have already been turned upside down, such as migrants, or the forcibly displaced.
Various NGOs who work with the homeless agree that every aspect of the health and economic crisis is felt more keenly by society’s most vulnerable and worst off.
“I think the pandemic has made the population more segregated,” said Laura Kate Correa, a spokesperson for NGO Fundación Visibles.
“It’s revealing the current social, economic and even political problems of the country,” echoed Nataly Cartagena, co-founder of the NGO collective Everyday Life.
“What this quarantine has done is show a reality that we perhaps might have forgotten,” added Cartagena, who also works with Red de Calle, a Latin America-wide network of programs to help the homeless.
Is the government strategy working?
Despite this, Correa praised the city’s public administration for the job it has done to protect the homeless population during the pandemic, highlighting the local government’s work to provide accommodation and washing facilities.
The National Health Institute (INS) reports just 501 positive cases of COVID-19 in the department of Antioquia at the time of writing, compared to 4,892 in Bogotá. The relatively low numbers of officially registered cases, combined with national lockdown orders to prevent the collapse of Medellín’s ill-equipped health system, has meant an outbreak of coronavirus among the homeless population is yet to unfold.
While the local government has taken some steps, it is still too early to tell whether they will be enough to protect the city’s homeless. Especially as it will be difficult for them to access healthcare if they do catch the virus.
Can Medellín’s local government protect the nearly 4,000 people who live on the street? Photo: Jorge Calle for Everyday Homeless.
We’re now faced with the prospect of a spike in coronavirus cases as the city looks to relax lockdown restrictions at the end of the month. Cartagena worries that public authorities will have to attend other sectors of the population which will reduce their current capacity to attend the most vulnerable.
“The [public health] problem is beyond the capacity of government entities,” said Cartagena, reflecting on the way that a decade-long problem of social inclusion is now teetering on the brink of becoming a public health disaster.
Lessons to be learnt
“This crisis has shown the importance of a social and wellbeing focus for the population,” secretary Gómez reflected. “The economic development of a nation or territory is based on the wellbeing of its citizens.”
When the crisis dies down, she explained, the local government will focus on generating opportunities for vulnerable members of the population. And one sector that needs particular attention in terms of opportunities are the city’s informal workers.
“We already knew how many homeless people there were in the city,” said Correa, referencing the 3,788 people registered by the 2019 DANE census. “But we had no idea how many informal workers there were. If these people don’t earn a daily wage, they literally have no way of being able to eat.”
Cartagena suggests the solution to this deeply-ingrained inequality consists of alliances and collaboration between the local government and NGOs. “We believe this is the basis of development,” she said.
For both Correa and Cartagena, now more than ever it is important that public and private entities work closely together to design integrated policies and relief strategies that can adequately protect the city’s vulnerable populations.
Day 58 of quarantine saw special measures introduced for five areas in Bogotá, and protests from sex workers.
The banners showing that Chapinero (this one is on Séptima with Calle 62) is on orange alert were up this morning. Photo Otto Berchem
Bogotá Mayor Claudia López today implemented extra new controls in certain zones of the city. These zones – considered the parts of Bogotá that are most at risk – were selected after consultation with the Instituto Distrital de Salud. This stems from various factors, contact with the virus chief among them but also including density of population and levels of adherence to the rules.
But what does this new alerta naranja mean in practice? Well, it’s a lot clearer than Duque’s orange economy. Essentially, it’s a return to the original quarantine measures from the initial simulacro. However, so far the rules on paper are a little different to life on the streets. At least for now.
One person only from each household is allowed out. There’s limited pet walking, no exercise, and essential travel only. Those who live in the zones but who have permission to work on site will be exempted from having to work for the next two weeks and their employers must accept that. It remains to see how this will pan out in practice. Hawkers and street sellers are still circulating, even though they’re officially not allowed to.
The first zone in Kennedy – which has about 20% of the capital’s total infections – was established on Monday, but the system was then expanded to include various other parts of Kennedy and the first zone in the north: UPZ Pardo Rubio. Confusingly, this UPZ is a few blocks north of Barrio Pardo Rubio – running between Calle 60 and 67 and Carrera 3A and 10. UPZ Britalia – Suba in the barrios of Cantagallo and Mazurén is also amongst the 12 at-risk zones.
Nuevas UPZ de Zonas de Cuidado Especial ➡️Quiroga, Rafael Uribe ➡️Puente Aranda, Puente Aranda ➡️Pardo Rubio, Chapinero ➡️Britalia, Suba ➡️Bosa Occidental, Bosa
En Kennedy ya estaban ➡️Bavaria ➡️Calandaima ➡️Calandaima II ➡️Kennedy Central ➡️Américas ➡️Patio Bonito ➡️Corabastos pic.twitter.com/U8YIrZx68n
The dates for the new measures vary, but most will be in place for about two weeks. For example in Pardo Rubio it initially runs from May 14 to May 25.
The official website says that no one is allowed in or out of the high alert zones, but readers living within them report that there are no checks on the streets to stop them wandering out if they want, so it looks for the moment as if it will be self-policed. However, military police have been seen in the UPZ Patio Bonito, which indicates the possibility of much stronger controls than in Chapinero. In the Pardo Rubio zone, people report no change in policing numbers, and Kennedy Central remains regular.
Cars spraying disinfectant have passed through Patio Bonito, as has been seen in various other countries in recent weeks. On top of this, cars moving around in the zone have been stopped and those that were found to be illegally in transit have been impounded.
People living in the special alert zone in Chapinero were impressed with the speed at which the zone was transformed, with plenty of signage going up within a couple of hours. This means you have no excuse for not knowing when you’re straying in or out of these zones. There are stickers on the pavements, banners across the roads and posters on buildings throughout the area. The main difference here seems to be the absence of rappitenderos not making deliveries.
At the time of publishing, we hadn’t heard of any random testing taking place in any of the zones, but the local authorities say that this will be taking place over the next two weeks. There are support tents in all zones, which you can visit in order to check information, give details and ask for tests.
Thursday also saw a demonstration from sex workers in the south of Chapinero, on Carrera 13 with Calle 45. The workers had travelled from Siete de Agosto and were protesting what they said was a lack of support from the state. One woman, Leidy, said to us that she believed resources from the UN that were destined for sex workers had not arrived.
Sex workers in Bogotá are often among the most vulnerable people in society, especially those working within the Siete de Agosto zona de tolerancia. Many of the sex workers protesting today are excluded from formal state assistance as they are unregistered, foreign or without bank accounts.
The protest on calle 45 with 13 today. Photo: Emma Newbery
Of course, bills still need to be paid and food needs to be bought, meaning that around 80% of the women are still working, according to Leidy. Given that they work with their bodies in the most intimate way imaginable, this means that infection is at very high risk levels. “we don’t want to do this, but there are no options for many of us,” says Leidy, who was conforming with all safety measures on the protest.
In sharp contrast to the low numbers of police a couple of kilometres north in the UPZ, there were roughly 100 police, some with riot gear (although no sign of Esmad), for a protest of a few dozen sex workers. It seems that state control continues to be very different between strata.
Gig workers in the field are eligible to apply for emergency funds. Meanwhile, Bogotá’s premier indie theatre is in a fight for survival.
Cine Tonalá put out a press communication expressing it will be very difficult for them to stay open in the current situation. Photo: Cine Tonalá
Emergency fund for nation’s audiovisual and film industry
Just before public activity in Bogotá started to grind to a halt, Cartagena was in the midst of hosting the FICCI (Festival Internacional de Cartagena de Indias), the national film event of the year. By the morning of its third day, however, festival organisers were forced to call off the rest of the multi-day event as the country prepared for a full-scale national quarantine.
This was disappointing for all in the film industry, whether or not they were in attendance. The significance of the festival’s cancellation indicated an obligatory pause on every forthcoming shoot in the country. Set decorators, production assistants, sound mixers, casting directors, and location scouts – all essential elements to most large-scale film and television productions – were set to lose their livelihood for the duration of the national emergency.
Project-based work is precarious in nature, relying on the stability of the market to provide consistent employment for its workforce. Like much of Colombia’s informal economy, contract workers lost out on future compensation for their services when the country shut down.
The Colombian Academy of Cinematic Arts and Sciences, ACACC, announced earlier this month that they, in collaboration with Netflix, would be making a relief fund of $500,000 available to eligible workers in the Colombian audiovisual industry. For Netflix, the fund in Colombia is part of a much larger global commitment to support creative communities all over the world with USD$150 million of emergency relief funding.
“We hope that by joining forces, we’ll be able to help them [technical workers] during this difficult time,” said Consuelo Luzardo, ACACC president. “We welcome Netflix’s commitment to this fund and we hope that other members of the industry will be able to come together and contribute.”
The ACACC will be managing the relief fund, awarding one-time payments of COP$1.2 million per grantee. Workers within 100 different roles (sound mixers, production assistants, set designers, etc) who had an active or pending contract during the relevant time period, are invited to apply.
Meanwhile in Bogotá’s picturesque La Merced neighbourhood, six-year-old indie house theatre Cine Tonalá is doing everything in its power to survive the pandemic.
Less than a month into the national quarantine, the theatre announced itself “about to close” if no radical measures were taken. The theatre’s social media accounts have communicated a general sense of uneasiness since the very beginning of the quarantine. Tonalá started promoting watch-from-home streaming options through the platform Mowies with the hashtags #apoyemosatonalá #cinetonaláresiste.
The multi-purpose venue’s full-service restaurant, which is of course also shut down for in-house service, has continued operating for delivery in order to serve customers and make some sales. But like many small businesses, it could be a struggle to stay open.
“It’s highly likely that we won’t see each other again in the house in La Merced where we always welcomed you with open arms and that we won’t be able to keep being a special space to host and promote Colombian film,” said Cine Tonalá’s last official press communication in a bid to raise awareness around the theatre’s imminent closure.
Cine Tonalá hopes that its status as a major supporter of Colombian film will help rally financial and institutional support. In just six years in Bogotá, it has hosted 4,000 functions dedicated exclusively to showing and promoting Colombian film.
As tensions and challenges from the nationwide quarantine increase, the usual channels that might pick up on abuse are not working.
Photo: Melanie Wasser, Unsplash
“I know that I am restless. I know that sometimes I cry just because. I ask you to be patient with me, I am getting to know myself. Guide me, accompany me, don’t shout at me, and please don’t hit me.”
These words introduce the Colombian Family Welfare Institute’s (ICBF) poignant plea to parents and caretakers, urging them not to take their lockdown frustrations out on their children. Their campaign ‘Let’s make home safer’ #HagamosDeCasaMásSegura, was launched on April 8to prevent violence against infants, children, and adolescents while families are quarantined together.
“We’ll make our home the safest place. That’s why I’ll never say ‘If I hit you it’s for your own good.’ Home confinement can increase family tensions. Always look for dialogue and negotiation.” Photo: ICBF campaign.
Concerned by the challenges this global pandemic poses to the home sphere, the campaign promotes telephone and WhatsApp lines to report instances of familial violence. In addition to responding to child abuse cases, it seeks to prevent harm from happening in the first place: an online platform Mis Manos te Enseñan (My hands teach you) is filled with engaging activities for families with children and adolescents. Just one month after the platform’s launch, the interactive site has received more than 410,000 visits.
Being in lockdown is stressful. Millions of families are confined to their living quarters and struggling to keep food on the table, which magnifies familial tensions. The Colombian Society of Paediatricians explained that, even before the pandemic, the unemployment rate was 13% in January and 46.5% of Colombian’s economy was informal. They concluded that over half of all families could be without an income right now. In addition to the obvious risks of malnutrition and eviction, children and their caretakers are prone to anxiety, depression, and other mental health conditions, as families are trapped in cramped living quarters.
“In these conditions, there is a higher risk of interfamily violence, maltreatment toward children and adolescents, and sexual abuse,” it reports.
The ICBF has highlighted another issue: A sharp fall in reporting. Between March 12 and April 4, the ICBF received 9,893 requests and reports associated with violence; in the same period last year, the number was 15,024. This may seem promising, but authorities suspect that large numbers of cases are going unreported because the usual channels that might spot the signs of abuse are currently closed.
Lina Arbalaéz, director of the ICBF, told Caracol TV that the quarantine has impeded efforts to report violence against children and young people. For her, the fall in the number of cases “sets off alarms.” She points out that “The institutions – schools, nurseries, and playgroups – which would wave the flag when a child begins to show symptoms are closed. That’s likely the reason that the number of cases is decreasing right now.”
Four in ten young people have suffered domestic violence
Last year, Colombia’s Ministry of Health released the first-ever extensive survey of violence against children and young people in the country. The results were shocking: Over 40% of children in Colombia have been victims of domestic violence before the age of 18.
That breaks down to 15% of girls who revealed they had been victims of sexual violence and 27% of physical violence. For boys, the figures were slightly different: 8% reported suffering sexual violence and 38% physical. Seventy per cent of the time, the first incident of sexual violence took place either in the victim’s or perpetrator’s home.
Beyond statistics, the report highlighted a “culture of silence and shame” that prevents many family members from coming forward about domestic abuse. It emphasised that is especially notable among cases of sexual violence affecting children.
Caption for photo 2: “Four out of ten boys, girls, and adolescents have suffered some type of violation before the age of 18.” Photo: ICBF campaign.
“Social norms purport the belief that violence against children in the home is a private affair, that physical violence is an acceptable means to discipline and educate children, and that children are expected to submit to the will of their parents, teachers, religious leaders, and other elders and authority figures.”
The practical outcomes of these pervasive cultural norms are that law enforcement authorities will often choose not to intervene in cases of domestic violence, and children are reluctant to denounce the people who take care of them. During a mandated quarantine, family members that might report cases of violence are deprived of privacy from their abusers, and cannot always reach authorities without endangering themselves.
The long-term consequences of child abuse or domestic violence against youth and children are manifold: non-communicable diseases (diabetes, cardiovascular disease), communicable diseases (STIs, HIV), mental health problems (anxiety, depression), and behaviours that increase risk of health issues (substance abuse, unprotected sex).
In contrast, the benefits of positive familial relationships are similarly resounding. That’s why the ICBF is encouraging families to view the challenges of the quarantine as an opportunity to grow closer and has created virtual tools to help parents who may not have time to entertain and teach their children throughout the day.
Interfamilial violence is difficult to resolve, even outside of quarantine. But the fact that it is being more openly discussed – and measured – is a step in the right direction.
If you or someone you know has been the victim of domestic abuse, whether as a child or adult, support is available. Call 141 or report via WhatsApp 320 2391320
A widowed Colombian farmer and her two young sons have gone viral on YouTube, to their own shock and surprise. Now their videos are educating viewers on the realities of life as a campesino.
Nubia and her kids on their farm in Chipaque. Photo: Nubia Gaona
The video opens with the sound of a chicken squawking, the camera panning shakily over the lush valleys of Chipaque, 45km south of Bogotá. The shot fades to Nubia Gaona Cárdenas and her two sons, Arley David, 14, and Jaime Alejandro, 9, and the family is waving, Hola!
“In this channel, we are going to teach you how to plant fruits, vegetables, herbs and much more,” the youngest says, breathlessly. “Let’s make this viral so that no one has to go to bed without eating.”
Somehow, the call to action was heard by the masses. Since being uploaded at the end of April, the simple video had amassed more than 1.1 million views at the time of writing. The channel itself now has more than 300,000 subscribers, and the family is being flooded with orders for its USD$5 seed-and-soil starter packs.
“When we uploaded the video we thought in one week we would have 50 orders, but right now we have so many that we know, with Gods’ help, we’re going to be able to deliver,” Cardenas told The Bogotá Post. She couldn’t even quantify the number of orders, as their WhatsApp had crashed under the demand, but she estimated she had more than 1,000. “By the time we reply to one person, a lot more orders have already come in.”
The idea to start a YouTube channel came from David, who loves to watch videos on the platform. The boys lost their father – the family’s breadwinner – to illness two years ago. “Before he died I hadn’t worked for 10 years, then out of nowhere I had no resources to provide for my family,” Cárdenas said. “It’s been really hard.”
The family has been going step-by-step since then, trying different ideas to get by. One constant lifeline has been neighbours Sigifredo Moreno and wife Juliana Zapata, who also own the social enterprise Huertos de la Sabana in Bogotá. They’d helped Cárdenas before with investment for crops, and with a job washing potatoes. So, when the pandemic began, she decided to bring her son’s idea to them.
“At the beginning, we laughed,” Moreno said. “Because I don’t even have social media, I don’t have Facebook, no Twitter, no Instagram, only WhatsApp.” Nevertheless, they decided to give it a go. Zapata would film and upload the video, Moreno would deliver the kits around Bogotá. “We thought it was going to be 50 to 100 kits, so we said, ‘Let’s get a sack of soil ready,’… But when we saw what was coming, we gasped.”
Moreno says he’s been told that the sheer speed that the video went viral was incredibly unusual, maybe even more unusual than winning the lottery. As of Thursday night, they’d replied to 5,634 chats on WhatsApp. They’ve had messages from as far afield as Israel, China, Russia and Oman. Fake Nubia e hijos accounts popped up. They’ve had to partner with three different delivery services. And they’ve moved to digging up soil on his property to meet the demand. “This got out of our hands – literally got out of our hands. But it’s a beautiful problem to have to fix,” Moreno said. By Wednesday, Moreno – a civil engineer by trade – had a website set up to take orders.
Cárdenas is taking 80 percent of the profits of the seed kits, while 20 percent is going to Huertos de la Sabana. In her video, she explains some of the difficulties of being a farmer in Colombia, and how sometimes the price they get for vegetables doesn’t even justify taking them out of the ground. According to the World Bank, extreme poverty was over three times higher in rural areas of Colombia than in urban areas in 2017. More than 15% of the rural population lives in extreme poverty, while 36% live in moderate poverty, defined as individuals living on less than USD$5.50 per day.
Moreno learned the harsh realities of this when he partnered with Cárdenas and her husband years ago on some farmland. From his USD$7,000 investment, they were only able to sell USD$1,500 worth of crops that year. “When I went to sell that harvest, which was potatoes, they paid me 150 pesos per pound. But when I went to the markets they were charging 2,000 pesos per pound – that’s a 2,000% difference that the intermediaries are adding.” The disappointing prices are also at the mercy of seasonal oversupply of certain vegetables, and the consumer’s expectation of a perfect-looking product. We don’t like to buy ugly veggies.
Moreno started investigating the supply chain and discovered there were often up to eight intermediaries between farmer and consumer, each of which increased the cost. Huertos de la Sabana was started to try to avoid those intermediaries so that farmers might get a fair price. “This is not an equal equation for everyone because the people at the farms are the ones who are breaking their backs under the sun, that job is really, really hard, and they are not getting fair remuneration,” Moreno said.
The organisation is trying to negotiate with sellers to always buy at a fair price (although Moreno says “you need the birth certificate of Jesus” to talk to the big chains). Change also needs to come in the form of policy, a prospect Moreno sees as unlikely as the sector is very politicised. “So they name a person who has never seen the fields or worked the fields.”
They are also trying to educate the public about the plight of campesinosand the importance of being socially responsible and sustainable consumers. So for now, the most important thing for Moreno is that people keep watching and subscribing to hear Cárdenas’ story, as well as upcoming videos with other campesino families.
And as for the ideas-man David, who this all sprung from? He’s just grateful to the public. “I’m so happy, because we weren’t expecting the support we’ve been getting, and we’ve had so many people helping us.”
Violence against women during Colombia’s quarantine has increased, prompting some chains to allow women to denounce violence when they are shopping.
Community organisations Siete Polas and Mutante compiled a multi-page virtual directory of resources for women victims of domestic violence during the national quarantine. Image courtesy of Siete Polas
Violence against women and femicide has increased markedly during COVID-19-related quarantines and lockdowns around the world. In Colombia, 19 women were murdered in the first three weeks of the nationwide quarantine, contributing to what UN Women has called a “shadow pandemic.”
Mother’s Day has always been one of the most violent weekends of the year, but this year it comes on top of a violent month. The 155 national women’s domestic violence hotline received an average of 132 calls per day between March 25 and April 23.
Camila Pérez, co-founder and member of Siete Polas, a Bogotá-based feminist blog and collective told The Bogotá Post about how much domestic violence has increased under lockdown.
“The possible effects of confinement, especially those that can most impact women, are no secret to anyone,” she said. That’s why Siete Polas teamed up with social change organisation, Mutante, to create a digital directory of resources for women victims of violence during the national quarantine.
“We assume, as a society, that the home is a safe place but in a country like Colombia and many others in Latin America, the reality is that that’s not the case. It is a privilege for a woman to be able to say that there is a safe space inside her home.”
One of the organisations included in the directory is Abogados en Cuarentena, a group of volunteer lawyers who are providing pro bono legal counsel and advice during the national quarantine. Laura Arboleda, a lawyer and co-founder of the group, explained during an Instagram Live event that they are taking a variety of cases including immigration, healthcare, and of course, domestic violence.
The directory is an effort to call attention to the wealth of other available local and independent resources in existence so that women can reach help more quickly and efficiently. It includes hotline numbers for individual cities, departments, non-governmental organisation helplines, e-mails, and social media information for related advocacy and social justice organizations.
Official response and resources to domestic violence
Authorities have clearly been concerned about the threat of domestic violence since the trial quarantine was first announced. Bogotá Mayor Claudia López launched Bogotá Solidaria en Casa almost immediately. Lead by the city’s department for women, the Secretaría Distrital de la Mujer, it aims to promote “solidarity at home” – to protect victims of domestic violence and secure legal sanctions for aggressors.
“We want to send the message that violence is unjustifiable, no matter the circumstances,” Diana Rodríguez Franco, Secretaría Distrital de la Mujer said in a press release. She sought to correct early rumours that women who reported violence would not be eligible for financial support.
Given the extraordinary circumstances presented by the novel coronavirus, the city has added other ways that women can get help. In addition to the contacts listed in their official resource guide, women who have been victims of violence can now report it when they go shopping.
Several big chains are part of the initiative, including Justo y Bueno, Tiendas D1, Farmatodo, and Ara. Participating stores will each have a team member who can take the reports and connect women directly with help provided by the Secretaría Distrital de la Mujer.
Rodríguez launched #Espaciosseguros on twitter on April 22, saying “now, women suffering from aggression can report and be attended in over 630 different stores.”
Lanzamos una nueva estrategia #EspaciosSeguros, para que las mujeres que estén sufriendo violencias en el hogar puedan reportar y ser atendidas en más de 630 tiendas de D1, Justo&Bueno, Ara y Farmatodo. pic.twitter.com/zhSMj4l2n5
Gloria Yamile Roncancio, founder and director of the awareness-building and crisis response nonprofit, Feminicidos Colombia, outlined the root of the issue during Proantioquia’s virtual event “Género, cuidado, y violencias: Como nos cuidamos?”
“It’s really about the perpetuation of violence against women,” Roncancio said, arguing that the term “domestic violence” does not accurately convey the gendered nature of the violence.
Assistant Minister of Women’s Affairs in Medellín, Claudia Restrepo explained that the pandemic is shedding light on issues that were already pervasive in Colombian society including violence and machismo. “We need to figure out how this situation can help us solve some of our structural problems,” she said.
UN Women agrees that this is nothing new, and that “even before COVID-19 existed, domestic violence was already one of the greatest human rights violations.”
Mother’s Day and domestic violence
A 2019 National Institute of Medicine report demonstrated that Mother’s Day is historically Colombia’s most violent day of the year. The report found that throughout the last decade, 184 violent murders have been committed on the supposedly celebratory day. Researchers suggest that the holiday’s lethality could be attributed to a combination of large family reunions and alcohol, which don’t mix well with tense family relationships.
After significant deliberation, Minister of Commerce José Manuel Restrepo announced early this month that Mother’s Day will indeed take place this May and will be followed by an additional celebration in August. The August celebration is meant to give Colombians a second opportunity to celebrate mother’s day outside of the current lockdown restrictions. The later date is also meant to give the retail and restaurant industries a second opportunity to cash in on the significant earnings that mother’s day typically represents.
Mother’s Day 2020 will be unlike any other, as the country will still be under nationwide quarantine restrictions and extended families will be unable to come together. This suggests the possibility (and hope) that domestic violence will not see its typical single-day surge this year.
What to do if you’ve domestic violence has affected you
If you have been the victim of domestic violence, support is available.
Call the 123 (the primary emergency line) or 155 (the dedicated national women’s domestic violence hotline)
Use the additional support in the directory developed by Siete Polas and Mutante, which can be downloaded and sent by WhatsApp or email. It includes phone numbers and emails for both governmental and non-governmental organisations, with lawyers and support networks throughout the country.
The Secretaría Distrital de la Mujer has 24-hour phone lines and breaks down support by district.
We’re now 48 days since lockdown measures started in Bogotá and construction and manufacturing workers have been able to return to their jobs, albeit under fairly strict protocols. President Duque announced on Tuesday that other sectors – such as the car and furniture industry – would be able to follow suit after May 11. Young people (aged 6 to 17) will be allowed out to exercise for half an hour, three days a week. Municipalities with no cases of coronavirus will be able to open up again, as long as large gatherings remain banned.
Data source INS
It’s 62 days since the first case (March 6) in Colombia and the latest stats show:
2,300 COVID 19 patients recovered (average age 40)
6,102 patients are sick but still at home (average age 37)
407 people confirmed to have the virus have died (average age 67)
There are 647 hospitalised cases, 129 of which are high-risk patients in ICU intensive care units
Data on the coronavirus in Colombia. Data source: INS
July-August peak
A report from the INS which breaks down possible scenarios for the spread of COVID-19 shows that even when you factor in the problems with accurate measurements, Colombia is far ahead of the worst-case scenario. The unanswerable question is the degree to which the quarantine measures are simply pushing the problem further into the future and how much they are buying breathing space to make them more manageable. And – as with most things – the answer is a bit of both.
“It is evident that any measure must be carried out in the long term, and its application for only two to four weeks would delay the peak of the epidemic, but not its magnitude,” say the report authors.
The report looks at a number of factors, breaking the population down into three groups: Those who are susceptible and might catch the virus, those who are infected and might transmit the virus, and those who have recovered and (we hope) are immune.
According to the report, if Colombia had done nothing, by day 100 (June 14), there would be over 30 million cases and roughly 5 million people would be in hospital. Of those, 1.3 million would need the ICU, which is a lot more than the 5,485 ICU beds the ministry of health recently said it had available.
Using data from other countries, it tries to predict the possible impact of measures such as shutting down schools or social isolation. An important figure that we still don’t know is the percentage of asymptomatic infections. This has a big impact on the projections because the higher the number of asymptomatic cases, the less strain there will be on the health services.
What’s interesting is that the updated estimations which factor in the quarantine project the peak for July or even August. But whether there will be enough hospital beds depends a lot on how the relaxation of the rules is implemented.
Amazonas
The spike in cases in the Amazonas today is certainly a cause for concern, though can be partly explained by a jump in testing. The INS reported 188 more cases today, taking the total to 418.
As we reported last week, Amazonas has the highest number of both cases and deaths per million inhabitants, by a long way. Wilson Arias, a senator for the Polo Democrático party, tweeted on April 29 that if the government did not send help, it would be a “genocide.”
El Amazonas tiene la tasa de contagio de COVID-19, por millón de habitantes, más alta de todo el país y en todo el departamento solo hay 8 camas UCI; si el Gobierno no envía ya implementos médicos y camas UCI, habrá un genocidio. #SOSAmazonas
The high figure is in part due to spread from neighbouring Brazil and exacerbated by a lack of health facilities. The government have sent both medical aid and security forces with a view to improving testing, improving medical care and patrolling the border.
Given the coronavirus incubation period and time lag in testing, we can expect to see the numbers continue to increase and only time will tell if the measures to control the spread have worked.
Number of confirmed coronavirus cases per million inhabitants. Photo: INS
Number of coronavirus deaths per million inhabitants. Photo: INS
President Duque announces that quarantine in Colombia will continue, but that more sectors of the economy will open up. Sales of cars and furniture as well as stationery shops, laundry services and book stores to open on May 11.
President Duque announces that the quarantine in Colombia will be extended with two weeks. Photo: Presidencia
With less than a week to go until May 11 when the current quarantine is set to end, Colombian President Iván Duque announced that the obligatory lockdown will again be extended until May 25.
Repeatedly stressing that any relaxation of the rules would happen in a ‘responsible’ way, the president said that he knows how many people are worried about when they can start work and when the country will get back to normal.
“We’re taking steps forward to protect lives,” he said. “But also to open up the country.”
To that end, Colombia will continue its strategy of gradual opening. Two weeks ago Duque said that construction and manufacturing sectors would be able to return to work under strict protocols. In yesterday’s presidential press briefing, the minister for housing, Jonathan Malagón, said that 350,000 people had already been able to get back to work and another 150,000 would follow.
After May 11 – and following the protocols that have now been established – the car, furniture and other industrial sectors will be able to resume. At a more local level, laundrettes, stationary stores and bookshops will be able to open.
Plus, young people aged between 6 and 17 will now be allowed to go out to exercise. This is to be permitted three times a week and for only half an hour – a small step that the government says is to give people a little more mental and physical health.
Traffic on the autopista Norte remains low as quarantine is extended again. Photo: Brendan Corrigan
Health minister, Fernando Ruiz said, “We understand that being in quarantine with children is difficult. But we have to take into account that children are the main transmitters of COVID-19 and that around 70% of children here live with older people.”
We’ve had several reports in recent days that Bogotá is already starting to re-open, but in a cautious way. A garden centre in Chapinero sprayed customers with anti-bacterial gel as they entered the store, while deputy editor Oliver Pritchard reports that several small businesses such as stationers and hardware shops have opened in Chapinero, often in full view of the authorities. These shops are obeying similar rules to restaurants: service bars at the entrance and facemasks needed to enter. Long (and mostly male) queues were seen outside banks today, but again most people were wearing face masks and maintaining metre distances.
Long queues for a bank in calle 72, but people kept their distance during quarantine in Colombia. Photo: Chris Payne
Yesterday’s briefing had a self congratulatory tone, as the government highlighted the number of ICU beds available and how much help had been given to those in need. Tonight, however, the president sought to reassure the public that life would return to normal – just in a gradual and controlled manner.
Finally the president announced that the municipalities which have not seen any confirmed cases of COVID-19 will be able to reopen with restrictions. There’ll be no big gatherings, no bars, no group sports and no restaurant meals.
The global COVID-19 death toll passed the 250,000 mark yesterday and many nations around the world are also gradually reopening. In Germany, some children are back in school, small shops are open and limited church services are allowed. Museums, parks and galleries are also operating under reduced services to provide critically needed public space. States and territories in Australia have lifted a lot of their restrictions. Social gatherings of 10 people are now allowed in some parts of the country and some national parks are open again. Spain, like Colombia, has allowed the manufacturing and construction industry to return to work and let people go out to exercise.
Thirteen poets, painters, musicians and other creators spent five weeks in lockdown together after the founders of ArteSumapaz, an art centre just outside Bogotá, opened their doors to those who needed a place to stay.
A drone view of ArteSumapaz
It wasn’t exactly by choice.
It was mid-March, and Tiffany Kohl was meant to be flying to out of Bogotá, when the Colorado-born expat’s flight was cancelled. With Colombia rapidly shutting down, Kohl jumped at an offer to return to ArteSumapaz, an art centre she’d visited in January, to wait out the lockdown with 12 other creative strangers in similar situations.
Over the next five weeks, the group made art, worked the property and broke pan de yuca together. Those who needed to grieve, grieved. A performance artist opened his show, delayed by COVID-19, to an audience of a dozen. It was a period Kohl – one of the founders of Gringo Tuesdays – describes as magical, inspiring, a moment in time that has her rethinking how she wants to live her life.
Cecelia Monroe on cello and Felipe Duran on piano in an impromptu library concert. All photos: ArteSumapaz
“I thought it would be a week, and it just kept extending and extending and extending,” Kohl says. “It was quite traumatic for some of us with the sudden quarantine, and ArteSumapaz really became a refuge in a very beautiful way.”
ArteSumapaz is an artist residency sitting among 116 hectares of overgrown rolling hills, a former coffee plantation in the Sumapaz Valley located three hours south of Bogotá by car. The residency offers rooms to artists with the purpose of creating a space to “heal the traumas of the world through art, connection, community and balance.”
Founded by California-born Ric Dragon, a former digital marketing entrepreneur, and Bogotano Pedro Crump, a pianist and composer, the centre celebrated its one-year anniversary on April 1. Although still in its infancy, the COVID-19 pandemic has pushed ArteSumapaz to stand up to its mission.
‘The Gate Was Locked’
Dragon says he first realised the full gravity of the situation when he visited Bogotá on March 15 and found Chapinero favourite Mesa Salvaje empty. He stocked up on groceries and put out the word to any prior ArteSumapaz resident: If you can make it by March 19, you’re welcome to stay. “We already had a small group at the centre, and another bunch straggled in, but true to our word, on the 19th, the gate was locked.”
Dragon says he’s reluctant to crow about the joys of being on lockdown with a group of painters, musicians, poets and other creators while others are suffering, but a description of their days speaks for itself. “Pretty much every day is full,” he says. “All meals are communal [and vegetarian], breakfast followed with a session of zazen meditation in the performance space, people engaging in various volunteer activities in the kitchen or the garden.” Twice a week the residents had an open critique session for their art (accompanied by hot chocolates, cookies, pan de yuca). One of the residents turned out to be a chef, and volunteered to lead the kitchen. Another took up baking sourdough. Each night over dinner residents would play “Rose-Bud-Thorn” – the game where you share your highs and lows of the day. A loose daily schedule run with the philosophy that art and community heals.
One resident took up baking sourdough bread, providing fresh loaves at breakfast each day.
“I’m intrigued by trauma,” Dragon says. “I think if you look at the history of our societies – not only so-called ‘first world,’ but here in Colombia as well, there is a succession of conflict and violence.” He points to post-Gulf War research into PTSD, where the US government found the condition could affect not only the person who experienced trauma firsthand, but also those exposed to that person after the incident.
“The bureaucrats may want to know by what percentage a poem may help reduce trauma in how many individuals of a population, and it’s true – we can’t answer that,” Dragon says. “Our role here is to make and share as much art as possible – to create a sort of refuge of artmaking.”
Vision for an alternative future
In its first year, ArteSumapaz built the strong foundation of this mission: It had 46 visitors, held 10 events, adopted three dogs. It performed an opera – a little-known piece by Mozart – and invited the local community. It was on track to achieve punto de equilibrio by the end of 2020 (ArteSumapaz is a non-profit, but it runs off artist residency fees and volunteers). However a surge of early applications have since been reduced by the pandemic.
During the lockdown ArteSumapaz had to cancel two exhibits of artists from Bogotá. But in the meantime, Ric Dragon installed a show of his own work.
Despite this, the centre’s vision for its second year remains strong. One of the opportunities it sees is in creating an “intentional community” of permanent residents who live and work in the valley.
“People all over the world are coming together and creating communities based on shared values,” Dragon says. “Most of the time, those can be on spirituality or organic farming. In our case, it’s art and culture.” The centre is looking forward to a future where it is 95% sustainable, where it has a large-scale sculpture park and nature reserve, a reforestation program, a performance and exhibition centre and an alternative art school, along with the artist residency.
For Kohl, the idea of being part of an intentional community at ArteSumapaz took root during her five weeks in lockdown there. Taking into account the hardship it has brought, she believes the pandemic has allowed many a “great pause” to stop and reflect on how we interact with the world, and to see that the way we are living is not sustainable for humanity or the environment.
Residents eat meals together, an opportunity for discussions, games and theatrics
“I’m a single, I have no family, I’m an expat living abroad and I’m very independent, but human nature is to be with others, we’re not solitary creatures,” she says. Kohl said it has become appealing to think about living in a community where her cost of living is reduced, where resources are shared, where sustainability and creativity is built into your way of life.
“I think for a lot of us who are still living in the city this is probably the push we needed to say, ‘That day is here’. For a lot of us this has changed our career path, we have to reevaluate things. Do I want to start over again, do I want to go back into the rat race? Or do I take what little savings I have and put it into a community?”
UK artist and chef Poppy Litchfield pulling a proof on the printing press
With planes grounded and intercity buses still banned, this weekend we’re exploring the best of Colombia on our computers.
Catching a roadside siesta under the palm trees by the Caribbean coast. Travel Colombia with Street View finds you some interesting encounters Photos taken from Google Street View
Everyone is longing for something right now. Whether it’s to go out without a mask, go dancing or hug a close friend. But for travellers, perhaps one of the biggest longings is to feast your eyes on Colombia’s skies, oceans, hills, and the unexpected encounters around every corner.
Whether you’re inside Colombia or outside her periphery, now the Primera de Mayo festivo is upon us, perhaps you’re thinking of what you might have been doing this weekend. Maybe you’re wondering whether you’ll ever get to realise your plans to explore Colombia’s many landscapes.
We thought we’d try to tour Colombia via Google Street View. It’s not quite 3D virtual tourism, but does scratch that travel itch a little. The simplest way to use Street View is to open Google Maps, press on the little yellow person icon on the bottom below right corner of your screen, and all streets that have been recorded with Street View will appear as blue lines on the map. Move the little yellow person icon to any street you want to explore and then scroll along, zoom in and out, drag your fingers along the street as far as the Google eyes allow.
You can walk through the earnest stone statues in San Agustín, or see a lethargic bicycler in Mompox frozen on the screen. Sip a coffee while wandering the winding roads around the lush hills in Eje Cafetero. You can even spot the alien-looking plants of the paramo, or the roadside cafe you would have stopped for your morning arepa y tinto.
The power of pictures and romanticising from your sofa is obvious as even just whizzing by fincas in Antioquia brings the heat to your skin, or seeing the aligned pop of colours in the paintings of the house facades in Guatapé makes you feel like you are walking on the cobblestoned streets of Colombia’s most historic towns.
You may want to play some cumbia to accompany you on your journey along the Caribbean coast, that takes you all the way from Cartagena to Riohacha and further along to the dramatic desert-meets-ocean La Guajira. Speaking of desert, Street View allows you to wander out into the garden of cacti right in the middle of La Tatacoa desert.
Below we provide a selection of what we found whilst armchair travelling through our screens.
We prefer seeing your real time travel photos from Colombia. Tag your favourite photo on twitter with #TravelColombiaFromHome and show us your favourite photos showing unexpected encounters in Colombia, or use the hashtag for what you find on your armchair travels.
The contrasting colours of the La Guajira desert are nearly as spectacular on the screen as in real life. Google Street View TravelZoom into the historic beauty of the Pueblos Patrimonio de Colombia, for example, Jardín.Slow-moving Mompox comes to a complete freeze on the screen.Virtually walk around the White City of Popayán.The storytelling house facades in Guatape.Street View takes you to the Tatacoa desert, but not just the entranceGo all the way into the Tatacoa desert and go right between the cactiTick off the San Agustín Archaeological Park as you can see the stone statues from Street View as well.Not an easy landscape to witness first hand, páramos are also not easy to capture on screen.Roadside workers and the scenic Eje Cafetero hills in the background.More roadside encounters around every winding road in Eje Cafetero.
Our regular roundup of COVID-19 cases in Colombia.
A summary of the coronavirus in Colombia. Data source: INS
Key points on coronavirus in Colombia:
314 deaths and 7,006 cases across 31 departments
Quarantine looks set to be relaxed on May 11
Amazonas hit hard and struggling with lack of facilities
It’s May Day weekend and 43 days since the beginning of that Bogotá trial isolation that turned out to be not so trial. The rules were relaxed slightly this week, with citizens allowed to exercise between 6am and 10am every day. Some industries are gradually being allowed back to work and everybody’s waiting to see what will happen after May 11.
It’s 56 days since the first case (March 6) in Colombia and the latest stats show:
1,551 COVID 19 patients recovered (average age 41)
524 patients are sick but still at home (average age 53)
314 people confirmed to have the virus have died (average age 66)
There are 524 hospitalised cases, 120 of which are high-risk patients in ICU intensive care units
Colombia’s health ministry announced yesterday that there are now 5,845 ICU beds available (up from 5,539 before) and that 58% of those are available. 2% of them are taken up with confirmed COVID-19 cases and another 40% are occupied by people with suspected COVID-19 or other diseases.
The issue is that some departments have a lot more capacity than others. For example, Amazonas has seen a big jump in cases in the past two weeks and according to El Tiempo, the main hospital in Leticia only has five ventilators and no intensive care beds.
Stats on the coronavirus in Colombia. Data source: INS
The issue is magnified in Leticia because it neighbours Brazil which could be seen as a case study for what happens if the pandemic is allowed to spread unchecked. Plus, hospital staff resigned in mid-April in protest at the poor conditions, lack of protective equipment and lack of pay. “We cannot participate in these arbitrary decisions and lack of pay for staff,” said the medics in a joint letter.
AUXILIOOOO….MEDICOS DE LA CLINICA LETICIA AISLADOS Y LOS DEL HOSPITAL SAN RAFAEL RENUNCIAN. AMAZONAS REQUIERE AYUDA pic.twitter.com/YiPqQHRQ5o
Amazonas now has 105 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus, and seven people have died. That number may seem low in comparison with Bogotá, if you look at it in the context of the total population, Amazonas has the highest number of cases per million inhabitants as well as the highest number of deaths per million habitants.
The health ministry has now promised to take action. It’s sent two ventilators as well as a team of doctors and nurses and a promise of more resources. Time will tell whether that’s enough to curb the outbreak.
Relaxing the quarantine
Elsewhere in the country, hopes are high that President Duque will announce further relaxation on the restrictions that are keeping people at home. Last week he said that the manufacturing and construction sectors could return to work under carefully-managed circumstances.
Stats on the coronavirus in Colombia. Data Source: INS
Meanwhile we’ve all become armchair scientists, looking at the number of cases and trying to see whether the curve is flattening – and so whether the country might open up. But the issue is that we’re not epidemiologists and we don’t have the full picture.
What the scientists are doing is taking that data and using it to model best and worst-case scenarios. Then they are trying to recommend policies that will prevent the worst-case scenarios from happening. Which is why we’re all staying at home. The challenge is that there are so many unknowns – such as how many people will break quarantine for Mother’s Day – and even a few percentage points make a big difference when multiplied exponentially. And of course, modelling the best health outcomes does not help us to model the best economic ones.
One figure that’s being talked about more and more is the doubling rate. That’s the number of days it takes for the number of cases or deaths to double. The reason that’s interesting is because if the doubling rate slows, then we’re managing to slow the spread of the virus. The difficulty is that the number of cases is so dependent on the number of tests and statistically speaking the numbers of deaths are still relatively low for analysis.
But if we look at the death rate in Colombia, it does show that the rate of spread is slowing. It took just over four days for the number to double from 10 to 20. And then another four days before it hit 40, and five days before it doubled again. Colombia saw 80 deaths on April 4, which was about 11 days into the national quarantine. Then it slowed further, taking six days to double to 160 deaths. Now we are 19 days further on and 314 people have died. So the doubling rate has increased from four or five days at the start of the crisis to 20 days now. Which – combined with the economic pressures – is why Duque is allowing certain sectors back to work.
Still grounded?
Yesterday, Avianca optimistically put flights on sale from May 11, but today Duque tweeted that domestic flights would definitely not start before the end of the month.
Many analysts say that airlines are facing a worse crisis than the one that followed the 9/11 terror attacks so it’s unsurprising that Avianca are keen to start selling tickets again. Indeed, Bloomberg put them at number 10 on their list of airlines most at risk of going bust in the next two years.
In Engativá, busier streets and roadways indicate people are itching for things to go back to normal. But local businesses say the economic fallout will continue well past May 11.
Selling vegetables from a truck in Engativá. Photo: Jessy Edwards
Two weeks ago you could walk down Engativá’s Carrera 102 to the Central Comercial Portal 80 mall and not see a single car. On Thursday, that same Carrera was busy with traffic and pedestrians, both male and female, despite the gender rules. It’s as though residents are already anticipating the end of lockdown on May 11.
Quarantine in this suburban barrio has been a fluid beast. When the rules first went into effect, soldiers were deployed to help the local supermarket enforce social distancing in its line outside. Men with guns would carefully pace out one big step, one little step, to ensure shoppers were maintaining a six-foot distance. At the door, only a few were let in at a time by an employee also tasked with spritzing everyone’s hands with sanitiser. Some days the line would end up stretching more than half a kilometre down Calle 80 and around the corner. Other times, the mall was empty, the only people in sight groups of Rappi delivery drivers waiting to pick up orders.
“When girls come out we sell a lot, but when guys go out we don’t really sell that much”
Olga Jánez, arepa seller
Since then, people appear to have learned the rules and have been self-monitoring and adapting. In the wide-open green of Engativá’s Bochica, where rivers run through lush parks and fragrant trees are in full bloom, even solitary dog walkers wear masks and keep their distance.
At the local tiendas, businesses are feeling the pressure of lockdown. Olga Jánez, a retired teacher from Venezuela, has been selling arepas at a stand in Bochica to keep busy and make money. She says quarantine has affected the owner of the business, especially on the days only men are allowed out. “When girls come out we sell a lot, but when guys go out we don’t really sell that much,” she said. “But we keep working, we can’t stop.”
Olga Jánez
Jánez arrived in Colombia on February 15 and got stuck in the country when quarantine was announced. Luckily she’s been able to stay with a friend nearby while she waits for her daughter and grandson to arrive from Chile so they can make their way home to Venezuela. Jánez says while she thinks lockdown is likely to come to an end soon, people still need to take care. “I see around here there are a lot of irresponsible people [not wearing masks and gloves]. Many people are not really seeing how intense this has been and how complicated it has been for everyone. There are no exceptions to the virus, right now no one is less or more, socially everyone is on the same line.”
Gustavo Enciso
Gustavo Enciso, 67, has run his internet cafe Angel Virtual in Bochica for three years, and says he is doing only 30% of the business he did before the quarantine. He says financially he is OK, as he is retired, but quarantine also takes a toll socially. “The fact that I’m locked down and besides that my wife died recently, so I don’t have a partner, it’s just me.”
While he believes Engativá is a barrio of people who are cultured and “conscious” of the novel coronavirus situation, he fears for neighbours who have unstable forms of income. “I don’t think that this is going to be done by May 11,” he said. “This is a pandemic, a terrible pandemic, and I’m one of those who believes that this is going to take a year. I hope not, but it’s going to be complicated.”
Felipe Bohórquez, 31, lives in an Engativá apartment his parents have owned for 22 years, and says he feels grateful to have a job at a call centre, working from home. “I think I was one of the lucky ones who was able to get a job in the middle of this thing,” he says. “There are people who I grew up with who are musicians, and of course for them, shows have been cancelled, they won’t be able to work for months.” Bohórquez also points to local neighbourhood businesses like gyms that may now have to close down.
However, he’s grateful to live in a neighbourhood with a strong sense of community, like Engativá. He’s seen people in his apartment complex start small businesses and residents supporting them with what they have. His dad, a hairdresser, has been cutting the hair of neighbours. Near the TransMilenio, enterprising people have been selling masks and other homemade goods. “I feel people around here have that sense of community and support those small initiatives,” he said.
He used the example of a person he knows who’d been forced to move from an expensive neighbourhood to a more modest one where she found more support from her neighbours. “You never know when you will need help from someone and you’re not so isolated,” Bohórquez says. “That’s how I feel this neighbourhood is — people wanting to help each other.”
This morning bogotanos were allowed to walk, jog, or run between 6am and 10am.
Wearing a face mask is also obligatory during exercise. Photo: IDRD
As European countries announce an easing of their lockdowns, so too was the quarantine in Bogotá more relaxed today than we’ve seen in recent weeks.
It is the first day that people have been allowed out to exercise. And, despite some initial confusion over the rules, many residents flexed their newfound freedom — and legs — on the streets this morning.
“It was great to be able to go outside for a run,” said one jogger near Galerias. He added, “Breathing through a face mask was not ideal though.”
Theoretically, today was also the day that those in the construction and manufacturing industries would join the ranks of exempted workers. But it looks like that’s going to take a bit longer to organise.
Are we allowed to exercise?
Yes. Bogotanos aged between 18 and 60 are allowed out between 6am and 10am every day to exercise for a maximum of one hour. The pico y género does not apply, so both sexes can go out as long as they wear masks and stay within 1km of their houses.
Pico y género does still apply to other activities, though. So for shopping, banking, and the like, it’s men on odd-numbered days and women on even-numbered ones. Trans and gender-nonconforming citizens can go out on the day that corresponds with their gender identity.
If you were hoping to nip down to the gym, that’s not going to happen any time soon. The IDRD, the city’s sports authority, said that physical activity can only take place in open spaces such as streets, parks, and trails. It also says that high-performance training is not permitted, only “light” activities such as walking, jogging and running.
According to an IDRD press release, “The aim is to avoid sedentary lifestyles and mental health problems that may occur during the compulsory quarantine.”
Obviously group training is a big no-no, and when you’re out you should keep a five-metre distance from other people if you’re walking and stay 10 metres away if you’re walking or cycling.
It’s not yet clear how carefully the rules will be implemented, but theoretically, anyone found more than 1km from their homes can be fined over COP$900,000.
If it gets too busy like around Virgilio Barco library this morning, newfound freedom could be taken away again.
Do we still have to wear masks?
Yes. Masks have become compulsory across the country over the last month. Since April 4, face masks have been obligatory on public transport and in areas with big groups of people such as supermarkets and banks. Basically, you now need to wear one whenever you go out of the house.
What about construction?
You might have been surprised that the sound of hammering has not yet drowned out the birdsong in the capital.
President Duque announced last week that construction and manufacturing workers would be able to return to work today (April 27). But companies first have to register with local authorities and put biosecurity protocols in place to protect their employees.
Each company needs to submit information such as the numbers of people who will be working, their shift pattern, and details of their commute. Online registration opened today in Bogotá and construction workers will be the first to be allowed back to work. Manufacturing companies may apply now but won’t be approved to start before May 11.
What about transport?
Getting all those workers to and from their jobs while also limiting the spread of contagion is one reason why they’re not back at work today. Those two industries account for about 577,000 people in the capital and mayor Claudia López wants to be sure they won’t all jump on public transport at once.
The TransMilenio and the Transmicable will operate regular hours with controls at the turnstiles to restrict the number of travellers. The national government has said that public transport needs to run at 35% capacity to avoid cramming people into enclosed spaces.
The TransMilenio will operate with 100% of its fleet on weekdays and are encouraging people to be sensible about not overcrowding individual vehicles. They’ve taped off alternate seats so that you can only sit one person per double.
Recuerda no sentarte en las sillas marcadas con cintas amarillas. Estas permiten mantener la distancia mínima de un metro para prevenir el contagio.#TransMiTeCuida, pero mejor quédate en casa pic.twitter.com/IrpOv2FXHg
The city also has also opened another 80 km of new temporary bike routes. Commuters who live within cycling distance may opt for this more socially-distant way to get about.
There are also new rules for courier services and delivery companies. All trucks, cars and motorcycles must register with Movilidad Bogotá and have the correct licence to be able to operate.
Getting home
Just as some of the tourists stranded in Colombia have been able to get home on recent humanitarian and embassy-organised flights, so too are Colombians managing to get back here.
According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 150 Colombians returned from Mexico today, with more arriving from Brazil, Italy and other countries in recent weeks. A total of 1,355 people have flown in on 17 flights. There’s strict health checks at the airport and obviously the obligatory 14-day isolation rule is still in place for new arrivals.
Trans activist opposition, incidences of discrimination, and other reactions.
Political Cartoon posted on Red Comunitaria Trans social media accounts depicting Mayor Claudia López, Senator Angélica Lozano, and Mayoral Secretary Luis Ernesto Gómez spending the quarantine in luxury while ignoring the anti-pico y género activists protesting outside.
The capital’s controversialpico y género policy has been in effect for well over a week now, though not without vocal opposition from trans rights organisations with concerns over discrimination and violence.
Pico y género in practice: Incidences of discrimination
Some initial reports stated that nothing had changed and that both men and women were still circulating freely without visible policing. But by the end of the first day of pico y género, there were also at least two known reports of possibly discriminatory incidents.
Videos of these kinds of incidents in supermarkets have gotten thousands of views on social media as confused employees attempt to enforce the policy as they understand it and both trans and gender-nonconforming citizens attempt to follow the decree as it is written. The measure and subsequent clarifications state that citizens can leave their homes on the days that correspond to their gender identity.
In conversation with The Bogotá Post and Balistikal, a new LGBTQ+ community healing and arts organisation in Chapinero, Red Comunitaria Trans cofounder Daniela Maldonado Salamanca shared her initial experience of fielding discrimination reports from trans community members.
“It hadn’t even been 24 hours [since the start of pico y género] and we were already aware of the first case of transphobia in Paloquemao. That same day, we saw another case [of discrimination], with one of our trans brothers in the Policarpa neighbourhood. It was the police but then the people surrounding him began to poke fun at the situation and to shout out violent things,” Maldonado said.
The Red Comunitaria Trans has been resolute in its opposition to the measure since Bogotá mayor, Claudia López first announced it, having published its official oppositional stance early on in a letter on social media. The organisation followed up with excerpts from another letter to the mayor, on April 18 reiterating their dissent and imploring her to reconsider maintaining the measure:
“A public policy, even an emergency one, should not be implemented if it is to the detriment of any social group… Mayor, you’re still on time. Reconsider. Don’t keep waiting for more incidences of violence to occur before taking concrete actions to protect our lives.”
On that same night, Fundación GAAT (Grupo de Acción y Apoyo a Personas Trans) reported that a trans woman in Ciudad Bolívar had been punched in the face. The aggressor defended his actions by explaining that the victim was out on a day designated for women, a day that in his opinion did not correspond to the victim.
“It’s really painful and it feels terrible to be an activist influencing social justice causes because you have to deal with a lot,” Maldonado commented. “It’s not just about carrying what might happen to you because you also have to carry what might happen to other community members.”
April 11 Mayoral memo to address enforcement questions
On April 11, two days before the official enforcement of pico y género, the mayor’s office sent a memo to city police authorities addressing questions that arose out of the original decree. A key issue was how the police – who have a problematic record of violence against the trans community – would enforce the measure. The memo clarified that “showing personal identification will not be required to prove a person’s gender identity.” It also acknowledged the existence of nonbinary individuals, stating that they should choose one category of days, odd or even-numbered days, during which to go out on essential errands.
According toEl Tiempo, police, the mayoral secretary, and representatives from concerned activist groups met on April 13 and “agreed on a protocol for police to follow while applying the measure.”
Pico y género in practice: Opinions and reactions
A nonbinary Bogotá resident that asked to speak anonymously feels that the measure is necessary, though flawed.
“Personally, I think the measure works well. I mean, I think it’s clearly easier to identify a man and woman than having to ask to see their identification, which requires [physical] contact which is what we’re trying to avoid. As far as safety goes, I think it’s complicated because it’s the police force that has always been characterised as being an abusive and intolerant entity. So it’s in that respect that I think the measure fails,” they said.
They explained that when they went out on a day designated for women (having chosen a day as per the mayoral memo), they felt safer. The absence of men gave them a greater sense of security, as it has for others in the city.
According toFlor Chavela “Feathers,” a member of the voguing house KikiHouse of Feathers, “This isn’t only an issue for trans people, this is an issue for people who have diverse gender expressions.”
Chavela added that women in their social network who have had to go out on odd-numbered days, either to perform essential work functions or simply to walk their dogs, have felt vulnerable under the intimidation of an all-male public. They also estimate that street harassment has increased on odd-numbered days.
Pico y género “is an invitation for the feminist movement to show up,” Maldonado said. “So that they don’t stay silent. There are a lot of people who don’t agree with this. And we as women are more vulnerable.”
Maldonado argues that Pico y género is not necessary and that more creative solutions can be found that control the public circulation of individuals while minimising contact.
“If you need it because you want to be able to have a ‘visible’ control measure, you can do it by pasting your id on yourself in a visible way,” Maldonado said. “Like the way workers wear name tags.”
She argued that pico y cédula works because it’s neutral and does not put any particular social group at risk.
“It’s painful to see that people think that we just don’t understand [the importance of] the quarantine when really, our whole lives have to be lived in hiding, in alternative spaces, so that we can feel safe,” Maldonado said.
“Sometimes there’s more fear around dying of transphobia than of COVID itself.”
Pico y género retracted in Peru
Just two days after Bogotá’s pico y género was announced, neighbouring Peru withdrew its own nation-wide version of the policy on April 10. Peruvian officials concluded that the policy did not meet its intended purpose of reducing the number of people transiting public spaces on any given day. According to France 24, the policy was deemed ineffective because streets were busier on the days designated for women than they were on the days designated for men. Presumably, women are disproportionately more likely to take on essential errands like grocery shopping. This rendered the policy futile and shed light on the commonly gendered, unequal distribution of domestic tasks.
“I think that we could and we should learn from Peru,” said Diana Castro, an activist and member of the local collectiveColectivo Guerrillerass.
“The measure was dismantled after exposing a lot of people to humiliation, violence, and aggression. And it didn’t prevent crowds from forming.”
*Trans and LGBT+ organisations like the Red Comunitaria Trans @redcomunitariatrans and Balistikal @balistikal have been active on social media since the measure was announced, communicating their oppositional stances and raising awareness about related incidences of discrimination.
President Duque announces that construction and manufacturing sectors will be able to return to work after April 27.
Duque announced the lockdown in Colombia will be extended until May 11. Photo: Presidencia
In a much-anticipated speech, President Iván Duque has announced that the national lockdown in Colombia would be extended by another two weeks. The country, which has been in obligatory quarantine since March 25, is being told to continue to stay at home until May 11.
After April 27, manufacturing and construction sectors will be allowed to restart, along with the public transport systems necessary to get people to work. We’re unlikely to see crowded building sites from our windows as there will be heavy controls on how these businesses can function.
For starters, the idea is to keep public transport at a 35% occupancy. Cycling is being encouraged and, in Bogotá at least, bike shops are joining the list of essential services that are exempt from the lockdown.
The idea is to attempt to reduce – at least slightly – the massive unemployment figures and economic impact of COVID-19. Vice President, Marta Lucía Ramírez told Portafolio that 77% of the country’s workers have had to suspend their activities to some degree during the crisis.
Recognising the importance of mental and physical health, Duque said that exercise will be allowed – which will be a relief to many. We’ll need to wait and see whether or not local authorities impose additional controls.
Bars, restaurants and clubs will obviously stay shut for the time being, as will schools and universities. The only international flights arriving or taking off until the end of May will be cargo and humanitarian ones, but be aware these measures could be extended even further.
National flights will remain grounded until the end of the health emergency and travel between departments will continue to be heavily restricted.
In the absence of a vaccine, the president warned that coronavirus restrictions could continue for 12-18 months. But 12 months is a long way away for a situation that is currently being reviewed every two weeks.
Coronavirus doesn’t only affect medical staff who work directly with patients affected by the illness. The knock-on effect to other areas of healthcare has also been profound, as we found out when we spoke to an epidemiologist.
Epidemiologists are at the centre of the coronavirus crisis. Photo: Wright-Patterson AFB
Maria* starts by telling us that her colleagues have been pulled away to deal with the novel coronavirus, causing a severe shortage of medical staff. “Because of the emergency, the institution I work at has made modifications to expand the services needed to assist the crisis. In my case, I work at my unit with two other colleagues; all other colleagues have been reassigned to other posts.”
That sounds dramatic, and she agrees. “Oh, it’s definitely changed. We had to cancel 90% of our morning shift activities, and we had to adjust the protocols in order to support the analysis, do follow-ups to COVID-19 cases coming to our hospital. In my opinion, we are neglecting other emergency services. Hospital emergency services in Bogotá have always worked to the fullest of their capacity, we’ve always had 150% occupancy, and this has not changed with this crisis.”
She would like to see some changes dealing with the novel coronavirus in the current medical system. “I think a special unit should be spared only to treat respiratory symptomatic patients (that’s how we call patients with respiratory symptoms), since we are receiving trauma patients, patients with heart conditions, and patients with suspected COVID-19 all in the same emergency room.”
It sounds worrying and Maria confesses that she’s not feeling great. “Concerned, worried about my parents who are seniors. I worry about getting the disease, and then infecting others.” I ask if she has access to full PPE: “A month ago, when the first case in Colombia was confirmed, the institution where I work adjusted its protocols concerning PPE. The problem is, these protocols do not adhere to international standards: Not everybody has 100% protection items at hand.”
Coronavirus has led to discrimination against medical workers in some areas, but luckily that hasn’t affected her yet, although she’s taking precautions. “I leave and come back home without my uniform on, and I suggest all my colleagues do the same. In my building, neighbours are very tolerant; there are also other physicians living there, we all do the same, none of us walk around in the common areas in their uniform.”
“The patient is fortunately fine, but it was late for everyone; we could’ve taken actions from the moment the patient was hospitalised.”
She tells a story that illustrates the coronavirus problems her medical team are having to face. “A patient in our institution was hospitalised with a diagnosis of atypical pneumonia, we suspected it was related to COVID-19 and the protocol was deployed. We did a test during this patient’s hospitalisation which was negative because there were some problems when processing the sample, and we had to wait for two weeks for the INS to run a new test, this time positive. By then, this patient I am talking about was already at home because the test could not be done while at the hospital. The patient is fortunately fine, but it was late for everyone; we could’ve taken actions from the moment the patient was hospitalised.”
Like Juan, a respiratory nurse who spoke to us at the weekend, Maria is critical of the governmental response to the social crisis. “It has been insufficient: We are very far from flattening the curve, there is not enough testing and it is very difficult to understand the current situation with fake data. Tests are only run on those with symptoms, and not the whole population, so there is higher risk of infection since we cannot know how many cases there are, and thus proper strict isolation measures cannot be taken. I am worried that, if the cases increase, we won’t have enough resources or staff, that the system collapses, and that our society collapses.”
“The issue is the government does not have the mechanisms to process [the cases].”
“The issue is the government does not have the mechanisms to process [the cases].” She moves on to talk about the effects of coronavirus on society away from medical care. “Now, in reference to the social aid being given, I believe the corrupt are stealing – precisely during these times – the resources assigned to those most in need; bank institutions are not offering any guarantees either. I actually don’t know what’s worse, the social crisis or getting infected with COVID-19.”
She goes on to explain the further effects of an increasing number of cases. “There´ll be more violence. Colombia is not a rich country, and people worry more about starving than about dying because of the virus, that’s why many patients don’t respect the quarantine, many of them make a living on a daily basis, and when facing starvation, they need to leave their houses to look for something to be able to feed themselves. I think the quarantine is a matter of social classes.”
She advises sticking to quarantine if you’re better off. “Those who can, stay home. Don’t look for excuses to go out if you really don’t need to, don’t try to flout the law, take care of yourselves so that the system does not collapse. Follow the recommendations related to hand washing, wearing a mask, and disinfecting your clothes and belongings when you get home. This is our moment to reflect as a society, and to leave aside any silly quarrels or superficiality.”
The COVID-19 lockdown has brought – or exacerbated – the hardships felt by many on a daily basis. Here’s how two local restaurants are providing lunches for homeless people.
“Thanks to you we have something to eat and can eat lunch,” said one of the many grateful messages received by Natalia Carreño Pombo, co-owner of Chichería Demente restaurant. “We’re so grateful to you for sending us these plates of food every day.”
With Bogotá’s quarantine in full force, life has become even more challenging for the city’s vulnerable communities, especially those living on the streets. While local authorities are providing some support, the crisis – which is both an economic and a health disaster – has further stretched already overloaded systems.
As Natalia explains, “The situation is going to continue to be a difficult one for those who are living day-to-day. For example, many people rely on recycling to collect enough money to pay for a bed for a night, but now with the city’s streets empty this is being made increasingly difficult.”
Which is why this project by bogotano restaurants Chichería Demente and El Chato has been met with such appreciation. Together, the two eateries are providing lunches for the 65 people who live in a hostel in the Siete de Agosto district. Natalia says the residents include “families, children, elderly citizens and young adults who have found themselves in challenging and far from comfortable conditions.”
Chichería Demente and El Chato are taking it in turns to deliver one balanced meal per person per day. Typical lunches range from ajiaco to rice and chicken.
El Chato and Chichería Demente invite people to help them provide food for some of the homeless shelters in 7 de agosto Bogotá. Photo: Facebook Chichería Demente.
The already precarious living situation faced by residents who are not receiving help from elsewhere has been compounded by the shutdown. With no people on the street, it is harder to get money from members of the public or recycling points nearby. And there’s an increased risk of exposure to COVID-19, which could pass quickly in this small shared living space.
Aside from financial difficulties, Natalia expresses her concerns about other problems that have been magnified. “We have heard of various cases of domestic abuse in which partners and family members have become aggressive.” And with everyone stuck inside, this leaves victims with nowhere to go.
Give with your mind
In some ways, providing lunches is a natural step for Chichería Demente. Helping those in need is at the core of the restaurant’s ethos. Located near the happening district of Quinta Camacho, Natalia explains it “has always aimed to support disadvantaged citizens.” She says, “Almost all [our] employees have been homeless or near-homeless at some stage”.
In fact, she says the name Chichería Demente comes from their mission to “dar con propósito, dar con mente” – loosely translated, to give with intention, give with your mind.
A number of the employees are cycling to work to avoid the risks of infection from taking public transport, some coming from as far as Soacha. Natalia assures us that they are all taking preventative measures to help reduce the risk of infection. “We have a very strict routine of care and hygiene; our employees wear face masks, gloves, and disinfect their hands before and after delivering the meals.”
When asked if she thinks that they will be able to keep delivering food until the end of the quarantine, Natalia responds honestly, “We don’t know. We’re going to try our best, but we just don’t know.”
However, she remains positive: “This is a time of solidarity and understanding. It’s a difficult time for us all but we are working together and hope that little by little things will improve and begin to take off again.”
How can you support the cause?
You can support Chichería Demente and El Chato in their project by placing an order for a COP$10,000 lunch. Go to the Chichería Demente facebook page or call them on 320 9373488 – 311 5611310. You can also order via Rappi and request to have it delivered to the housing. Support El Chato via facebook or Vaki here.
Natalia says that, “For every meal donated, a note is signed, in order to give confirmation that the food has been successfully delivered and received.”
Many are working from home, others have no work to go to. Some people, though, are key workers for society in the COVID-19 crisis and have to continue turning up in person.
Medical workers are on the frontline. Photo: Dimitri Houtteman Unsplash
Juan* works at the unit in charge of COVID-19 at a hospital in the localidad of Teusaquillo and has signed an NDA, which is why we’ve changed his name. He’s a respiratory nurse, so is very much at the forefront of Colombia’s medical response to the coronavirus crisis and says he’s under a lot of pressure. “I am a little stressed and worried; I won’t deny it, because COVID-19 patients at the hospital where I work have passed away, something which has me thinking about my parents, my family, and my friends in general. I am afraid to see people die en masse.”
He says the quarantine might be difficult, but that it’s necessary for medical workers in coronavirus times. “If we don’t keep the preventative measures and the quarantine, we’ll have an increase in infections and in morbidities and mortality.”
Juan says that things so far are not as bad as some have feared. “The hospital occupancy has not reached the 80 ICU beds it has available for COVID-19 cases. There are currently 15 patients with the virus at the hospital: Half of those cases have complications, but I can say we don’t feel like the service has collapsed yet.”
Professionalism is a watchword, and he explains that there are protocols in place to enter and leave the hospital premises. “We must take a shower at the end of every shift, and before leaving the building, we also have in-hospital isolation protocols, and protocols to handle patients.”
There have been complaints about the provision of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) for medical workers dealing with coronavirus in some parts of the country, but Juan says that’s not an issue for his team. “I have everything: surgical scrubs, caps, masks, overshoes, white protective suit, surgical suit, scrub cap, overshoes, goggles, face mask, N95 masks, skin shield sterile gloves, and other gloves to wear over the skin shields according to procedure.”
However, his team is somewhat privileged. “I started working in this hospital 20 days ago, and it has been a relief knowing there is PPE available, compared to the hospital where I worked before, which had very poor work conditions concerning PPE biosafety protocols.” As he explains, the situation isn’t the same for everyone in the hospital. “There are lots of other health workers and cleaning staff who don’t have one single biosafety item at hand. It should be the responsibility of the ARL [Work-related risk management companies], but they have not been present in the two months of the health emergency. The government has not yet stepped in.”
He’s clearly angry at the way the government have managed the medical situation when dealing with coronavirus. “They have made decisions that only benefit the wealthy, and I’ll say bluntly, without mincing my words: the problem in Colombia is this neoliberal system, where economy and mercantilism come before politics, and what’s worse, health. Resources are poorly distributed, and that without mentioning the dreadful corruption cases in the midst of the crisis.”
There have been plenty of stories floating around social media featuring abuse against medical workers treating coronavirus, but Juan says that hasn’t been an issue for him. “I haven’t been discriminated against, I’ve received a lot of support from my family, friends, and [people] in my social networks. However, I have sensed the fear people have when we use public transport. I have not been treated badly, though, I have not been rejected or attacked, I only hope people keep being tolerant.”
— Valentín Arboleda Isaza (@Valentin_arbo) April 18, 2020
Looking forward to the coming weeks, he’s sympathetic to the pressures that many are under. “I think the quarantine should be extended, but that’s difficult because of the economic and social crisis this may generate; this is a set of situations which should be taken into account and exert control as a society and in the communities.” He recommends following and fully understanding the preventative and quarantine measures and to get information from reliable medical sources when dealing with coronavirus.
To conclude the interview, he makes an impassioned call. “The health emergency is not the root problem; the root problem is this opportunistic, unfair, and corrupt government. We need to demand education and health services, and that we must change our mindset, that means that demanding these services is not synonymous to having a socialist or communist thinking. This is not only about politics, this is about being logical, this is about social cohesiveness. I think this is the least I can share from myself, and from my profession. Thank you, and I hope my words have the ability to stir some thinking and encourage reflection.”
Our regular roundup of COVID-19 cases in Colombia.
Key points on coronavirus in Colombia:
153 deaths and 3,439 cases across 29 departments
Talk of intelligent isolation continues
Protests in Ciudad Bolívar
Coronavirus cases in Colombia until April 17. Data: INS
We are now 42 since the first case (March 6) and latest stats show:
603 COVID-19 patients recovered (average age 40 years)
450 patients are sick but still at home (average age 55 years)
153 persons confirmed to have the virus have died (average age 66)
There are 450 hospitalised cases, of which 112 are high-risk patients in ‘UCI’ intensive care units.
There’s been a lot of questions around the world on the topic of testing – and Colombia is no different. On Sunday and Monday, the number of confirmed cases seemed to have flattened off, but it turned out the number of tests had also shrunk significantly. As discussed in previous updates, there have been issues with faulty testing, and testing bias – only testing those who fit certain criteria. All of which means that, just like many other countries in the world, Colombia does not have a clear idea of how many people are actually infected.
Taking a closer look at the numbers, while Bogotá continues to have significantly more cases than other areas, it is Santa Marta that has the most deaths per million people (11.5), followed by Cartagena at 9.8. With its smaller population and high footfall, Cartagena also has more cases per million inhabitants than Bogotá.
Data: INS
Is there such a thing as intelligent isolation?
With the quarantine now due to end on April 27, people are wondering what is going to happen next. Intelligent isolation? Smart quarantine? The accordion model?
Colombia’s health minister, Fernando Ruiz Gómez, said yesterday that “society can’t be kept permanently closed.” Explaining that ending the quarantine at the end of the month is also not an option, the minister spoke of “a systematic, gradual and controlled opening of some sectors of the economy.” And if cases start to get out of control, he says we’ll be back to a lockdown.
Of course, that takes us back to the thorny question of testing. Which is probably why the health ministry is insisting that new rapid tests will be available on the EPS systems. EPS providers have come under fire for failing to transfer much needed cash to hospitals as well as not testing enough people.
What’s rapid testing?
Given the massive number of variables – from how the data is reported to what information is released and whether pending tests and negative results are counted – it’s difficult to compare testing between countries. However, Our World in Data is attempting to do just that. While Colombia was quick to enforce isolation measures, the graph below shows it has not been as quick in implementing testing.
There are two types of tests. A “serological” test that basically involves taking blood and testing it for COVID-19 antibodies and a “molecular” test, which involves a swab of your nose or throat.
The molecular tests take more time and need to be processed in a lab, which is one of the challenges in a country as geographically spread as Colombia. Less reliable are the blood tests, partly because it takes time for people to develop the antibodies they test for. But the health minister says you can get results in less than 20 minutes, making them a quick-fire way to test a lot more people.
The idea is to keep using the molecular tests for high-risk groups, such as medical workers or those over 70. Then these new rapid tests can be used for the rest of the population.
The INS say there are now 22 labs ready for testing across the country. Nine of these are in Bogotá, and others are in places like Huila, Arauca, Santander, Valle de Cauca, Meta and Antioquia.
Economic hardship
Whatever form it takes, an end to the quarantine can’t come quickly enough for the country’s worst off. As the Norwegian Council for Refugees put it, “Coronavirus is affecting everybody, but we’ve seen increasingly devastating effects on displaced populations in particular.” Venezuelan migrants, homeless people and informal workers are all suffering, as are the millions who normally survive week to week.
There have been cacerolazos in the capital for the past two nights as people in Ciudad Bolívar and other parts of the city demand more support from the authorities. Both nights have resulted in violent clashes with the police (including ESMAD) in Ciudad Bolívar, but they show no signs of stopping.
Neighbourhood leader Christian Robayo Arias called on authorities to review the way citizen protests are handled and posted a video of two women accusing the police of shooting a man and putting him in hospital.
The commemoration of Colombia’s National Day of Solidarity for Victims of the Armed Conflict was muted this year as the novel coronavirus lockdown forced individuals to shelter-in-place.
Jorge Eliécer Gaitán was known for his charisma and oratory skills. Photo: Original photo by Luis Alberto Gaitán, courtesy of Gaitán Archivo
April 9 in Colombia is typically a day filled with speeches, commemorative walks and symbolic performances – in remembrance of the victims of the armed conflict, as well as the death of Jorge Eliécer Gaitán. The liberal presidential hopeful was shot on April 9, 1948, and his assassination sparked the city-wide revolt known as the Bogotazo which launched the country into a decade of conflict.
This year, however, the remembrance was muted. The countrywide lockdown limited governmental organisations, NGOs, and political leaders from both sides of the spectrum to only tweets and commemorations through social media. The Centre of Memory, Reconciliation and Peace offered several virtual platforms to learn more about the historical importance of the day on their Twitter feed and website. That includes El dia del odio (The Day of Hate), a work which recounts Gaitán’s death, available on their website for all interested readers.
In a speech, Bogotá’s mayor Claudia López spoke of the importance of remembering the past and the actions her administration is taking to ensure Bogotá is a safe haven for victims of the conflict. “Every day, every year, every 9 of April, we affirm our commitment to the victims of the Colombian armed conflict. We remember their pain to honour it, their memory to respect it, their rights to fulfil them. That is what it means to be the epicentre of peace and reconciliation.”
More than three years have passed since Colombia signed a historic peace agreement with the FARC. The conflict left over eight million victims and seven million displaced. One million of those victims currently live in Bogotá, according to the alcalde.
Since then, implementing the accord has been an uphill journey. While we’ve seen important advances such as the disarmament of the FARC and its transition to a legal political party, the process towards a lasting peace has been dogged by violence in rural Colombia, a rise in the activities of illegal armed actors and the killing of social leaders. Indepaz reports 816 leaders have been assassinated since the treaty was signed, as of March 26 of this year. There has been limited progress when it comes to land reform, effective reintegration of ex-FARC members, and improving electricity and water provision in rural areas. The Kroc Institute of Notre Dame concluded that, two years after the peace treaty was signed, nearly two-thirds of the 578 provisions had zero or minimal implementation.
Image from the Bogotazo, the city-wide riot that left Bogotá semi-destroyed in 1948. Photo: Original photo by Sady Gonzáles, courtesy of Archivo de Bogotá
And now, the COVID-19 pandemic has piled further difficulties onto implementation. The Organization of American States (OEA) has warned that the quarantine and health risks brought by the virus will also leave rural communities more at risk to illegal armed groups. The Washington Office on Latin America has confirmed via reports from various human rights organizations that “despite the national quarantine in Colombia, killings and attacks on social leaders and armed confrontations continue and have become more targeted.” Not only that, but the economic impact of the shutdown is sure to hit the country’s most vulnerable.
While we could not march last week in memory of Gaitán, Colombia’s leaders could honour his memory by acting to support those hardest hit by the coronavirus lockdown.
Who was Gaitán?
On April 9, at approximately one in the afternoon, three bullets sliced through the air and lodged themselves into Jorge Eliécer Gaitán’s head and torso. It was 1948, and he was the favoured candidate for the upcoming presidential elections. Less than an hour after the attack, the central hospital announced his death and crowds rioted.
Some historians and reporters call Gaitán ‘la voz del pueblo’ for his charismatic and accessible speeches, support for workers, and rejection of the corrupt ruling oligarchy. While political opponents despectively called him “el negro” or “el indio,” referring to his darker hue of skin and humble background, Gaitán reclaimed those names as he fought for the rights of Afrocolombians and indigenous groups throughout his political career.
In a previous interview with The Bogota Post, historian Arnovy Fajardo Barragán expounded on Gaitán’s principal idea of “two Colombias”: one was composed of peasants, workers and small plot-holders, while the other was a “political country” of a ruling political and economic oligarchical class. As Barragán explained, “Gaitán proposed that a ruling class should be based on merit, and be conscious of people’s needs, so that it ruled for the benefit of everyone.”
Gaitán’s assassination ended his call for a political revolution, and the result was devastating. Mass rioting left the city of Bogotá in tatters, and launched the country into a decade of violence (known as la Violencia) between the conservative and liberal parties. Six years after the conservatives and liberals agreed to end their fighting, two guerrilla groups were established that dragged Colombia into over half a century of armed conflict. The reverberations are still felt today, in particular among the Afrocolombian, indigenous, rural, and working communities who Gaitán resolutely defended.
There’s always a mishmash of people in the centre of the city and that’s magnified with the quarantine that has now been extended to April 26. There are a lot of tourists trapped in the hostels as well as extreme poverty. How is the centre dealing with this heady brew under quarantine?
The OXXO on Las Aguas where many meet. Photo: Phil Dyer
Contributor Phil Dyer lives in the centre, and tells us that the streets were getting dodgier and dodgier around Las Aguas post-lockdown, with much more aggressive panhandling than usual. He also says there’s been a far higher police presence since last week, with a couple of coppers close to any of the few stores that are open. Those who are out are walking with a purpose. There’s not much in the way of dawdling going on.
Almost everybody’s wearing face masks and people are trying to stay a couple of metres away from each other. In the local Carulla, everybody gets a couple of squirts of alcohol gel on their hands as they enter. Around here at least, people are taking social distancing seriously.
Walking around, during the day at least, feels as safe in the centre as before quarantine. He’s asking the same questions as we heard from Teusaquillo. “There are so many people that I just don’t see around nowadays, and I worry about what they can be doing to make ends meet. It feels like the big chains like Carulla, Olímpica and Farmatodo are doing very well, but what about the arepa guy, the old lady who sold confectionery, the people selling tourist stuff in the market? What’s happened to all the people living on the street?”
Brazilian resident Ester Javorski has an answer for that. It’s very quiet, she says, but there are still homeless people around the centre during the quarantine, especially the bazuko addicts who have limited access to state support and nowhere to go. “Around San Victorino and Décima is very quiet, just security guards, some homeless guys eating and domicilio workers bringing food to people,” she says.
The OXXO on Carrera 3 and Las Aguas has become a gathering point of sorts, she tells us, with some tourists going in to buy food and three or four long-time street residents in turn hanging around asking for help. “The long-term homeless guys around here are friendly, unlike in some other areas. They come past the house looking for food and I give them what I can. The tourists don’t give them food because they don’t know who they are.”
As a foreign resident, she’s had few problems, though it sounds like there’s more control there than in the other zones we’ve looked at, like Chapinero and Usaquén. Ester was stopped in the parque de periodistas by police and migration officials, which is something we’ve not heard of elsewhere, although it was announced a long time ago. “They wanted to see my passport to see if I was in quarantine or not. I applied for Colombian nationality this month, so they just checked my cédula number and residency visa.”
Photo: Melanie Alsop
Reader Ryan Eastwood lives a bit further south in the Candelaria, saying it’s not too bad, given that it’s not the most salubrious part of the centre anyway, quarantine or not. He agrees with Phil that it’s probably OK in the daytime. “I haven’t left the house much, went to Éxito on 7a with 11 today and it was a little sketchy. Not many people around at all so always a bit edgy (but not in a London, overpriced, but still not posh and a bit shite edgy) when it’s like that.”
Let’s go slightly further north in the centre to see how the quarantine is affecting the Macarena. Robin Davies, a regular contributor to our movie and English learning pages, says the streets are very quiet and empty around him, but two blocks north the Perseverancia is business as normal but with face masks.
Luckily, local markets are still open, as are small tiendas. “I’m going a bit stir-crazy, but at least the dog gets me out and about for a bit. Shopping for food has been easy so far,” he explains. “The marketplace remains well-stocked with limits on the number of people who can enter. Nevertheless, nobody is observing the social distancing recommendations and most people go with their other half to shop.”
Claudia López announces gender-based restrictions to mobility.
Claudia López announces pico y género measure. Photo: Alcaldía de Bogotá
López’s latest announcement regarding the quarantine in Bogotá, which is currently set to continue through April 26, comes with Decree 106, which includes pico y género. The attempt at a catchy name for the new policy is meant to hark back to pico y placa, the traffic-control policy in which car traffic was restricted according to the odd or even-numbered ending of a car’s plaques.
When applied to gender, the policy functions similarly. Women will be allowed to circulate to perform essential tasks – ie grocery shopping, going to the bank, and going to medical appointments – on even-numbered days, while men will be permitted to do so on odd-numbered days
The policy starts on Monday, April 13 and will be implemented through the end of the current quarantine period, April 26. Anyone else who is not acting in accordance with the policy will be fined 1 million pesos.
To make things easier on the public, the City of Bogota’s website published a list with the days from April 13 to April 26, accompanied by the gender that is permitted to go out on that day. Healthcare workers, civil servants, delivery people, and other essential workers, are exempt – as well as people walking their dogs.
What other additional measures have been announced?
Beyond pico y género, Decree 106 includes two major additional policies. Bogotá’s taxi drivers, who are permitted to circulate under certain restrictions, must keep an official record of all of their passengers. At the end of the day, taxi companies must report the passenger name, origin and contact details to the local authorities.
Alcohol sales are now limited to one product per person, and shops also need to keep a record of them. Additionally, supermarkets and markets will open special queues exclusively for seniors and healthcare workers. The decree also contains additional measures to protect delivery workers, such as disinfecting workplaces and banning gatherings of more than five workers.
Why not pico y cédula?
Pico y cédula, would allow people to leave their homes for essential errands depending according to whether their cédula, or identity card, ended in an odd or even number. However, in her announcement of pico y género, López explained that pico y cédula is very difficult to control.
Many other cities in Colombia, including Medellín, Cali, some cities and towns in Cundinamarca, Ibagué, Tunja, Santa Marta, Cartagena, and Popayán have all implemented pico y cédula within the quarantine. Popayán did so from the outset on March 24, while others like Cali, implemented the measure earlier this week.
Where else is pico y género being implemented?
Neighbouring Panama and Peru have been implementing pico y género style quarantine measures since last week. Panama was the first to announce its new policy on April 1 with Peru quickly following suit on April 2.
In El Espectador, Panamanian epidemiologist Xavier Sáez-Llorens explained that gender really didn’t have anything to do with the rationale behind the government’s new policy. The reason gender is being used, he explained, is because separating who can and cannot go out by gender is “one of the easiest ways to take control” and strengthen the effectiveness of the quarantine.
Pico y género and the trans and/or gender-nonconforming communities
Theoretically, gender should give authorities more obvious, visible markers with which to enforce a policy meant to reduce the number of people on the streets at any given time. However, it is important to note that this is not always the case: An individual’s perceived gender does not always match their gender identification, nor does it always match the sex listed on their identification card.
López did her best to acknowledge the issues this would cause for the city’s significant trans community, stating that trans-identified individuals should follow the policy according to the gender with which they currently identify.
Colombia Diversa, a nonprofit that aims to champion the rights of LGBT people in the country, quickly responded to obvious concerns surrounding the measure, with a series of reminders to the community. These include:
The mayor’s office has clarified that trans people can leave their homes on the days corresponding to their gender identity.
Several reminders regarding police, who must respect trans identities when enforcing the new policy and who should not ask to see people’s identification cards.
The group called for police and other governing bodies to collaborate in order to monitor police enforcement of pico y género on a daily basis.
Similarly, one of Bogotá’s most active trans-rights groups, the Red Comunitaria Trans, responded to the decree with an open letter titled “Tenemos miedo” or “We are afraid.”
The letter explains that though the organisation understands the importance of quarantine in mitigating the threat of COVID-19, it rejects “measures that restrict mobility based on the criteria of sex/gender” and opposes putting the police in charge of gender policing.
This, the letter goes on to say, will put trans individuals in danger, perpetuating a police culture of violence against trans people. Finally, the letter demands that the city create an official reporting system for people who experience harassment or violence in these circumstances, as well as a decree that explicitly states how police with be punished if they abuse their power.
The organisation published the letter on social media, followed by historical footage of 2015 police violence against trans individuals in the city, and several artworks accompanied by the hashtag #lapolicianomecuida (the police don’t take care of me).
Here are our recommendations for language resources, online course providers, and Spanish-language shows to stream on Netflix during quarantine.
Watch Desenfrenadas to keep up your Spanish during quarantine. Photo: Netflix
Are you in quarantine alone or with other non-Spanish speakers? Worried that you might backtrack on all of the language progress you have made living in Colombia? For better or worse, you likely have the internet at your fingertips, which means you have seemingly infinite language learning resources at your disposal, like our online Spanish archives. You just have to know where to look.
Improve listening comprehension through these binge-worthy series on Netflix
Just as for those learning English, consuming Spanish-language media is a great way to improve your skills. Depending on where you are in your Spanish-learning journey, I’d recommend you start by watching with English subtitles if needed. Then upgrade to Spanish subtitles, and then finally remove them altogether. With an unknown but seemingly long quarantine ahead, you definitely have the time.
Desenfrenadas (Unstoppable)
(Season 1 available on Netflix)
This Mexican Thelma-and-Louise-style road trip story is the ultimate quarantine binge (besides Tiger King, obviously). In an attempt to escape their not-so-serious fresita* issues, best friends Vera, Rocío, and Carlota go off on a spontaneous weekend road trip to Oaxaca. They have barely made it out of Mexico City when they are intercepted by Marcela, a woman with much more serious issues, including getting her little brother away from a dangerous drug lord.
In a move of desperation, Marcela pulls a gun on the women and demands that they give her a ride. This is where the adventure really begins. From witnessing a home birth during a tropical storm to revelling in a psychedelic party on the shores of Puerto Escondido, the women have some wild experiences during unplanned stops. While funny and addictive, the show is also sharp and smart. It questions the role of class in the third-wave feminist and anti-femicide movement currently raging in Mexico. Fortunately, the series also most certainly passes the Bechdel Test.
*Fresa or fresita: a term widely used in Mexican slang to describe someone who is upper-class or perceived as upper-class or stuck up. Similar to the term ‘gomelo’ in Bogota.
Bolívar
(Whole Series available on Netflix)
For a highly stylised look into Colombian colonial and revolutionary history, Caracol’s telenovela,Bolívar, recounts the life and times of the libertador himself, Simón Bolívar. The show is a full biopic that tells Bolívar’s story starting from his childhood. Netflix released the series internationally in June of 2019 and on Caracol in Colombia in September of 2019. All 63 episodes are currently available on Netflix.
Yo soy Betty, la Fea
(Whole series available on Netflix)
If there is one Colombian telenovela that you have to watch, this is it. Ask any Colombian out there and they will have something to say about this iconic series that defines a culture. If you’ve never seen the Colombian version, you’ve probably been exposed to one of its many remakes, which include American adaptations like Ugly Betty and Betty in New York, as well as other spinoffs in 19 other countries. Yo Soy Betty, la Fea, starring Ana Maria Orozco as Betty, is the real deal original. It premiered in Colombia on RCN 1999 and ran through 2001.
From “Don Armando!” to “Desgraciado!”, this telenovela will bring you up to speed on common Colombian cultural references. It’s also a great opportunity to practise listening comprehension for the rolo accent. You’ll also learn some late-nineties and early-00s slang while you’re at it.
Disclaimer: The show does not age well. Take the misogyny with a grain of salt and reflect on how far Colombian society has come.
La Casa de las Flores (The House of Flowers)
(Seasons 1 and 2 available on Netflix)
This is another one of my Mexican favourites available on Netflix. The family dramedy and telenovela-like premise are sure to get you hooked from the start.
The series is about the de la Moras, an affluent family that lives in Los Lomos above Mexico City and that owns a well-respected boutique flower shop in the neighbourhood. When a suicide takes place in the shop, the family uncovers their father’s life-altering secret. The family’s three adult children each have their own juicy subplots, which get increasingly exaggerated and salacious as the show goes on, just like any good telenovela.
Two full seasons are available on Netflix and a third season is set for release later this year.
One of the most popular Spanish-language podcasts in the U.S. is Radio Ambulante from NPR (National Public Radio). Though it is produced by an American station, the show features Latin American stories in Spanish from all over the region, including Colombia. For example, we recommend “La noche más larga” parts 1 and 2 for excellent reporting on the historically significant capture of the Colombian Palacio de Justicia in 1985.
The producers of Radio Ambulante realized that many non-native Spanish speakers were using them as a resource to improve their listening comprehension. In response, they decided to launch Lupa, a companion language-learning app for the podcast. The app helps learners track new vocabulary words, control the speed of the recording, and provides access to real-time translation.
Language-learning apps and online course providers
Babbel, a German language learning website, is offering a free month of learning to students currently enrolled in K-12 education or in a higher education programme. The site offers instruction in 13 different languages including Spanish. After the free month, you can choose from Babbel’s several different subscription packages. You can pay USD$12.95/month, USD$8.95/month for a 3-month commitment, and so on.
Duolingo came onto the ed-tech scene in 2012 as a language learning app, allowing users to improve their language skills through their smartphones. Duolingo’s original platform has always been free, so you can create an account and get started free-of-charge. Just be aware that anything that’s free usually means that there are plenty of ads involved: the app will blast you with ads between lessons and is not available offline. Duolingo’s paid premium version, Duolingo Plus, offers an ad-free experience and downloadable lessons, so you can keep learning when you do not have internet available. The site offers coursework in 36 different languages, from the popular Spanish to more obscure options like Hawaiian and Welsh
Type the word “Spanish” into the Coursera search box and 941 search results will appear. This MOOC provider, which partners with universities and companies to offer courses, has Spanish-learning and maintenance opportunities for anyone at any level. You can brush up on utilitarian and conversational Spanish with “Basic Spanish” or dive into the intricacies of copy-editing and grammar with “Corección de estilo”. Some courses are completely free and make all material available free of charge. Others are free for initial basic coursework but require that you pay a fee for full access. Additionally, some courses offer professional certificates, which come at an additional price (typically USD$50).
EdX is an ed-tech company founded in 2012 by MIT and Harvard. It offers thousands of MOOCs by partnering with hundreds of universities to offer exclusive content. EdX offers three levels of Spanish free of charge and gives members the option to pay USD$50 to earn an official certificate.
Coronavirus has hit Colombia’s economy hard, but just how bad are the long-term prospects? We take a look at what could happen post-virus.
What does the coronavirus mean for the Colombian economy?
Confused about the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on the economy in Colombia? You’re in good company. The nation’s top financial institutions appear to be plugging new numbers into tried and tested economic models, behaving – in public at least – as if the game hasn’t fundamentally changed. Meanwhile, international observers warn of an economic crash that would dwarf the 2008-09 global financial crisis (GFC).
At the beginning of the year, before coronavirus, Colombia was on track to log a respectable 3.7% growth in the economy for 2020. In late March, the national institution of financial institutions (ANIF), downgraded its forecasts to 1.8-2% while Fedesarrollo, a leading think tank, revised its own estimates to 2.3%. Both figures have the feel of rearranging the deckchairs as the iceberg approaches.
These estimates rely on the idea of a “V-shaped” recovery, whereby household consumption of goods and services – equivalent to over two thirds of GDP – is only temporarily dampened by a national quarantine and comes roaring back once restrictions are relaxed. One local analyst says that, structurally, nothing has changed and that pent-up demand from the middle classes could help the country reach positive growth.
That is not a view shared by international banks. The headline of a 23 March research note by US bank Goldman Sachs warned that Latin American economies were about to “hit the wall”, with Colombian GDP declining by 2.5% compared to a region-wide fall of 3.8%.
To put that in context, Colombia has only experienced one year of negative growth since records began. That was 1999. Ten years later, the economy – boosted by strong coal and oil exports – grew at 1.7%, in the worst year of the GFC, and at a healthy average of 5% for the following five years.
The short and long-term impacts of coronavirus shutdown look far more ominous for the economy in Colombia. Analysts at several banks declined to comment for this article in the current atmosphere of uncertainty.
Even before the arrival of the virus, Colombia had problems. In March, a price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia led to a collapse in oil prices that has rendered many of the country’s oil wells uneconomical, accelerating a decline in national production that began in 2013. Reduced export income from oil will expand the current account deficit which at 4.4% of GDP, is already one of the highest in the region. Should that widen further and international credit ratings remove the country’s investment grade, billions of dollars would flow out of the country, crashing the stock market.
But these are the everyday concerns of economists and bankers. Today they seem like terms from a bygone era. The current crisis will have a global impact, but developing countries look set to be the worst affected. The country’s public healthcare system was already swimming in debt and corruption scandals. Unlike in 2009, strong Chinese demand for commodities will not keep the treasury topped up.
The rapid depreciation of the Colombian peso over the past two years – now over 4,000 to the dollar – means imports remain expensive, including food given that the country has been unable to make the land reforms needed to create a competitive agricultural base. With the outlook for airlines and international travel looking highly precarious, even the government’s estimate that tourism receipts could return to their pre COVID-19 levels by mid-2023 look ambitious.
The government has already dropped interest rates to record lows and prepared a stimulus package equivalent to 3% of GDP but its stabilisation fund, unlike those of Chile and Peru, only stashed away sufficient oil revenues for a rainy day, not a category 5 economic hurricane.
The Economist Intelligence Unit points out that public debt across Latin America is higher than before the GFC and that multilateral finance will be crucial for an effective stimulus. Colombia already has a flexible credit line – a loan facility reserved only for the top emerging market countries – of around USD$11.4bn with the International Monetary Fund, and the government could draw down on this loan as a last resort. But the size of the spending programme required to reactivate the economy will be unprecedented, and the government may be reluctant to do anything that would risk the sustainability of its fiscal balance (what it spends versus what it earns) in the medium term.
The effects, unsurprisingly, will be felt hardest in the poorest strata of society. Venezuelan migrants, hospitality and tourism workers, cleaners and the huge number of informal workers have already seen their meagre incomes cut. When the country tops international lists for ‘entrepreneurship’ it’s because many Colombians start their own business – from dry cleaners to photocopy shops – due to lack of employment options. Most of these small businesses run on thin margins and tiny cash buffers. Many will not survive until the end of quarantine on 27 April, more will fail if it is extended and when something like normality does return to the high street, prevailing caution could cut discretionary spending.
Ten years ago HSBC named Colombia as one of the CIVETS, a group of six developing countries it considered to be the next wave of up-and-coming investment destinations. Since the 1990s, the idea that ‘emerging economies’ would close the gap on developed countries and offer juicy returns for investors has been an article of faith. That logic now looks flimsy.
No one can foresee the long term economic consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak, but developing countries look set to be hit hardest, increasing international inequality. As developed nations prioritise their own economies, re-shore key industries and rethink international travel and investment, Colombia’s key industrial sectors (commodities, construction, services and tourism) could all see their long-term prospects altered in a way unimaginable a few months ago.
After 13 days of quarantine, Colombia will extend the obligatory lockdown by two more weeks.
President Duque announced a two-week extension of the quarantine in Colombia. Photo: Colombia’s health ministry
President Iván Duque announced this evening that the quarantine in Colombia will continue for a further two weeks, now finishing at 11.59 pm on April 26. The quarantine was originally set to end at 11.59 pm on April 12, though there has been speculation that it could continue as far as June.
The countrywide quarantine has seen businesses, schools and universities shut down, with only essential services remaining open. One person per household is allowed to go out to shop for groceries and medicines or to walk dogs. Unlike other countries, Colombia’s shutdown does not make exceptions for those wanting to walk or jog.
The lockdown has hit the country’s most vulnerable the hardest. From the Venezuelan migrants to the poorest Colombians, there are reports of vulnerable informal workers being forced from their homes. Obviously those who normally survive through selling on the street are struggling as people stay home.
Our interviews with residents of Soacha last week showed that many there were holding out for April 13, the original end date for the countrywide quarantine. Businesses, too, are suffering with one small business owner telling us, “The great majority [of small businesses] will go into bankruptcy.”
The challenge for Colombia, with so many living day-to-day or week-to-week, is balancing the country’s very real economic challenges with the equally real public health ones.
Just yesterday the president had said the quarantine could not continue indefinitely and had suggested the possibility of intelligent isolation. “Depending on the behaviour of the epidemiological curve, next week we will report if the quarantine is extended or if we move to intelligent isolation,” he said.
However, with another 94 new Colombian COVID-19 cases and 11 deaths confirmed today in Colombia – taking the total cases to 1,579 and the total deaths to 46 – Duque told the nation that the current obligatory quarantine would be extended for another 14 days.
“The measures we’ve taken have been positive,” he said. “Our challenge is to continue to save lives.”
How is the national quarantine affecting your barrio? We’ve been talking to people all over the city, with today Teusaquillo.
Photo: Oli Pritchard
Our novel coronavirus expert Steve Hide reports that with the coronavirus quarantine, La Soledad is even lonelier than the ‘solitude’ its name suggests, with empty streets and its leafy Parkway – never a bustling avenida even at the best of times – reduced to a handful to dog walkers and Rappi riders. A few cyclists are being stopped and questioned. But life goes on. If you look carefully some small businesses are still attending essential services, such as vets, papelerias, corner shops and many cafés are doing take outs or domicilios.
Street people and informal vendors congregate around the popular Carulla supermarket on Parkway, so bring small change or buy extra food if you want to help them. Carulla operates a preferential hour’s slot – 7am to 8.30am – for the elderly or incapacitated. Just as we heard from people quarantined in Usaquen, outside these hours there are usually long queues, so allow up to an hour to do your shopping. The large Colsubisidio supermarket nearby on Avenida 26 is also fully stocked and usually much emptier, and there are also corner food shops with good stock.
Security is always a concern during the Teusaquillo quarantine. It’s an area that’s walkable from downtown, and the empty backstreets with zero footfall potential have become likely mugging sites if you wander off the main streets. We have heard reports of people being attacked for their cell-phones.
Police patrol the areas and sometimes check people to verify why they are out on the street. Many locals say they’re avoiding going out early and late. People are sticking to the main routes and closer shops and just taking cash or a bank card for their shops.
That’s a story we’ve heard again and again – most of our readers and writers in Teusaquillo’s quarantine seem to be worried about the safety on the streets. Many people report not leaving their apartments or conjuntos. Martin Higgins says that people in his neighbourhood have been whistling from the windows when they see suspicious people on the street. Daniel Aguilar says he hasn’t had to leave his conjunto yet, but there are very few people outside in his area close to the Universidad Nacional.
“All very quiet. You know I’m in a quiet area, now it’s fucking quiet.”
Rainier Latchu
Longtime reader Rainier Latchu lives between Parkway and Séptima. He says there are odd people walking around, usually crossing the area, heading from the Parkway environs and heading towards Caracas & Séptima. He lives near a school and a church, both of which are quiet. “All very quiet. You know I’m in a quiet area, now it’s fucking quiet. No school, no funerals. But I’m wondering what is happening to the average of four funerals per day. Are the bodies in chill mode? Is padre doing the services at the cremation site?” Answers we don’t have. In this brave new Bogotá, there is only uncertainty.
As the government decree that TransMilenio riders have to wear face masks, expect to see more masked people from your windows. Tomorrow we’ll be reporting from the centre and later in the week we’ll visit the outer suburbs of Suba and Bosa.
And if you’re at home and looking for entertainment, check out some of the ways that Colombian performers are switching to streaming performances.
How is the quarantine affecting you? If you’re living in Colombia, email us or use the comments below or on our facebook page.
Our regular roundup of COVID-19 cases in Colombia.
Going green: two weeks after Bogotá’s quarantine, live traffic maps show zero rush hour.
Key points on coronavirus in Colombia:
35 deaths and 1,485 cases across 26 departments
Face masks now obligatory on public transport
Talk (but no promises) of ‘smart quarantine’ after current lockdown ends
COVID-19 cases reported to April 5 by Instituo Nacinional de Saludwww.ins.gov.co
We are now one month since the first case (March 6) and latest stats show:
88 COVID-19 patients recovered (average age 42 years)
1,167 patients are sick but still at home (average age 40 years)
35 persons confirmed to have the virus have have died (average age 60)
Graphs showing COVID-19 cases in Colombia to April 5. Source: INS
Hospitalised cases are 195, which represents about 14% of currently affected patients. Of these 63 people (4.5%) are in the ‘UCI’ intensive care units, these are high-risk or severely affected patients.
This proportion of COVID-19 hospitalisation in Colombia reflects WHO global clinical findings from other countries that “most patients with COVID-19 develop only mild illness, approximately 14% develop severe disease that requires hospitalisation and oxygen support, and 5% require admission to an intensive care unit.”
Capital increase
Coronavirus has spread to 26 departments, including Isla San Andrés, but the capital Bogotá remains the major hot-spot and accounts for almost half of all confirmed cases: That’s to say the city has close to the same number as the rest of Colombia combined, with new infections rising faster.
Bogotá vs. The Rest of Colombia in terms of coronavirus cases. Data source INS
There could be several factors to this: The larger and denser population, its role as a transport hub and the cooler weather (which can facilitate transmissions, according to recent scientific reports). There is also likely to be a testing bias towards Bogotá, with more labs based here (INS, District Health).
Time to tapaboca
As we covered in the last update, there’s been a global change of tack over face masks, and from today in Colombia people using public transport systems – buses, taxis, TransMilenios etc, – will have to use tapabocas or face a stiff fine.
According to new presidential decrees, the face masks will be mandatory in “areas where there is a massive influx of people such as market places, supermarkets, banks, pharmacies, where it is not possible to maintain a minimum distance of 1 metre.” Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
Remember you can make your own cloth face covering if there are none to buy.
In the month since the first confirmed coronavirus case in Colombia, the INS reports having done 23,000 tests, an average rate of 760 per day, though in the last week this has increased to 1,700 per day, with some lab teams working in shifts to process samples 24 hours.
Colombia’s health minister has already given some hints: the “accordion strategy” of squeezing and releasing movement restrictions according to how the outbreak is going, i.e. follow the science.
Today President Duque talked about “smart isolation” similar to used in Asian countries like South Korea and Singapore which rely on mass testing, rapid contact tracing, and selected isolation of contacts of positive cases. If successfully adopted in Colombia – perhaps a big “if” – this could mean easing of the blanket quarantine we have at present.
Duque suggested that the vulnerable and elderly will continue to be kept inside and that schools and colleges will stay shut.
The final decision – which will surely come just before April 13 – depends on advice from Colombian health experts based on how the outbreak is progressing over the next week. So for now, keep watching the curve.
As we come to the end of the second week of lockdown, we get our readers and contributors to tell us what’s going on under quarantine in Usaquén and around.
Big queues were seen outside Davivienda near Calle 170. Photo: Brendan Corrigan
As with other parts of the city, the quarantine means a ‘new normal’ has taken hold in the northern localidad of Usaquén. Just like the quarantine in Chapinero, people report queues at supermarkets and banks, and though there are citizens on the streets, many are wearing face masks.
Ángela Forero, a long term member of our editorial team who also writes our learning Spanish column, says that the Autopista Norte looks like your regular día sin carro. A quiet quarantine day in northern Usaquén but not completely dead. A few people out with shopping bags, but not much more. A group of six or seven young Venezuelans came past asking for food on Tuesday morning. “After my neighbours set off the panic alarm and got the portero to scare them away, I managed to hand them an apple, a tangerine and a tuna can by throwing them from the window to one of the workers in the local car wash, who skilfully caught them and gave them to the young lads.”
In Cedritos, central Usaquén, reader Giselle Nara tells us the quarantine means she’s also seen “long bank lines and quite a lot of people still on the streets.” Supermarkets there seem like they’re back to normal. It’s the same story from Daniela near the Séptima and 180, who says “In my neighbourhood, all drug stores and groceries are open but close early. Fortunately, inside my conjunto, we have a small grocery shop which is a life saver sometimes. Not only in these quarantine days but the whole year. We also have a laundry shop but for obvious reasons it has been closed. In fact, I talked to the owner like 3 days ago, she happened to be here to water her plants, and she is worried sick about this economy as she cannot operate.”
Even further south, Aussie reader Cameron Curtis says there’s not much of interest to report in Santa Barbara, “pretty quiet, though lots of delivery motos and vans about.” Surtifruver on Calle 119 #11a is fully stocked, and is requiring customers to have face masks in order to enter.
“long bank lines and quite a lot of people still on the streets.”
Giselle Nara
And contributor Brendan Corrigan reports on how the quarantine is affecting a barrio popular near to Portal Norte at the limits of Usaquén. “These economically poor and vulnerable ‘blindspots’ are at risk of being overlooked by charities offering much-needed assistance in these very difficult times as the focus is very often, understandably, on the vaster swaths of poverty to the south,” he says.
He says if one didn’t know any better, one would nearly think it was business as usual. That is to say, there is a fair amount of movement on the streets. Yes, police on motorcycles do regular rounds and appear to randomly question those walking the streets but it’s common to see groups of more than two people on corners, chatting away. Brendan’s in favour of the relaxed enforcement, saying “of course, these could be family members living under the same roof so, going by the ‘rules’, there is no issue here. The police seem, sensibly in my opinion, tolerant in this regard. They all live in very close quarters in any case, so breaking up small groups of people would seem a little pointless.”
Appearances apart, it is not business as usual. Needless to say, tienda bars are shut, save for the select few that sell for takeout. “The majority of men I know in the barrio are independent construction workers and have thus been idle the last two weeks with no income. The lucky ones have partners working in “essential” menial jobs such as shop and cleaning staff, that kind of labour, and at least have something coming in. Others, however, are the sole providers for a number of mouths.”
While adults are out on the streets, children are conspicuous by their absence. By all accounts, the police are less tolerant of children running about unchecked in the barrio so parents/grandparents have acted accordingly.
A little further south, in the more affluent Cedritos and surrounds, you won’t see people hanging around on the streets, except for the meeting spots of Rappi and other delivery guys. Here, movement appears to be reserved for walking the dog or heading out to do some shopping or some other essential errand.
Bank queues are where you’ll find the biggest gatherings, the Davivienda on the autopista close to Calle 170 being a particular case in point. On Thursday the line ran the entire block south, extending around the corner of the next street. “On the same day, the queue to enter Éxito at Portal Norte was equally long, if not longer. Apparently it was ‘subsidy day’ so, again, more a lower-to-working class inconvenience.”
In terms of following quarantine rules and recommendations, social distancing was a bit ad hoc, two metres in places, no more than two feet in others. Most were wearing face masks, which of course is not obligatory but a number of establishments will now not allow you to enter without wearing one.
That’s reassuring given that according to yesterday’s update on coronavirus cases in Colombia, the jury is finally back on the face mask debate, with advice from the Centre for Disease Control that we should be wearing face masks.
That’s the situation in Usaquén, but how is the quarantine affecting you? If you’re living in Colombia, email us or use the comments below or on our facebook page.
Coronavirus in Colombia: In this update we say: you do need a mask for coronavirus protection.
Key points on coronavirus in Colombia:
Slower increase in new cases, but deaths jump to 25
Bogotá still the focus with 587 cases
26 departments now affected
COVID-19 confirmed cases to April 3. Source and graphic: INS Colombia www.ins.gov.co
Colombia’s COVID-19 cases seem to be still holding steady even as the viral disease skyrockets around the globe. Today’s stats from the Insituto Nacional de Salud (April 3) do show an increase in deaths – eight since our last Update two day’s ago – but a slight decrease in new cases, which number 202 in the last two days compared to 267 in the previous similar period.
Colombia’s coronavirus curve is showing slight signs of flattening. Data: INS
Comparison curve: Colombia v Italy
While we are far too early in the outbreak to draw concrete conclusions – and there can be gaps in the data collection – the graphs below show Colombia registering a lower rate of infection when compared with Italy and even South Korea, previously considered a success story for effective outbreak control.
It’s worth noting that case detection can lag behind actual infection by up to two weeks, and the death of a patient can also lag behind by another two weeks: Hence deaths can still rise even as cases start to slow down.
COVID-19 cases in Colombia plotted against curves for Italy and South Korea. Sources: INS and Worldometer. COVID-19 deaths in Colombia plotted against curves for Italy and South Korea. Sources: INS and Worldometer.
Could the BCG jab protect Colombians?
As we’ve mentioned in previous updates, because of the silent spread of the virus there is increasing evidence that early adoption of mass quarantines can slow the outbreak by breaking the chain of infection.
Italy on began regional lockdowns after 200 deaths and 5,000 cases, the U.S. has 7,000 deaths and 270,000 cases – and some states still deciding to quarantine. In comparison Colombia implemented restrictions for much of the country early; before any recorded deaths and less than 200 cases confirmed.
But there might be another medical reason Colombia is seeing less coronavirus cases: BCG vaccinations. Since the early 1970s, around 80% of Colombians have routinely had the BCG anti-tuberculosis jab. And now scientists think it also protects against COVID-19.
A ray of hope? Or more coronavirus fake news?
A draft scientific paper by medical researchers in New York and posted onlinecorrelates high-BCG countries – those which historically mass vaccinated – with low COVID-19 cases. And in fact, the BCG has long been known to offer some protection against other respiratory illnesses.
And countries with no universal BCG policy are some of the hardest hit such as Italy and the U.S. So now human trials are now taking place around the world to see if the vaccine can ward off the coronavirus.
If it does work, then having widespread BCG coverage could help Colombians, though so far only those under 50 years young enough to have had the jab. Even then, less virus in the younger population can help prevent spread to the older.
The face mask debate reaches a conclusion
Back in Bogotá, a burning question for many is: should I be wearing a tapaboca? And is the embarrassment factor of looking like you just failed a casting call for ER offset by the slight chance it might protect you from coronavirus?
It’s fair to say that no single COVID-19 issue has divided the world’s experts more than this one.
Then there is the theory that the amount of virus you ingest or breath in – the ‘initial dose’– can have an impact on how sick you get. Since smaller amounts of virus could mean less chance of dying, then barriers to reduce that initial dose – such as face masks – surely would help.
Now – six whole weeks after the Surgeon General’s directive – the Centre for Disease Control today announced that, yes, we should be wearing face masks.
The U.S. boffins came to this conclusion after three months of coronavirus research found that “the virus can spread between people interacting in close proximity – for example, speaking, coughing, or sneezing”.
To which most of us would say: No shit, Sherlock?.
Luckily, lots of us did figure it out earlier, and many people (and some countries) have taken the sensible precaution to use face masks, and if they can’t find them, make their own.
Squeezebox strategy
During a ten-minute walk to the shops in Teusaquillo today I noted more than 90% of people on the street were wearing face masks of some type, and according to social media some shops are now demanding people to wear one before entering.
Perhaps face masks will form part of the forthcoming “accordion strategy” announced by Colombian leadership this week.
Relax, it’s nothing to do with using Vallenato songs to scare away the bug, but rather a series of squeezing and then easing of quarantines to control localised outbreaks. Less lockdown but coronavirus control could be music to Colombia’s ears.
As the country grinds to a halt and almost all public spaces have been closed, many have taken to the internet to cope. While many films and albums are readily available to stream online, the age of COVID-19 brings with it an expanded world of digital performances and live-stream content.
Service industry workers have been laid off due to business closings meaning that many current working artists, who often rely on the gig economy for their income, have had everything cancelled or postponed. Next time you’re looking for entertainment and are thinking about binge-watching something on Netflix, consider supporting local artists instead by tuning into a live-stream
Here are just a few Bogotá-based options:
Drag
When Bogotá drag queen Lesley Wolf started planning Home Drag Festival, she was responding to an immediate need in the drag community. The country’s quarantine orders had left drag artists like herself with cancelled and postponed performances. Wolf, in collaboration with Bogotá production company Victoria Films and the related YouTube channel, Raros Queer Experience , decided to put on Home Drag Festival, a virtual drag series that had its first installment on Sunday, March 29.
Wolf said she had low expectations for the event and was pleasantly surprised to find that over 500 people tuned in for Sunday’s stream. After seeing that the drag community in Canada was putting on virtual shows while practicing social distancing, Wolf decided to produce something similar but with a Colombian twist. Sunday’s show featured over 30 Colombian drag artists from all over the country.
“This initiative has several purposes,” said Wolf. “It seeks to shed light on Colombian drag art– we had queens from Pereira, Cali, Medellín, Bucaramanga, and of course from here, from Bogotá. It also serves as a platform so that the artists can receive tips for their performances.”
Each performing drag artist has two minutes to perform, choosing to compete in one of the following categories: lipsync, makeup, and outfit. During each performance, the queen’s name, social media information, and payment platform information- Nequi, Paypal or Daviplata- appears on the bottom of the screen.
“We didn’t expect such a marvellous and massive response. We also didn’t expect the donations to be so spectacular,” said Wolf as she expressed her gratitude for last Sunday’s audience generosity.
Tune into Raros Queer Experience this weekend for the next installment of Drag Home Festival to support Colombian drag art.
Indie music
When they saw unknown artists struggling to gain exposure, friends Pablo Chilito and Lucas Muñeton formed a production collective, NoiseNoise in April 2016. Though the collective stopped producing in mid-2019, Chilito and Muñeton decided to celebrate their fourth anniversary through a four-day festival, which has now developed in the form of a virtual lineup of curated local talent.
“Though we couldn’t do it on stage, we’re excited to open doors to these new names. People are home, they can tune in, they have time,” said Chilito.
Chilito added that the silver lining of hosting a virtual event is that there are no physical boundaries. Musicians who are currently outside of Bogotá, including those from Medellín, Mexico, and Chile, are participating.
The full line up is José Vitola, Tobogán Andaluz, Pavlo, Ahtu y los animles sueltos, Babelgam, El cómodo silencio de los que hablan poco, 100 años de monstruos, Bella Álvarez, Encarta 98, Viaje del Héroe, Las de Hiroshima, Los Viles, EV, Prehistoricos, and some surprise acts.
“Our focus is to create space and form audiences, to really open doors and highlight unknown artists. Our purpose has always been to convince people that just because they don’t know an artist doesn’t mean they’re not worth seeing,” said Chilito.
Film
Since its opening, Bogotá’s Cinemateca has been extremely popular, offering cinephiles excellent programming. It isn’t letting up during la cuarentena. Here’s how your inner movie buff can stay connected to the city’s cinematic epicentre through a range of virtual offerings.
Launching the online course “Ciudad y cine Colombiano” or City and Colombian Cinema. Registration is open until April 5th and is open to all, both Colombians and non-citizens, who are interested in the topic.
A range of virtual workshops, lectures, and live streams, including local short films.
Keep tabs on the Cinemateca’s website for up-to-date calendar updates as they expand their offerings throughout the quarantine.
Classical Music
Colombia’s national symphony orchestra, the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Colombia released a video on Monday with “un obsequio para el mundo,” a “gift to the world.” Each symphony musician individually recorded their part of the piece from home using mobile phones. Director Olivier Grangean is featured in the film conducting the piece, Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations, IX Nimrod, as if he were in front of the full orchestra.
The video is accompanied by a brief caption including these simple comforting words: “Music will always be with you.” The city’s philharmonic orchestra, the Orchestra Filarmónica de Bogotá is making virtual concerts available to the public. Its first, which took place on March 27, was a Bach concerto by the organization’s youth chamber music group. The professional orchestra also recorded a virtual performance of “Colombia, tierra querida.”
Our look at how quarantine is affecting different areas of Bogotá takes us further afield to Soacha.
Red cloths hang poignantly in Soacha’s windows during the quarantine. Photo: Emilse Cruz Villada
Quarantine or no quarantine, there are still a lot of people in Soacha who can’t afford to stay home. A lot of people are staying in, but there’s still plenty of activity on the streets.
From my window, I can see red cloths hanging in many windows. It’s difficult to see so many of my neighbours are struggling – the red cloths are a way to show people that they need help. There are a lot of people who are not officially catalogued as vulnerable, so don’t receive assistance, but because they work independently are losing money.
I’ve lived in Soacha for a long time, but there’s more poverty here than I realised. People would rather die from the virus than from hunger, they say the virus would only kill one member of the family but hunger will kill them all.
Some do not have a choice. Mario, a 40-year-old builder, couldn’t work even if he wanted to. Even without the quarantine, nobody’s doing any renovations. Coronavirus fears mean clients won’t risk having any unnecessary people in their homes. “I’ve got a bit of money saved,” he told me. “But it’s not going to last for long.”
That’s a sentiment echoed by Soacha resident Jhoana, a hairdresser who works from home. Her business has been suspended to combat contagion, which puts her in a difficult situation. “I am not classified as vulnerable so I don’t qualify for help from the government,” she said.
Landlord Carlos lives on one floor and rents out the other. He is concerned about what will happen as his tenants can’t work and need to use the money they have to cover their food costs. He won’t throw them out, but his small allowance doesn’t go very far towards the costs of public service and utility bills.
And the quarantine is no picnic for those who can still work. Armando is classed as an essential worker because he’s employed in a supermarket. He needs to support his family, even though on some days he has to cycle the 24 km into Bogotá because of limits on who can enter the TransMilenio stations. He says it’s a tough ride but he can’t afford to lose his job.
The TransMilenio in Soacha is operating a ‘pico y cédula’ service that limits the use of the service according to ID numbers. Depending on the day and the final number of your ID, you’re only able to use the service at certain hours — this in an attempt to thin traffic and limit the spread of the virus.
It’s not all doom and gloom. Yuliana’s routine hasn’t changed much at all. The only real change is that they have to wear facemasks and gloves at the warehouse in Abastos where she works. She’s able to get to work by buseta and says that if anything, her trip is easier now because there’s less traffic.
While Soacha is closely tied to Bogotá, it’s actually a different municipality. The mayor of Soacha, Juan Carlos Saldarriaga, is asking citizens to help neighbours who have hung red cloths from their windows that show they are in immediate need. He says they have received an extra 50,000 food packages from the government and the Red Cross which will be distributed, but that more help is needed.
What’s worrying is the number of people pinning their hopes on an April 13 end to the quarantine. Mario spoke for many when he said he’s holding on “I’m not receiving any help at the moment, so I’m waiting for the quarantine to pass so that everything can go back to normal.”
But this week, Bogotá mayor Claudia López warned that the lockdown may well continue until June. If that happens, several of the people I spoke to this week would not be able to cope. Both Mario and Jhoana said if the quarantine is extended they will need support from the local authorities, and that they would also have to ask family or friends for financial help.
Crisis looms with mass evictions of Venezuelans during coronavirus quarantine
Venezuelans searching for lodging in Bogotá today during the coronavirus. Some families are sleeping on the street after being summarily evicted from hostels in the city centre during the lockdown. Photo: Steve Hide
Migrants and vulnerable informal workers are still being forced out of rooms for rent in downtown Bogotá, families reported today, even after city authorities moved to prohibit landlords from putting families on the street during the coronavirus crisis.
How is the national quarantine affecting your barrio? We’ve been talking to people all over the city, starting with Chapinero.
Chapinero is where many of our contributors live and play, so we’re starting in the capital’s most vibrant localidad. In the south end, it’s been pretty quiet. Deputy editor Oli Pritchard reports normal-ish activity around the Javeriana University where he’s been walking his dogs. It’s a medical supplies zone, so that explains the need for many of these shops to continue trading. Footfall is much lighter than normal, but there are people on the streets.
Of course, the capital’s homeless population have nowhere to go, so they’re all still around and in some cases getting aggressive. People appear to be giving generously where there’s no aggression, thankfully. There’s no real threat of violence so far, just a bit of an edge.
There are police stationed at regular intervals along the Séptima, about every five to ten blocks or so. There’s little for them to do though, as Rappis whizz by, cars thunder along and the odd street seller or beggar wander past.
Taxis are running fairly frequently and some are definitely empty as they slow down and honk as we pass. The EPS clinics are open, with everyone waiting outside in a careful metre-spaced queue. A few chains are open for sandwiches and the like, but you can’t enter the shop. Tostao have begun stocking basics too, which could be a good alternative for people that need only bread and eggs and don’t want to run the contagion risks of entering a shop.
Most local tiendas and supermarkets are open too, although Ara has boarded up the windows, perhaps fearful of rioting. Supermarkets are likely to be limiting visitor numbers, so expect to wait a few minutes in line before entering the shop. Rats are now skittering through the streets in daylight hours.
The local parks have a fair few dogwalkers and the occasional person who appears to be sidling out for a cheeky fag. Everywhere you look there are delivery riders, but even their numbers are dwindling as we move further into lockdown. The Parque Nacional is given over to the armies of gardening workers and the occasional dogwalker cheerily waving from a great distance.
In Chapinero Alto, readers say they’ve seen varying amounts of people on the streets. One of our writers near 63 was out earlier this week and saw no more than five people in a three minute trip to Carulla, which seems to match up with most people’s reports. The store there was fully stocked, with about 40 people inside. Even at the preferential time, people who were not elderly or pregnant were going in at 7.20 am on Thursday morning, no queue. In general, apart from bread, most people seem to be able to find exactly what they want.
All in all, Chapinero is far from normal, but also far from shut down completely. You’ll have little problems in getting basic provisions and if you need to do urgent things like visit the bank or EPS office, that should be relatively easy too. Even the odd papelería is open, so it’s far from a ghost town out there.
Coronavirus cases in Colombia to April 1. Source: INS
Key points on coronavirus in Colombia:
1,065 cases to date, 17 deaths
19-year-old dies in Cali
Community spreadmeans more cases
Colombia enters ‘mitigation’ phase of outbreak
Coronavirus is now widely circulating in Colombia with a significant rise in community cases that cannot be linked back to the original imported infections from Europe.
The so-called ‘mitigation phase’, as announced by the health minister Fernando Ruiz, has been triggered by data showing that 20% of confirmed COVID-19 cases have popped up in the population among people that so far have no known connection to those flying in sick from Europe last month. In Bogotá that figure is 30%.
This new stage of the outbreak comes as 1,065 cases were detected in Colombia and 17 deaths reported.
Squash the sombrero
Anyone following the coronavirus crisis has acquired an interest in epidemiological curves, and particularly making them go down again – or “squashing the sombrero” as a U.K. politician poetically put it.
Meanwhile in Colombia – a country with cool hats – the virus has got loose, even though the health minister says that Colombia’s quarantine measures are “showing effects by flattening the outbreak curve” and giving time for health services to better attend sick people.
Since the first coronavirus case in Colombia, 15% have been hospitalised, and a third of these (5.5% of all cases) have required life-saving treatment in intensive care.
Curves are on the up….Colombia’s cases and deaths plotted since first notification.
Stats also show that:
The average age of confirmed cases is 42 years
The average age of hospitalised cases is 55 years
The average age of persons who have died is 60 years.
The youngest death so far was reported today, a 19-year-old female in Cali who had pre-existing health problems according to authorities.
Transmission
break-down
Should we be worried by this new phase? According to health experts this is a normal and expected part of any outbreak, which can be broken down into the following stages:
Stage 1 – imported cases. These cases are the people who have arrived infected from foreign countries such as Italy and Spain. With the airline ban these cases stopped arriving in Colombia in late March.
Stage 2 – local transmission. Virus spread from imported cases, usually family and friends, also known as related cases. This explains the higher number of cases on the north of Bogotá, for example, where families of more fly-in infected are living.
Stage 3 – community transmission. Despite efforts to trace how people got infected, there are no clear links to either imported or related cases. These cases could have accidentally been infected by local and imported cases (form example in a public place) or via another infected person who shows no symptoms and remains untested for coronavirus. We would expect a more even spread of community cases around the city.
Stage 4 – epidemic. The virus spreading widely. During this stage there is little chance to trace the virus.
Transmission stages during the coronavirus outbreak
Seven of the previous eight deaths in Colombia (since March 28) appear to be community transmission cases with no link to travellers arriving from overseas. This suggests that community transmission has been going on for some time.
The silent spreaders
According to latest findings by health experts, community transmission of coronavirus is hard to contain because the virus has some very unusual tricks: For example, people who get sick can take up to two weeks to develop symptoms, and some people showing no symptoms at all can be highly contagious.
In fact, from Chinese studies it appears up to one in four infected people is walking around spreading the virus without even a sniffle.
And in a study of a choir group in Seattle, U.S., one singing practice of 60 choristers – even using alcohol rub on their hands and everyone looking healthy – caused 45 cases and two deaths.
Silent spreaders can move among crowds unwittingly passing on COVID-19.
This silent spreading makes COVID-19 hard to control by the usual and obvious means. This is because as an asymptomatic spreader:
You don’t stay at home because you are not feeling sick.
And you are unlikely to be selected for testing since you don’t fit the criteria.
Plus, you won’t show up on any hi-tech thermometers used for rapid screening, i.e. at transport hubs.
This also means that testing data – usually focused on people with symptoms or those closely related to a confirmed case – is likely to be a massive underestimate. But by how much?
Detecting the undetected COVID-19
Scientists are trying to work out the real numbers of COVID-19 cases in different countries, a tricky task given the wide variety of testing protocols in play. But it is likely that the more advanced the outbreak, the greater the gap between confirmed and undetected cases.
With community transmission now happening in Colombia, health experts are estimating that at least four times as many people are infected with COVID-19 – and showing mild or no symptoms – than have been tested, a figure of around 4,000.
In Europe, where the outbreak is more advanced, an estimate study by bio-mathematicians at Imperial College London suggests that hard-hit countries like Spain and Italy could have at least 50 times more cases than have been officially recorded. This means some places have more than 10% of the population infected.
This sounds a lot, but is still way short of the amount of 70% needed to provide effective natural resistance in the population – the so-called herd immunity.
As we mentioned in the last update, some of these questions can be answered by cheaper rapid testing that detects antibodies, but globally there have been quality problems – too many false results – and fake news related to duff products. But many countries are now homing in on cheap mass testing, which within weeks will give hard data to these theories.
How are we doing with the coronavirus?
There is no coronavirus country league table and there are too many varying factors between places to make easy comparisons. But by looking at a simple measure – the number of deaths reported in various countries on the date that is 12 days after the first death – and adjusting it for country populations, then Colombia appears to be doing OK.
Total deaths 12 days after 1st death
Population (millions)
Deaths/10m people
US
41
329
1.25
Hong Kong
2
8
2.50
Colombia
17
50
3.40
South Korea
28
51
5.49
Peru
30
33
9.09
Germany
84
84
10.00
UK
71
68
10.44
Ireland
6
5
12.00
Ecuador
29
17
17.06
Italy
107
61
17.54
Sweden
27
10
27.00
Sweden has the highest number of deaths per population, something to be expected in a country not currently enforcing any quarantine measures.
Day One of quarantine in Bogotá…all together nowDay 12 of quarantine in Bogotá…keep your distance
Colombia’s achievements so far come from successful social distancing, which is the new normal for some parts of Bogotá, as the above photos show. Mayor Claudia López reckons that “75 per cent” of rolos are complying with the national quarantine.
But progress comes at a high price: locking down a population already struggling economically. And now with community spread – and large number of undetected cases – health experts are again emphasising the need for “control and containment of the general population,” as the health minister Fernando Ruiz put it this week.
So far, he has not made a clear statement on what might happen after the current quarantine ends on April 13. But Ruiz did say that “we will continue taking measures to keep the curve as flat as possible”.
How will this play out with a population desperate to get out and back to work? At The Bogotá Post we’ll keep you posted.
This weekend, Latin America is hacking the virus. Join the Online Hackathon today from your couch and help create solutions to the Covid-19 crisis across Latin America.
How can we, as a society, address the challenges that arise from the COVID-19 crisis with new solutions? That’s the driving force behind the COVID Hackathon challenge that has taken over the world the past weeks, from Germany, Estonia, Hungary, Austria, Switzerland, Cambodia, and now coming to Latin America this weekend.
The online collaborative effort is a community-driven initiative that looks for daring and innovative ideas to help society emerge stronger from the current difficult situation caused by the novel coronavirus. In a 48 hour online Hackathon over the course of this weekend, people all over Latin America will come together to create solutions and concepts in a short amount of time. A hackathon (a word created from “hack” and “marathon”) is a collaborative solution development event. The goal of a hackathon is to find useful, creative or entertaining solutions in a collaborative effort to solve problems.
For this to work, the #CadaDiaCuentaHackathon needs a strong, diverse community. That means people with very different perspectives and abilities. You do not need to be an entrepreneur, programmer, or hacker to contribute. No matter if you are a creator, a doctor, teacher, designer, an IT specialist, a project manager, a scientist or just a keen problem solver – everyone is welcome to join. No coding skills are required!
There are multiple ways to get involved, you can register as a participant, as a mentor guiding one of the challenge teams, as a partner to the initiative, or registering a challenge for the Hackathon to solve. Everyone is somehow affected by the Covid crisis, and if you are facing a challenge, many others across the region are likely facing the same one as well.
A few pre-selected categories under which challenges can be submitted are: health system; economic impact; solidarity and cohesion; public policy and civic participation; social inclusion; food; education; and data intelligence.
This cross-border virtual initiative is driven by local teams including Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, Brazil, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Haiti and Mexico, and has the support of over 30 organisations such as UNDP, the Young Americas Business Trust of the OAS, Sistema B, Techo, SGS, Selina, as well as local governmental agencies such as Innpulsa. Scalable solutions may become more directly accelerated in a second stage with the support of different allies.
The Hackathon takes place online and virtually, using platforms such as google drive, whatsapp as well as video conferencing for live webinars, Q&A sessions and daily check-ins. Detailed technical instructions and access to the individual tools will be sent to all registered participants in due time. The registration deadline is midnight tonight (1 April). For more information as well as registration forms go to https://cadadiacuenta.org/.
Let’s hack the crisis together!
Online Hackathon: 3rd to 5th of April Registration closes midnight 1st of April https://cadadiacuenta.org/ #CadaDiaCuentaHackathon
As talk grows of an extension to the national quarantine due to the coronavirus, many small businesses are worried.
Small businesses are often closed and the ones that do open stick to takeaway. Photo: Oli Pritchard
The lockdown is biting hard on small and medium-sized businesses, many of which face an uncertain time. And it’s hard to support local businesses while isolated in the house, which is frustrating since the high number of local businesses is one of my favourite things about living in Colombia. With that in mind, I spoke to some small business owners to find out how they’ve been affected and what they see in the future.
Remember, most local tiendas are open for business, as are local drugstores and some panaderías. When you go out for your one-person-per-household shop, it’s the perfect time to avoid supermarkets and support the less-frequented shops nearby. If you’re using delivery services, you don’t have to depend on domicilios from the big boys – some (mainly fast food) restaurants are operating delivery services, not always through Rappi. It’s also possible to get deliveries directly from small fruit and vegetable outfits.
Local shops may be able to open, but Bogotá’s bars have been shut for some time. Open Light is a cornerstone, almost literally, of the Lourdes nightlife. This bar has been rocking for 24 years. Now, though, the doors are closed and there’s no sign of life. “I have the ability to take this for a few months,” says owner Alex Moreno. “But not until the end of the year, as some are saying.” Even closing for months will hurt – Alex estimates he will lose around COP$40 million a month. “It’s a lot. Really a lot. The great majority [of small businesses] will go into bankruptcy. The economy wasn’t functioning well already. Then came this pandemic and it’ll finish off the weak companies or those that are starting.”
At least Alex has an established business with some ability to weather the storm. It’s a different story for those he mentioned that are just starting out – like newly-opened restaurant Oriundo near the Javeriana. “We opened to the public on the 16th of February,” owner David Serna Zuluaga tells me. “The business started well and we were generating a clientele. But as you would imagine, all our savings had been put into the business.” Then came the virus, and with it the quarantine. “We took the decision to close from the 20th March. We spoke to the cooks and gave them the produce we had left over. We’ve been talking to them to check their health and food situation. Today we managed to give them their pay for the last two weeks, even though we’ve been closed. The truth is, I don’t know if we can make the next salary payment. It all depends on the renegotiation of our rent.”
They tried opening the restaurant to make deliveries at least, but quickly found it wasn’t worth it, as Rappi takes a high percentage of the sale. “We tried a week, but it didn’t work. We don’t have enough sales to justify a percentage that high and it would have forced us to make a loss. We’d need around 50 orders a day to break even. In mid-April I believe we’ll return to operation, but doing our own deliveries. This is sustainable.”
At El Inglés, the capital’s home of English delicacies, they took a precaution and shut earlier than the official state-sanctioned dates. All members of staff are at home on holiday pay, including those who didn’t have pending holiday, and the restaurant sits empty. Owner and head chef, Lee Madden, is trying to remain upbeat, “I’m sure it will be very quiet once we reopen, but everyone is in the same boat.” He doesn’t expect much state assistance: “The odds of companies getting financial help is slim, they have cancelled utility bills for these three weeks, but if you’re closed you’re not using them anyway.” Positive words, but question marks remain, especially over the viability of having seated customers in the next few months.
Macondogs provide an excellent dog walking service for people living around the Parkway and Sucre areas. Run by three Venezuelan entrepreneurs, they’ve built up a strong client base. With the quarantine restricting movement, though, they’ve had to shut down operations. Sylvia Rugeles is feeling the squeeze: “Like many companies, we feel like we’re between the sword and the wall in this crisis. We’re adhering to the governmental decrees, which has obliged us to stop work, strongly affecting our work and financial position, like any human in Colombia. I want to make it clear that we’re keeping ourselves in quarantine from our own free will and because it’s right. This situation has hit us a lot harder [than others] for being immigrants and for not receiving various government benefits.” As she points out, although money stops coming in, it doesn’t stop going out. “Worries come and go, the costs keep running: rent, food and other basic consumption.”
Germán Herrera of Sanar y Áloe Vera might be expected to be doing a roaring trade in these times of high demand for anti-bacterial gel. The reality, however, is a bit more complicated. His microbusiness normally produces moisturiser, as there’s limited demand for bacterial gel. However, when the virus came, he saw an opportunity and switched production. “For 20 days we were producing and selling well,” says his daughter Jennyfer, “but when the simulacro and later the quarantine started, the sales stopped.”
Demand still exists, but it’s not as easy as that, as Jennyfer explains: “Although people are ringing and making orders, it’s complicated because they’re making orders for single units and it’s not worth the risk of contagion to sell individually. Worse still, it’s not worth the sanctions either. The large orders don’t exist, because here [in Soacha] you only see the local shops open. The large companies are generally closed.”
One person who is doing well is Medusa Perverette, an online webcam model. With the dollar remaining resilient throughout the pandemic, she’s continued earning at a good rate. Better yet, with people locked indoors, many are searching for human contact in any way they can find, as Medusa explains. “Webcam platforms have always been an escape for many people. The truth is, I’ve passed [the quarantine time] taking advantage of the fact that everyone’s at home.”
Of course, her clientele is international, including plenty in Europe and Asia. “They’re worried,” she says, “but the thinking isn’t as depressive as here in Latin America. My users aren’t getting depressed, it’s the people here that are doing that.” It’s reassuring to know that for one person at least, life is good. “I made a million this weekend, it’s the perfect moment,” Medusa concludes.
How you can support local businesses:
Where you can, shop with local stores rather than the big chains
Reach out to local business owners and see if you can support them: Some shops are selling off stock in bulk or trying to survive through small orders
Check on their facebook / instagram feeds to see if they are doing deliveries. If they aren’t, see if you can negotiate a solution
If you usually pay for a service, whether it is cleaning or dog walking, commit to keeping up those payments if you can afford it. After all, it’s better for you if the service providers stay in business.
In the early morning of 24 May, 2012, Rosa Elvira Cely was brutally raped and assaulted in the Parque Nacional in Bogotá. When authorities found her, she was taken to a nearby clinic, where she suffered further health complications. Despite days of treatment and a concerted effort from a team of physicians, she died four days later. The incident reverberated throughout the country, as Rosa became the face for the phenomenon of male-driven violence against women in Colombia.
In the aftermath of the murder, Colombians mobilised, pressuring lawmakers to introduce new measures that would guarantee the thorough investigation and punishment of violence against women. What resulted was a law in Rosa’s honour, the eponymous “Ley Rosa Elvira Cely”– enacted in 2015 – which, for the first time in Colombia’s history, officially included femicide in the country’s criminal code.
Femicides in Colombia in May 2019. Graph: Observatorio Femicidio Colombia
The amendment identified femicide as, “the killing of a person because of their status as a woman or as a result of their gender identity,” and has become the catalyst for lengthy criminal sentencing that, in some cases, has surpassed 50 years for those found guilty. But if its definition is anything to go by, the law hasn’t always protected everyone that it’s meant to.
In 2017, more than 500 women fell victim to real or attempted femicide in Colombia
In 2017, more than 500 women fell victim to real or attempted femicide in Colombia. Another 6,219 reported having received threats. In May of last year alone, 70 cases of femicide were recorded, and that doesn’t take into account those that went undocumented. Yet, as harrowing as these figures are, they leave an important part of the story out.
Ana Sophia García spoke extensively about the life of being transgender.
What gets buried under those stats is the fact that there exists a group of women who, though they often suffer much worse violence and discrimination, are looked over. Though they identify as women, their communities and, in some cases, their own families scoff at that distinction. Transgender women in Colombia face a level of persecution that’s often hard to fathom.
Transgender violence
If you want to understand violence against the women in Colombia’s transgender community, look to La Costa, the northernmost region of the country whose departments border Venezuela to the east, Panama to the west, and the Caribbean to the north. To varying extremes, the cultural factors at play there also exist in other parts of the country, but in the interest of an instructive history lesson, the coast is a useful example.
Perhaps more than any other region in Colombia, the Caribbean coast boasts a history of rich multi-culturalism. Natives to the region can trace their lineage through indigenous populations, Afro-descendant slaves, and European colonisers. The latter of those three bears a lot of responsibility in shaping the region into what it became culturally.
Through violence and the forced submission of non-European populations on the basis of religion, class, the creation of different races, and the elevation of the patriarchal family model, European settlers created a society that was homogenised culturally, imposing their belief system on the other populations. What came out of that were male-dominated communities that put a premium on masculinity, while assigning gender roles that made supposed feminine traits and the women themselves inferior.
Fast-forward to the present and the impacts of this system are clear. Families in the region are predominantly patriarchal, with men acting as representatives, while women are often relegated to roles and spaces that are domestic.
This – and much more – is highlighted in an investigative report called Enterezas, published by Caribe Afirmativo which is designed to improve Colombia’s response to violence against women from the LGBT+ community.
Colombian LGBT support groups help transgender people. Photo: Alejandro Lanz
The report says that when individuals break from these social norms, they are seen as transgressors who present a threat to tradition and the moral fabric of society. Violence towards them serves as an instrumental tool to fix their non-conforming behaviour in a way that, when done publicly, also discourages others from assuming non-heteronormative roles. In other words, because traditionalists think that trans women should act like men – due to their sex – they take measures into their own hands to correct what they see as social sickness.
Though there are plenty of instances of trans women being attacked by people they don’t know, they also face significant abuse from their own family members during their formative years.
The violence can come from anywhere. Though there are plenty of instances of trans women being attacked by people they don’t know, they also face significant abuse from their own family members during their formative years. The following account is taken directly from the report. In it, an unnamed transgender woman recalls:
“(…) my uncles treated me horribly. Once, an uncle hit me so hard that he cracked my skull, leaving me with a mark for life for being like a faggot, [telling me that] I needed to walk like a man. (…) Later there was an uncle who also threw hot sperm back there, you can imagine where, because I walked with my ass stuck out. Then, one gave me a whipping with stinging nettle, and I also have an aunt who hit me with an “agua celeste.” Agua celeste is a hose that they cut short and hit you with really hard and it stings terribly. So I was quite mistreated by them growing up.”
Taking refuge
Though some women choose to bear this abuse, many flee their homes at an early age, taking refuge with other trans women that they meet who have suffered similar rejection from their families. Unable to stay in their homes long enough to receive an adequate education, and devoid of financial support from their families, these women are often forced to work in non-regulated areas, involved in the microtrafficking of drugs or, more commonly, becoming sex workers.
This brings with it an entirely new set of dangers. First, a significant number of reported cases of violence and femicide against trans women involve disputes gone bad between clients and sex workers. Some clients refuse to pay for the services, while others accuse the women of having stolen money from them, using this as an excuse to assault or, in extreme cases, kill them. Secondly, sex workers typically occupy specific areas of a city. Police officers often know which zones these are and occasionally visit the areas, making a habit of verbally harassing, physically assaulting, and selectively applying the law to women based there.
Seventy percent of harassment claims filed against Colombia’s national police involve trans women
Stats from Caribe Afirmativo’s human rights reports from 2012 to 2017 bear this out. Seventy percent of harassment claims filed against Colombia’s national police involve trans women, and a specific analysis of police violence toward lesbian and trans women in Caribbean departments – where 60% of police violence toward the LGBT+ community occurs – revealed that of 19 documented cases from 2015 to 2016, 16 involved a trans woman.
Understandably, the women involved in these incidents are reluctant, if not wholly unwilling, to report them, given that doing so could mean further reprisal from the person that assaulted them. Even in cases where they are able to report the incidents, there’s no guarantee that the fiscalia, the investigative body to which the incident is reported, will be adequately trained to deal with them.
Inadequate training
In departments such as Atlantico, for example, the fiscalia acknowledged that, while they do have a designated department for LGBT+ complaints, they were in serious need of further training and that, when looking into incidents, they were not including the victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity as part of the investigation. The island department of San Andres and Providencia, for its part, has no investigator with expertise in LGBT+ matters, and only one of its investigators had received sexual and gender diversity training before being transferred to another department. At the time of publication of Caribe Afirmativo’s most recent Enterezas report, no investigator with such training had been delegated to replace them.
This imbalance in understanding from one department to another regarding matters associated with transgender female victims leads to fraught investigations. In a Barranquilla murder case from 2016 involving a 22-year-old trans woman named “Natalia,” it was documented that police had no gender or sexuality training; paid no attention to the victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity during the interrogation process; and repeatedly referred to the victim as “someone of male gender belonging to the LGBT+ community.” Identifying the victim this way makes it impossible to try the case as a femicide, resulting in the courts treating it as just another murder.
The transgender flag used worldwide
In point three of article 58 in Colombia’s penal code, the Constitutional Court notes that “the most punishable circumstance [of a crime] is generated when the punishable conduct is inspired by motives of intolerance or discrimination referring to both sexual orientation and gender identity.” If those investigating the crime don’t establish that the victim had a gender identity that may have led to discrimination, there’s not much the court can do when it comes time for criminal sentencing. Their hands are tied.
“If those investigating the crime don’t establish that the victim had a gender identity that may have led to discrimination, there’s not much the court can do when it comes time for criminal sentencing. Their hands are tied.”
Violence against trans women is not a phenomenon that’s limited to departments in the Caribbean. Heavily-populated areas such as Antioquia, Cauca, and Bogotá have all seen significant incidences of violence directed toward the LGBT+ community, and many of them have resulted in death. A lot of the same issues that plague departments in the Caribbean also complicate the process of classifying the murder of a trans woman in other regions as femicide. But that may be starting to change.
Trans woman femicide ruling sets legal precedent
In December 2018, the second criminal court of the Garzón circuit in Huila convicted Davinson Stiven Erazo Sánchez of the February 2017 killing of Anyela Ramos Claros, a trans woman. Sánchez was sentenced to 20 years in prison in a psychiatric facility. It marked the first time in Colombian history that the legal system recognised the murder of a trans woman as a case of femicide, setting a legal precedent for similar cases in the future. While it’s welcome news for non-gender-conforming women, it hasn’t stopped new cases from popping up, and the fear in which many women in Colombia’s trans community are forced to live calls into question how much of a long-term effect the ruling can actually have. In a broader context, cases of femicide and aggression towards women have actually risen throughout Colombia since 2015, though this may be a case of a country’s new law uncovering an ugly truth that’s been an open secret for a while.
Anyela Ramos Claros. Photo: Caribe Afirmativo
Whatever the case, the same law enacted in 2015 to protect every would-be Rosa Elvira Cely in the country should also protect each would-be Anyela Ramos Claros. If it doesn’t, it’s not being true to its own wording. Whether or not that ends up happening is something only time will tell. Sadly, for many transgender women in Colombia, time isn’t something there’s a lot of.
The Red Comunitaria Trans, based in the Santa Fe neighbourhood, has organised a Sex Workers Emergency Fund to support vulnerable sex workers who live on a day-to-day basis during the Covid-19 crisis. In order to support the initiative, send non-perishable foods to Calle 21 #16A-66 Apt. 201 Bogotá, Colombia. You can also donate through PayPal. For more information, visit the organisation’s Instagram.
Our regular roundup of the country’s COVID-19 cases
Colombian COVID-19 cases had risen to 798 by March 30.
Key events since our last update:
190 new coronavirus cases in previous two days
798 cases reported since March 6
14 deaths so far, including two younger victims
INS predicts 3,000 COVID-19 deaths in Colombia
Colombia’s COVID-19 cases are slowly rising but yet to see the rocketing growth experienced by other worse stricken countries. Is this good news? Or a calm before the storm? And how far can we trust the testing?
As Bogotá shuts down to slow the spread of the coronavirus, many who were already living day to day are struggling to find food or put a roof over their heads.
Colombia’s national lockdown aims to slow the spread of COVID-19, more commonly known as the novel coronavirus. But the capital’s 24-day quarantine has quickly pushed many Bogotanos into dire circumstances.
Approximately 10,000 Bogotanos live on the streets and according to recent reports, hundreds of Venezuelans have been evicted from hostels in the centre due to an inability to pay rent. Food and housing insecurity remain a top concern across the board.
With non-essential businesses closing during the quarantine, many residents have lost their sources of income. Several local and national organisations have coordinated responses to support vulnerable residents.
Read below for how you can contribute to the effort:
Bogotá Solidaria En Casa
Last week, Claudia López announced that the city would guarantee aid for 350,000 families to buy daily necessities during the quarantine. This aid would replace the daily income that many families have lost due to the crisis. The city hopes to expand this aid to 500,000 families and is asking for private donations to contribute to the effort.
To donate online or through your bank, visit the donation page.
Banco de Alimentos Bogotá
Banco de Alimentos, run by the Catholic Archdiocese of Bogota, distributes food and non-food products (such as cleaning supplies) to vulnerable residents in Bogota. Working with over 1,100 local organisations, the Banco is collecting donations through several major banks, including Bancolombia, Banco de Bogotá, and Banco Caja Social, among others. The organisation hopes to combat food insecurity during this time, and its goal is to support 31,000 families on a day-to-day basis.
TECHO, an international organisation that serves to combat poverty in Latin America, has coordinated an effort to deliver emergency food kits to underserved communities in Bogotá. The kits include food products, sanitisers, soaps, and toilet paper, among other necessary goods. The organisation runs mostly on volunteer efforts to distribute the products. Last week, the organisation delivered kits to 400 families in Bogotá.
Two local restaurants, Chichería Demente and Restaurante El Chato, have decided to use their culinary talents to provide meals for vulnerable residents. The restaurants hope to serve daily lunches for 65 people staying in a shelter located in the 7 de Agosto neighbourhood. A COP$10,000 donation would support one meal for one person.
To support the initiative, call the coordinators at 320 9373488 or 311 56113106.
Red Comunitaria Trans
The Red Comunitaria Trans, based in the Santa Fe neighbourhood, has organised a Sex Workers Emergency Fund to support vulnerable sex workers who live on a day-to-day basis during this crisis. The fund hopes to provide 45 food kits worth COP$45,000 for 45 sex workers in Santa Fe, in addition to a COP$17,000 daily allowance for housing costs.
In order to support the initiative, send non-perishable foods to Calle 21 #16A-66 Apt. 201 Bogotá, Colombia. You can also donate through PayPal. For more information, visit the organisation’s Instagram.
Somos Mas
RECON Colombia and the Colombian Red Cross, Cruz Roja, have partnered to create a fund to support vulnerable residents during the coronavirus pandemic. The campaign is collecting donations for cleaning/health kits and food kits, in order to reduce the social impact of the crisis. The Red Cross is distributing the kits to those with need.
No new deaths reported in two days. Total deaths stays at six.
Bogotá showing biggest rise with hot-spots in Usaquén, Chapinero and Suba.
Testing glitches could give misleading case numbers.
Latest data shows the rate of contagion is increasing in Colombia, despite faults in COVID-19 testing continuing to cast doubts over the true picture of coronavirus in the country.
In the last update (March 26) we highlighted problems with quality of patient samples and geographic scope of tests. Then Colombia’s main health lab at the Instituto Nacional de Salud (INS) suffered key equipment failure, creating a backlog of unprocessed sample.
The machinery is now fixed but the glitch seems to have created a dip in positive cases last Friday – only 10 confirmed for COVID-19 according to INS data.
Coronavirus curve for Colombia. A slight flattening on Friday was caused by a faulty machine in the main testing lab. Data source: INS
Bogotá, Colombia’s capital, continues as the main hot-spot with 264 cases to date, 43% of the total in country’s total – a percentage that has stayed fairly steady for a week now – and 50% of the deaths.
Globetrotting virus carriers
Roughly 80% of the Bogotá cases are directly connected to people who flew in from other countries, the majority from Spain and Italy showing the city’s vulnerability as a hub for international spread of the virus.
We could tentatively conclude that this travel factor explains the concentration of cases in the city’s wealthier barrios – Usaquén (38 cases), Chapinero (30), Suba (27) where globetrotters and their families are more likely to reside.
According to official data, poor barrios down south have hardly been affected so far. Highly populated Ciudad Bolívar and Usmé have only recorded one case each.
This is likely to change in coming weeks as the virus spreads by local community transmission, and air travel bans reduce imported cases.
We can welcome the fact there were no new deaths reported in the last two days, leaving the total at six cases.
Speed test
There is also small comfort that Colombia is not alone in its COVID-19 testing problems: Many countries including US, Italy and the UK have messed up this vital part of the response leaving health experts with a insufficient data to shape their response.
This partly explains the wildly varying death rates from the virus across then world, from 0.5% (Germany) to a horrifying 10% (Italy) since if we have limited lab testing we never know how many people were actually infected. Or how many really died of the disease.
New coranavirus detection devices and ‘rapid tests’ are being rushed out around the world, including a five-minute portable kit announced today.
DEATH RATE WORLDWIDE (probability of dying if infected by the virus)
80+ years old
14.80%
70-79 years old
8.00%
60-69 years old
3.60%
50-59 years old
1.30%
40-49 years old
0.40%
30-39 years old
0.20%
20-29 years old
0.20%
10-19 years old
0.20%
0-9 years old
0
Colombia’s relatively young average age of 30 years could means less fatalities since younger people get a less severe illness.
In Colombia only 7.5% of the population is over 70 years old. Compare this to Italy, with an average age of 47 and 20% of the population is over 70, where you would expect at least twice as many deaths.
The scramble to make beds
Another key factor in reducing coronavirus deaths is a health system’s capacity to save lives, and the last days we have seen the US, and European countries, scrambling to set up emergency intensive care wards and source equipment such as ventilators which keep severe patients alive.
One shocking fact revealed by El Tiempo today was Colombia’s lack of ‘UCI’ (intensive care) beds, currently there are 5,000 across the country though five large departments (Vaupés, Vichada, Guainía, Amazonas y Guaviare) are without a single one. It has long been a tradition to transfer patients from these places in air-ambulances to Bogotá or Villavicencio.
Five remote departments currently transfer severely ill patients to distant cities, and lack an intensive are beds in their hospitals. This will affect coronavirus cases.
Added to that, 80% of the current ICU beds in Colombia are already full with other patients. How will we cope?
According to projections reported by El Tiempo, even under the best case scenario, by May the country will need 16,000 ICU beds to cope with severe cases.
So like many other countries, Colombia is in a race against time to ready its health system and, as mentioned in previous updates, is creating pop-up hospitals in warehouses and conference centres.
But will it be enough? And will they have the hi-tech equipment to keep people alive? We’ll bring you updates in the coming days.
What caused so many world leaders to stick their heads in the sand and act as though the novel coronavirus was not going to spread?
Photo: Unsplash
Cast your mind back to a couple of weeks ago. Did you really think that by now you’d be holed up in your flat deciding whether to spend the next half hour worrying about a killer virus, a crime wave, or an economic depression?
If not, you’re far from alone. Just last month, the US stock market reached an all-time high on February 19, a full three weeks after Wuhan had been locked down, and at a time when COVID-19 was displaying indisputable exponential growth outside of China. If it seems totally irrational that the entire world could have underestimated the importance of something that now feels like it was depressingly foreseeable, that’s because we humans, alas, are far from rational creatures, and all too susceptible to an array of cognitive biases with one thing in common: We don’t make decisions based on how we think, but how we feel.
Even though coronavirus cases were clearly spreading outside China, the stock market hit an high on February 19. Data source: investing.com and author’s calculations.
Do you remember September 11, 2001? What about when Donald Trump defied the odds to be elected US President, or Britain voted to leave the European Union? Perhaps a particularly stunning event – good or bad – in your own life? You were probably thinking something along the lines of I can’t believe this is actually happening, even though looking back, the writing was on the wall.
The likely explanation is that you were blindsided by normalcy bias, also known as the ostrich effect. In a nutshell, it is a tendency to believe that things will continue to function more or less as they always have done in the past. In evolutionary terms, this is a sensible shortcut, since it is more efficient to assume that sabre-toothed tigers are always unfriendly, shiny fruit always tastes good and it’s better to be inside your cave during a thunderstorm, than to re-evaluate matters from first principles every time. But this evolutionary coping mechanism misfunctions horribly when it comes to impending disasters. When the statistics told us what was coming, we searched our memories for devastating pandemics, came up blank, and shrugged.
Of course, it depends on what you consider to be normal. Tellingly, Bogotá started its quarantine last Friday, when there were just 54 confirmed cases in the city. New York State, on the other hand, waited until its number of infected had topped 10,000 before declaring a full shutdown. This pattern was replicated worldwide: At time of publication, the table of countries with the most COVID-19 cases shows five members of the G7 in the top nine places. Could it be that in nations like Colombia, where civil unrest and security issues never feel far away, chaos is simply easier to imagine – and even remember – so governments spent less time in denial and resorted more swiftly to unpalatable but inevitable action than those of wealthier nations? Normalcy bias would suggest so.
OK, but what with quarantine being the new normal, can we be trusted to think rationally from now on? Not so fast…
Thanks to the drastic measures taken recently, the spread of the virus throughout Colombia will hopefully slow down next week. The emergency package announced on Wednesday means that the poor have a lifeline, for now. And the country’s newly created Emergency Mitigation Fund ensures that for the moment at least, the money is there.
However, you don’t need to be a behavioural economist to know that we have an unfortunate tendency to value today much more than tomorrow. Anybody who has ever overspent on payday, drunk too much on a weeknight or procrastinated on an assignment will recognise the gnawing regret that follows.
Faced with the offer of $15 today or $30 in three months’ time, experimental subjects traditionally display indifference to the two options, to the chagrin of traditional economists and vindication of their behavioural counterparts. Once again, human nature rears its irrational head.
Due to this bias, known as hyperbolic discounting, we consistently overvalue the short term at the expense of the long. To be clear, free cash today really is slightly better than the same amount in three months’ time – though not as good as double – and we need to survive today to even see tomorrow, but studies show that we will neglect the future to an excessive degree.
With cognitive biases in mind, what we can expect to see is a gradual build-up of problems for the second half of the year and beyond, which are too distant to consider now, but will loom larger and uglier as the months pass by.
Once the immediate emergency has abated, the oil price crash from early March and its huge impact on Colombia’s economy will likely come back into focus, the swollen debt-to-GDP ratios of sovereign states around the globe will be there in black and white to horrify fiscal conservatives, and we will discover that priorities from earlier in the year not only still exist, but are way behind schedule.
Speaking of which, on April 5, 1987, El Tiempo’s front page boasted that “Bogotá [would] have a metro in three years!”. Similarly optimistic predictions abound, with almost any large-scale government project virtually guaranteed to take longer and cost more than anticipated. We are all familiar with this bias on a personal level too: Just sending a simple email or getting ready in the morning can leave us looking at the clock in disbelief and wondering where all the time went.
Photo: El Tiempo
So if you’re indignant at the six days of quarantine that Bogotá’s needy had to endure before the government finally announced details of a package to provide food for the capital’s poorest and most vulnerable families, you may want to direct your wrath at the planning fallacy, our tendency to underestimate the time and costs of future actions, especially if they pertain to complex situations.
A type of optimism bias, the planning fallacy stems from our propensity to imagine things running smoothly and inability to deal with compound probability. “The more steps you have in whatever project or task you’re working on, the greater the chance that in one of those steps you’re going to hit a snag and it’s going to turn out to be atypical”, writes Julia Galef, co-founder of the Center of Applied Rationality.
Somewhat worryingly for humanity, we now face a plethora of uniquely complex challenges with innumerable steps and inevitable setbacks, and both history and behavioural science tell us that finding a solution will be an even harder and longer process than we think.
Phil Dyer first came to Colombia on holiday in 1995. He spent the next few years realising how much worse England was before finally giving up and flying back to Bogotá. When not writing articles, he teaches English to corporate clients, translates academic papers, and gets annoyed whenever he hears ocho, quince, or especially veinte días.
The usually busy Avenida 26, mid morning Day 7 of the Bogotá’s coronavirus quarantine. Photos: Steve Hide
Key points on coronavirus cases in Colombia:
185 new Colombia cases since our last update
Total cases now at 491
Six deaths since start of outbreak
Stats show severe illness also in younger people
Testing for virus still facing challenges
Colombia coronavirus data to midday March 26. Data INS
According to the latest data from the Instituto Nacional de Salud (INS), in the last four days more people caught the virus within Colombia (105) than brought it with them from overseas (80). So although import cases still make up the majority of infections (279) the trend is towards more local transmission. This is linked to international flight bans imposed for several days now.
Six deaths are now reported, with two in the age range 50 to 59, two in 70-79 and two over 80 years old. Three deaths are from Bogotá. Eight people have now recovered, and 450 are being treated at home.
Some 27 patients with COVID-19 disease are hospitalised across the country, the surprise being the relatively young average age of these severe cases (55 years) with some six persons under 40 years old. This suggests the acute illness here is not exclusively in the elderly.
Graph showing Colombia COVID-19 cases to March 25. Data: INS
Is the cure
worse than the disease?
In Latin American countries, like Colombia, with extreme inequality another more immediate problem arises: The stay-home orders can have a devastating impact on people living from the informal economy such as street vendors whose income has evaporated overnight.
In Bogotá, the mayor’s office has scrambled to find ways to assist 350,000 poor families with subsidies and hand-outs so they can survive the quarantine.
Advocates of the “economy first” approach are generally wealthier nations trying to protect their GNP. These include the UK (briefly, it backpedalled after seeing mass deaths in Italy), the U.S. (President Trump wants to reopen the country to business by Easter) and Brazil (where President Bolsonaro has resisted lockdowns and called the coronavirus a “media trick”).
Public pressure to quarantine
The flaw in this strategy, according to counterarguments by some economists, is that the root problem is not government’s enforcing lockdowns; it’s the virus. As cases and deaths rise many populations demand isolation measures, and many would stay at home even if the government lifted travel bans.
For example:
Under public pressure, the UK government changed from “isolation lite” to bolder restrictions. Now 93% support the quarantine.
In Colombia, local authorities were calling for curfews even before a national lockdown.
Mayors in Brazil are locking down cities in defiance of their president.
In a less healthy response, Colombia’s illegal armed groups have joined the call for people to stay home. In its zonas of control the ELN is promoting self-isolation “with revolutionary punishments”, and ex paramilitary drug gang the Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia have sent out leaflets in Córdoba insisting on even tougher restrictions such as an alcohol ban “or we will be obliged to take action.”
China on the
mend?
Some Asian countries have managed to outsmart the virus without the need for massive lockdowns, rather using small local quarantines to stop spread by quickly tracing contacts of known cases.
This has only worked because of rapid mass testing and in some places the clever use of phone apps that use a Bluetooth app to record people proximate to an infected person. Europe and the Americas have been slow to implement that technical capacity.
But it was strict quarantine that characterised the response in China, the original source of the virus and most affected in terms of case numbers. Some good news is that China seems to be on the mend, both in terms of the outbreak and the economy.
No toilet roll shortage here. For now at least, in Bogotá, large supermarkets remain well stocked one week into the lockdown as cargo and goods companies keep running.
According to recent scientific studies, the strict containment can be eased there successfully when tied to “rapid and ubiquitous testing” to firefight resurgent cases. This has allowed “low level economic activity” to resume in China and Hong Kong, reports the UK’s Guardian, even though coronavirus cases are still around.
Screen, test
Another key response has been testing, with the WHO reciting the “trace, test and treat” since early in the outbreak. Since March 6, Colombian health labs have done 9,000 tests in 19 days, less that South Korea in one day.
As we explained in the last update, the bottleneck here is
not the lack of testing capacity (the country can do more than 3,000 a day) but
lack of adequate test samples arriving at the labs.
Samples have been taken wrongly from patients, or packed and stored badly making test results inconclusive.
Patient data has been lost in transit, or the samples poorly marked, and slow time to get results back to patients meaning higher contagion risks as they wait to hear if they are positive or not.
Only five out of 32 departments have proper transport services for bio-risk material.
This means COVID-19 cases and deaths are being missed, with a reporting bias towards urban and accessible areas.
Will COVID-19 testing and treatment reach Colombia’s remote areas?
Given these problems, health authorities are aiming to import easier rapid tests and roll out COVID-19 detection to all 32 departments. But even then, in zones like the Llanos, Amazon and Chocó health teams will face huge problems to test and treat patients.
The Bogotá Post will bring you more details as they come in. Check our site for more coronavirus case updates. We’ll keep you posted.
Our regular roundup of the country’s COVID-19 cases.
Coronavirus in Colombia, data to end of day March 23, 2020. Source: INS.
Key events since our last Colombia coronavirus update:
Now three COVID-19 deaths, in Cali, Santa Marta and Cartagena
66 new cases in 24 hours, taking the total to 306. The virus is spreading faster.
Most infections still in age range of 20 to 29 years.
19 departments now affected, including Isla San Andrés
Based on coronavirus data to the end of day March 23 in Colombia, the virus has spread into new regions of the country, including the remote island of San Andrés. Bogotá (113) and key departments of Antioquia (52) and Valle de Cauca (37) have the most cases, according to the latest data from the Instituto Nacional de Salud (INS).
Worldwide, Colombia ranks 43rd in terms of numbers with 306 cases. Biggest rises are currently in US and Europe, with the WHO warning of an alarming spike with 100,000 new infections reported globally in the last four days.
Most cases are still imported from people arriving from overseas, with 201 out of the 306. There are now 15 cases ‘under study’, which means the health authorities have yet to find a link to an imported case. This suggests that community spreading could be taking place.
One good sign is that most cases are being reported in younger people who are more resilient to the effects of the disease, and with only seven cases reported in the over-80s, those most vulnerable.
Of the total 306 cases, 19 are hospitalized, six have recovered, three have died and the rest are being treated at home.
Colombia: a timely nationwide lock-down could keep us safe
Colombia has been an early adopter of lockdowns and today
enters a national quarantine until at least April 13, with strict movement
restrictions across the country designed to reduce community spreading of the
virus.
In this report, we compare stats until March 23 for Colombia with Italy and the UK, which both recorded their first cases on January 31, though the spread in the UK has been much slower. To date:
Italy has recorded 64,000 cases and 6,078
deaths.
UK has recorded 6,650 cases and 335 deaths.
But the death rate in Italy is now slightly slowing after enforced lockdowns the last two weeks. These will only start to show effects now because of the week-long incubation period of the virus. This slight shift in the right direction suggests that lock-downs work.
Italy started its lockdown on March 9, after 39 days, with 9,000 cases and 463 deaths.
UK started its lockdown on March 23, after 53 days, with 6,650 cases and 335 deaths.
Colombia has much of its lockdown on March 23, after 277 cases and three deaths.
If the benefits of the lockdown only show after two weeks – as seems to be the case in Italy – we can expect both the UK and Colombia to see a small drop in the daily increase in cases and deaths in 14 days, which is April 5.
If we plot Colombia and the UK on the same curve as Italy, then:
By April 5, Colombia on the same curve could reach 9,000 cases and 360 deaths in a worst case scenario.
By April 5, the UK on the same curve could reach 64,000 cases and 6,000 deaths in a worst case scenario.
Predictive graph of cases and deaths if Colombia follows the same path as Italy in terms of coronavirus outbreak. With our early lock-downs, we should see the line start to level off by in the first week of April, unlike Italy which was slow to respond. The Italian curves come from Worldmeters and our Colombia data dates from INS.
If the lockdown has been effective, the cases and deaths will start to drop after 14 days. In fact, since some populated areas of Colombia have already been in quarantine for five days, such as Bogotá, the daily increase in Colombia cases might start to slow by April 1.
Of course, there are many other factors involved in how the virus will spread, and the number of deaths can be heavily influenced by the quality of health care; numbers of ventilators and trained staff can make or break the response.
Another big factor is testing, only 7,000 in the last month despite a national capacity of several thousand a day. Are there are many more unreported cases out there? Or the health authorities are only looking at a narrow range of import cases and their friends and family? A leap in testing will also mean a leap in case numbers.
But despite these unknown factors, this crude analysis shows how important an early lockdown is to protect Colombia. It also suggests that Italy and the UK were very late to implement strict isolation measures.
A graphic circulating on Colombian social media shows how isolation can slow the spread.
Could hot climates slow the virus?
A new scientific study reported in the UK’s Daily Mail suggests that the COVID-19 virus cannot survive easily in hot humid climates. There is still spread, but slower. This could explain why the fastest outbreaks have been taking place in the cooler spring climates of the US, Spain and northern Italy.
Will hot sweaty weather protect Colombia with a slower spread of the virus? Clearly cooler Andean cities will face the same conditions as fast-spreading countries, but the country’s vast lowland areas might see a less aggressive rise in coronavirus cases.
Latest coronavirus spread map shows cooler countries more affected. Recent research suggests the virus might go slower tropical climates. Source: John Hopkins University
Initiatives to mitigate the outbreak
Colombia’s isolation plan should slow the outbreak, buying vital
time for fragile health services. Mitigation strategies are also important: the
ability for medics to save the lives of those infected. In the last four days
the WHO has issued calls to countries around the globe to help test some
promising cures for COVID-19, including exiting drugs already being trialled to
save lives. Vaccines are also in the pipeline.
Home-grown response here announced during the last few days
are:
Repurposing of large spaces such as Corferias conference centre, and cargo ships off the coast, as emergency hospitals.
Military and police hospitals and health units ready to receive cases.
Engineering whizz kids at Medellin’s Escuela de Ingenieríade Antioquia designing a mechanical ventilator – essential kit to save lives of severe patients – that can be rolled out locally at a tenth of the cost of imported gear.
The Bogotá Post will bring you more details as
they come in. Check our site for more coronavirus case updates. We’ll keep you
posted.
Citizens must stay at home until April 13 unless they have a good reason — like needing food or medicine — to be out.
Empty streets of Bogotá during the quarantine in Colombia. Photo: Oli Pritchard
When does it start?
The national quarantine starts on Tuesday, March 24 at 11.59 pm and runs until 11.59 pm on April 13. It could be extended if necessary. Bogotá and nearby areas already under the test shut-down will move directly to the nationwide quarantine with no space in between. This is to prevent mass movement, panic shopping and other activities that could increase the spread of the virus.
I’m stuck outside Bogotá, how can I get back?
If you are within driving distance of Bogotá, the city is allowing cars to re-enter on Monday and Tuesday, following pico y placa rules. Today, Monday 23rd, cars with even ending number plates can drive back into the city. Tomorrow, Tuesday 24th, cars with odd numbers can return. You will need to fill in this form and go straight to your home.
Internal flights will still be running until tomorrow (March 24), so if you live in Bogotá, try to get a flight back as soon as possible. After that all national flights and most long distance bus transport will be stopped.
Für alle ausreisewilligen Deutschen, die noch nicht in Bogotá sind: um an der Rückholaktion teilzunehmen, begeben Sie sich umgehend nach Bogotá. Am 23. und 24. ist die Ankunft in Bogotá noch möglich. Weitere Information: https://t.co/oBRlE2ezbo
However, you can leave home briefly for the following reasons:
To buy food
To go to the bank or notary office
To walk pets
Normally only one person per household will be allowed out, so don’t go in groups. What we’ve seen in the past few days in Bogotá is that as long as you are not flagrantly flouting the rules, the police are being reasonable in enforcing them.
Home deliveries (domicilios) of food, goods and medicine will continue to operate. Restaurants are only allowed to provide take-away food, but hotels can serve residential guests. Messenger services and journalists are also exempt from travel restrictions, as are medical personnel and key workers in essential services such as gas, water and electricity. You can also go out to provide or receive medical treatment, which includes taking your pet to the vet, or to care for an elderly, disabled or sick person.
Most food shops, including small local grocers, can open, as well as funeral services. Call centres and — importantly — internet repair people will continue to be able to work. Rubbish collection will follow its normal routine, unless the building where you reside advises otherwise.
Public transport and taxis will operate but only for exempt workers and exceptional circumstances, such medical or veterinary. If you are going shopping you will be expected to go on foot to somewhere near.
As we said a few days ago, if your house is burning down or the city is struck by an earthquake, nobody expects you to stay inside.
Is there ley seca? Will I still be able to buy alcohol?
Don’t panic. There is no ley seca at a national level and the sale of alcohol will continue as normal in supermarkets and by domicilio. The only rules about alcohol are that you can’t drink it in public spaces or pubs. Which won’t be so difficult since you can’t go out.
The decree overturns any rules brought in individual departments or cities in recent days. As of March 24, the sale of alcohol will not be prohibited anywhere in the country.
Can I still walk my dog?
Yes. As per the current rules, one person per household is allowed out for dog walking. The decree doesn’t mention the 20-minute limit that was introduced for the isolation drill.
How safe is it to be out and about?
Most coronavirus cases in Colombia came from people arriving from overseas, or are friends and family of these ‘import’ cases. For this reason, many people here see the coronavirus outbreak as an outside threat, and some foreigners here have reported xenophobic comments. These are rare events, but to be sure, now is a good time to keep stick to the rules and keep a low profile.
If you are visiting Colombia, make sure you carry a photocopy of your passport and entry stamp when outside, as police may ask to check how long you have been in the country. Residents should carry their cedula ID card.
At present streets are very empty and we have heard reports of attempted robberies. You are best to venture out in daylight hours at peak times when more people are out shopping.
What about flights?
The Ministry of Transport has confirmed a total suspension of incoming international flights, including final destination and connecting flights, on Colombian soil.
That means that for 30 days from 11.59 pm on Sunday, March 22 no international flights will be arriving in the country. This may be shortened or extended as the situation develops.
Various embassies are working round the clock to help their citizens get home. For example, the Dutch embassy have agreed with the Colombian government that two KLM-AirFrance flights can leave for Amsterdam on March 24 and March 26.
1/3 #GOED#NIEUWS: Zoals u weet hebben de Colombiaanse autoriteiten ingestemd met het Nederlandse verzoek om in ieder geval op 24 en 26 maart vluchten toe te staan van Bogota via Cartagena naar Amsterdam. Op deze twee vluchten zijn nog tickets beschikbaar.
The Swiss embassy have a special flight leaving on March 24 and the British embassy are also trying to organise a flight with Avianca.
Outside of those specially-agreed flights, the only people who will be allowed entry are: flight crew, technical and administrative staff, and those associated with airlines. They must abide by strict and mandatory preventative quarantine measures with a quarantine of 14 days.
The airlines are responsible for informing their customers about flight suspensions due to the conditions of the decree; they are also responsible for providing customers with official sanitary recommendations to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Importantly for international tourists, anyone who arrived in the country since the start of the outbreak must still self-quarantine for 14 days. So far more than 60 foreigners and 2 Colombians have been sanctioned for not following the quarantine. President Duque emphasized that those found to be noncompliant will face severe legal consequences.
What about my visa?
We got some visa questions answered by Migración Colombia a few days ago, and many of those answers still stand.
You can apply to extend your permiso de ingreso (which many see as a tourist visa), on the Migración Colombia website. The Cancillería says all cases are being processed online and the office in Bogotá is shut at the moment.
What happens if I break the rules?
According to the government’s decree, those who break the rules will be sanctioned under article 368 of the penal code. What that means in non-legalise is that you could be fined up to a million pesos and in extreme cases, sent to jail.
The penal code says those violating measures adopted to prevent the spread of a pandemic could face prison sentences of four to eight years. Given what’s been happening in Colombia’s prisons recently, that’s not somewhere you want to be right now.
What are other ministries doing?
The National Planning Department says that public audiences will be held electronically where possible, and says that the Ministry of External Relations Legal Fund, has the authority to use international administrative partnerships and contracts that lead to the acquisition of goods and services to mitigate the pandemic.
It will implement emergency hiring for contract jobs or executing construction in response to the public health emergency. Other public hiring processes will be suspended.
The Ministry of Housing has promised immediate reinstallation or reconnection of aqueduct services to those whose service was previously cut or suspended. It announced a temporary suspension of fee increases for at-home services for aqueduct or sewage-related utilities.
It says that each city or town needs to provide its citizens with drinkable water during this public health emergency.
Community leaders and journalists are at an increased risk during Colombia’s curfews and quarantines, say humanitarians.
Civil organisations are calling on Colombia’s illegal armed groups such as the ELN and Autodefensas Gaitanistas to “stop military action” during the coronavirus pandemic which has now spread to 16 departments of the country.
“The emergency situation deserves our focus as a country and as a society to take on this challenge,” said the communication penned by a wide range of humanitarian groups working on the conflict front line, such as the Campaña Colombia Contra Minas and Fundación Paz y Reconciliación.
The cease-fire plea comes as four social leaders have been assassinated during the first half of March, all by armed men with military-style weapons but in four distinct parts of the country.
Meanwhile Colombia’s press freedom body FLIP – Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa – has called for urgent state protection for investigative journalists in “immediate risk of assassination” after uncovering high-level corruption.
Colombia’s foundation for the press has called for urgent protection for these investigative journalists under threat for uncovering high-level corruption. Photo: FLIP
According to FLIP, mafia-style armed groups with political connections are plotting to murder reporters behind the startling ‘ñeñepolítica’ scandal that implicated elements of ruling Centro Democratico party to known mafia figures and vote-rigging schemes.
“Criminal groups have been meeting to plan the killings of journalists uncovering the ñeñe political scandal,” FLIP announced on its website.
The revelations cast a shadow over the legitimacy of the current government even while the country’s news media has been massively distracted by the coronavirus crisis.
Some commentators are worried that threats and killings by assassins working to a political agenda could go under the radar while the world’s media is looking the other way.
A country-wide lock-down could also facilitate murders as illegal armed groups move among civil populations confined by quarantines.
“The media agenda is bit by bit being submerged by the outbreak which creates collective panic and leaves us isolated,” commented El Espectador newspaper in response to the recent deaths of prominent social leaders.
So far in 2020 the plague of violence against community leaders in Colombia has shown no sign of abating. According to think tank INDEPAZ, in the first 10 weeks of 2020, some 57 community leaders and human rights defenders have been murdered by armed groups, and another 10 former FARC guerrillas involved in the peace process.
Last week’s threats against four journalists came after their investigations cast a shadow on former president Álvaro Uribe, now the subject of a Supreme Court probe into an alleged conspiracy to commit election fraud with drug money launderer Jose Guillermo Hernandez, a.k.a. “El Ñeñe”.
Hernandez was killed last month in suspicious circumstances while in Brazil.
Four of the journalists under threat include veteran investigative reporter Gonzalo Guillén, who founded Colombia’s press association Colprensa, as well as with Julián Martínez, Diana López and Daniel Mendoza, and twitter user Beto Coral.
According to social media messages by Guillén, the threats originate from the Águilas Negras, a shadowy armed group often implicated in threats against social leaders.
This week the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) added its voice to calls to protect the journalists currently under threat.
“We call on the state to evaluate the death threats…and establish adequate protection measures,” said Edison Lanza, special rapporteur for freedom of expression for IAHCR in Colombia. According to FLIP, the state has not yet responded with protection measures. Meanwhile the country’s media is on the alert for what El Espectador calls “killings hidden by the coronavirus plague”.
Class Pass is an American-based fitness network. Their digital library of fitness classes is available on demand to anyone who creates a free online Class Pass account.
The collection is divided into four categories: 1. Cardio (Includes HIIT, Kickboxing, boxing, and dance workouts), 2. Strength (full body, upper body, lower body, abs), 3. Mind and Body (yoga, barre), and 4. Express Videos for quick, efficient workouts.
Fitness Blender is a husband-and-wife team virtual small business turned online fitness giant. The site offers over 500 different streamable workout videos, featuring a variety of styles, from cardio favourite HIIT, to strength training videos, to yoga and pilates.
Fitness Blender also offers FB Plus, a paid service with access to FB Plus-only videos and other tools: $8.99/month auto-renew or $11.99/month pay-as-you-go
This is a free online yoga classic. Adriene Mishler is a Texas-based yogi who created Yoga With Adriene, a YouTube channel and online yoga community with over 6 million followers. There are hundreds of videos available on demand. Better yet, you can search the library of videos to find a yoga practice based on time, focus on a particular part of the body, or a theme like “yoga for joy” or the all too appropriate, “yoga for uncertain times.”
Core Power Yoga is the largest yoga franchise in the US, with studios in 24 states plus the District of Columbia. Their yoga is high-intensity, and fitness-centered; they even use free weights during some of their sequences.
Much loved by celebrities, this trendy fitness darling is live-streaming high-intensity fitness workouts on IGTV twice per day. Check them out at @Barrys.
OrangeTheory Fitness, Free video per day
This US-based gym franchise and patented fitness programme offers one-hour circuit training cardio classes. Now that it has had to go digital, with OrangeTheory at home, they will be posting 30-minute daily workout videos led by coaches from around the world.
This is an app that provides 20-minute HIIT workouts. You can choose from those that are bodyweight only, or choose some that require basic equipment if you have some at home. Download it for free.
4. Barre, Pilates, Dance, and more
Barre
What is barre? It’s a fitness method that blends pilates, yoga, and ballet into a low-intensity strengthening workout that will leave you sore for days after you first give it a go (likely much to your surprise, as the movements are small and seemingly easy).
Developed by Montreal-based former professional ballerina, Miranda Esmond-White, Essentrics is a dynamic strength and stretch workout unlike anything else. According to its website, “Essentrics dynamically combines strengthening and stretching to develop a strong, toned body with the complete ability of moving each joint and muscle freely and with full range of motion.”
Spinning
If you have a stationary bike at home, check-out these online spinning programmes.
Indoor spinning giant Peloton has made a 90-day free trial available for access to online videos, which also include yoga, meditation, strength, and running
The first announced case was of a 58-year-taxi driver from Cartagena. The patient died on March 16, but was only confirmed as a coronavirus victim yesterday, according to the Ministry of Health. The victim’s sister and a carer have also tested positive for the virus.
According to the health ministry, the taxi driver fell sick after driving Italian tourists around the historic city of Cartagena on March 4. He also had chronic untreated illnesses – diabetes and high blood pressure – which contributed to the severity of his coronavirus illness.
The Cali death is of a 70-year-old patient who had underlying health problems. The female victim’s husband is also hospitalised and a confirmed COVID-19 case. Health experts suspect the couple could have been infected by their daughter who recently returned from overseas.
Bogotá is in a trial lock-down. Cafes are still open for take-aways, left, but roads are empty as most people stay indoors, right. Photos: Brendan Corrigan
Bogotá is still the focus – but national spread
Latest data from the Instituto Nacional de Salud (INS) shows the majority of cases recorded in Bogotá (88), but there is now a wider spread across the country, with 16 departments now affected.
Most cases are still imported from people arriving from overseas, (142 of them), and there are now eight cases ‘under study’, which means the health authorities have yet to find a link to an imported case. This suggests that community spreading of the virus (i.e. not related directly to someone coming from outside the country) could be taking place.
So far, most infections are in younger people with 62 cases falling in the 20s age range. Older cases in the more vulnerable over-60 range only total 33 so far. Of the total count of 231, 13 people are currently hospitalised, two have died, one has recovered and 216 are being treated at home.
The only way is up…graph showing coronavirus cases in Colombia to March 21. Data source: INS
Colombia: More like Italy or South Korea?
As we mentioned in the previous report is interesting to compare Colombia to Italy and South Korea which are roughly one month ahead in terms of infection dates. One month later both countries have had very different outcomes:
Italy has recorded 54,000 cases and 4,800 deaths.
South Korea has recorded 8,900 cases and 104
deaths.
One theory is that the country was slow to lock down and practice social distancing, thus allowing the virus to spread silently through the young population which tends to be more socially active and show less signs of illness.
The virus then spread rapidly into the older generation – which suddenly did show severe symptoms overwhelming the health system. Italian hospitals cannot cope with the sudden influx of very sick patients, leaving many victims to die.
Testing times
The fact Colombia was late to catch the virus has given the country time to learn from other places, and impose curfews border restrictions very early on in the virus’s progression. But it is too early to say if the population will comply with the measures, and how effective they will be to prevent a health crisis.
According to World Health Organisation another key response to the outbreak is mass testing of people to isolate confirmed cases and find their close contacts to also track and isolate other carriers, as was used successfully in South Korea.
Colombia health authorities recently announced plans to import 50,000 COVID-19 tests from South Korea which will give faster results – within four hours – and speed up case finding and contact tracing.
Colombia enters
national quarantine until at least April 13
Meanwhile, there is growing evidence from the severe outbreaks in Europe of the vital importance of enforced social distancing and quarantine measure needed to control outbreaks. Colombia has now declared a national quarantine from March 24 to April 13, which in Bogotá and some nearby departments will join immediately the current four-day lock-down drill ending on March 23.
Details are still being finalised by the government,
but from what we know so far:
All internal flights will stop from midnight on March 23. Most terrestrial transport will also be suspended.
Food shops and essential services will operate all over the country, allowing people to buy food and essential supplies during the 20-day quarantine. This is to avoid shortages caused by panic buying.
Dog walking is still allowed (Photo: Oli Pritchard). Rolos are reacting to the lock-down with good humour, such as the ‘I’m off to Carulla’ meme, right.
From what we are experiencing in Bogotá this weekend, people can easily go out on foot to buy food and supplies and walk their pets but must maintain social distancing.
All vehicle traffic and cycling is banned, unless connected to authorized essential activities. Home deliveries of food and supplies, for example Rappi and UberEeats, will all be running.
The Bogotá Post will bring you more details as they come in, and check back here for more Coronavirus case updates. We’ll keep you posted.
As the city winds down, it hasn’t quite turned off completely.
Parque Nacional is almost empty on the first day of quarantine. Photo: Oli Pritchard
So what is like out on the streets of Bogotá? Well, with two energetic huskies in the house, there’s a pressing need for me to be out of the house and making use of those 20 minute walking slots. For our first stroll around, things were fairly normal: Tiendas were mainly open and people were enjoying coffee and stocking up on necessary items. While it was quiet, it was only about the same as a Sunday, save for the ciclovía not being active. Most drug stores were open, as were EPS clinics, although they were all almost completely empty.
Chains took a different attitude: Subway was closed, but Dunkin’ Donuts and Ara were fully open and serving with gusto. Tostao’ decided to open, but to offer service at the door, which some OXXOs copied. Again, this was inconsistent and varied shop to shop.
Shops are open, but there are very few people.
In the Parque Nacional, there were a number of dog walkers wandering about at great distances. There were few other people in the park, but far from totally empty. It was an odd mood – normally my dogs like to socialise and meet people, but today we kept away from everyone. It was jovial though, and waves were exchanged from distance
Police were present but not getting involved. Most people were obeying the spirit of the simulacro, and so the police let them get on with things. I passed a number of officers, all of whom ignored me or smiled and waved. Having been previously worried about the increasing focus on fines and compliance, I was relieved to see it handled sensibly and rationally.
Going out in Bogotá’s quarantine
Speaking to people in other parts of the city, different stories emerged. Up in Suba, my friends saw only the occasional rappitendero as the conjuntos remained quiet. The story was the same in Nueva Zelandia around the 183.
Chapinero seemed almost normal in a few places, especially around the 60s. Towards the south, a friend in Bosa commented that most people were going out completely as normal. In Soacha, some said life continued since transport was not fully connecting the town with Bogotá proper, and many are cut off from work. Others reported that people are scared and staying at home.
While medics were getting things done on the way to and from work, others went to work shifts at burger places in Chapinero, presumably to meet the domicillio demand. But there were others about with seemingly no connection to essential services. And people definitely managed to order taxis on apps to visit friends’ houses.
In the end, it seems as though the simulacro is doing its job: the city is largely closed and the chances of widespread infection are being reduced. On the other hand, life is not completely finished – remember, one person per household is still allowed to go to the shops and you can still cover the essential needs of life. All of this without a heavy-handed police presence. As Bogotá breaks new ground with this seemingly world-first trial run, things are looking good for future, longer, shutdowns.
President Duque announces that Colombia will go into a total shutdown from midnight on Tuesday, March 24.
Photo: Presidencia
Speaking at the end of the first of four days of quarantine in Bogotá and neighbouring departments, President Duque has announced that the whole country will go into shutdown from 11.59 pm on Tuesday night.
The country-wide quarantine measures will be in place until April 13. Find out more about the measures and how you will be impacted in our Quarantine 101 story.
Accompanied by several medical experts, Duque spoke of the impact that the coronavirus or COVID-19 pandemic has had on the world, but he said that if it is handled properly, Colombia can slow the pace of the spread.
“We know the difficulties and challenges that this presents for families, but it’s a fundamental decision to protect health,” he said. He said that the measures the country has taken so far — such as limiting events and social contact — have had an impact, but more drastic action is neded.
The president stressed the importance of protecting the most vulnerable members of society, explaining that while many people who have contracted the virus have got better, Colombia has to protect its grandparents.
“It’s a time to protect ourselves,” he said. “It’s a time to understand that our behaviour can save lives. It’s a time to cooperate strongly. And to value, more than ever, it’s a time to value the work of doctors and medical staff.”
Our regular roundup of the country’s COVID-19 cases.
According to Colombia’s public health authority the Instituto Nacional de Salud (INS), 145 coronavirus cases have been confirmed so far in the country, with no confirmed deaths. This tally puts us in 55th place worldwide. Meanwhile, nearly 4,000 suspect cases have been tested negative for COVID-19.
Yesterday’s recorded increase – 17 cases – was lower than the
previous day’s rise of 26 cases, but the graph still shows an upward trend
since the first notified case on March 6.
Most cases continue to be imported, with 93 persons catching the disease overseas, the majority among people recently in Spain (55).
Another 50 cases are people who caught the disease from travellers bringing it in, mostly close contacts such as friends and family. So far, the INS has not reported any confirmed cases of community spreading, that is cases not obviously connected to the imported cases.
Bogotá has the highest number of coronavirus cases
The INS also reports that the region with most cases is Bogotá (54) but with hotspots in Medellín and Cali. Some good news is that the majority of infected people are being treated at home, with only 10 requiring hospitalisation.
On the up: Colombia’s cases. Data Source: INS
It is interesting to note that in terms of case numbers, Colombia
today is close to the figures reported by both Italy and South Korea on February
21 of this year. One month later both countries have had very different outcomes:
Italy has recorded 37,000 cases and 4,000 deaths.
South Korea has recorded 8,600 cases and 94
deaths.
This data shows the two very different possibilities for the future of the outbreak in Colombia. In one month will Colombia be closer to South Korea or Italy?
Keep your distance
According to Science magazine many countries are opting for social distancing strategies to slow the virus spread. European countries that were slow to impose restrictions are now seeing massive increases in cases and deaths.
So far Colombia has been an early adopter of curfews, lockdowns, travel restrictions and enforced isolation. Bogotá is currently under a four-day test quarantine drill with most people obliged to stay at home. Land borders are closed and next week inbound international flights will be banned.
But will these measures be enough to prevent a big outbreak
in Colombia? Since the virus can incubate in the human body for up to two weeks,
the impact of preventative measures will only be seen down the line.
Queues form at Bogotá supermarket as entry is controlled as part of ‘social distancing’.
Testing,
testing
The World Health Organisation recently announced that another key response to the outbreak is mass testing of people to isolate confirmed cases and find their close contacts to also track and isolate other carriers, as was used successfully in South Korea.
Such a tactic requires human power – teams to go out and find cases and contacts – and the ability to carry out fast mass testing.
Colombia currently has seven laboratories able
to test for COVID-19 between them able to process more than 3,000 tests a day,
but with results coming usually after 24 hours.
But despite this testing capacity, the director of the INS Martha Lucía Ospina today told El Tiempo that only 800 samples were being sent per day by health clinics around Colombia, despite people reporting symptoms of the coronavirus and wanting confirmation.
“We’re worried that not enough test samples are being sent in,’ said Dr Ospina. Teams have now been dispatched to health clinics to find the bottleneck.
The INS comments – and experience of other countries – suggests the real infection figures could be much higher than the official test figures.
Scientists in China now believe for every COVID-19 case confirmed by the lab there are 5 to 10 times as many cases that go undetected among people with mild or no symptoms of the illness, but still able to spread the virus.
Check our website for more updates in the coming days.
As the capital enters its mock quarantine, we’ve got some Colombia-related ideas of things to get you through the day.
Bolero Falaz from Aterciopelados is a classic for Colombian indie lovers and could be a welcome distraction during the quarantine in Bogotá. Photo: Aterciopelados
Some people in Bogotá have been isolating for a while now. Especially those in the mandatory 14-day self-isolation for anyone arriving in the country.
But after the panic buying and running around in fear of what isolation might bring, this morning’s calm might come as a relief. If you don’t work from home, you can lie in, make yourself a leisurely coffee (assuming you remembered to buy some) and idle away a bit of time on social media.
By 10am you might be starting to get restless. Maybe you’ll last till noon. Or maybe you’re an introvert who sees quarantine as a gift sent from the gods of some secluded Amazon tribe.
Of course, there’s no shortage of TV and other international offerings online to keep us entertained. From the Met Opera to the very first facebook play. But since we’re all about Colombia, we thought we’d pull together a day by day guide to keep you as sane and entertained as possible.
Listen to some Colombian music
Let’s start off with something a bit different. Colombia is rightly famous for its many tropical genres, and we’ll get to those in good time at the weekend proper. Instead, we’re going to start off with some leftfield indie. We’ve selected a trio of Bogotano bands who you’ll easily be able to see live once (if) life returns to normal. These are only starting ideas – see where the suggested songs take you!
First up, El Terrible Tarantismo. They’re gypsy-punk genre destroyers in the mould of Gogol Bordello and cut their teeth busking. Rockafella is a rare English-language track. Next up, Monsieur Periné. It’s a little twee, but a single day into quarantine and soft-indie delicacies are perfect. Bailar Contigo was an absolute smash and you’ll still hear it around the city. Finally, a classic for every Colombian indie fan, but not always well-known outside Latin America, Bolero Falaz. It was the breakout song for Aterciopelados, easily the capital’s biggest indie band and far the most creative. They’ve won awards by the ton, and constantly reinvent themselves, but this mid-90’s tune is their classic sound.
Visit a gallery virtually
It’s not only international galleries that are doing online tours. Bogotá’s Museo de Arte Contemporáneo has got in on the act with eight exhibitions online. If you’re already missing the Bogotá’s graffiti, ‘Hybrid Identities’ has some striking visual work while ‘Abstracción en Colombia’ takes you on a tour of the museum’s permanent collection. If you’re feeling reflective, the videos, text and images in ‘No Repetition’ are all about conflict in Latin America.
The Museo de Memoria allows you to do an actual 3D tour of the museum, moving around each room as if you were actually there. It’s not super intuitive, but worth a quick stop. Medellín’s Museo Casa de Memoría is easier to use and more informative once you get the hang of moving around.
Catch up on your reading
If you’ve got a kindle, you have access to a host of books — some are even free. Amazon also has free online kindle readers, so you can download books to your computer or phone. But if you’re a real-pages-or-nothing type of a reader and you don’t have a pile of books you’ve been meaning to read, the English-language Bookworm say they will be delivering through Rappi.
We’re steering clear of recommending One Hundred Years of Solitude and other classics. Though now is a perfect time to catch up on your Gabo. Our recommendation for today is The Sound of Things Falling by Juan Gabriel Vásquez. This widely acclaimed noir thriller takes on the Colombian cocaine industry and the people it touches. Let it take you into the streets through words not footsteps.
Watch one of Colombia’s best football matches in history
Missing football already? Some of us definitely do. Luckily some of Colombia’s best ever matches are on YouTube, and the full 90 minutes as well. Colombia’s emblematic 5-0 victory over Argentina in the World Cup ‘94 qualifiers is a classic, Manager Maturana’s team with ‘El Pibe’ Valderrama, ‘Tino’ Asprilla and Freddy Rincón was possibly the best Colombia has ever had and against the South American giants that quality came to a climax with a historical 5-0 victory.
Live online ranchero
The young Colombian ranchero musician, Juandas – who calls himself a ‘ranchera optimista’ – will be performing live tonight at 8pm on instagram. If a bit of optimistic guitar playing is what you’re missing in your quarantine, look no further.
We’ll be back with more ways to keep yourself entertained tomorrow. Don’t forget that even if you’re quarantined, you’re not alone. You’re in a city full of people doing exactly the same things as you. And it’s a great time to call or video chat with friends — whether here in the city or anywhere else in the world.
Bogotá will shut down all but the most essential of services at 11.59 pm tonight. Find out how the four-day shutdown is going to work.
Empty streets in Bogotá will be the norm in the next couple of days. Photo: Melanie Alsop
Bogotanos will be forced to stay at home over the holiday weekend in a four-day citywide shut down, aimed at preparing the city for a serious novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.
Under the slogan #YoMeQuedoEnCasa, everybody is being told to stay home from 11.59 pm tonight (on Thursday, March 20 and running until 11.59 pm on Monday, March 23). The measures are being coordinated with public forces, police and the government.
After some confusion yesterday, President Duque and Mayor Claudia López confirmed that the quarantine simulation will go ahead. López called on citizens to stay home in an unprecedented obligatory isolation drill to test how the capital would cope if the coronavirus took hold.
“It doesn’t make sense to wait until we are already contaminated to do a quarantine simulation,” said López. “It’s now, while we don’t have a massive contagion, now, while we don’t have a massive collapse of our health systems, that we need to do this simulation.”
A very limited number of people will be allowed out to perform essential tasks, such as caring for elderly and sick people or providing emergency services. Taxis and a skeleton TransMilenio service will operate to ferry those people around.
In addition to the measures adopted in Bogotá, President Duque has announced that no international travellers (whether Colombians or foreigners) will be able to enter the country after the weekend. If you are already in the country and plan to leave after March 22, it is strongly advised that you contact your airline to understand what flights will be operating. Just as in Bogotá’s last curfew, exceptions will be made for people trying to get to the airport – you just need to be able to show your ticket if you get stopped.
The five main exceptions to the quarantine in the capital are:
Supply and acquisition of food
Provision of health services
Care for the sick and elderly
Public order and emergency services
Extreme necessity
Obviously, if there’s an earthquake or your house is burning down, you’re not expected to stay inside. Also under the umbrella of necessity come ‘essential’ operations such as sanitary services, call centres and funeral services.
And platforms like Rappi or UberEats who deliver food and necessities are exempted from the quarantine. But nipping out now and getting hold of a Rappi bag is not going to exempt you from the curfew: delivery people will need to carry identification.
What will I be allowed to do?
One person per household will be allowed out to buy groceries or medicine. That means that some large supermarkets and pharmacies will be open in addition to offering delivery services.
Other than that, unless you work for the military, police, fire department, Red Cross, prison service or other authorised relief agency, you’re going to be stuck at home.
What about pets? Will I be able to walk my dogs?
Pet owners will have 20 minutes to take their pets out. It’s not clear how many times they can go out or who is going to be checking up on them, but you’re not going to get in trouble for taking your dogs out to do their business.
Can I go to another city?
Theoretically, yes — if you leave before midnight (like now). But bear in mind that the neighbouring departments are implementing the same measures and the main bus terminals will be shut. The departments of Cundinamarca, Meta, Boyacá and Santander are involved in the simulation and have introduced their own measures. Other department capitals are following suit.
The mayor repeatedly stressed that this is not a time for holidays and that since the capital has the largest number of cases, it would be irresponsible to leave. “We are the capital of Colombia and we have an obligation not only to take care of ourselves here, but also to help to take care of the rest of Colombia,” she said.
What is ley seca? Does that have anything to do with the quarantine?
Ley seca is a law that prohibits the sale of alcohol. It’s already been implemented in several departments, and as of 6pm, you will not be able to buy booze in the capital. We don’t yet know whether this measure will be extended after the stay-at-home drill but if you are someone who enjoys the odd glass of wine, we’d advise stocking up now.
What happens if I break the rules?
While this was originally proposed as a voluntary drill, the quarantine simulation is now obligatory. That means fines and reprimands which could even involve prison. It’s very unlikely you’ll be sent to prison for breaking the rules, but it’s probably not a good idea to test it.
In addition to the quarantine, don’t forget that anyone who’s recently arrived in the country needs to self isolate for 14 days. More than 40 foreigners have already been expelled and 700 people have been under investigation for breaking the isolation rules.
What about the city’s homeless population?
There are a large number of people living on the street in Bogotá and it remains unclear how they will be protected in the event of an outbreak. The alcaldía say they are putting measures in place, including additional hand washing facilities.
Worried about your visa/travel situation with the recent coronavirus restrictions? We got answers from Migración Colombia about some common concerns.
There’s a lot of information and disinformation flying around about COVID-19, more commonly known as the coronavirus. We asked Migración Colombia to solve some of the problems that readers have told us they’re worried about. Here are the answers we have for some of the most common visa issues and migration situations. Thanks go especially to Juan Caicedo at Migración for his help.
Please be aware that the situation is changing quickly, which means the rules are too. It’s a good idea to double-check with the relevant authorities and to keep an eye on the news. Various Colombian departments have already announced curfews, ley seca and other restrictions. Also, be aware that Migración Colombia do not control airports or airlines, nor are they medical professionals. If you want information on flights, ask the airline.
First, make sure you know what type of visa you actually have. This has changed a few times in the last few years, and the current system has been streamlined. If you’re a tourist, you probably have a permiso de ingreso stamped in your passport. Some people think of it as a tourist visa, but it isn’t actually a visa — and is issued by Migración Colombia, not the Cancillería.
If you’re here for a short amount of time and you have a visa, you probably have a type V (Visitante) visa. These are for people who are in the country for temporary purposes, even if that could be relatively long. It covers people studying, on volunteer courses, tourists who require visa, journalists and those on fixed-term contracts.
R (Residentes) visas are for residents, and this covers conjugal visas as well as regular residencies. If you don’t yet meet the requirements for a type R visa, you may have a type M (Migrante) visa instead. This is very similar to a type R visa, and most likely means that a type R is coming if you stay for five years.
I heard that all flights are currently grounded. Can I leave?
All scheduled flights have been grounded and this looks unlikely to change until at least May 30. However, there are occasional emergency and humanitarian flights repatriating people. These flights are being arranged at short notice and may require flexibility on your part.
As of March 27, planes have departed to the UK, Europe and North America in order to repatriate citizens of some countries. Your chances are especially a lot higher if you are within easy reach of El Dorado airport in Bogotá. There may be the possibility to take these flights from Medellín or Cali, but this is far from certain. You may be required to make your own way to Bogotá in order to take a flight, so if you are exploring this route, find out if this will be possible – do not expect embassies to take you door-to-door
What type of visa do I need to enter Colombia as a foreigner?
At the moment, only foreigners with type M, R or C (Cortesía) visas can enter Colombia. Foreigners with type V visas or tourists with no visas cannot enter the territory. However, as you may have noticed, no scheduled flights are arriving until May 30th.
I have a visa that allows me to enter the country, what do I have to do?
To enter Colombia, foreign nationals will have to complete the Formulario de Control Preventivo Contra el Coronavirus before their arrival in the country. It does not matter what type of visa you have, this applies to all valid visa holders. Once in Colombia, you will have to undergo an obligatory 14 days of isolation at a point of your choosing.
This can be any place you nominate, but it can be only one place and cannot be changed. For example, if you have a finca and a city apartment, you cannot move between them: you must choose one or the other. If it is a hotel or other temporary residence, make sure that you can stay at the hotel for the 14 days without break, and that the hotel is prepared to admit you.
You will be issued with a code which registers you in the isolation control database, and you may be required to show this to prove compliance with the regulations. You will also receive a daily reminder that you should be in isolation as well as notification when your time is up. There are no excuses for breaking the isolation norms, and it is possible for suspicious citizens to report you to Migración if you are thought to be breaking the rules.
What if I have a residency visa and I am ready to arrive in Colombia for the first time. Can I enter?
Yes, because you have an R visa. Remember that after arriving in Colombia you have to register the visa within 15 days. New visas of any type will not be issued outside the country for the foreseeable future.
I am already in Colombia and want to extend a permiso de ingreso (‘tourist visa’) for 3 months. Is this possible?
Normally, you should apply for a prórroga de permanencia on the Migración Colombia website. However, this has currently been suspended and the time from now until the 30th May will not be counted. If your permiso de ingreso has recently expired, relax. It is unlikely that Migración will fine or sanction people who are acting in good faith, so stay calm and follow the rules as best you can.
The deadline of 30th May is not set in stone, and may well change, so please check updates. Finally, the official wording is that all documentation will remain valid “until the flight situation normalises”. In practice, again, if you are acting in good faith, expect to be treated well. If you try to spin out extra time claiming you can’t get on a flight when they are clearly available, do not expect lenient treatment.
Will it be possible to get a new M, V or R visa if I am already in Colombia?
It appears to be possible as of the morning of 27 March, although this might change. Remember that all visa applications must be done online unless you are explicitly asked to attend the office. The website is still accepting applications for type V visas, but remember that this will not allow you to re-enter if you leave Colombian territory. Type R and M visas appear to be as normal. Migración and the Cancellería are under a lot of stress right now so expect delays and administrative hiccups.
If my visa expires and there are no flights to other countries, what should I do? Will it be possible to get a salvaconducto?
The current regulations are being implemented according to current conditions. If and when those change, Migración will make an announcement. Until then, any news is pure speculation. It is not currently necessary to apply for a prórrogo de permanencia, see the above question for more details. Migración are giving you time until “the flight situation normalises”, which is open language and implies that they will be reasonable.
I am flying from Panama to France. Can I change planes in Colombia?
Yes, although you need to check the current regulations of the country you will arrive in. As long as France will let you arrive and your air carrier is willing to take you, there is not a problem with changing planes in Colombia. However, there are currently no flights from either country, so the situation is unlikely.
If I leave Colombia at Leticia, but Brazil denies me entry, what happens next? Can I re-enter Colombia?
All Colombian land, sea and riverine borders are closed, and you are not permitted to leave this country by these routes. Air travel is the only way out at this stage. If you illegally leave Colombia, you should not expect a warm welcome back.
I am leaving Colombia soon to go home to my country. What should I do before arriving at Migration?
Complete the control form on the Migración Colombia website. Check with the relevant authorities in your country that you can enter without problem. It is currently recommended that you arrive at the Migración checkpoints (not just at the airport door) at least three hours before your scheduled departure time.
If I am in self-isolation and want to leave the country early, is this possible?
Yes, but you must complete the above-mentioned 8 and abide by the isolation and quarantine norms. It would be wise to allow even more extra time at the airport in this case. Remember that flights are extremely limited at the moment and this is unlikely to change.
Someone has reported me for breaking the rules on isolation, what happens next?
Migración officials will visit your chosen isolation address and confirm the situation. This is where your code will be used, and hotel staff or building security may be questioned as to your movements. You will be subject to administrative and penal measures if found to be breaking the rules and seven foreigners have been deported already for contravening the isolation regulations. Colombia, like all other countries in the world, is taking this seriously and you should not treat the measures lightly.
This also applies for the national quarantine which, as of March 27, will last until April 13. You are unlikely to be deported for this if you are not a visitor, but it’s wise not to test the rules. Expect at the least to pay a hefty fine – at least one minimum salary – and perhaps serve jail time.
I have been deported for breaking the rules on isolation, what happens next?
You will have to follow the rules for all people deported from Colombia. First, that’s seven years without being able to visit Colombia except in exceptional circumstances. Next, you’ll get a stamp in your passport saying you have previously been expelled from a country, which will be a big headache. After the seven years, you can apply for visas again, although don’t expect it to be easy. As there are no flights at the moment, you may well be imprisoned until flights become available.
When will non-resident foreigners be able to visit Colombia again?
As of March 27, the borders are closed until May 30. This is, however, subject to revision depending on circumstances, which are volatile both in Colombia and worldwide, so keep an eye on updates.
Please note, this information is based on answers supplied by Migración Colombia and supplemented by additional information from other sources.
City authorities are asking citizens to stay at home for a four-day isolation practice.
The streets of Bogotá will be empty for four days during an isolation drill. Photo: Melanie Alsop
Bogotá mayor Claudia López announced this evening that the capital would shut down over the coming bank holiday weekend in an isolation simulation. The mayor called on people to remain in their houses for four days, beginning on Friday March 20.
She stressed that this was only a drill but a necessary one. “This is something that we’ll have to do eventually. I invite the citizens to participate in this exercise because, when we do have to do it, it’s better that we know how to do it, we know how it went.”
López said that this has not happened before, but expressed the hope that other local authorities will follow suit. The idea is to minimise the disruption by holding it over a holiday weekend, but also to make it realistic by including a weekday.
Four-day isolation to include everybody
“Everybody is everybody,” the mayor said. “All of us will stay at home for four days.” She said that people are free to use their cars on Wednesday and Thursday to go out and run any errands that are needed.
A lot of the details of the plan will become clearer tomorrow, especially as López is keen to consult the public. “We’ve been thinking a lot about the rules for the drill, but we’ll put it to the citizens tomorrow so that people can contribute,” she said.
While the idea is that the city will stop completely, certain professions — such as doctors and emergency services — will be able to work. “We’ve never done this. It’s the first time that we’re going to do it. We have to learn how to do it – it’s part of the new challenges we face.”
In addition to the restrictions, López also announced measures to support the city. The city will extend lines of credit to businesses who have been particularly affected such as restaurants and entertainment companies.
Bogotá has restrictions but also assistance
The time period to pay certain taxes, such as predial and the Registro Mercantil, has been extended. Supercades will continue to operate, but will implement a pico y placa system (where people can use the services on alternate days depending on whether their cédula ends in an odd or even number.)
Public spaces such as museums and libraries will be closed temporarily. Bogotá will join Cundinamarca in restricting the sale of alcohol. The city’s parks will remain open, but with controls to ensure that people are able to enjoy them and still keep a suitable distance from others.
The mayor finished by calling for calm and co-operation, stressing that it was an opportunity for bogotanos to work together with empathy, patience and collective intelligence. “This will be a new cultural challenge for the citizens of Bogotá. It’s extraordinary,” she said.
Stay home, stay sober, say regional chiefs spooked by coronavirus spread.
The Cámara de Comercio in Bogotá was almost empty on Monday and adopted a social distancing measure by setting all chairs 1 metre apart. Photo: Emma Newbery
A sharp spike in Colombian COVID-19 has seen confirmed cases rise by 34 in the last 48 hours bringing today’s total to 65. Now departmental governors – acting under an ‘exceptional circumstances’ mandate granted by the capital – are creating their own rules to try and beat the crisis with a host of Colombian coronavirus closures.
What is closed in Colombia because of the coronavirus?
Bars, cinemas and theatres are closed in the capital. And Bogotá bishops have banned Catholic masses in large churches to avoid creating crowds.
The popular tourist destination of Cartagena has introduced a curfew between 10pm and 4am and suspended tourist activities in museums and beaches.
All Colombia’s national parks have been closed.
Córdoba imposed a toque de queda (curfew) from 7pm to 6am, by order of the governor.
Santander and Quindío forced people to stay indoors from 10pm to 4am, and closing gyms, bars, discos and cinemas.
Valle de Cauca, which includes the party city of Cali, has banned gatherings of more than 10 people.
The governor of Meta, in the Llanos, decreed an 8pm to 5am curfew topped off by a ban on selling alcoholic drinks, known here as ‘ley seca’. The restrictions will last at least two weeks.
Cundinamarca governor, Nicolás García, has declared a curfew between 9 pm and 5 am, saying, “This is not a holiday, this is a period of trying to contain a pandemic.” They have also banned the sale of alcohol.
Doubling down on COVID-19: no more foreign visitors
Not to be outdone by his local leaders, Colombian President Duque himself took to the airwaves today to announce a 10-week stoppage of all human movement across land, sea and river borders with neighbouring Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Venezuela and Panama. Cargo shipments will be allowed in over official border posts.
Crowds will not be massing in the city’s misas, which are closed in churches in Bogotá. Photo: Steve Hide
The fast-moving events are part of daily initiatives designed to double down on COVID-19, such as the nationwide closure of schools and colleges, a ban on gatherings of more than 50 people, and a total ban on foreign visitors “from anywhere in the world”.
These come on top of recommendations that people to self-isolate at home and maintain ‘social distancing’ – keeping a minimum of two metres from others in public areas – as well as frequent handwashing with soap and water.
Colombian nationals and foreigners with resident status can still enter by commercial flight into international airports in Colombia, and travellers currently in the country are able to fly out – if their destination country will allow them.
At a press conference yesterday, the head of Migración Colombia, Juan Francisco Espinosa, stressed that those wanting to fly should contact their airlines. “We don’t control the airport or airlines, we only control entry and exit from the country,” he said.
Following the spread of the coronavirus
Meanwhile, data presented by the Instituto Nacional de Salud showed the majority of new coronavirus cases are in Bogotá, with a total now of 33, but also in Antioquia (8), Huila (7) Valle de Cauca (5), Bolívar (4), Atlántico (2) with Meta, Caldas, Risaralda, Norte de Santander and Cundinamarca each with one case. This brings the March 17 total to 65. Since January, more than 2,200 people have been tested negative.
According to the INS, only 7 are hospitalised and the rest are being treated at home.
The day’s good news, delivered by Bogotá’s mayor Claudia López, was that one of the early victims was now declared cured.
Rumours were swirling online late Monday of a coronavirus death in a coastal city, but not yet confirmed.
Analysis of the stats so far shows that cases have either been imported from abroad, mostly by travellers arriving by air from overseas (37 cases), or are ‘associated’ cases (20), which is to say among people in close contact with those travellers soon after they arrived in Colombia.
“Test, test, test”
So far no ‘community’ spread has been proven to have occurred, though experts in other countries now believe that the virus could have been circulating worldwide undetected for much longer than testing indicates. Experts also believe that for every positive case tested there could be as many as 10 hidden infections several times removed from an initial import case.
For this reason, the World Health Organization (WHO) has urged countries to escalate detection of the virus in communities to show where the outbreak is heading.
“We have a simple message to all countries – test, test, test,” the WHO director-general told world media on Monday. “All countries should be able to test all suspected cases. They cannot fight this pandemic blindfolded.”
According to Colombian health chiefs, the country currently has three laboratories able to test for COVID-19, two in Bogotá and one in Antioquia, between them able to process more than 2,000 tests a day with results usually within 12 hours.
More labs are expected to come on-line shortly.
Check for more updates on The Bogotá Post – we’ll keep you posted.
President says that stopping the spread of COVID-19 is in our hands.
President Duque stressed that panic is as dangerous as the virus. César Carrión – Presidencia
The number of COVID-19 cases in Colombia reached 54 today, with nine new cases confirmed in Bogotá this morning.
The first case was confirmed 10 days ago and the numbers have risen steadily since then, with many of the virus’s victims having travelled in recent weeks. Worldwide, the total number of cases has risen to almost 170,000 and over 6,500 deaths.
Don’t panic: Fear is the virus’s greatest ally, so don’t go to health centres if you are not sick and don’t hoard medicines you don’t need. Medical services may be under severe pressure soon and may not be able to see non-urgent cases.
Wash your hands. Simple measures can reduce contagion by 50%. Stay at home if you are exhibiting symptoms and wash your hands frequently with soap and water. Avoid physical contact and try not to touch your face. If you are outside of the house, use disinfectant gel.
Closure of schools and universities: From this morning, Colombia’s public schools and universities will be closed until at least April 20. Private educational facilities are mostly doing the same. This week, teachers will be preparing virtual study programs.
Closure of Colombia’s borders: Existing restrictions on arrivals from European countries have been extended. As of today, no non-residents or non-nationals will be allowed to arrive in Colombia. The border with Venezuela remains closed.
The Bogotá Post will be attending a press conference with the head of Migración Colombia this morning and will keep you posted on any developments that might impact foreigners living in the country.
Mayor seeks to ban large gatherings among moves to delay spread of COVID-19.
Mayor Claudia López announces rules and recommendations to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in Bogotá. Photo:bogota.gov.co
Citizens of Colombia’s capital woke this morning to a raft of new rules and recommendations planned by Mayor Claudia López to stop the spread of the coronavirus in Bogotá. These include the postponement of public events, teleworking from home and intensive disinfection of public spaces and transport systems.
The “yellow alert has legal force, is obligatory to comply with,” said López last night.
“We are in change mode for our daily habits to care for ourselves and those around us.”
Among collective measures announced, López asked businesses and schools to organise home working and study, arrange rotas to ease congestion on transport systems, and for event organisers to postpone shows with concentrations of more than 1,000 people.
The district authority will also ramp up its disinfection procedures with the spraying of public spaces and buses, and temporary hand-washing basins at transport hubs. Schools and colleges are also expected to do daily cleaning.
The measures will not stop contagion – which is already happening, explained the mayor – but to delay the spread to allow health service to cope with severe cases and gain time for the scientific community to find cures, which currently don’t exist for the virus which originated in China late last year.
Wash your hands
López also reinforced practices such as frequent hand washing to reduce the epidemic.
“Panic is not going to take care of us, but self-care is going to help. To prevent the health system collapse we must reduce contagion by 50%, which relies on washing hands, reducing contact and timely reporting the symptoms,” she said.
Another plank of the mayor’s proposal was to streamline health services via the city’s health secretariat. Coronavirus response would supersede the current patchwork of private and public health facilities and instead dedicated teams would “work together by territorial distribution.”
The goal was to try and treat COVID-19 confirmed patients in their homes to decongest health facilities and stop the virus from spreading further, she announced.
Health teams will also attempt to attend people at home with other chronic health problems such as diabetes and high blood pressure, to avoid these mostly older patients – and those statistically most at risk from severe coronavirus symptoms – travelling to health centres where they are more likely to be infected.
López’s stance was widely welcomed by commentators this morning, though it is still not clear what legal footing the action plan has in place, or whether it is all achievable.
But the fact that Bogotá is talking tough – rather than the usual platitudes of “keep calm” from world leaders – suggests the city’s leadership has studied the crisis in other countries and is moving the get ahead of the outbreak, even with just three cases confirmed locally.
And putting collective responsibility to the crisis was also seen as a bold move, and copies the successful strategy lauded in some Asian countries such as Singapore and South Korea.
The mayor reminded the media and NGOs present yesterday that “this is not a challenge from the Ministry of Health or the Ministry of Health, but from each citizen”.
“It is literally in everyone’s hands to prevent the infection and respond properly to the coronavirus.”
Foreigners failing to comply face deportation, say health authorities as Colombia’s confirmed cases hit nine.
The ministry of health put several measures in place to avoid spreading. Photo: Ministerio de salud Colombia
Travellers arriving in Colombia from China, Italy, Spain and France will be “obliged” to quarantine themselves for 14 days – or face deportation and fines, authorities said today as positive cases confirmed in-country jumped to nine.
The measures, announced by President Ivan Duque, were to “protect the collective” health, on the same day the viral COVID-19 outbreak was declared a pandemic by world health body WHO. To date, 118,000 cases and 4,300 deaths have been reported in total from 105 countries.
Anyone who has passed through any of those four high-risk countries within two weeks previous to arriving in Colombia will be expected to “self-isolate” in their hotels or homes for a minimum of 14 days, explained health minister Fernando Ruiz.
“Don’t come to Colombia if you don’t have the means or funds for preventative isolation,” warned Ruiz. The new rules apply to both foreign visitors and returning Colombians, but not to airline crews.
Foreign visitors who fail to self-isolate faced deportation, and Colombian returnees could be fined, he explained.
The Colombian Ministry of Health has yet to say how it will monitor self-isolation, or clearly define exactly what self-isolation entails.
Experts in other countries recommend potentially exposed persons to “stay indoors and avoid contact with others”, for two weeks even if you have no symptoms. This is because people in good health can spread the disease if they are carrying the virus. Fourteen days is the usual maximum time for the virus to show itself in an infected person.
China, Italy, Spain and France are all facing severe outbreaks of the COVID-19 bug, with 10,000 cases and 631 deaths in Italy which is now in country-wide lock-down. It is not clear why Colombia’s health ministry did not include South Korea or Iran, both with higher case numbers than France or Spain.
Meanwhile, Colombian confirmed cases climbed to nine today, these currently are:
Three cases reported in Bogotá, all of whom had recently travelled from Europe.
One case in Cartagena, an older US citizen who recently arrived in Cartagena on a cruise ship from central America and the U.S. The cruise ship docked in the city on March 8. The patient is now isolated in a city hospital.
One case in Buga, Valle, close to Cali.
Four cases in Medellín.
According to the Ministry of Health, the Medellín cases are significant because three were from “local transmission”, having caught the virus from a woman who recently arrived in the city from Spain. All other previous Colombian cases have recently returned from overseas.
This means Colombia now has its first proven examples of coronavirus spreading in the community. On the bright side, no deaths have been reported and all the nine cases are “doing well” with most being supported with treatment at home, Health Minister Ruiz told media today.
For the latest information on coronavirus COVID-19 in Colombia, and worldwide, check the Instituto Nacional de Salud website.
Bogotá’s Secretaría de Salud website has put up a useful self-assessment page and information on where to get help for those who suspect they might have COVID-19.
What is self-isolation?
If you have been told to self-isolate, you need to stay indoors and avoid contact with other people for 14 days. It is important to follow the advice for the whole period, even if you do not have any symptoms. The UK’s National Health Service gives the following advice.
Stay at home
Separate yourself from other people – for example, try not to be in the same room as other people at the same time
Only allow people who live with you to stay
Stay in a well-ventilated room with a window that can be opened
Ask friends, family members or delivery services to carry out errands for you, such as getting groceries, medicines or other shopping
Make sure you tell delivery drivers to leave items outside for collection if you order online
Clean toilets and bathrooms regularly
Think about a bathroom rota if a separate bathroom is not available, with the isolated person using the facilities last, before thoroughly cleaning the bathroom themselves
Use separate towels from anyone else in the household
Wash crockery and utensils thoroughly with soap and water; dishwashers may be used to clean crockery and cutlery
Stay away from your pets – if unavoidable, wash your hands before and after contact
Do not invite visitors to your home or allow visitors to enter
Do not go to work, school or public areas
Do not use public transport like buses, trains, tubes or taxis
Do not share dishes, drinking glasses, cups, eating utensils, towels, bedding or other items with other people in your home.
A look at the abortion debate in Colombia and throughout Latin America.
La Mesa Por la Vida y la Salud de las Mujeres, which pushes for the sexual and reproductive rights of women in Colombia celebrated 20 years in 2019 with its ‘unstoppable women’ – Mujeres Imparables – campaign. Photo: La Mesa Por La Vida
Since 2006, Colombia has been considered a regional leader in defending women’s reproductive rights. That may have changed on March 2 when the Constitutional Court had the chance to vote again on its 2006 abortion legislation. In 2006, Colombia decriminalised abortion in the cases of rape, incest, or life endangerment to the mother or foetus.
Amanda Klasing of Human Rights Watch, an international human rights NGO spoke to The Bogotá Post about the Court’s ruling.
“The Court lost an opportunity to change the lives of women and the chance to keep its leading role in the region to uphold human rights standards with the jurisprudence that respects the human rights of women,” she said. “The good news is that the debate is still alive with a vibrant civil society that isn’t afraid to speak out and help to shape the debate.”
When abortion opponent and lawyer Natalia Bernal brought the case to the constitutional court, seeking a total ban on abortion, she accidentally catalysed a full reconsideration of the 2006 decision. The Constitutional Court had three options:
To uphold the current law and maintain restrictive legal abortion
To expand the criteria for legal, decriminalised abortions
To roll back on the 2006 decision and criminalise all abortions in all cases.
It went with the first option, which neither advanced nor progressed abortion rights in Colombia – it upheld the current status quo.
Human Rights Watch had been involved since January, after submitting an amicus brief to the Colombian Constitutional Court, urging them to opt for decriminalisation.
Americas Director, José Miguel Vivanco urged the court to be realistic. “When considering Colombia’s obligations, the court should ensure that its ruling reflects the reality for women, girls, and adolescents in Colombia who already struggle to access many health services,” he said in a press release.
Abortion in Latin America
Colombia is not alone in its resistance to change. Latin America has long been a bastion of Roman-catholicism and as a result, traditional, conservative ideals. Today in Latin America, only three countries permit abortions without restriction: Cuba, Uruguay, and Guyana. Until this week, the Constitutional Court’s decriminalisation of abortion made Colombia a trailblazer in the region, despite the inherent restrictiveness of the 2006 law.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, a sexual and reproductive rights research and policy organisation, Latin America sees the highest percentage of abortions per pregnancy with 32% of all pregnancies ending in abortion from 2010-2014. This rate has remained largely unchanged since 1990.
Abortion in Argentina
A bill to legalise abortion during the first 14 weeks of pregnancy, beyond the two cases of rape and maternal risk, narrowly failed in the Argentine senate in mid-2018. In response, pro-choice activists proposed a similar bill with more inclusive language in May 2019, which has yet to be voted on. Meanwhile, Argentina’s recently-elected President Alberto Fernández made making legal abortion one of his campaign promises. In a speech to the Argentine congress on March 6, President Fernandez doubled-down on his commitment, announcing that he plans to bring the bill before congress next week. Meanwhile, the debate remains fierce on the streets of Buenos Aires and beyond, where the emblematic green of the Ni Una Menos women’s rights movement clashes with the blue of the right-winged, pro-life opposition.
Abortion in Ecuador
Our neighbour to the south is no stranger to the abortion debate. Ecuador’s current abortion laws only allow the procedure in two narrow cases: pregnancy resulting from the rape of a woman with mental disabilities and when the mother’s life is in danger. An effort to expand legalisation was blocked when Ecuador’s National Assembly rejected a bill that would have expanded the current law to include all rape cases and cases of fetal abnormalities. As a result, Ecuadorian women, including those without mental disabilities who abort a pregnancy resulting from rape, may be jailed for up to two years. Some conservative members of the National Assembly defended their votes by arguing for more severe punishment for rapists rather than increased access to abortion for women.
Abortion in Mexico: Mexico City and Oaxaca
Mexico has gained international attention recently around its alarmingly high rates of femicide and corresponding radical feminist response to the violence. According to numbers released in early 2019 by Mexico’s Executive Secretariat of the National Public Security System (SESNSP), an average of 10 women are murdered in Mexico every day. Meanwhile, two of Mexico’s states – Mexico and Oaxaca – are blazing a trail with both states allowing all abortions within the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. The state of Mexico was the first to make the move over a decade ago in 2007, when the Mexico City legislature approved a bill that proposed decriminalisation in the first trimester of pregnancy. It took until September of 2019 for another Mexican state, the state of Oaxaca, to follow suit. This was in response to fierce activism to pass the measure, considering that according to government figures, abortion is the third leading cause of death among women in the region.
The path forward
As Klasing suggests, Colombia’s vibrant civil society and nascent, paro-influenced protest culture will likely spark a push-back to the March 2 decision. Argentina is poised for a renewed debate in the coming weeks, with President Fernandez’s new bill. Perhaps continued discourse in one part of the region will stoke the flames of pro-choice activism in others. What remains clear is that as women continue to die in clandestine, unsafe procedures, there’s a clear public health issue that is not being addressed.
Students demonstrate against campus sexual harassment.
Fifteen women protest sexual harassment on university campuses. Photo: Daniel Figueroa
Fifteen women, most of them donning neon pink and green paint in lieu of shirts, stood in a row in the main courtyard of the Externado University on Thursday afternoon to read aloud emotional and graphic testimonies of sexual harassment, rape, domestic violence, stalking and childhood abuse. The students read stories submitted by anonymous female classmates, often choking up while reading and moving some women in the audience to tears.
The demonstration was organised by feminist collective Destapa la Olla as part of an effort to call attention to rape and sexual harassment on campus, and what the members see as the university’s insufficient response to address it.
Paula Valentina Castro, more commonly known by the moniker Val Riot, says that many of the cases of “sexual aggression” are perpetrated by fellow students, professors and administrators.
The existing protocol for sexual harassment and assault, said Castro, doesn’t provide enough support to victims and often retraumatises them in the process. One of the anonymous testimonies read aloud described this experience.
“I’m fed up with having to see my classmates suffer for having to share spaces with a rapist. I’m fed up that they can’t walk calmly through the campus or even just enter a classroom. I’m fed up that they never believe us, that we are the ones who are persecuted while the rapists walk free. I’m tired of my friends blaming themselves for having been raped. I can’t stand knowing that those men that have destroyed lives walk calmly through the university. I’m sick of people that believe them and give them second chances without having to recognise what they did. One day they will fall.”
Members of Destapa la Olla said that the culture of entitlement to women’s bodies often extends to the classroom, where female students receive sexually inappropriate comments from their professors.
“They think they have the right to comment on our bodies, about what we’re wearing, about how we’re dressed,” said Castro. “Obviously the girls report them but nothing ever happens.”
In addition, she said the administration doesn’t follow up on cases, resulting in victims sharing classes with their rapists and perpetrators.
“They continue to teach here, they continue to inhabit the same spaces as their victims,” she said. “So we got tired of staying silent because we feel that silence is permissive and silence is complicit with the aggressors.”
Thursday’s demonstration was a continuation of protests organized by Destapa la Olla and other collectives at various universities. A year ago, the group staged a similar event at the University of the Andes that eventually resulted in a professor stepping down from his position last month after six of the testimonies accused him of sexual assault, intimidation and abuse of power. Last year, National University dismissed a professor accused of sexual assault by three students.
Participants on Thursday said that the culture of silence is what motivated them to take part in the event, in order to make the numerous cases of sexual assault more visible. “I think a lot of girls are left without the power to say anything out of fear or because they don’t feel acompañadas,” said one of those participants, Laura Linarez. “So I decided to be part of this because I feel it’s a voice to tell them ‘Hey, we’re with you if you need anything, we’re going to listen to you and support you in any way that we can.’”
Another demonstrator, Hada Quimbayo, said that she also hopes the event will put pressure on the university to implement a stronger protocol for dealing with cases of sexual violence and harassment. “It’s a way to give a voice to these testimonies and also take away the fear that they won’t be believed,” said Quimbayo. “But I also think it’s very powerful for the institution because it’s like — Hey this is happening, what are you going to do about it? What measures are you taking?”
As for the unusual choice of attire, Castro said the decision was simply a method of drawing onlookers to their cause. “We know that in this country it is not normalized for girls to walk around with their chest exposed so we knew it was a fija strategy to get attention and to make people want to sit here listening to us.”
In keeping with its globe-trotting character, coronavirus has landed in Colombia by plane from Italy, according to Bogotá-based health officials.
The coronavirus has arrived in Colombia, the ministry of health confirmed today. Photo: Pixabay
The news we were all expecting – but hoped would never come – was announced this afternoon after a 19-year-old female patient from Colombia, who recently flew back from Milan was tested positive on the coronavirus by the National Health Institute.
Soon after the announcement recently appointed Health Minister Fernando Ruiz took to the airwaves to call for calm. “There’s no need to panic; we’re prepared,” said Dr Ruiz.
But a tweet from Bogota mayor Claudia López was hardly reassuring: the patient had in fact arrived in the country from Italy some days ago and went to the city’s Hospital Fundación Santa Fe on March two with cough-like symptoms, before the positive test today, and is currently “being isolated at home”.
This fact rather undermines President Duque’s assertion at a press country today of “strict migration control” as an effective tool against cases coming in.
In fact, Colombia may well be wise to worry: the country scored poorly on last year’s Global Health Security Index, set up before the Covid-19 coronavirus was detected, but designed to measure worldwide resilience to flu-like outbreaks.
Colombia comes 65th in the world ranking with a 43% score, putting it behind Costa Rica and Peru, but ahead of Venezuela with a hyper low 23%.
No cases have yet been reported from that neighbouring country.
The Colombia Covid-19 case comes as the world total topped 100,000 this week and claimed close to 3,500 deaths, most in China, but also in Italy where the Bogotá import originated.
Perhaps surprising given its air connections with Europe and the U.S., Colombia has been a latecomer to the viral pandemic which first took off in January and is now occurring in 85 countries including nearby Ecuador, Brazil, Peru and Chile.
A health bulletin emitted by the Health Ministry today stated that the country “had been preparing since eight weeks to confront the arrival of the new coronavirus” and had developed self-help campaigns for citizens based on hand-washing, which is the most effective way to prevent person-to-person spread of the flu-like bug.
The National Health Institute has also been reporting many tests of suspect cases in recent weeks, all negative until now. With a confirmed case the “preparation phase” was now ended, said the Ministry of Health, and is now moving to the “containment phase”, though it has not yet given details of what this entails.
Could’ve, would’ve, should’ve, didn’t. Can you use modal verbs correctly, or might you make a mistake? Follow our guide and you should be perfect.
You mustn’t steal signs telling people what they can’t do! Credit: Pixabay
It’s difficult to know how you should study English nowadays. There are so many options! You could use apps, but perhaps you ought to enrol in a language school to get some extra support. Whatever you choose, you have to study every day: that’s really important.
It’s difficult to know how you shouldstudy English nowadays. There are so many options! You could use apps, but perhaps you ought to enrol in a language school to get some extra support. Whatever you choose, you have to study every day: that’s really important.
In our daily lives, we do a lot of different things. We talk about
the things we’ve learnt to do, and we ask for permission to do those things. We
check what we need to remember when we’re doing them, we make suggestions to
others about the best ways to do them, and even try to predict what will happen
as a consequence.
Fortunately, there’s an easy solution for all these situations: Modal verbs are your flexible friends in the world of English, and essential for many situations. Read on as we talk about some of the different types of modal verbs.
Ability:
Are you a great guitarist? Or do you enjoy riding a bike? We all
enjoy talking about our abilities. When talking about the present, we use can
and can’t to talk about the things that we are and aren’t able to do,
and could and couldn’t to talk about similar ideas from the past:
I will have to take a taxi to get there, because I can’t drive.
She could speak French when she was just ten years old.
Although not a modal verb, it’s important to also understand and
use the phrase be able to. This has a similar meaning to can and could,
but is much more flexible. You just need to know how to conjugate the verb to
be:
I’ve been able to swim since I was a child.
My friend has lots of money. He might be able to lend us some.
Requesting and giving permission:
Do you need a favour? Or do you need someone to let you do
something? Then can and could are also very useful:
Could I leave a little earlier today?
You can use your phone after you finish your work.
This is one area of language where some people say that can
is not a good option, as a phrase like “Can I use your toilet?” might be
talking more about your physical ability to use a toilet, and not the required
permission. These people will say that “May I use your toilet?” is a
much better option, but in practice, can is frequently used in this way.
Advising and suggesting:
We all have problems in life, but fortunately we also have friends
who will suggest possible solutions. To give advice, we can use should
or could:
You should take a painkiller if you have a headache.
You could take a taxi to get there faster.
Another option is to use the semi-modal verb, ought to. This
has a similar meaning to should and could, but is a semi-modal as
it uses to. Notice that this to is an important part of the verb,
so you need to include it, even when ought to is at the end of a
sentence:
You ought to visit your friend if he’s sick.
I know you don’t want to eat vegetables, but you ought to.
To give a lot of emphasis to a suggestion or advice, we use must.
You must visit Longstanton Spice Museum!
If you have a cold, you must stay in bed.
Obligations:
An unfortunate part of life is that there are a lot of rules. Some of these are very important, but we can safely ignore others.
When something is very important and it’s a necessity to follow the rule, we can use must or have to. Some grammar guides say that must is used when a particular obligation is something I’ve decided is important, and have to is for a rule which someone else has decided, but in practice these two forms are very similar:
You must wear a seatbelt when you drive.
She has to take her dog for a walk every evening.
When something is a possibility but not essential, we can use don’t
have to to explain that this is optional:
He doesn’t have to wear a tie if he drives a taxi.
Finally, when something is definitely against the rules, we can use
mustn’t:
You mustn’t drink and drive. You will lose your driving license.
Deduction:
Some things in life are easy to understand. Sometimes though, we
have to guess. To make these deductions about something that is happening now,
we can use must when we’re sure that something is true, might, may
or could when we’re not sure, and can’t when we’re sure that
something is not true:
He’s just finished running a marathon; he must be exhausted!
I’ve seen her around the hospital many times. She might / may / could be a doctor.
They’re only twelve years old! They can’t be university students!
We can also use the same modal verbs to make deductions about the
past. To do this, we just put the verb after the modal verb into present
perfect:
They went straight to bed when they arrived. They must have been very tired.
She has spent a lot of time in Europe. She might / may / could have visited Spain.
The food can’t have been cooked properly, because we all felt bad afterwards.
Seeing double
Be careful: One tricky thing about modal verbs is that the same modal verbs can be used in different situations, with different meanings. For example, the phrase she should be sleeping now could mean a) I’m a critical parent who wants a friend’s daughter to be in bed, or b) I’m a teenager who predicts that my mum is now in bed, so it’s time to sneak out for a party. Everything depends on context, so think about it carefully!
Conjugations
Modal verbs work a little differently from normal verbs. They are not conjugated, so there’s no need to use the “s” for third person. In addition, the verb that comes after the modal verb is used in its base infinitive form, without to. Check the following examples to see some common conjugation mistakes with modal verbs and how to correct them:
Incorrect
He cans work every day.
She
must to wear a uniform.
They
could saw the film.
Correct
He can work every day.
She
must wear a uniform.
They
could see the film.
Originally from Sheffield, England, Phil Stoneman has been living in Bogotá and teaching English since 2004. He teaches at Externado University, where he might have a great semester if his students realise they ought to arrive on time.
Collecting and sharing Venezuelan migrant and refugee testimonies.
Eric Huxley of Samaritans Purse speaks during the discussion panel at L’Aldea, Nicho Cultural. Photo: Henry Ramírez
A pregnant woman is forced to leave her young child behind in order to care for her unborn child. A man with three university degrees arrives in Colombia and cannot use his qualifications to find work. A young woman motivates her son to keep walking from town to town, even when she has little motivation left for herself. These are just details from a few stories, but there are thousands of similar ones – all of Venezuelans making the long, harrowing journey from the Venezuelan border to Bogotá on foot.
Until recently, there was no personal written record of these stories.
That is until Douglas Lyon and Solymet Carrero started collecting them in October of 2018. The pair, who had met in Cali during an acro yoga retreat, found themselves in Pamplona, a Venezuelan town about 70 kilometres southwest of Cúcuta. They were there to coordinate a cultural and technical exchange between Acroyoga Montreal and a group in San Cristóbal, Venezuela. Their purpose quickly became much greater.
“Not completely understanding the scope of the crisis but understanding there was something big going on, we thought to leave a libro de actos (guest book) in one of the refugios in Pamplona. This was to let the refugees themselves write their stories. We came back a week later and it was filled with dozens of stories. Stories about people’s journeys out of Venezuela crossing through the border, the bridges, the trochas... heart-wrenching reads,” said Lyon.
Some shy away from the term refugee because international law affords refugees certain protections – such as the protection from being sent back to their homes. However, the UNHCR (UN Refugee Agency) argues that “the majority of those fleeing the country are in need of international refugee protection.”
It argues, “UNHCR considers that for Venezuelan nationals, or stateless nationals who were habitually resident in Venezuela, the majority are in need of international protection under the criteria contained in the Cartagena Declaration on the basis of threats to their lives, security or freedom resulting from the events that are currently seriously disturbing public order in Venezuela.”
The migrant route continues from Cúcuta and Pamplona, following Colombia’s Eastern Andean range, and ascending to Bucaramanga and Bogotá. The UN estimates that there are 500 to 1,000 Venezuelan refugees on the route every day. In less than a year, Lyon and Carrero collected hundreds of stories from the albergue in Pamplona.
“Migrants need to find ways to parse through their emotions, to reflect and mourn what it means to leave their country,” said Carrero.
“Reading those stories, and the effort and the care that the refugees put into writing them, we felt that we were witnessing not only a moment in history but we had a document in front of us that would be of current and historical importance,” said Lyon.
Carrero continued, “We weren’t thinking about an NGO at that moment. We just wanted people to write. Because writing in itself can serve as a kind of therapy, as a form of introspection.”
As the power and potential of the project began to take shape, Lyon decided to create a nonprofit: Todos Somos. In mid-2019, Lyon and Carrero registered Todos Somos as a nonprofit organization in both Oregon, USA, and Colombia. The group also self-published Que Pasa Venezuela? a curated selection of some of the stories collected in the albergues.
Todos Somos: From the page to the stage
In addition to collecting people’s stories, Lyon and Carrero feel strongly about sharing them through performance.
On Saturday, February 22, Todos Somos hosted its second story reading in Bogotá’s L’Aldea Nicho Cultural. I had the opportunity to participate by reading one of the selected stories. It was an emotional experience, from learning about Todos Somos and the work that has gone into the NGO to the connection I felt in reading migrant’s words through the reading.
Two project participants read story vignettes in Todos Somos performance at L’Aldea Nicho Cultural. Photo: Henry Ramírez
I was forced to really reflect on the difficulties that many Venezuelan refugees experience.
The night’s reading included ten full stories and a collection of bilingual vignettes. A panel discussion followed, contextualizing the personal testimonies within the greater political and humanitarian conversation. Jozef Merkx, UNHCR representative for Colombia, Eric Huxley, Country Director of Samaritan’s Purse, and Roger Fajardo, a Venezuelan-Colombian citizen and story-collector for Todos Somos, made up the panel.
“We hoped to bring to Bogotá and more fortunate people, the first-person stories of Venezuelans fleeing their country. Everyday Colombians often see Venezuelans on the streets […] and they often see them hustling, selling candy, asking for changing or begging, doing anything they can do to survive,” said Lyon.
He continued, “There comes a point where these folks are seen as kind of inconvenient and in time, they become kind of invisible… Our reading was meant to help Colombian society see Venezuelans as real people, people with stories, families, and in the middle of a period of transition and hardship. To see them as people in need of compassion and understanding rather than marginalization and rejection.”
This was the second reading of its kind. The group first hosted a reading of collected testimonies in mid-2019 in Portland, Oregon, where Lyon is based. Todos Somos plans to continue to host story readings as the project grows.
Reducing xenophobia towards Venezuelans
The group aims to help reduce the xenophobia that has developed in Colombia as a result of the crisis by sharing the human stories of everyday Venezuelan refugees. They also hope to publish two to three more books of stories and illustrations per year.
Lyon explained that the group’s overarching goal is to manage more story-collection sites along the migration route, including two in Bogotá, in order to eventually collect at least 5,000 individual testimonies. Carrero added that in order to do so, they also hope to develop story-collecting methods that prompt refugees to be more reflective in their writing.
“I want to highlight the intrinsic value of writing in society and in a community in crisis,” said Carrero.
The plan is to create a digital searchable archive open to researchers, NGO’s, and government institutions like the UN.
“We’d like to be a key reference that international institutions, governments and NGO’s seek out when trying to understand this international crisis and the human cost of it,” said Lyon.
Higher education funding per student has decreased dramatically in the past decade and the deficit won’t be easy to bridge.
Higher education has been hit hard by underfunding and corruption scandals. Photo: Unsplash
The public university system continues to be in crisis. Every year, the government effectively reduces the annual net investment in public education. According to Semana, after inflation is taken into account, the budget for public higher education has only increased by 2 percent in real terms since 2000, while the total student body has quadrupled.
This imbalance means that the government’s funding contribution per student has fallen dramatically, with the government allocating less than half per student today than it did in 1996.
Scandals and underfunding in public higher education
Public university students started protesting long before the national strike, responding to broken promises from the national government the year before to increase the national education budget (this was in response to two months of striking in 2018). In September and October, protests in Bogotá were met with ESMAD (Colombian riot police) force, leading students to then protest for their right to peaceful protest. Many protested general lack of funding and corruption, although protests centred on the Distrital, where a professor was found to have been defrauding the university.
Lasting in some cases for two months, the protests have had a profound effect on the university calendar, with 12 of the country’s 32 public universities having to postpone the conclusion of the semester. The SUE (State University system) called on these students to promptly return to class in January to finish the previous semester before starting the first semester of 2020 in February.
Bogotá’s public universities are protesting specific issues too, chiefly the Distrital’s corruption scandal, in which ex-director of the Instituto de Extension y Desarollo Humano, Wilman Muñoz, used nearly COP$11 billion for personal purchases on a university credit card.
Meanwhile, at Universidad Pedagógica, students have been calling for student representation in university leadership and boards. These calls turned into several days of striking in October and November before the national strike. The situation escalated when, on November 15, 2019, the university held a roundtable forum between university administrators and students to discuss the student demands. During this meeting, university director Leonardo Martínez was threatened and forced out of the meeting by student protesters outside.
Public education teachers and the national teacher’s union
In addition to university students, public school teachers, including those in the national teacher’s union Fecode (Federación Colombiana de Educadores), are also striking. According to Fecode’s website, it is participating in the strike to demand the government’s compliance with the points agreed upon on June 16, 2017. That agreement came after strikes in which they demanded many changes, including the overhaul of what they called “a terrible service and deterioration” of their healthcare system. They also disagree with planned labour and pension reform and are fighting for functional healthcare for all national education workers.
This year, Fecode participated in the January 21 national strike to support greater national issues like the killing of Colombia’s social leaders. They also marched to express their stance against institutional wrong-doing, like the armed conflict’s history of collecting false positives and the state’s illegal actions against journalists and members of the political opposition.
On Thursday and Friday, February 21 and 22, Fecode returned to the streets with an additional 48-hour national strike. The national teacher’s union protested the threats to teachers by armed groups in rural areas. Teachers convened in cities throughout the country, including Medellín, Pereira, Bucaramanga, and Cali. Many may have turned up to demand a thorough investigation of the February 8 attack on former Fecode director, Carlos Rivas, who, fortunately, was not harmed. In Bogotá, groups gathered at el Parque Nacional and marched to the traditional protest spot of la Plaza Bolívar, where they called on President Duque to discuss solutions to the threats rural teachers are facing. Throughout the country, university students joined teachers on the streets in an expression of solidarity.
Where are we now and what changes might we see this year?
The major, consistent source of unrest continues to be the underfunding of public education, as 2018 and 2019’s protests show. Meanwhile, public university leadership is struggling to regain credibility. The student protests that took place within the framework of the national strike were to protest the same issues at stake during the university strikes that preceded November 21, in addition to greater national issues. After the Christmas break, public universities around the country are attempting to keep discontent at bay while picking up the pieces around their shattered semesters. Unrest is bound to continue.
Beyond Metro and TransMilenio, changes in other forms of transport are set to take place in the capital region. With RegioTram, bike lanes, and ride-sharing, residents may have many options for cleaner, more efficient transportation.
The capital’s transit expansion extends past city limits. The RegioTram, officially known as the Train for the Vicinities of Bogotá, will connect the city with municipalities to the west, including Funza, Mosquera, Madrid, and Facatativá. With a length of almost 40 km, the train will make a significant dent in travel times between Bogotá’s city centre and outer regions, home to many commuters.
According to the Bogotá Ministry of Mobility, about 10,000 passengers move between Bogotá and other municipalities per hour on intermunicipal short distance bus routes. The RegioTram, by comparison, expects to transport approximately 130,000 per day. The whole journey, which will run from downtown Bogotá to Facatativá, will last 50 minutes. Depending on the cost of the trip, which has yet to be set, the RegioTram could appeal more to commuters than buses currently do.
The entirely-electric train system is expected to be operational by 2024. The COP$3.43 trillion project is funded by the nation and the Department of Cundinamarca.
Bicycle Paths
In addition to investments in mass transit systems, the city plans to grow its already extensive network of bicycle paths in a promotion of clean mobility. The new TransMilenio and metro lines will be linked to bicycle paths so that cyclists can transfer easily to a mass transit station. The city will construct 19 kilometres of bicycle paths that serve the metro and equip stations with 10,000 bicycle parking spaces. The expansion builds on previous moves to integrate cycling with mass transit. For the past decade, the Urban Development Institute, Insituto de Desarrollo Urbano (IDU), has incorporated bicycle paths into its Plan for Territorial Organization, Plan de Ordenamiento Territorial (POT). The new paths will add to 344 kilometres of bicycle routes already in use in Bogotá.
Ride-sharing apps
Uber, the popular ride-hailing service, returned to Colombia last week. Residents and tourists have several other options as well when it comes to ride-hailing apps. Chinese company DiDi and Greek company Beat are comparable alternatives that offer a similar service to Uber. In addition, riders can use Cabify, which allows them to order a taxi using a phone app.
The controversial TransMilenio on Séptima has failed to gain popular support, while the TransMilenio on Avenida 68 has the green light.
A recent survey found that only 30% of Bogotá residents support a TransMilenio on Séptima. Photo: IDU
Bogotá residents associate Avenida Séptima with many images: constant gridlock, sites of protest, and the historic Parque Nacional. But a TransMilenio? The controversial plan remains in political contention, with local officials wary about public opposition, already-made land purchases, and continuing legal battles.
On the campaign trail, then-candidate Claudia López vowed against constructing a TransMilenio line on the Séptima. She responded to the plan’s vast unpopularity amongst residents, particularly upper-class bogotanos, who live along the historic avenue. But it turns out that residents aren’t the only ones who oppose the route. The majority of the city opposes the project as well. A recent survey by á Como Vamos found that 44% of respondents were against its construction, with only 30% in favour. Part of the hostility towards the plan stems from its intervention in Parque Nacional, a city landmark considered cultural patrimony of the nation.
The new TransMilenio line would run from Calle 32 to Calle 200, roughly Museo Nacional until Portal Calle 200. With 23 stations covering 19.1km, it would seek to alleviate Séptima’s high congestion and prepare for even higher transit demand in the coming decade. In addition, proponents say it would significantly reduce travel times along the corridor, benefitting many commuters who use Séptima to traverse the city every day.
Still, opposition has been fierce. Séptima residents have formed committees to oppose the project, and “No TransMilenio en la Séptima” stickers dot the apartment buildings and shops alongside the avenue. Many have expressed fear that the TransMilenio would threaten the safety of pedestrians and alter an emblematic central avenue of Bogotá. A tranvía alternative to the TransMilenio has circulated on social media, favoured for its aesthetic, reduced noise, and lesser impact on the street. But tranvía trams are significantly more expensive than TransMilenio buses, have a lower capacity, and move at a slower speed. While appealing, a tranvía system would likely fail to reduce Séptima’s intense rush hour traffic.
The project’s unpopularity hasn’t stopped the national government from allocating funding for the construction. During her campaign, López advocated to divert this money and instead use it for the extension of the metro’s first line. In an interview with Semana, she stated, “With the COP$2.6 trillion that Peñalosa wants to waste in the TransMilenio for la Séptima, when I am mayor I will spend COP$2 trillion to complete the first subway line to Suba and Engativá, and COP$600,000 million towards Séptima because it needs intervention.” However, given the start of the bidding process for the project’s construction, the mayor has now acknowledged that she does not have the legal grounds yet to reverse the process.
TransMilenio on Avenida 68
The TransMilenio on 68 would directly link to the Metro and RegioTram. Photo: IDU
“TransMilenio on 68 is a priority,” stated Claudia López in mid-January, responding to the results of a study from the national development financer, la Financiera de Desarrollo Nacional. While the TransMilenio on Séptima remains in question, plans for the system expansion on Avenida 68 are moving along a different trajectory. López essentially ensured the expansion of TransMilenio into the western side of the city, a route with the aim to create more connections between neighborhoods in Bogotá’s larger mobility plan.
The new line will run 17km, from Autopista Sur as far as Séptima with Calle 100. With 21 stations, it will connect Suba, Autopista Norte, Ciudad de Cali, Jimenez, Calle 26, and Calle 80. And crucially, the line will facilitate transfers between these main avenues and the new first line of the metro.
The mayor’s support is partially based on high demand in the corridor that the TransMilenio on 68 would serve, in addition to its compatibility with the metro and RegioTram for western suburbs of Bogotá. But more importantly, the decision to construct a TransMilenio on 68 cannot legally be reversed. Though Claudia López asked that Peñalosa hold the bid at the end of his term, he rejected the request and opened the process. On January 23, the bid was awarded to nine different construction consortiums, with a single constructor, Mario Huertas Cotes, present in four.
The decision to continue with the TransMilenio on 68 has upset many of López’s core supporters, who called her out for contradicting her campaign promise to reject any expansion of TransMilenio during her administration. Members of López’s own party, Alianza Verde, and el Polo, participated in demonstrations to try to convince her to suspend the bid. Manuel Sarmiento, a Polo Democrático Councillor, told Semana, “The fact that we are in the ruling party does not mean we do not have differences in some things. We are not asking her to cancel [the bid], but rather suspend it to make some revisions, and she as the power to do this.”
Are the brakes finally off for the Bogotá metro construction? The constructors say they will break ground in April.
Is the Bogotá metro actually going to happen this time? Photo: Metro de Bogotá
The next decade will bring major changes in the way that Bogotá residents move around the city. We’ll cover what’s planned in a series of articles, from the Metro construction to a TransMilenio expansion, an all-electric suburban tram line, and new bicycle paths. Utilising newer, clean technologies, the city hopes to cut down commute times and improve mobility – as well as providing improved public transport solutions for the population of this ever-growing city.
Metro
After 78 years, it looks like Bogotá might finally get its metro and shake off Medellín’s taunts. City officials say that Bogotá residents will be able to ride the city’s long-planned metro by 2025, revolutionising mobility in the city.
The planning phase for the city’s metro officially began in 1942, when then-mayor Carlos Sanz de Santamaría ordered the first studies for the mass transit system. Now, the city finally seems to be ready to start construction on what will be its largest public transit project since the TransMilenio. Along with the new metro, bogotanos will see a vast array of changes in the city’s public transit system, hopefully improving mobility and quality of life for many residents.
The first planned line of the Bogotá Metro will stretch almost 24 kilometres, from Bosa (Portal de Américas) to Calle 78 with Caracas. The Empresa Metro Bogotá, a Colombian state company tasked with the metro’s planning, construction, operation, and maintenance, plans to integrate this line with several other forms of transit, including bus, train, and bicycle.
Construction is set to begin in April of this year with Patio Taller in Bosa, a facility with the capacity for 60 in-use trains. Ten of the 16 stations on the first line will be connected to TransMilenio, so commuters will be able to transfer easily between the two systems. But there are obvious advantages in speed and comfort of the metro compared to its bus counterpart: Empresa Metro Bogotá claims that the first line will connect the north to the south in just 27 minutes.
According to Empresa Metro studies, the first line will provide direct benefits to the 2.9 million people who live alongside the main route and have walking access to the stations. More than one million passengers a day from 78 barrios across nine localidades are expected to ride. It may not be the strongest claim to fame, but it could become one of the metro systems serving the largest number of people in South America. Former mayor Enrique Peñalosa has also lauded the economic benefits of the line: Its construction will generate 60,000 jobs, and many neighbourhood development plans are linked to the first 16 stations.
Though handing out contracts for the metro was originally a project of the Peñalosa administration, current Mayor Claudia López has confirmed the planned construction will go ahead. Indeed, she’s even proposed to extend the metro as far as Calle 100.
While she supports the overall project, she’s also criticised her predecessor for corruption in the planning process. In January 2020, it was revealed that the Peñalosa administration had duplicated studies already commissioned by the previous Petro administration, prompting a Comptroller’s probe. But López has promised that under her administration, “The metro will move forward with total transparency.”
For years, metro construction was held back by the question of financing. But in 2018, three international banks agreed to finance USD$1.5 billion of the total USD$4.3 billion cost of the metro. The Inter-American Development Bank (KDB) and International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) contributed USD$600 million each, and the European Investment Bank (EIB) offered a USD$480 million loan. The external investment, in combination with national and district public funds that will finance the majority of the project, allowed the metro planning to continue into the bidding phase.
In October 2019, Empresa Metro Bogotá awarded the construction and maintenance contract to Apca Transmimetro Consortium, a Chinese engineering group. After the bidding process, ‘Bienvenido Metro’ messages have rolled through TransMilenio buses, and the 78-year plan seems to finally be becoming a reality. The construction consortium plans to break ground in April 2020; the current timeline expects a fully operational system in five years.
From commentary on the art market to perspectives on the paro, there’s plenty of art to see in the city.
These vast beaches will feature in Andrés Bermúdez’s first solo show at Galería Beta. Photo: Galería Beta.
On the second floor of a brutalist exhibition space in La Candelaría, viewers enter a small art market. Abstract works dot the space: two pipes in the form of a swastika, pieces of clay piled on pedestals, a looped video displaying workers on a mountain. Mercado libre, an intervention in Espacio Odeón, plays with the viewer’s expectations of an art market and the monetary exchanges that take place in the world of high art.
Mercado libre is part of a six-week-long exhibition, Que no cunda el pánico (¿hay otras maneras?) or Don’t spread the panic (are there other ways?), on show until February 29. The show contains works by 23 participating artists, combining temporary installations with daily public programming, shows, laboratories, and actions. It uses Espacio Odeón’s refurbished theatrical building and outdoor garden to showcase its projects. The show centres on collaboration and contribution amongst various groups of artists.
The exhibition presents the conundrum of artistic freedom and reliance on funding. Its overall statement articulates the central issue of cultural venues, commenting, “In general, spaces like Odeón sustain themselves through the intake of public grants and private resources. This means that in one way or another we are obligated to respond to a rhetoric of effectiveness and productivity, one that ultimately generates a competitive and individualistic cultural sector that has to adhere to meritocracy to access state resources or be ‘sellable’ to obtain private support.” With the question of art funding and productivity in mind, each project contemplates the process of art creation and puts experimental works on display.
La Calle No Calla or The Street Does Not Shut Up, a collective photography exhibition, is on view until March 14 at OjoRojo Fábrica Visual in La Macarena. The gallery has compiled photographs, video, and print work from thirty artists, who highlight distinct moments of the paro nacional. The collection contains striking images of events recently experienced by the population of Bogotá, and it combines documentation with emotional scenes of individuals taking to the streets. In several images, photographers showcase violence by ESMAD and police forces against protesters: a screaming individual is held to the ground, surrounded by police, an ESMAD officer grabs a protester by the back of his neck, an ESMAD tank shoots tear gas directly at a single person.
La Calle no Calla: Fabio Cítrica is one of 30 artists whose work relate to the protests. Photo: Fabio Cítrica
Other featured photographers grasp the scale of the protests during various days of the paro. In one image, dozens of women gather at Parkway to perform un violador en tu camino. The viral performance routine, which originated with Chilean feminist group Las Tesis, features blindfolded women chanting and dancing in a denouncement of gender violence. The exhibition’s sole video installation assembles a timeline of the paro, capturing footage from each day’s protests. La Calle No Calla captures the overwhelming multiplicity of the strikes. Bringing together perspectives from different days, neighbourhoods, groups, and actions, the exhibition gives Bogotá residents a chance to reflect on the significance of the paro.
In San Felipe, two galleries will be presenting solo shows by Colombian photographers. On February 13, Galería Beta inaugurates the first solo show of Andrés Bermúdez, a Bogotá-based photographer whose work is inspired by cinematic imagery. Utilising light and landscape, Bermúdez will present several works from sites outside of Colombia. His images of vast beaches, filled with sunlight, tourists, and the contrasting blues of the water and the sky, are at the centre of the exhibit. The inauguration coincides with Noche de San Felipe, in which 19 cultural spaces in Barrio San Felipe will open their doors to the public from 6 to 10 pm.
‘Colombia Hoy’ by Federico Rios Escobar. Photo: Bandy Bandy Galería
Starting February 27, Bandy Bandy Galería will showcase an archive of photography by Federico Rios Escobar. The New York Times-featured photographer has been recognised internationally for his work documenting FARC in rural and coastal Colombia. Los Días Póstumos De Una Guerra Sin Final or The Posthumous Days of An Endless War brings viewers into FARC camps in Chocó during the negotiation of the 2016 Peace Agreement. Rios’ work has allowed international audiences a rare glimpse of the daily routines of FARC combatants. Subjects interact with local rural residents, cook a pig in the jungle, and dance together in the evening. The solo show at Bandy Bandy presents a decade of Rios’ work and will be on until April 9.
Que no cunda el pánico (¿hay otras maneras?) will be on show at Espacio Odeón until February 29 (Carrera 5 #12C-73)
La Calle No Calla will be on show at OjoRojo Fábrica Visual until March 14 (Carrera 5 #26C-62)
Andrés Bermúdez’s first solo show opens at Galería Beta on February 13 (Calle 75A # 20C-52) and is on view until March 12
Los Días Póstumos De Una Guerra Sin Final will show at Bandy Bandy Galería February 27 to April 9 (Carrera 22 #75A-06)
Although Chilean and Colombian unrests have things in common, a comparison of both country’s protest movements is completely unfounded.
The Latin American Spring doesn’t exist, Chile’s are very different from the ones in Colombia. Photo: John Englart
This story of wrong conclusions, misleading narratives and culturally specific demonstrations started when Colombia joined a wide range of Latin American countries, including Chile, Ecuador and Bolivia, in protesting against the status quo at the end of last year. It wasn’t long before it was labelled as part of a ‘Latin Spring’.
And even though the unrest throughout the continent has similar roots, lumping a dozen countries – all in different situations – together under the same umbrella is simply disingenuous.
Latin American Spring
“I wouldn’t accept the term ‘Latin American Spring’,” German Rio de Janeiro-based correspondent Christoph Roeckerath told The Bogotá Post. According to the ZDF journalist, while there were some elements that connected them, as each country faced similar problems, this continent is too complex to be described with a single narrative.
Anyone who regards Latin America as one homogenous space will indeed have difficulties understanding what is behind the unrest. Just because all the countries suffer from similar broad-brush problems – such as inequality or corruption – it doesn’t mean that, for instance, Haitian and Venezuelan people have the same motivations for taking to the streets.
Chile vs Colombia
Let’s take two other countries that have recently been mentioned in the same breath: Colombia and Chile. In Santiago, a 30-peso hike (COP$130) in metro fares saw an eruption of unrest which started on October 18 and still continues. What started as a small protest of students jumping subway turnstiles quickly became a massive social movement which has already forced the government into a re-writing of the controversial Pinochet-era constitution.
“It’s not about 30 pesos, it’s about 30 years,” protesters have been chanting in the streets of Santiago for almost four months now. They’re venting their anger over structural problems in the health, education and pension systems. Social inequality is the biggest issue, in a country which has been labelled “one of the fastest-growing economies in Latin America,” according to the World Bank. The challenge is that the cost of living in Santiago is similar to cities like Brussels or Frankfurt, while the minimum wage is considerably lower.
Inequality goes hand in hand with the country’s constitution, which dates back to the 17-year military dictatorship of General Pinochet in the 80s and strongly prioritises a market-driven economy. “This constitution supports the power of the elite and forces inequality,” Silvia Otero, professor for political science and international relations at Rosario University in Bogotá, told us.
Though in both Colombia and Chile many people took to the streets, the Latin Spring doesn’t exist. Photo: Michael Marangos.
Obviously, there have been reforms since the 80s, but Chile falls behind other countries in terms of citizen participation. Not least because its current constitution still gives full power to the president. At the moment, this is Sebastián Piñera, who is among the five richest people in the country.
It’s difficult to put 50 years of increasing social and economic inequality in Chile into the same box as 50 years of armed conflict in Colombia.
But still, the similarities are clear enough. Both countries have well-performing economies with stable growth and GDPs which rank highly within Latin America. Both have right-wing, neoliberalist presidents and leading parties. Both have privatised large parts of the public sector.
And both suffer from chronic inequality. Numbers from the 2018 World Inequality report suggest that extreme inequality has slightly decreased over the past decade in Colombia, but continues to be “stubbornly high”. On top of that, in 2017 its top 10% of earners received 39% of the entire country’s income that year, according to the World Bank.
Furthermore, at just under .50, Colombia’s Gini coefficient – a common measure of inequality – remains significantly worse than the Latin American average, although it has fallen in recent years. Otero says that the narrative about inequality hasn’t taken on the same weight in Colombia. “For decades, it was all about peace and war here,” she said.
“And war is still the cleavage of Colombian politics. Inequality, therefore, has not been on the political agenda for a long time, although people know it exists,” Otero continued. According to her, it started to become a more recognised issue after the peace treaty was signed and it was certainly one of the reasons behind the protests.
But in comparison to Chile, the demands of the Colombian protests were much more diverse. People, for instance, protested for pension reform, they protested against corruption and privatisation and demanded affordable education, but these stood among many other issues. All those things were getting buried in the mass of demands, Otero said. “This makes it much harder to articulate a solution and to move forward.”
In Chile though, it was a different story: “Chilean protests have that umbrella narrative of inequality,” the 34-year old professor told me. She said that this was an important unifying element among the protesters: “It became a great way to make sense of all things that were happening. The people in the streets also started to pull their claims around the topic of inequality.”
To satisfy the people on the streets and their demands, in Otero’s eyes, a new constitution was the only solution. This was also different in Colombia. “The constitution isn’t the problem here. In Colombia, the idea is to incorporate people in the political process and make institutions more accountable to the people,” Otero claimed and continued: “There is no disappointment about the constitution in Colombia.”
And it’s not only the protesters’ demands that differ between the two countries. It’s also the culture of protest. After being repressed during the time of Pinochet, the political opposition has recovered and nowadays it plays an important role in the young democracy.
Regular mass protests, like the student movement in 2011/2012, did their bit to make this type of unrest a much more acceptable way to express dissatisfaction. “While Chileans are very used to it, people in Colombia are more resistant to protests because the armed conflict of the past 50 years has created a mentality of staying out of trouble,” the Rosario professor explains.
In contrast, as Otero points out, the leftist opposition in Colombia faced criminalisation and stigmatisation during the conflict. But now, we are seeing major shifts in the country’s politics as centre-left parties like the Alianza Verde become more popular. And the protests are a sign that not only are people more willing to protest, it may be the start of a new tradition.
“Colombian protests could lead to a stronger left opposition. The paro in Colombia shows that there are changes in society. Just the fact that those masses of people are protesting for such a long period of time is new. The past years have created an environment in which people are more active and more willing to participate,” she said.
It’s clear that each protest has made its mark on each country. And while, as Otero tells me, the Chilean protests almost certainly influenced and inspired the Colombian protest, it certainly doesn’t make Colombia a second Chile.
Colombia is the only country so far to have banned the service, in spite of legal challenges in many other countries. However, after 20 days of inactivity, Uber is back with a new solution. It has essentially turned itself into a car rental service, and its app allows you to rent both car and driver for your trip.
Each time you use the app, you will be signing a rental agreement for that journey which is then terminated when you arrive. If the car is in an accident, it is insured through that car rental agreement.
The surprise move was announced early this morning and Uber’s network of 88,000 drivers are already transporting customers.
The Superintendence of Industry and Commerce (SIC), which banned Uber for reasons of unfair competition last year has not yet responded — and the Ministry of Transport say they are evaluating the announcement.
To sweeten its return, Uber is offering customers a 40% discount on their first ride.
The documentary La Sinfónica de los Andes focuses on the suffering a small indigenous community has endured as a result of Colombia’s conflict.
La Sinfónica de los Andes is a direct and sometimes shocking film that tackles the horrors of war. Photo: Marta Rodríguez
In La Sinfónica de los Andes, legendary anthropologist and filmmaker Marta Rodríguez goes into northern Cauca to examine the disastrous consequences of war on a small Nasa community grieving the loss of numerous children who have fallen victim of the conflict. They never quite understood it but, tragically, were nonetheless part of it from birth.
There is no grandiloquence in this film, it doesn’t pretend to be something bigger than it is. That’s a recognizable feature of Rodríguez’ filmography which goes way back to the 60s when she and her partner Jorge Silva started to pave the way for documentary filmmaking in Colombia with their debut film Chircales.
For over forty years she has managed to give a voice to hopeless and marginalised communities. She strives to give them the recognition they deserve but can’t find anywhere else.
The film is direct and doesn’t wander around. The crudeness that comes with the images the film presents and the chronicles of its characters are proof of it; shocking imagery that some viewers might find disturbing or heartbreaking, interviews about the passing of children that only confirms the horrors of war.
This documentary relies strongly on the spoken word, members of the Nasa community telling their heartbreaking stories about how, unexpectedly, little children and young members of their community were killed by the instruments of war that would constantly wake them up in the middle of the night, or take them off-guard while going to school.
The titular music orchestra works both as an artifice that serves as the documentary’s soundtrack, but it also works a tool for healing, to honor these children and their families. With the help of the orchestra, these families hope to overcome what’s happened to them, all while waiting for proper reparations and a long overdue apology from the government and the armed groups for causing them so much pain.
The film intertwines these touching testimonies with archival footage of many important moments in the history of the Colombian conflict, such as the demobilisation of the M19 guerrilla group or the 2016 peace agreement with FARC. But the most striking footage are some intimate clips depicting the M19 members training, discussing their demobilisation and showing them in the middle of a combat with the Colombian army.
As many films about the conflict, La Sinfónica de los Andes is an invitation to never forget and to remember all those lives that have been lost. The film emphasises the deep and long lasting effects violence has had on this particular indigenous community.
It’s quite admirable how Marta Rodríguez allows these people to be heard, to express their opinions and grief. Especially at a time when the official institutions that should be doing that aren’t.
3.5/5 stars
La sinfónica de los Andes opens in Colombian theatres today.
Voted one of the most versatile ingredients, los huevos are a basic ingredient in many meals, breakfast the most notorious among them. Eggs bind other ingredients, they are the main component of incredible desserts, they add texture to dishes and fill us up at a reasonable price. It is easy to simply order huevos y chocolate o jugo de naranja for breakfast, but if you want to be more specific in Spanish, it is understandable that you may be at a loss for words sometimes. Fret no more; we have prepared a quick and easy guide on ordering huevos.
¿Cómo quiere los huevos?
Boiled
Cocidos, no tan duros: boiled Bien cocidos/bien duros: hard-boiled Tibios: soft-boiled (white is cooked, yolk is smooth)
Fried
Huevos fritos con la yema líquida / bien blandita: sunny side up Frito por ambos lados, pero con la yema blanda: over easy Frito por ambos lados, pero con la yema bien cocida: over hard If you are aiming at fancy, huevos escalfados, pochados or poché: poached
Scrambled
Revueltos / batidos Pericos: the Colombian recipe par excellence (eggs, chopped onions and tomatoes) Revueltos con (add your ingredient of choice – maizitos, jamón, tocineta, champiñones): scrambled with corn, ham, bacon, mushrooms. Also, if you visit Antioquia, expect to be asked whether you want your eggs with aliños; that means revueltos with extra ingredients or chopped onions and tomatoes.
Omelette
En tortilla
Dirty talk
There are plenty of expressions using the word huevo, or a transformation thereof. I am sure you’ve heard them a number of times on the street or from your Colombian friends; other Spanish speaking countries use them too. When researching this article I found that expressions such as ‘manda huevo’ – which people say when they are really outraged by someone’s attitude/behaviour – actually have nothing to do with our versatile gastronomic pal. The word uebos is an archaism meaning ‘necessity’ or ‘necessary thing’. It was used in expressions such as ser uebos (be necessary) – no longer in use of course.
There is, however, a widespread use of huevo, and its derivatives, in relation to male genitalia, which, by the way, has given me a good translation for the rude use of the word ‘nuts’: huevos or huevas. Our column does not want to encourage the use of foul language, but it is out there, and it never hurts to know a thing or two about other uses, so find below a list of common phrases with our article’s main character, and their translation into English:
Remember, these are very colloquial expressions. #Nottobeused at your parents in law’s or in a meeting with your boss.
¡Me vale huevo! = I don’t care! ¡Es una hueva! = He/she is a pushover! ¡Vale un huevonal de plata! = It costs a lot! ¡No tiene los huevos! = He/she has no courage / doesn’t have the guts/balls. ¡Huevón! = ¡Douchebag! Interestingly enough, it is also used among male friends to address each other: ¿Qué más, huevón? (What’s up, pal? How’s it going, pal?) ¡Tiene (manda) huevo! = Said when you’re outraged by someone else’s behaviour/attitude. Also, if something or someone really takes the biscuit, people in the Caribbean coast of Colombia use ¡manda cáscara (eggshell) [¿de huevo?]!
Going local goes further afield with a trip to Venezuela where petrol is free and the shops are full but there’s no money to spend.
Chávez supporters still rule poor barrios, though often through the force of armed gangs. Photos: Gerald Barr
Having flown from Bogotá to Caracas, then travelled 13 hours by car to a dusty shanty on the edge of an inland city, I’m surprised to find myself chatting with former Colombian FARC guerrillas. A decade back, they fled persecution, crossing into Venezuela and taking shelter in Chávez’s socialist paradise. So how did that work out?
“We still support the Maduro government. But, yeah, we need help”.
Even as we’re talking, a gas-guzzling 1970s V8 rumbles over the broken tarmac nearby. The old car is the suburb’s last form of transport since the servicio municipal went bust, literally, judging by the skeletal remains of Chinese buses littering the barrio.
Then suddenly there’s the sound of steel scraping on stones as the car’s front right axle collapses. People get out and start walking.
“The wheel came off,” comments one chavista, though it’s not clear if he means the car stuck in the road, the transport system, or the whole country in general. Maybe it’s all three.
Keeping the wheels on: Mechanics work on a 1970s gas guzzler in Caracas.
It’s towns like this – far from Caracas – where the economic meltdown of this formerly wealthy country is most visible. Electricity is intermittent. Water comes once a month. A month’s pay buys food for two days. If you suck up sufficiently to the ‘Jefe de la Calle,’ a political street boss, you might get the monthly CLAP, a state food box with pasta and rice and a tin of sardines.
But if you live in Maracaibo, the sky-scrapered city perched on the western shore of the oil-rich sea lagoon of the same name, you’ll get the food box once a year. Or never. The ‘opposition’ city – once the petro-industrial hub of the oil boom – has been worst hit by this man-made crisis.
In a fishing village along the Maracaibo lagoon shore, kids come to a volunteer’s house to collect an arepa with egg for lunch. Except it’s also their breakfast. And for some, their dinner too. A few kids have sunken eyes and yellow hair, meaning diet deficiencies and chronic food shortage.
Having said that, there is food around. In Caracas, the shops are full. It’s just that most people don’t have any money to shop with. Hyperinflation sent the local bolivar spiralling into nothing while a dollarised economy and perverse fiscal rules punish the impoverished majority who scrape by on worthless currency and government hand-outs.
“If we don’t get foreign currency, we’re screwed,” explains my driver. He earns some greenbacks, so he can keep the wolf from the door.
Most Venezuelans get some foreign currency that dribbles in from overseas. But it’s not much. Sometimes a few soles from Peru, or pesos from Colombia – from those scrawny guys washing windscreens at the traffic lights in Bogotá. Not only are they barely surviving in Colombia’s capital, they’re also sending every spare peso home to keep their kids, parents, aunts and uncles alive. Think of that next time you shoo them away.
Not only are those window washers barely surviving in Colombia’s capital, but they’re also sending every spare peso home to keep their kids, parents, aunts and uncles alive. Think of that next time you shoo them away.
Strangely though, if you have a car in Venezuela, fuel is free. The only cost is the time spent queuing to fill up and maybe a pack of biscuits for the petrol pump attendant. In fact, along with state-subsidised water, electricity, and gas, petrol has always been ridiculously cheap here – Venezuela is one of the world’s most prominent producers.
Cold comfort
In Caracas, the capital, there seems to be electricity in excess. In fact, during my stay, the overactive air-conditioning turned out to be an unexpected problem. My hotel, perhaps expecting a delegation of polar bears, set the aircon to 2 degrees. And not just in the hotel room, but the whole building.
I shiver my way through reception to the chilled lift, enter my frigid room to search for the switch to turn the aircon off. Even then it hisses like some thermo-Terminator and keeps seeping frozen air. So while half the country has power cuts, Caracas, which is Maduro’s Potemkin village, wastes megawatts on catching colds. Greta Thunberg would have a cow.
My hotel, perhaps expecting a delegation of polar bears, set the aircon to 2 degrees. And not just in the hotel room, but the whole building.
I do find some tropical heat at a coastal resort in Anzoátegui, a six hour’s drive east of the capital. Dotted around a luxury marina are luxury flats, luxury hotels, and luxury restaurants. In the blue water float luxury yachts. Behind them sway luxuriant palm trees. The only thing missing is Don Johnson with a snub-nosed pistol shoved in his shorts.
The next morning, at the buffet breakfast, there are plenty of handguns amid an arsenal sported by 20 tough-looking military types. They obviously didn’t notice the large ‘No Weapons Allowed’ sign on the restaurant door. I nervously queue for my scrambled egg and a slice of watermelon.
“They’re protecting an enchufada, he’s staying here with his family,” says the local driver I’ve hired. Enchufada means ‘plugged in to power,’ as in the electric outlet. But in Venezuela, it refers to a corrupt government crony who drains the country’s wealth. Many have sunk their cash into flats and yachts in Anzoátegui. The bigger fish have houses in Monaco, according to local lore.
The wealthy yacht harbours of Anzoátegui are also a haven for stolen wealth.
Still, an army of twenty bodyguards seems a little excessive for just one politician. He can’t be too popular.
Neither is his boss. Apart from the confused Colombian ex-guerrillas, no one I talk to has a kind word for Maduro. Even the cult-like love of Chávez is a half-remembered dream. Did he really hand out houses, free services, health, and cash windfalls?
Maduro now pops up on evening TV promising an inflow of medicines to empty hospitals. Some health workers have been stealing supplies, he explains, so he’s tasking the National Guard – “people I can trust” – to take care of distribution so everyone can get “the free health they deserve.”
My lunch companion splutters over her coffee. “Some Guardia Nacional chief just opened a shop in my barrio selling the stolen medicines.”
Nationalised crime
Unfortunately, Venezuela’s gone beyond the petty pocket-lining common to many countries on this continent and graduated to criminal state status. The government isn’t infiltrated by criminal gangs, it is the criminal gang, with dozens of underling gangsters to do its dirty work.
These have fun names like Tren de Aragua (The Araguan Train),Pranes – which stands for Preso (Imprisoned) Rematado (Auctioned) Asesino (Killer) Nato (by birth), and Cartel de Los Soles (Cartel of the Sun). But subjugating a hungry nation requires extra muscle, so Venezuela is fair game for Colombia’s ex FARC, ELN, EPL, Rastrojos, Urabeños and, popping over from the Middle East, Hezbollah and Hamas.
It is through countries like Iran that the Venezuelan politicians are enriching themselves by fencing 100 tonnes of gold a year, mined by criminal gangs in the Amazon region. Meanwhile the state oil company PDVSA – the one handing out free fuel – has faked million-dollar oil deals and even ‘builds’ fake refineries to launder USD$40 billion proceeds from organised crime in central and south America.
This explains why there is no ‘Evo’ moment in Caracas. In Bolivia, a population was faced off against a real government, so protesters had leverage. And in Bogotá, maybe too. But Venezuelans are battling a nationalised criminal enterprise. Complain too much and you’ll be silenced with extreme prejudice. Last year, 7,000 people were shot dead ‘resisting the police,’ often following opposition rallies.
Meanwhile, Maduro’s back on TV with some Khrushchev-style fist-pumping. The camera pans to a table full of apparatchiks chanting “Leales siempre, traidores nunca”. Always loyal, never traitors.
Maduro’s image dominates Venezuela, though many countries no longer recognise him as a legitimate leader.
But the Big Banana looks tired, like he wants to chuck it in and sail off in his superyacht to Monaco. But he can’t, explains a friend, since he’s a “puppet for the military chiefs.”
“He couldn’t resign if he wanted to.”
Meanwhile blaming foreigners is the favoured tactic for a cornered caudillo. Billboards all over Caracas say: “No Más Trump.” True, the US has spearheaded international sanctions and the freezing of millions of overseas assets. Then there was the oil price crisis, probably another gringo trick to drive down difficult nations.
It’s that same oil that funded those boom years and fantastical public spending that set Venezuela apart from its neighbours. People really did have it good. But Chavism’s drive to bridge the inequality gap has backfired in a major way. The country is now a filthy rich political class, a missing middle class (most fled), and the poor, very poor and extremely poor.
I struggle to make sense of it all. But my driver nails it as we queue for the giveaway fuel.
“Anyone could see their plan was never sustainable. You can’t go on forever just giving stuff for free,” he says.
EF cycling finished in a 1-2 on the last day to confirm the victory for Sergio Higuita in the six-day race
The peloton with Team Ineos up front racing through Parque Nacional in Bogotá, it wasn’t enough to shake off Higuita. Photo: Oli Pritchard.
In a thrilling finish to the Tour Colombia UCI 2.1, Sergio Higuita was pipped to the post by teammate Daniel Martínez. Martínez might have taken the glory on the race’s queen stage, but Higuita won the General Classification and will have an orange jersey to hang up in his spare room. Their positions there were exactly reversed, as Martínez finished second in the GC. Jonathan Caicedo took the final podium position as EF controlled the six-day race from start to finish.
Best of the rest was reigning Tour de France yellow jersey Egan Bernal, finishing third on the day and fourth overall. Good placing from the tyro that lit up last year’s Tour Colombia, but he’ll likely be disappointed not to have tasted glory on home roads. Esteban Chaves placed seventh in the overall rankings as the top ten was dominated by Colombians. Torstein Traeen was the highest placed non-Andean at 9th, 3’19” off Higuita’s pace.
On the stage itself, half the top ten were from local teams, with Medellín’s Robinson Chalapud finishing within a minute of the leaders. Impressive riding from the second-division pro. By the time the riders started the final ascent, the field had fractured violently, with no peloton to speak of and a rag-tag collection of groups making their own way through the course. The damage was done at spots well-known to local cycling aficionados such as the Alto de Arepas, the Alto de Cable and of course Los Patios.
While the race has been fairly disappointing this year, with a few tedious turns up and down the autopista, today’s stage surely counts as a huge success. The field was tested by some serious climbs and the turnout of fans was immense. Séptima was crowded and the road was lined with spectators all the way to the start of the páramo at Verjón’s finish. Let’s hope for more of the same, and let’s see how many people lost their Strava records on local climbs today!
Colombia has turned into a cradle of new sprinters. Molano takes his second victory.
Molano takes his second sprint victory. Photo: Cyclingtips
The aggressive third stage of Tour Colombia UCI 2.1 witnessed a second victory in a row for Colombian sprinter Sebastián Molano (EUA). At the finish line Molano beat his rivals Edwin Ávila (Israel Start Up Nation) who was second and Álvaro Hodeg (Deceuninck – Quick Step) who crossed third. Some years ago, locals wouldn’t have expected such a final sprint between national riders.
However, Ecuadorian riders have also been stars of the competition as Jonathan Caicedo (EF) remains leader in the general classification and Richard Carapaz (INEOS) surprised everyone trying his luck in the sprint of today’s stage.
At the beginning of the day, Egan Bernal (Ineos), Camilo Castiblanco (Illuminate), Oscar Sevilla (Team Medellín), Diego Camargo (Col Tierra de Atletas) and Diego Ochoa (EPM Scott) moved into the first breakaway that was caught almost immediately.
Then, after 70 kilometres of racing, Sebastián Henao (INEOS), Simón Pellaud (Androni Giocatto), Félix Barón (Team Illuminate) and Óscar Sevilla (Team Medellin) separated from the main bunch and struggled in a lasting breakaway that was annihilated close to the finish. Sebastián Henao was awarded with the combativity prize. INEOS finished the stage without Italian rider Leonardo Basso who had arrived only 48 hours prior to the Tour.
The upcoming fourth stage is a tricky one with a short climb at the end that could give a chance of victory to more explosive cyclists like Sergio Higuita (EF), Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck – Quickstep) or Molano’s teammate Fabio Aru .
Workers’ rights and salaries are divisive topics in 2020. We look at labour reforms likely to upset regular workers.
The expected reforms will mostly hit the people doing the hard labour. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
“Long hours, low pay” sums up work in Colombia. The country languishes at the bottom of the OECD work-life balance scale in the Better Life Index, and is second only to Haiti in terms of inequality in Latin America, with a GINI score estimated at just under .50 by the World Bank. For reference, the GINI ratio is a measure of income inequality where 0 is perfect equality and 1 is perfect inequality. By OECD measures, Colombia ranks near the bottom.
Despite Colombia having a regionally high minimum wage, in many cities even the average salary is too low to live well, as our own analysis showed in 2017. No wonder people want better.
But the bigger problem is that many working people toil in the ‘informal’ sector, cutting them off from a higher range of salary-linked benefits such as pensions, insurance and proper health plans. The National Administrative Statistical Department (DANE) puts the percentage of people in major metropolitan areas to whom this applies at around 46%, although a figure as high as 85% for rural areas is estimated by the Labour Ministry. This creates two extremes in Colombia: families tied to a salaried worker, and the masses living cash-in-hand such as your run-of-the-mill street vendor. Self-employed tradespersons can opt in to the social security system, partly to avoid tax, but also because of the dense paperwork involved.
Historically, workers’ struggles have been central to Colombian life. The 1928 bananeros massacre was a pivot for one of the world’s greatest works of fiction, 100 years of Solitude, and in 2002 some 184 trade unionists were murdered, more than in the rest of the world combined that year. Labour rights have been hard-won. They won’t be given up without a fight.
Now reform is in the air. This year the government is bent on streamlining labour law to make it easier for companies to hire – and fire – employees and pull more workers into the public-private social security network. That means reducing the bureaucracy that companies struggle with to get a worker legally on the books.
HR departments currently have to wrestle with health plans, work insurance, pensions, obligatory apprenticeships, bonus schemes, redundancy schemes, transport allowances, and clothing donations. Added to that is multi-unionism: some employers deal with as many as 80 different worker groups.
Then there’s the annual minimum salary rise, which this year at 6% outstrips inflation and, according to business analysts, is a key factor driving down job slots and driving up the current 10,5% unemployment rate.
One barrier for employers is a bureaucratic straightjacket. They can only pay ‘non-wage benefits’ on a full monthly basis, making it impossible to formally hire staff for one-off activities – seasonal or surge tasks – forcing them into illegal short-term hires even if they want to play fair.
And since there’s little effort by authorities to police the workplace, hardly any employer gets caught. That’s why so little of the workforce is in a proper job with many of the rest struggling in part-time or menial roles. That means Colombia’s vaunted ‘minimum wage’ is a facade.
“Somewhere there’s a compromise, but it will take a lot of tear gas to get there.”
Given this situation, ideally, both bosses and workers would back reforms that bring more people into proper employment. But so far there is little common ground. CUT, a workers’ union, called the 2020 6% pay rise “miserable”, whereas ANIF, a business group, called the hike unsustainable for employers.
In fact, ANIF blames the 2020 award for rising youth unemployment, currently at 17%. According to ANIF, companies are reluctant to open positions for young workers given this “high cost.”
This, then, is the elephant in the room: a large chunk of Colombia’s young population not being able to get a foot on the work ladder. That makes for social problems downstream.
The government’s response is to moot reforms such as zero-hour contracts–which they say can benefit digital-age workers such as Rappi riders–variable minimum wages (for example in different cities), a 75% minimum wage for young people, and uncluttering non-wage payments. The goal is to put “flexibility” into the employment market, the labour minister told media late last year, while also meeting the needs of a “changing world and orange economy” and opening doors to first-time job seekers.
Reform is being backed by business guilds, the OECD and the IMF, and being sold as a growth package to “stimulate the economy” and create more jobs. Meanwhile, labour union CUT has declared the plan as something beneficial to big business by “ending worker rights,” something worth protesting.
How will it end? Hopefully with better conditions for more workers. But it won’t be easy. One headache for President Duque’s is the ghostly presence of past president Álvaro Uribe, an avowed right-winger who came to power in 2002 – the same year all those unionists were killed. With Uribe in the background, the debate will get personal and protracted. Somewhere there’s a compromise, but it will take a lot of tear gas to get there.
Sebastián Molano claimed the first individual stage of Tour Colombia 2.1 in Duitama.
Local boy Sebastián Molano wins Tour Colombia 2.1 stage two. Photo: Tour Colombia 2.1
UAE Team Emirates continued their very successful opening of the season as Sebastián Molano crossed the line first at the final of the second stage of Tour Colombia 2.1. The flat stage of 152 Kms took off in Paipa (where Molano was born in 1994) and ended under plenty of sun in Duitama, a small town that hosted the Road Cycling World Championship in 1995.
After the start of the race, a bunch of ten riders from several pro continental teams and national teams participated in a long breakaway that was eventually caught in the final five kilometres. Just before they were hunted down, the pursuing group got stuck after a crash that involved many cyclists. Luckily, nobody was hurt.
A bunch sprint final allowed the sprinters to show their potential. Team Ineos was the first team that took the initiative but in a blink of an eye Deceuninck Quickstep, UAE Team Emirates and Israel Start – Up Nation went for the victory. Álvaro Hodeg had been the favourite to win the stage but the finish line it was Molano who beat his compatriot to take the glory. The orange jersey is still in the hands of Ecuadorian rider Jonathan Caicedo from Education First.
Upcoming stage of 178 kilometres promises a very interesting battle between cyclists as the hilly ground could allow attacks from specialists and those freshmen that are in need of fame. However, it could be another day for the sprinters as the last 30 kilometres are flat.
Strong showing from Education First on the first day of the Tour Colombia
Education First won the opening stage, a Team Time Trial in the Tour Colombia 2.1. Photo Tour Colombia 2.1
Thethird version of Tour Colombia UCI had a sensational opening after the victory of Education First that stopped the clock at 18’01”. As a result, its Ecuadorian rider, Jonathan Caicedo, became the first leader of the overall classification above Egan Bernal, Julian Alaphilippe and Fabio Aru to mention just some of the favourites.
The first stage was a Team Time Trial that took place in the capital city of Boyacá, Tunja, where riders rolled along 16.7 kilometres. Some cyclists like Rigoberto Urán and Jhonatan Narvaez seemed to be out of shape during the hilly part of the road, losing contact with their teams.
As projected, world tour teams jumped into the first positions. The second place was for Deceuninck – Quick Step, 45 seconds behind EF as Ineos took third place with a strong Egan Bernal giving away 46”.
Wednesday’s stage sees the riders race from cheese town Paipa toward Sogomoso and ending up in Duitama. It’s flatter than a Dutch pancake, so it’ll be one for the sprinters – perhaps the likes of Álvaro Hodeg might cross the line first. Keep an eye out for Sergio Higuita as well, as he’s full of confidence in all types of terrain. They will roll off at 10:30AM.
Teams top ten:
1. EF EDUCATION FIRST 18’01” 2. DECEUNINCK QUICKSTEP +45” 3. TEAM INEOS +46” 4. RALLY CYCLING +59” 5. UEA TEAM EMIRATES 1’00” 6. EPM – SCOTT ST 7. MOVISTAR TEAM 1’02” 8. ISRAEL START – UP NATION 1’21” 9. TEAM MEDELLIN 1’22″ 10. UNO-X NORWEGIAN DEVELOPMENT TEAM 1’32”
Individual General Classification:
1. Jonathan Caicedo (ECU) EF1 18’01” 2. Sergio Higuita (COL) EF1 ST 3. Daniel Martínez (COL) EF1 ST 4. Tejay Van Garderen (USA) EF1 ST 5. Lawson Craddock (USA) EF1 +9” 6. Julian Alaphilippe (FRA) DQT +45” 7. Bob Jungels (LUX) DQT ST 8. Jannik Steimle (GER) DQT ST 9. Bert Peter Van Lerberghe (BEL) DQT ST 10. Egan Bernal (COL) INS +46”
Get your heart racing with our rundown of some hot spots to visit for Valentine’s Day dates
Valentine’s day is widely celebrated in Colombia. Photo: Tim Bash, Unsplash
It’s just under a week before Valentine’s Day and love is in the air, although it might be somewhat hard to sense through the Bogotá smog.
Perhaps you’re hopelessly in love, maybe you’re planning a big date night in order to romance that special someone or possibly just desperate to escape the clutches of singledom (don’t worry, we’ve all been there). Whatever the situation, there are a few happenings around town that’ll be sure to make you feel like you’ve been hit by Cupid’s arrow. But first of all you have to ask yourself what type of night you’re looking for.
Fancy a traditional and romantic candlelit dinner? Well then head on over to the aptly-named Storia D’Amore, the Italian eatery chain where, with a bottle of wine or jar of sangria, you’ll get your own love-heart padlock to truly transform the date into something special. Italian not your thing? Never fear, Pop House Sushi is also holding a sushi festival that same night, complete with live music and karaoke.
If you’re not into the pomp and circumstance of wining and dining fear not, there are plenty of parties happening all around town. For starters, you could head over to Gringo Fridays, put together by the team behind Gringo Tuesdays. They’ve no doubt provided the spark for many a blossoming romance. You’ll have a chance to flirt in all sorts of different languages before heading out in a party bus- just be sure to wear red. If you’re in the mood for swinging your hips, you can head to the Salsa Fiesta Colombiana, where you’ll be dancing salsa with a mashed-up modern tone against Revellion’s distinctive steampunk setting.
But if you’re in the mood for something a bit more pulsating to end the night with, then head on over to the Fusion Wild bar, where the band Fonocroma will be covering funky French hit-makers Daft Punk until early in the morning.
Maybe you’re one of those couples that opts for a quiet night of Netflix and chill rather than the palava of a big night out. In which case, why not surprise your partner with a cooking class so that you can ensure your downtime is as sumptuous as possible?
Last, but by no means least, don’t feel left out if you’re some poor single soul who’d rather spend a quiet night in. There’s no obligation to head out on the town, out of some misguided fear of missing out. Good things come to those who wait.
Our regular roundup of Colombian news that went global.
Popular in China: Shark fins from Colombia. Photo: Unsplash.
With amigos like these?
A trend by Trump to bad-mouth Colombia drives Washington’s Latin American ally closer to China, warns Bloomberg. Bogotá is recalibrating its economic ties to the U.S. after recent outbursts from the White House and threats to “decertify” Colombia in the war on drugs. Meanwhile, Chinese consortiums are winning billion-dollar transport contracts planned for the capital. Last year, Trump said Colombia’s President Duque had “done nothing” for the U.S., throwing a decades-long interdependency under the (probably Chinese-built) bus.
Tram to beat the jam
Beside the Regiotram, the Bogotá Metro is another big transport project, Chinese companies got involved. Photo: Bogota Metro
Indeed, electric buses from China are busy in Medellín and in Cali. On this side of the mountains, Beijing-based engineering companies have been signed up to build the capital’s long-awaited elevated Metro, as well as the Regiotram de Occidente, a 43-kilometer tram-train line that could connect Facatativá with to the capital by 2023. According to China Dialogue, these mega-projects represent a “notable turnaround” in the relationship between China and Colombia, despite U.S. opposition.
Fin end of the wedge
And what does China get back from Colombia? Shark fin soup, according to Al Jazeera, highlighting the wasteful practice of fishing sharks for just their fins. After the fins are cut off, the sharks are often tossed back into the water to die slowly. Finning is technically banned in Colombian waters, and sharks supposedly protected by international treaties, but the trade goes on unabated.
Rotten rehab
Shocking video of psychiatric patients caged and chained to poles in Palmira, near Cali, surfaced on the U.K.’sDaily Mailwebsite. State social workers rescued 105 patients from a private mental health institute whose staff now face charges of aggravated torture. Abuses included shackling vulnerable victims – including 17 minors – in an underground lair.
Hipp-overdose
Sorry folks, but Colombia’s hippos resurface on world media more regularly than they do in the Río Magdalena. So for those living in a cave the last decade, here’s a recap (as reported in CNET and Israel’s Haaretz): Colombian drug baron imports hippos to private zoo on huge ranch. Popular drug baron shot dead. Extremely violent semi-aquatic vegetarian mammals escape to tropical river, have baby hippos, scare locals. Scientists find the African invaders – now numbering 80 – are fuelling harmful algae blooms in nearby lakes. Population growth will go “exponentially skywards” claims the lead scientist. As will stories on Pablo’s hippos.
Mushroom for debate
Is the country’s science chief peddling quack cures? Naturemagazine reported how newly appointed science minister Mabel Torres ruffled fellow scientists’ feathers by treating cancer patients with mushroom extract. The fungus expert was “not following the protocols” said Colombian boffins, now demanding data disclosure and full clinical trials. Torres says she is complementing science with what she calls “ancestral knowledge”.
Record high
Green plant on a high. Photo: Unsplash
Meanwhile, this year Colombia can legally cultivate a record 56 tonnes of ‘High-THC’ marihuana – the type that gets you high – says the International Drugs Control Board (IDCB). This should boil down to 560 kilos (or 65,000 doses) of psychoactive cannabis, according to Khiron Life Sciences, which grows the weed. The IDCB quota – representing 21% of the world allocation – affirms Colombia’s role as “one of the most important supply sources for the licensed global cannabis economy”, according to Finance Colombia. The UN body regulates High-THC for “legitimate medical and scientific purpose”. Who says science can’t be fun?
There were 34 assassinations of social leaders in January alone. We look at the numbers and ask why there is still no peace for Colombia’s human rights defenders.
A clear message left by activists in the centre of the Colombian capital. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
For many Colombians, the start of a new decade is a time of hope. Not so for the country’s social leaders and rural communities who have witnessed an increase in violence and threats since the FARC put down their weapons.
On January 2, Carlos Cardona, deputy manager at a local hospital, was shot in Ituango and later died in hospital. Investigations into the death of the father of one have so far led nowhere.
The health official was the first of 34 community leaders and human rights defenders that Indepaz say were killed in the first month of 2020. This number includes five former FARC combatants.
Areas like Antioquia, Arauca, Caquetá and Cauca have seen the majority of the violence, as those who work towards land restitution or take a stand against illicit drugs are targeted. From environmental activists to local politicians and indigenous leaders, many of the people who stand up for their communities do so in the face of threats, violence, and murder.
Violence against activists is nothing new. From the massacre of the bananeros to the killings of Unión Patriótica members in the 80s, with or without the internal conflict there has always been severe danger for those who attempted to bring about change.
What is striking about the current situation is not only that these killings are increasing, but that they are doing so in a country that is, theoretically, at peace. And for many, the assassinations of social leaders is indicative of a failure in the implementation of the peace agreement.
The government has come under fire both locally and internationally, as observers demand that they stop the killings. Equally, they’ve been criticised for an increasing military presence in response to the problem.
For example, the government announced on January 8 that a further 70 soldiers would join the 600 stationed in Bojayá. This came in response to paramilitaries briefly taking the area. But Indepaz Director Camilo González points out that sending more soldiers is not the answer. “This government’s problem is that it insists on a policy of war policy in those territories, and not on a policy of peace,” he told Semana in January.
Playing with the numbers
The government claim that the number of social leaders assassinated has decreased since President Duque came to power. A lot of that is down to discrepancies in defining who is a social leader — and in how you prove that someone was killed because of their activism.
“The fact that there is no one record of the threatened and murdered social leaders is a threat in itself,” Colombian peace platform Pacifista tweeted.
Que no haya un registro único de líderes amenazados y asesinados es una amenaza en sí misma.
Pacifista has broken down how different organisations get their figures, pointing out that the government uses figures from the UN Organisation of Human Rights in Colombia (OHCHR) as their official source. If someone is killed, the OHCHR instigates an investigation on the ground to verify that the person was a leader with local activist organisations, and only then do they count it as a social leader murder.
On the other hand, Indepaz has the highest count. This is because it considers anybody who is active in their community – no matter their position – to be an activist. And they have the contacts on the ground to get instant answers. According to Indepaz, 756 social leaders have been killed between the signing of the peace accord on November 24 in 2016 and the end of last year and the trend is not decreasing.
Government inaction
While the government do admit there is a problem, and that even one activist death is too many, they continue to argue that the activist homicide rate is decreasing. And they claim that the measures they have put in place — community-building workshops, the four-pillared Timely Action Plan (PAO), increased force and the extension of public order laws — are working. A claim that most peace NGOs here hotly deny.
But even the Secretary General to the UN expressed alarm at the end of the year about the way that “human rights defenders, social leaders and people involved in the implementation of the Peace Agreement, especially in rural areas, continue to be targets of violence and intimidation by illegal armed groups, criminal organisations and drug cartels.”
The fear is that by denying the extent of the problem, and by focusing on military rather than community-building solutions, the numbers (however you count them) will continue to rise.
Indeed, in the first six months of 2019, Indepaz recorded the highest number of acts of aggression against social leaders since the peace institute started its monitoring in 2009. And numbers from other social organizations like the non-governmental MOE (Misión de Observación Electoral) also show that there have been more assassinations this January than any other in recent years.
Murders erode democracy
It’s little surprise then that the first strikes of 2020 were dedicated to the country’s human rights defenders. Activists on January 21 left a clear message in the centre of the capital: “There is no democracy without social leaders.”
“The people who march for the implementation of the peace accords have grievances against the government due to the assassination of social leaders. Because they believe that the government’s lack of enforcing the peace accords lead to this violence,” Silvia Otero, professor in political science and international affairs at Rosario University, told The Bogota Post.
She continued: “If the government implemented the peace agreement as it should, the security conditions for social leaders wouldn’t be as bad.”
The hashtag #niunomas – not one more – is a simple rallying cry. But in reality, ensuring that the country’s community leaders are safe requires a number of long term actions. Implementation of the peace accords, delivering the promised land reforms, tackling illicit drugs and restricting the activities of armed gangs will all take time and effort.
And as long as the government denies the extent of the problem, it’s hard to see how things will improve – putting those who dare to defend their rights in danger, and in turn, undermining the country’s democracy.
The latest exhibition from Sako Asko invites us to examine our own self-perceptions.
Sako Asko
Tucked away behind the shirt shops of quinta and a stone’s throw from Universidades station is art gallery Street Lynx. It’s a hot Saturday afternoon when I call by for our interview, conducted in the gallery itself. The atmosphere is convivial and my dogs are welcomed too. The walls are liberally plastered with art, a veritable smorgasbord of images glaring down at us as we settle down for the talk. No minimalism here, that’s for sure.
Their hot February show features Santiago Oliveros, a largely self-taught artist who goes by the name Sako Asko. He’s young and open-minded, keen to avoid cliché. Working in a pop-art style and heavily influenced by comic book imagery, the work is colourful and bright, with bold Colombian colours splashed liberally around. However, the themes within are often dark and hint at depths concealed below the bright colours.
“It doesn’t have a great connection with what is called Colombian art,” he explains. “But equally, the palettes of colour that I use are related to the old bus placards, colours that are common in the tropical culture of Colombia.” A lot of it references the absurdity of modern life – dummies on cell phones, for example. Are you suckling the news right now on your cell phone?
While the colours come from Colombia, more international influences are evident in the forms he uses. “Aesthetically, I’m interested in American comics, instruction manuals and leaflets, signs. Also mythology.” It’s a wide-ranging collection of interests, but for Sako, “The line connecting it all is self-observation. The central theme of the work is the window, which is a metaphor for perception. When you observe from a window, you interpret the landscape, your perceptions of what is there.”
Urban art isn’t confined to galleries
Like many other urban artists, he hasn’t always worked in traditional gallery spaces like Street Lynx. “At 16, 17 years of age, I was doing graffiti, and I still paint sometimes in the street. In fact, tomorrow we’ll be making a mural close to here.”
Sako claims that, “My biggest inspirations are my experiences in life, of the people in my life like friends and family. I’m interested in themes like psychology, psychoanalysis, mental illness.” That’s evident in the piece he says is his favourite: a baby, entangled in its own umbilical cord. It carries a haunting quality as well as an arresting visceral image. “It’s similar to how we are with family,” he says.
He’ll also be releasing a compilation of images featuring his character el viajero later this year. “He’s someone that has gone down well with fans when I’ve put those images online, they’ve always been segments of a story, and now I want to collect them together”
Gallery manager Lorenzo Masnah explains that the gallery is designed to showcase young artists rather than the more conservative choices to be found in other city galleries.
The gallery reflects its surroundings, vibrant and relentlessly urban. As the Candelaria chaos swirls about outside, some of that frenetic energy is captured in the art visible on the walls.
It’s affordable art as well – with smaller pieces going as low as COP$50,000. This makes it work that is genuinely accessible, which reinforces the connection between artistic community and collectors. Despite this, Lorenzo says that foreign buyers represent a large proportion of their sales.
To put that price tag into perspective, even prints from someone like Banksy will set you back thousands of pounds. Sako says, “We say that with regards to the prints, it’s a product that’s accessible to everyone.”
Street Lynx gallery is at Calle 18 #4-92 and the exhibition runs from Saturday, February 8 until March 2. The gallery is open Tues-Sat, 11am-6pm. Or follow the gallery on instagram.
After the resignation of the defence minister last year, there have been immediate consequences. Is this is a one-off, or a promising sign for the future?
Are people rewarded or reprimanded for jumping to the front of the queu? Photo: Unsplash
One of the stories dominating the news headlines last year was the appalling affair in Caquetá, where eight minors were killed by the military in a bombardment of a dissident FARC camp. Enough has been written about the events themselves, but what interests me is the political fallout. Within a couple of days of the incident becoming front-page news, Defence Minister Guillermo Botero resigned, the right decision, as it was a horrific overreach by forces under his control.
Political figures in Colombia often cling on to power doggedly, like scarab beetles ensconced in shit, but in this case the resignation came fast. It seems unlikely that it would be on moral principle, given that Botero appears to have the moral fibre of a paper cup. In contrast, Nestor Humberto Martínez only resigned after months of scandal and the threat of exposure by the Supreme Court. In the rest of Latin America, Odebrecht led to resignations and protest. In Colombia, almost nothing.
One might expect political figures to avoid consequences in any country – the congenital liar Boris Johnson or the scandal-ridden Donald Trump being but two examples. But it’s not only politicians. A lecturer at the Universidad Nacional was accused of sexual harassment last year. The consequence? Promotion. That’s in the liberal heart of the Colombian intelligentsia. If even an institution like that fails to act, what deterrents are there for anyone?
Consequences in Colombia follow a strange logic. They seem to simply not apply to some people, who act with an impunity that beggars belief, and not to others. Of course, this happens in other countries too – as a cyclist I can reel off dozens of cases all over the world where cyclists and pedestrians have been killed by motorists who simply stroll away with a slap on the wrist (if that). Residing here, though, I see the cases in Colombia day in and day out.
The consequences, however, of exercising your democratic right to protest can be swift, violent and brutal. Every week, without fail, we see the consequences that exist for those social leaders that operate in zones where the state exercises at best minimal control. In those parts of the country, speaking out often means being silenced for good. The notion of justice thus seems wildly unfair, with neither moral nor legal consequences, rather simply brutishness.
In daily life, many actions seem to exist without any consequences. Breaking the law or not following rules becomes so routine that the rules themselves become pointless. Near my house is a police station and cars routinely flout the law in front of it, creating traffic havoc and dangerous situations. All this takes place about ten yards from a bunch of coppers. In our local parks, some people don’t bother picking up their dog’s shit because they know that nothing will happen if they don’t. I mean, there are consequences for children who can’t use the park, for people that step in shit, and for people that don’t like looking at a green space bespeckled with it. But critically, no consequences for those flouting common decency.
A failing student can simply submit extra work, bribe the teacher or exert pressure on the school to avoid those embarrassing grades. This persists up to university. At any rate, even if there’s no bending of the rules, there are always opportunities to retake levels, to sit exams a second, third, fourth time. When a person barges to the front of the queue, it often brings dividends rather than rebukes.
Over time, all of this leads to a situation where people forget the reasons not to do things and act purely according to their own base self-interest. From this stems a lot of corruption. After all, while people should (and many do) act on moral grounds, there are plenty of people who do the right thing simply to avoid castigation.
Hopefully, the case of Botero is a marker that the political landscape at least is changing. Let’s hope that Mayor Claudia López will make sure that those accused of corruption in the private sector also face real consequences for their actions. After all, the list of people accused of or linked to corruption that turn up to high-society events is extensive. If there continues to be no real consequence for doing the wrong thing, when will that stop?
Irish author Mary Costello gives a powerful talk as Blazing a Trail exhibition opens at UNAL.
Blazing a Trail: Irish women who changed the world is on display at UNAL’s Edificio Uriel Guttiérez until February 18.
“I’m learning too,” said Mary Costello, one of the loudest voices in contemporary Irish literature.
In her talk, “Women’s voices in literature and their role in modern Ireland,” at la Universidad Nacional de Colombia (UNAL) Sede Bogotá, Costello admitted to just recently understanding the uniqueness of her own perspective as a woman writer.
“She’s one of the most important writers in Ireland today,” said Irish ambassador to Colombia, Alison Milton when describing Costello.
The University’s Office of External Relations, the Embassy of Ireland, and Culture Ireland, an organisation that promotes Irish culture globally, jointly hosted Costello and opened a coinciding exhibition, Blazing a Trail: Irish women who changed the world, a historical look back on pioneering women in the Irish diaspora.
In her introductory remarks, Ambassador Milton explained that both Costello’s talk and the exhibition are part of the Embassy’s celebration of Saint Brigid’s Day. Appropriately, Saint Brigid is a beloved Irish patron saint that celebrates women’s creativity. Milton also highlighted the strong ties between Ireland and UNAL, a partnership that promotes the global significance and influence of Irish culture and literature.
Who is Mary Costello?
Prior to focusing on writing exclusively, Costello was a teacher. Notably, she did not publish her first book, a widely acclaimed collection of short stories,The China Factory, until she was in her forties. Two years later, she published her first novel, Academy Street, for which she won the Irish Book Award and Irish Novel of the Year award.
To promote The River Capture, Costello travelled to Colombia for the first time. Prior to arriving in Bogotá this week, she spoke and led workshops at Cartagena’s annual literary event, The Hay Festival.
Alejandra Jaramillo, writer and Professor in UNAL’s humanities faculty, introduced Costello’s talk with excerpts from glowing reviews of The River Capture, which both the Irish Times and the Irish Independent named Book of the Year in 2019.
“Women’s voices in literature and their role in modern Ireland”
Rather than discuss her own writing in isolation, Costello began by contextualising her writing within the history of women’s writing both globally and in Ireland.
In discussing why women writers have so often been shrugged off as irrelevant or unremarkable, Costello referenced Simone de Beauvoir’s opposition to the once widely-believed notion that, “When women write, they write about the female experience but when men write, they write about the human condition.”
Costello went on to argue that women are, no doubt, just as capable of writing about the human condition and that they are particularly adept at writing about people’s “inner lives.”
Having provided important historical examples of the silencing of women’s voices overall, Costello also discussed the state of women in Ireland in the twentieth century, from gaining the vote in 1922, to the election of Mary Robinson, Ireland’s first woman Prime Minister in 1990.
Costello concluded by discussing the lives and works of four Irish women writers: Maria Edgeworth, Kate O’Brien, Edna O’Brien, and poet Eavan Boland. In addition to discussing how they influenced her and her writing, Costello spoke to how these writers subverted the deeply conservative and patriarchal Irish status quo through their innovative, feminist writing.
Their influence on Costello is unmistakable. She was unpretentious from the outset of her talk, qualifying her remarks by stating that she is not “an academic,” but rather, just a writer who has thoughts. These thoughts, which she so captivatingly described and contextualised, highlighted Costello’s own non-confrontational, radical feminism.
Following a brief Q & A with Costello, Ambassador Milton formally inaugurated the Blazing a Trail exhibition, a display of pioneering Irish women in activism, the sciences, the arts, sport, politics, and humanitarianism. The exhibit will be on view in the lobby of UNAL’s Edificio Uriel Gutiérrez until February 18.
While there has been some progress, the slow implementation of Colombia’s peace agreement continues to be a source of discontent, especially as rural communities continue to suffer violence and displacement. Part two of our ongoing look at the issues that face the country.
The (lack of) implementation of the peace agreement was a much seen theme during the protests. Photo: Michael Marangos
Colombia’s 2016 peace agreement between the government and the FARC has been hailed as historic, experts consider it to be one of the most comprehensive and innovative deals ever reached. However, its implementation has seen many hurdles and it continues to stir controversy among a deeply polarised and divided society.
Although last year’s protests were not primarily driven by concerns associated with the peace accord, it has influenced the mass demonstrations in at least two ways.
While it is true that certain regions of the country face a surge of targeted killings, peace with the FARC did lead to an overall drop in violence. Consequently, people’s day-to-day concerns have shifted away from the armed conflict towards issues such as corruption and cuts to pensions or education.
Secondly, and all its controversy notwithstanding, the peace agreement is backed by a large sector of Colombian society (it was only narrowly rejected in a plebiscite in 2016). The National Strike Committee has included the issue in its demands, urging President Iván Duque in a letter to “comprehensively implement the peace agreement and explore possibilities to resume negotiations with the ELN.”
However, Duque has done little to convince this sector of his intentions to comply with these demands. On the contrary, since taking office he has made several efforts to follow through on his campaign promise to “correct” the peace agreement with the FARC: in March, he launched a series of objections targeting the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, a transitional justice tribunal created to try war crimes committed during the armed conflict. In addition, many protesters consider that his social and economic policies have disregarded key measures of the peace agreement aimed at improving security and development in rural areas.
The Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies has been monitoring the state of implementation of the peace deal and has stressed important advances, such as the disarmament of the FARC and its transition to a legal political party. Meanwhile, measures concerning the substitution of illegal crops and rural reforms show little progress. Such measures would be crucial to address the violence that has spiked in former FARC strongholds where newly formed criminal gangs or remaining rebel groups such as the ELN have gained control.
In these areas, prospects for a real peace are clouded by on-going killings of social leaders and former FARC rebels: according to the NGO Indepaz, 29 social leaders and five demobilized FARC combatants were murdered in the first 30 days of 2020 alone.
These are not the only trends that have enraged supporters of the peace deal. In November 2019 news broke that the Colombian military had killed 18 minors during an aerial raid on a dissident FARC camp in the southern province of Caquetá.
Against the backdrop of such events, peace remains elusive for many Colombians. Even if Duque were to follow through on every measure of the peace deal, the structural reforms needed to eradicate residual violence and promote development in the countryside would take years to deliver tangible results. Until then, public discontent, especially in neglected territories, is unlikely to die down.
Colombia’s conflict didn’t disappear, it’s just went under the radar. But for how long? We report from the troubled region of Sur de Bolívar.
The green hills of the Serranía San Lucas in Colombia’s troubled Sur de Bolívar region. Photos Gerald Barr
Santa Rosa’s plaza is like in any small town in Colombia: Old folk on benches under shady trees, kids playing hopscotch near a broken fountain, weather-beaten women selling freshly-squeezed orange juice and a scrawny shoe-shine guy trying to polish your trainers.
Except this hectic market town is nestled in the green hills of the Sur de Bolívar – the cocaine and gold-rush heart of Colombia. It’s the focal point for every bad-ass armed group in the country, and even one from Mexico, according to a friend showing me around the town.
“The Cartel de Sinaloa, they’re here too,” he murmurs.
The feared Mexican narcos keep bad company. ELN guerrillas hide out in the distant hills of the Serranía de San Lucas, a rugged green ridge dividing Río Magdalena and Río Cauca. Down by these rivers, ex-paramilitary groups like the Clan del Golfo keep the lowland communities clamped down with extortion, threats and selective killings. Somewhere in between is a baker’s dozen of smaller gangs vying for a bigger slice of the gold-and-cocaine pie.
“In the old days, at least we knew who we were dealing with,” says my friend wistfully. He’s talking of past decades when the area was dominated by one guerrilla army. With the current mishmash of pistoleros it’s hard to figure out who’s who, and dangerous even to try.
And these irregular gangs keep shifting territory, making and breaking uneasy truces, creating invisible barriers – both in towns and the green hills – and keeping everyone on their toes. One thing my friend is sure of: they all have eyes on Santa Rosa’s plaza.
Pineapple front?
With this in mind, I sidle up to a guy hawking slices of pineapple. His yellow slabs of juicy piña are some of the best I’ve tasted. But are they a front for a hardened sicario? He gives me my change and a broad smile. Maybe he’s just a fruit seller after all.
Conflict? What conflict? Surely the post-peace-process country has turned a corner. Tourists are flooding in. Escobar’s ranch is a theme park. Hey, we’ve joined the OECD!
The problem with Colombia’s current crisis is you can rock up in the hot zone and everything just seems normal. Conflict? What conflict? Surely the post-peace-process country has turned a corner. Tourists are flooding in. Escobar’s ranch is a theme park. Hey, we’ve joined the OECD!
But it’s simply not that simple. In Sur de Bolívar, multiple armed groups go under the radar for the mutual pursuance of instant fortunes. Greed keeps the lid on the pressure cooker, but the heat is still on. Meanwhile there are new rules designed to keep conflict contained and the cash flowing.
Golden days
The first is: If you’re digging in your own illegal gold mine, keep digging. Towns like Santa Rosa are riding the bonanza with every other shop selling water pumps, pipes, generator plants, picks, axes and beer. Less obvious are the suppliers of mercury and cyanide, contaminants used to leach gold out of the soil.
Gold mining is seen as the “lesser illegal activity compared to cocaine production,” my friend explains, so miners drive from town to the mines unhindered in their pimped Land Cruisers or Hummers (there are supposedly three in town). And they tend to avoid gunfights.
“There’s huge profits to be made, so they focus on the work,” explains my friend.
But in Santa Rosa, miners are as good at losing money as finding it. At 9am, café tables are crammed with beer bottles as blurry-eyed diggers celebrate their latest strike. Later in the pachanga, daft bets will be laid and riches lost on a handshake. According to town gossip, last month, one local chancer staked 350 million pesos on who’d win the mayoral election.
According to my contact, the boomtown days might be ending. For decades the state has also coveted the gold, or at least control of the mines which they can sell to foreign mining companies. Then with taxes the state can improve the roads and infrastructure. And reduce mercury run-off into the rivers.
It all makes perfect sense. Unless you already own your own goldmine, in which case swapping it for a monthly pay-check from Anglo Ashanti is a bad deal. “The small-scale miners won’t give up without a fight,” predicts my friend.
Painting their presence known
Happy to help them in that are the ELN guerrillas, who tend to tax the illegal mines rather than waste too much time doing their own digging, freeing themselves up to grow coca, plant landmines, recruit teenagers and set up roadblocks to spray-paint cars with political slogans every July 3 (their birthday). As an armed group based on ideology, after 55 years it must remind everyone it’s still around.
Gold mining is seen as the “lesser illegal activity compared to cocaine production,” my friend explains, so miners drive from town to the mines unhindered in their pimped Land Cruisers or Hummers.
And recently the ELN has expanded through Sur de Bolívar, filling the demobilised FARC’s muddy boots. Unfortunately, this push comes with numbskull plans such as their recent attack on the main road from San Pablo.
The guerrillas planted four roadside bombs attached to a tripwire from which dangled an ELN flag, which also had a bomb. The plan was to block the road for a few hours, maybe make the army bomb disposal guys sweat a bit.
Boat-bus on the Río Magdalena. Entrance to the region is by boat or ferry along Colombia’s main waterway.
But it was still dark when they set the device and they didn’t count on a merry miner charging down the road from Santa Rosa at 5am in his armoured Land Cruiser. He collected the string, the flag and the small bomb – which exploded – and flew into a roadside ditch (and, amazingly, survived).
Old habits die hard
Old habits die hard, though, so when not running cocaine labs, the Clan, along withsimilar ex-para gangs, impose control through political killings.
Despite old-style guerrilla tactics, these Cuban-Marxist revolutionaries have their own new rules, such as selling coca leaves – the raw material of cocaine – to their political and ideological opposites, gunmen from the Clan del Golfo, a group descended from right-wing remnants of paramilitary armies that terrorised the region with massacres in previous decades.
Old habits die hard, though, so when not running cocaine labs, the Clan, along withsimilar ex-para gangs, impose control through political killings. According to their new rules, these assassinations – often of social leaders – are single murders done infrequently.
“The goal is to kill enough to keep the community petrified, but not so often to spark a big reaction from state forces,” explains my friend.
Now we’re in a small bus heading from Santa Rosa to Simití, a historic town – older even than Mompox – set by the bluest lake ringed by the greenest hills, quite simply the most beautiful view I’ve seen in Colombia.
The town feels abandoned, but recently joined to the main ports of the Río Magdalena by a new tarmac road. More surprisingly, a spanking new hospital sits on the outskirts, complete with specialist services.
Fishing on the lake at Simití, a historic town that claims to be older than Cartagena and Mompox.
Nearby a local NGO has set up a tilapia fish farm and training centre for young campesinos with crops to feed their families and excess to sell. Local cacao cultivators are feeding international demand. If these social changes take root, they could suck the oxygen out of the armed groups. That’s not supposed to happen in Colombia. But, hey, new rules.
We have a cold beer and watch cormorants in the lake as the sun sets behind the Serranía de San Lucas. A local guy joins us and points to the ridges. Some days before the guerrillas were up there “dando plomo” – giving lead – to army troops on patrol.
But these are no ordinary troops. The state has deployed a special task force of 2,000 troops – the Fuerza de Tarea Marte – with anti-drug police and close air support. Their first targets are the ELN and Clan del Golfo. Then gold mines and recuperating state taxes. Taxes that could disappear into some politico’s pocket. Or pay for more roads and hospitals.
How it will end? No-one knows. The Sur de Bolívar has been impenetrable for decades. But everyone feels a wind of change. New rules.
A new flu-type virus could be the next pandemic. Here’s a Q&A to keep you up to date…
Coronavirus Colombia: Health post in Amazonas state: services in remote areas are often run down bringing challenges for outbreak response. Photos: Steve Hide
Should we be worried about the coronavirus?
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), yes. The UN body has just declared the ‘2019n-CoV’ bug a global health emergency. The virus, which jumped the species barrier from animals to humans in China late last year, can cause severe pneumonia-type illness with fatalities. According to the latest World Health Organisation stats (January 30), 10,000 people have been diagnosed worldwide with 220 deaths. Most cases have been recorded in China, but the bug has also spread to Europe, the US and Canada.
How bad can it get?
Hard to say. Viruses are fickle foes. They can mutate to become more deadly…or fizzle out. Public health influencers walk a fine line between prevention and panic. Past declared global health emergencies – SARS, MERS, Ebola – have not spread worldwide as feared. One game-changer with 2019n-CoV is we now know it can pass between humans, not just from animals. This means people with no direct contact with the source in China can also catch it. The WHO now says the transmission risk is “high at the global level.”
Will the coronavirus come to Colombia?
Probably. Although eight suspected cases have tested negative in the country in the last week, the bug’s high rate of contagion – facilitated by international global travel – suggests that it will get here eventually.
What can Colombia do to prevent its spread?
Not much, partly because the bug is capable of ‘asymptomatic transmission’ meaning people can catch and spread the virus without themselves getting sick. This means screening at borders – for example testing airline passengers for fevers as they arrive at airports – is ineffective. And quarantining sufferers will have limited effect because the bug takes days or weeks to show up: A patient has already passed it on before being isolated. On data collected from China so far, each patient tested positive has already infected at least three other people.
Is everyone at risk?
No. Analysis of cases in China shows deaths occurred mostly in middle-aged male patients with other chronic diseases such as diabetes or heart conditions. Younger, female and generally healthy people have more chances of fighting off the virus. Some children who tested positive for the virus never even got sick. On the evidence so far, experts say that 2019n-CoV is not as deadly as other types of coronavirus such as SARS, which also originated in China and killed nearly 800 people worldwide in 2002-03. However, experts also say less ‘deadly’ viruses are likely to be more contagious and spread further, eventually affecting more people.
Can’t I take a pill?
No. New viruses require vaccines, which need time to develop, maybe months or years. Infected people rely on their own immune system to fight it off, and if necessary, hospital care to treat the symptoms.
Many areas of Colombia are only reachable by river. Isolation can reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission, but also delay patients reaching proper medical care in case of infection.
How do you know you have the bug?
Symptoms are similar to flu with fever, cough, shortage of breath, and in severe cases kidney failure and death. But some infected people never get sick at all. One problem is lack of testing; at present patient sputum samples are molecule tested to prove the presence of 2019n-CoV. The WHO is scrambling to establish a worldwide network of labs that can process these samples, and biomedical companies are working around the clock to produce a cheaper test for rapid diagnosis. Colombia health authorities can send samples to the U.S. for gene testing, which is costly and time-consuming: it can take several days for a test result.
How ready is Colombia for this coronavirus?
As a tropical country, Colombia is used to dealing with virus epidemics – i.e. chikungunya, zika – and fared well in the H1N1 swine flu pandemic of 2009. It also revamped its quarantine capabilities during the Ebola scare of 2014-16, and has systems in place to protect health staff. Colombia’s public health body the Insituto Nacional de Salud has a robust disease surveillance system and is busy producing guidelines and updates to health professionals.
In a worst-case scenario, can Colombia cope with the coronavirus?
With difficulty. Despite high levels of technical expertise in-country, the semi-privatised health system is weak and concentrates quality care in urban centres. Cities like Bogotá have overcrowded transport systems such as the TransMilenio which could spark rapid transmission of the virus. And in remote rural areas – where services are often chronically under-resourced – people already face a struggle to reach adequate health care, often hours away by boat or mule. And we know from previous flu outbreaks that speed of attention is a critical factor in patient survival. With high case numbers, frightened health staff could abandon their posts, especially if they lack protective clothing. There is potential for system collapse.
What about Venezuela?
Colombia shares a 2,000-kilometre open border with neighbouring Venezuela, which has economically collapsed causing a health emergency with drug shortages and many health staff fleeing the country. This country-wide crisis makes the population there uniquely vulnerable to the 2019n-CoV virus, though, so far, no cases have been reported. But if cases do arise, Colombian health officials will be watching border areas with concern.
Wash hands, here comes Coronavirus! WHO recommends it as the best way to avoid infection. Alcohol gels – available in pharmacies – come in handy when you’re out on the street.
What can I do for now?
Protect yourself. For this, WHO recommends frequent hand washing with soap and water or alcohol-based hand rubs, particularly in public places where other people are touching common surfaces (i.e. handrails on escalators). We actually spread flu and cold viruses more by hand-mouth contact and inadvertently touch our mouth hundreds of times a day. Face masks can help in crowded public places. And stay informed. We’ll keep you posted.
‘In post-conflict Colombia, the battles will be about corruption.’ We look at the bribes that bind, one of the issues that drove so many people to the streets.
Corruption in Colombia was one of the many reasons that drove so many people to the streets in the past weeks. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
When US News called Colombia the world’s most corrupt country in its ‘Best Countries’ index last week – below even Mexico and Bolivia – it caused a wave of indignation from Bogotá’s political class, but struck a chord with a country whose leaders are constantly caught with their hands in the cookie jar.
In fact, Colombia’s poor ranking is slightly unfair: The US News survey skews the stats by bundling ‘red tape’ in with ‘fraud’ perceptions. The more trusted Transparency International index gives a marginally better 37 points out of 100 for perceptions of corruption (based on business and expert data sets) and ranked it 96th in the world, above most of Latin America.
Still, nothing to brag about. And even by the state’s own estimates, corruption costs the country a staggering US$18 billion a year. Understandably, Colombians are fed up.
In fact, the November general strikes – which lasted into December and have trickled into 2020 – were preceded by bloody skirmishes on Bogotá’s streets between anti-riot cops and students clamouring against corruption at the Universidad Distrital.
The clashes kicked off in September when students – already angered by education cuts – got news that a Distrital boss had siphoned off USD$3 million to spend on jewellery, luxury cars, prostitutes and five-star hotels.
Added to this fraud was institutional foot-dragging. The splurge had gone undetected over four years in a fog of bureaucracy that so often enables illicit enrichment. Enough was enough.
Furious protests were met with heavy-handed policing. The clashes spread to other universities. Walking down the Septima, dodging acrid clouds of tear gas, I remembered the words of Colombia’s head of the Peace Process after the historic signing in 20016: “In post-conflict Colombia, the battles will be about corruption.”
Perhaps combating corruption could be the unstated common cause of all the Paro Nacional protesters. In Colombia it affects everyone through a multitude of mechanisms such as price-fixing of toilet paper, or paying a small bribe to get seen at the health clinic – a cash payout known as la mordida – to losing your council job because ‘the new guy’ got elected, or multi-million-dollar backhanders for road-building contracts.
For many, compounding corruption is widespread judicial impunity, and real threats faced by anyone calling it out. Whistle-blowers face a bullet in the post or invitation to their own funeral. Just last month, Semana journalists uncovered a plan by army officers to hire assassins to kill them. This follows revelations by the weekly news magazine of high-level corruption in the military.
A recent Gallup poll reported that only 11% of Colombians trust their legal systems. The multi-million-dollar Odebrecht bribe scandal ended political careers all over Latin America but hardly touched Colombian politicos. Even when one congresswoman was jailed for vote-buying she escaped by rope from a dentist’s window, a daring plan clearly facilitated by some of the very people locking her up.
But it is the everyday graft that upsets most people, such as the Carrusel de Contratos whereby cascades of front companies take their 10% cut from the public purse – usually feeding a politician’s pocket – leaving a pittance for the actual work. Behind every half-finished road and undug tunnel, you’ll find a roundabout.
Political control of these contracts is called mermelade, jam to be spread among key supporters and henchmen in the form of sweetened contracts. These in turn guarantee votes at the next election. This political patronage is so embedded few believe it will ever end…
Or will it? Some commentators see improvements. Mayors elected in Bogotá and Medellin are left-field candidates elected on anti-graft platforms. At a local level, technical advances are reducing corruption. Take Bogotá’s new automated traffic cameras for example: you can’t so easily bribe a computer.
Meanwhile, Colombia’s ruling party still claims the high ground. State institutions “are embarked on a battle without quarter against corruption,” said the VP last week in reaction to the US News survey.
And thanks to the strike demonstrators – and a large army of anti-graft commentators active on social media – the issue is permanently on the table. An end to corruption is a hope that glues Colombia’s disparate protest groups in a common goal: Change.
As English language changes, you want to be on the right side of his(or her)tory.
The times they are a-changing. Is your English going in the right direction? Photo: Unsplash
The times they are a-changing and language is a-changing with them. Since languages are organic creations of human culture, as that culture changes so too do they. The language used by Shakespeare is so different to modern day English that secondary school students usually reach for their dictionaries. That’s quite old, but even texts from the Victorian or Edwardian era sound very strange to a modern ear. A lot of people ejaculate in Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes novels, yet the modern meaning of the word gives the whole thing a comical feel.
As a language learner, you need to know where the language is going, not where it has come from. There’s little point wasting your time learning words and phrases that are going out of fashion, for a start. Also, you want to sound modern and up-to-date, not like some bizarre Victorian cliché. Actually, I quite like sounding like a bizarre Victorian cliché, but I’m not a good role model in general. Do as I say, not as I do.
Third person plural
To avoid the problem of he/she; his/hers etc, English now tends to use third person plurals when gender is unknown or irrelevant. An example: “When a person arrives, they see the bar first.” In this example, although the person is singular (a person) they represent any random person, and so are of indeterminate gender. To avoid the rather ugly he or she, we simply say they. If it helps, imagine that the person is actually male and female and therefore plural.
Inclusive language
For decades now, English has been shifting to more and more gender-neutral language where necessary, appropriate and possible. So, firemen are now firefighters, businessmen are business people and policemen have become police officers. Also, many feminine versions of jobs are disappearing, so we have male and female actors rather than actors and actresses.
Lessening formality
There has been a growing trend towards informality in English. In general, regular American English is still more formal than regular British English, although exceptions persist, of course. The old idea of addressing men as Sir and Mister and women as Madam or Ma’am is certainly slipping away. To be honest, it sounds almost sarcastic at times, and definitely old-fashioned.
Text-speak and its place
As mobile phones become ever-more present in our lives, so too does text-speak. Parts of text-speak have made their way into regular speech (yes, people really do say lol now) and it is becoming more accepted in emails and other written communication. The real key for learners of English in the future is understanding when text-speak is OK and when it’s not. That’s not so difficult (and of course the rules are still being defined) – simply use common sense and think about if you would use Spanish text-speak in a similar situation.
Obligations
‘Have to’, ‘must’, ‘ought’ are a bit different in real life and in English textbooks. You may have been taught that have to and must are different because of external and internal obligation. That’s really not true in any sensible way any more. Nowadays the difference is more that must generally feels stronger and have to is less dramatic. South Africans use must a lot.
Ought to isn’t changing its meaning, but it is being used less and less. In your classes, I would focus on using should and recognising ought to but not worrying about using it so much. A bit like the ‘vosotros’ form in Spanish for us foreigners living in Colombia. It exists and we want to be aware of it, but it’s not a usable form.
EU English
English is very tolerant of regionalism. From South Africa to India to the Caribbean to the British Isles and even the USA, different varieties of English follow their own rules and often have grammatical and lexical differences. Unlike some languages, there’s no unifying standard, so usage becomes the final decider of correctness. Interestingly, English is developing within the EU now, almost entirely among second-language speakers.
With Britain set to leave and currently sulking like a brat in the corner, the four million Irish speakers and handful of Maltese will be the only remaining native speakers in the Union. Despite this, for political reasons English is likely to continue as a neutral language of communication – with some twists. For example, the progressive tenses are being used more frequently and a whole new lexicon is developing to handle EU-related matters. In general, English is being pulled closer to other European languages – actual is often used in the Spanish sense, for example.
Vocabulary
Just as certain words in Spanish now seem absurdly old-fashioned, words in English also fall in and out of fashion. Cool was the big thing when I was a young’un, and it has stuck around. Wicked (meaning good) didn’t stand the test of time though and fell away. There’s rarely a lot of logic to these changes and it’s worth just watching the language that you see and seeing what you notice being used more and more.
Also, some words change their meanings over time. When I was younger, disinterested and uninterested had separate meanings only. As the years marched on though, people increasingly used disinterested to mean uninterested. The OED eventually accepted that there were enough of these people to mean that disinterested now both has its original meaning and is also a synonym of bored. As many of you might feel after reading that, I suspect.
Some big words from last year.
Not all of these are exactly from 2019, but they’ve all started to go mainstream over the past year or so.
Cannabusiness – the growing industry related to cannabinoids as they are legalised in more and more places.
Lit – cool, great, amazing.
Upcycling – using as much as possible of an item.
Firehosing – Telling as many lies as possible as fast as possible to make life difficult for fact-checkers.
Yass (Yaaaas/Yas) – alternative to yes, showing extra excitement.
Cryptocurrency (or simply crypto) – currencies that don’t physically exist, such as Bitcoin
Deepfake – Videos that have been significantly altered, often with special effects, to present a convincing lie.
Snowflake – Easily offended people, perceived to be poor at taking criticism. (Not new, but got big this year.)
TERF – Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist. Feminists who don’t recognise transsexual people as part of the feminist movement.
Quid pro quo – After centuries of extremely rare usage, you’d be hard pressed to find an American news story right now without this Latin phrase for a tit for tat.
Woke – To be fully accepting of (usually) progressive points.
Salty – To be bitter or angry (Jürgen Klopp complaining about VAR after Liverpool drop points).
The ride-sharing app Uber will no longer be available in Colombia from midnight January 31st onwards, the company announced Friday.
Uber stops working in Colombia after January 31. Photo: Flickr
The decision was in keeping with a ruling made in December by the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce (SIC), which said that Uber was skirting laws governing the public transport market and giving itself a significant advantage at the expense of Colombia’s taxi drivers.
In a statement, Uber said that it would obey the decision taken by SIC, but it considered the ruling to be arbitrary.
“We’ve used all our legal resources (…) to defend the two million users who choose how they move around the country and the opportunity for the 88,000 registered driver using the app to make additional money to help sustain their families,” Uber said in a statement. “We believe that the national government can take urgent steps to allow Uber and other platforms to continue working in the country.”
“Six years ago we were the first company to offer Colombia an innovative and reliable form of transportation,” the statement continued. “Today Colombia is the also the first country on the continent to close its gates to technology.”
On its Twitter page the company also admitted defeat in its battle to stay in Colombia, posting “Goodbye… hopefully see you soon #UnaSolucionParaUberYa.” The food delivery service Uber Eats, however, will continue to function as normal.
SIC’s battle against ride-sharing apps is unlikely to end with Uber. Other services used by Colombians such as Beat, Didi and Cabify will continue to work in the near future, although the lawyer representing SIC against Uber, Nicolás Alviar, announced plans in December to go after Uber’s competitors.
“CoTech gave me the order to initiate the same process of unfair competition against Didi, Cabify, and others like InDriver,” Alviar previously told El Tiempo. “We think that the historic precedent [set by the Uber case] will make these cases much more simple.” He added that the maximum that each one of the cases could take would be a year-and-a-half.
Reactions to Uber’s departure were decidedly mixed. While those involved in the taxi cab industry were understandably elated by the news, others saw it as a step back and a rejection of technological progress.
“It’s sad news for the present and for the future, which we should confront hand in hand with technology,” David Luna, director of the Tanque Al Centro thinktank, said on Twitter. “The government and SIC prefer to go against the consumer, protect monopolies and expel technology…We’re seeing the beginning of the end of the benefits of the digital economy, it’s absurd and shameful.”
This is hardly the first time that Uber has faced a major setback in the last year. In August the company reported a $5.2 billion loss, and in December co-founder Travis Kalanick resigned from the board of directors. The company has also faced regulatory setbacks in New York City, London and Germany.
6 Christmas songs you need to know to impress your Colombian friends and family this festive season.
Mi Burrito Sabanero is very common during the Novenas. Photo: YouTube
A guaranteed way to appear even more of an odd species to your suegros than you already do: play them ‘Fairytale of New York’ by The Pogues and tell them this is Christmas music in your country.
“But música de Diciembre is supposed to be bailable, alegre…” says the puzzled looking tía in the corner.
Don’t try to explain it. Rather, if you’re lucky enough to be spending the festive period here, get in the mood with our guide to Colombian Christmas music.
Mi burrito sabanero
Ask a Colombian what they consider typical festive music and surprisingly few, for such a Christian country, will mention songs that even allude to Navidad. Luckily, at my first ever office novena I was roped into strumming and singing this villancico – Christmas carol – about a little donkey from the savannah making his way to Bethlehem.
Con mi burrito sabanero, voy camino de Belén (x2) Si me ven, si me ven, voy camino de Belén (x2)
The composer is the Venezuelan Hugo Blanco, who passed away aged 74 in June – meaning you might hear this even more than usual this year. If you’re in appropriate company, we recommend belting out the alternative version, El Burrito Cervecero. Google those lyrics yourself.
It may call itself the país del sagrado corazón, but Colombia basically uses Christmas as an excuse for an almighty rumba lasting several days, most perfectly summed up in the title of this classic cumbia that Narcos fans will have heard over the credits of episode nine. The chorus needs little translating.
Tabaco, tabaco, tabaco Tabaco y ron Tabaco, tabaco, pero tabaco Tabaco y ron
You will hear a lot of Rodolfo Aicardi – a legendary cantautor of música popular from Magangué, Bolívar – in December, with ‘Adornay’ one of those songs that nunca falta at a festive family party.
El hijo ausente (Pastor López y Su Combo)
Aicardi is also a major proponent of the fantastically onomatopoeically named Chucu Chucu genre, real traditional música del pueblo that heart-warmingly comes into fashion every December among both pelados and viejos. Chucu chucu refers to the sound made by scraping the guacharaca (hence the genre’s alternative name: raspa). But arguably the Christmas king of chucu chucu is this Venezuelan classic, despite the genre originating in Colombia. The lyrics speak to many expats missing their family…
Vamos a brindar por el ausente Que el año que viene esté presente Vamos a desearle buena suerte Y que Dios lo guarde de la muerte
Las caleñas son como las flores (The Latin Brothers)
Salsa Claus will be in only one place on Christmas Day: Cali, at the opening of the world famous Feria. Each year, one song is voted the Disco de la Feria. We recommend checking out a list of all the winning tracks since the 1950s for an unrivalled romp through the rich diversity of Colombian music. But señor Claus could only pick one, and this track is particularly timeless.
Las caleñas son como las flores Que vestidas van de mil colores
Faltan cinco pa’ las doce (Néstor Zavarce)
Finally a December classic with lyrics vaguely relating to the time of year! Like many of the songs you’ll hear this month, it originated in Venezuela, but the DJ is not worth the name if he’s not putting this one on at five to twelve. (Expats are advised to find a stand-in Mum in advance.)
Faltan cinco pa’ las doce El año va a terminar Me voy corriendo a mi casa A abrazar a mi mamá
Cabeza de hacha (El Burro Mocho)
‘Axe head’ by The Dehorned Donkey may sound a little like a spoof heavy metal band, but in fact it is a classic that rings out across the country from the Eje cafetero to Valledupar during the holidays. El Burro Mocho was born Noel Petro in Cerete, Córdoba, in 1936 and became a pioneer of the tropical and vallenato genres. Mind you, if you examine the lyrics you’ll find that the tía has some front complaining about the alleged melancholic nature of British Christmas music…
He vivido soportando martirios, martirios Jamás debo de mostrarme cobarde Arrastrando esta cadena tan fuerte Hasta que mi triste vida se acabe
This is but a glimpse…
…of the fascinating music you’ll hear in Colombia this Christmas. Notable tragic absences here that will definitely not be absent at your parties are the likes of Fruko y Sus Tesos, El Cuarteto Imperial, Alfredo Gutiérrez, Diomedes Díaz (if you’re anywhere near the costa), Octavio Mesa and Las Hermanitas Calle if you’re partying with paisas, Los Corraleros de Majagual (Los Beatles colombianos), Helenita Vargas, and Nury Borrás.
Festival and light displays from the Andes to the Caribbean.
Medellín lights from festivities past. Photo: laloking97 on Creative Commons
December in Colombia is a magical time and an opportunity to leave the capital and check out some of the most incredible light displays across the country.
Villa de Leyva, Boyacá
One of the most beloved Christmas light destinations in Colombia, only about 150 kilometers away from Bogotá, is Villa de Leyva, a town known for its particularly festive light displays. In addition to keeping its celebratory lights on for the full month of December, the town hosts a much-loved weekend event, el Festival de Luces, or the Festival of Lights. This year, the celebration will take place from December 6 to 8, with December 7, el día de las velitas, the day of the candles, falling smack in the middle of the three-day festival.
Otherwise known as The Festival of the Virgin Mary’s Immaculate Conception, día de las velitas, can trace its history to December 7, 1854, when Pope Pius IX declared that the Virgin Mary was conceived outside of original sin. Colombians marked this occasion by lighting candles and the tradition stuck. In Villa de Leyva, December 7 is a precursor to Christmas, with a calendar of events that includes choral shows, painting exhibitions, and a special annual fireworks show. You can expect to see the best home-made fireworks in the country, with a stunning display and fierce competition based on luminosity, height and shape.
Quimbaya, Quindío
In Quimbaya, a small town just northwest of Armenia in the heart of the Quindío department, el día de las velitas takes on its own, unique form. Locals refer to the tradition as la fiesta de velas y faroles, or the festival of candles and lanterns because they take the festivities to another level with lanterns in addition to candles. Regional artisans work to painstakingly create individual, ornate lanterns that illuminate each town block through the night of December 7.
It takes more than 100 lanterns to light up each town block, making for over 40,000 lanterns in total. The regional tradition is so special, that in 2009 it was deemed of “intangible cultural heritage” to the department of Quindío in 2009 by the national Ministry of Culture.
Medellín, Antioquia
Alumbrados Navideños, Medellín’s official annual Christmas light displays, is back in 2019 with an extra surprise. While the major display will be in el Parque Norte amusement park, there will be an additional display in Parques del Río, where the river itself will be lit with changing coloured-lights. As in years past, the Parque Norte display will be accompanied by a market selling food, drink, Christmas-themed items, and local crafts.
In addition to the two main attractions, every park in Medellin’s 16 comunas will be decorated with light. This is a feat that takes all year to plan and that had the participation of 220 city residents. Many Paisas will also participate in the tradition of hopping on a festive chiva and touring the city’s best light displays. The lights will glow from November 29 through January 6.
Barranquilla, Atlántico
Rather than being concentrated in any one central point in the city, Barranquilla’s Christmas light display is spread out throughout the city in 19 significant points of interest, including the central Plaza de la Paz and Plaza de San Nicolás.
Cali, Valle del Cauca
Cali’s larger-than-life annual celebration, la feria de Cali, takes over the city from Christmas Day to December 30, when Colombia’s salsa capital celebrates its signature dance. Naturally, the city is also decorated with a festive light display to accompany the world-class salsa and local traditions of the feria. The main light display is concentrated along the Bulevard del Río, where thousands of caleños gather before the start of the feria, when they head to the Salsódromo for the main rumba.
Bogotá
The capital turns up the power at Christmas as well. The lights are already on and you’ll find big displays up north around the Zona T, Calle 85, Parque El Virrey, Parque de la 93, Parque El Tunal, Parque de los Novios and around the Biblioteca Virgilio Barco again. As part of la ruta del navidad several other Christmas activities will take place during December, including the ciclovía nocturna on December 12.
Kroc Institute reports that 42% of gender commitments in Colombia’s 2016 peace agreement have not yet been started, compared with 27% overall.
The lack of implementation of the gender element from the peace agreement was also a reason for the recent protests. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
New analysis released today highlights a clear gap in the implementation of gender specific aspects of the Colombian peace agreement and stresses that the active participation of women is fundamental to constructing a lasting peace.
It has been three years since the historic signing of Colombia’s peace agreement. And one of the many reasons given by the protestors for the current demonstrations is a frustration with the slowness of the agreement’s implementation.
Another issue that has driven people to the streets is gender inequality and violence against women, which is why today’s report – which examines the implementation of the gender specific aspects of the peace accord – is so timely.
The Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies has developed a matrix that measures the implementation of peace agreements, analysing over 30 different accords that have been signed since 1989.
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Some of the placards seen at the women’s march during the national strike. Photos: Lukas Kaldenhoff and Oli Pritchard
Recognising that ending decades of conflict will not happen overnight, it follows over 570 specific measures in the Colombian agreement and not only analyses the level of implementation, but also compares it with similar processes in other countries.
According to its April analysis this year, Colombia has begun to implement more than two-thirds of its commitments, which is on a par with peace agreements in other countries. However, today’s report shows that gender issues are an area where the country is falling behind.
The study, carried out in collaboration with the International Accompaniment Component, which includes Sweden, the Women’s International Democratic Federation and UN Women, showed that 42% of commitments related to the gender approach had not been started as of September 2019.
42% of commitments related to the gender approach had not been started as of September 2019
That compares with 27% of elements related to the overall agreement. It also shows that that a much lower percentage of gender initiatives have been completed (8% compared with 25% for the agreement as a whole).
What that means is that of the 130 gender focused commitments, about 55 have not even been started, 10 have been completed and 65 are in process. According to the institute, only two of those commitments are scheduled to begin after 2019 – the other 128 should all be in progress.
The Colombian peace accord was initially applauded for its pioneering approach to gender issues. As it was drafted, the accord highlights the importance of women’s empowerment and leadership to achieving peace, an inclusion that UN Women lauded as “a historic opportunity to transform the status of women in Colombian society through fundamental structural change.”
However, the Kroc Institute’s report, which analyses the gendered approach to implementation from September 2018 through August 2019, shows there is a major gap between the accord’s original intentions and its current achievements.
Gender implementation: Challenges and achievements
The report identified that “the most pressing remaining challenge is to provide security guarantees to female social leaders and human rights defenders.” No doubt, October’s two massacres of indigenous social leaders in Colombia’s Southwestern region of Cauca confirms this notion. If, as the original Final Peace Accords stipulate, women’s leadership is so significant to achieving peace, then defending social leaders, many of whom are women, is essential.
The Kroc Institute also identified a more nuanced challenge: initiating the implementation of the Accord’s commitments. Because many of the commitments involve long term action, a late start will have long term consequences.
Though the overall report is more critical than congratulatory, the Kroc Institute does highlight some achievements of the gendered approach to implementation. They highlight the establishment of the High Level Government Body for the Implementation of the Gender Approach, an organisational body created with the sole purpose of creating a gender and sexual orientation-inclusive plan for implementation.
Active participation of women is essential for peace
By providing a qualitative and quantitative breakdown of the state of implementation as of September 2019, the Kroc Institute makes an important, yet grim statement. While there have been advances in general implementation of the Peace Accord, the implementation of the Accord’s 130 commitments with a gendered approach is lagging behind – a truth that runs counter to the accord’s original commitment to prioritise gender parity.
The report concludes with a strong warning: “Without active participation of women in decision-making, the final peace agreement will not fulfill its purpose of closing social and economic gaps between men and women, and between individuals in the territories most affected by the armed conflict and the rest of the country.”
If you don’t know your Noche de las velitas from your Nochebuena, now’s the time to get to grips with Christmas festivities in Colombia.
Christmas Colombia: Ease into the festivities by lighting a few candles on Noche de las velitas. Photo: Sarah Lapidus
Is this your first Christmas in the country? Or your twelfth night? Either way, this quick guide will cover everything you ought to know about Christmas in Colombia.
The run up
Colombians, as we all know, love to celebrate. Whether it be someone’s birthday, or a family member passing their driving test, Colombians will take advantage of any opportunity to pull out huge speakers, blast vallenato and eat piles and piles of good food. No time is more emblematic of this celebratory predisposition than Christmas.
Therefore, to all intents and purposes your December needs to be cordoned off and declared a time for festivities, and festivities alone. The only snag in wanting to live it up as the locals do is that many events are family-centric, which can be a bit restrictive if you are a foreigner without family ties. Yet, there are many families here who be happy to open their homes and hearts to an international guest.
The merriment begins with ‘Noche de las velitas’ or candle night, which takes place on December 7. Friends, families and roomies come together in the evening to light candles of all shapes and sizes and place them on their balconies, windows or on the pavements outside their homes. Some people design and hang their own cardboard lanterns, especially in smaller towns.
The streets come alight with flickering flames and are a delight to walk along, even if you decide not to light any candles of your own. Just make sure you get wherever you want to be in good time as the roads are often jammed.
A typical Colombian family gather for the annual novena.
‘Novenas’, which begin on December 16 and run up until the 24th, are a lot less tame. A series of nightly parties, with no breaks and ending only on the big day, novenas are perhaps the most famous Colombian holiday tradition. Whilst appearing as a devoutly religious ceremony, with groups reading a series of prayers or gozos each evening, novenas are widely thought of as an excuse for families and friends to come together and celebrate.
Carols are sung, food is laid out, games and raffles are played. Many novenas even descend into fully fledged raves, with guests dancing the night away. Each novena will be different, depending on the host’s preferences, so be sure not to bring a litre bottle of aguardiente to your devoutly catholic co-worker’s evening.
The big day(s)
Perhaps where you’re from, December 25 is the Christmas day. But if you think Christmas day in Colombia is about stumbling down the stairs in your pyjamas to sit about the freshly cut tree and open presents, you are dead wrong.
For Colombians the big day is December 24, commonly known as ‘Nochebuena’. Families pick a house, gather in the living room and often fill up the entire space like sardines, all grappling for an ounce of wiggle room. Music blares from the outset. Beginning with classic festive tunes such as ‘Mi Burrito Sabanero’ it will inevitably evolve to include popular cumbia, salsa, vallenato, ranchera and reggaeton tracks.
Alcohol will flow in abundance throughout the evening, but the seasonal food is the real star. There’s sure to be tamales, which are those banana-leaf-wrapped parcels you may have spotted from afar, and buñuelos, the fried balls that come in to their own in December.
Every family is different, and in big families the feast is often a kind of potluck where different people bring different dishes. You may find lechona – a humongous roast pig stuffed with vegetables, rice and spices, that has been slow cooked for hours and hours beforehand – taking pride of place at the table, but you may also find arroz con pollo, slices of cold turkey or the not-so-Russian ensalada rusa (mayonnaise, potatoes, and peas).
There’s sweet treats aplenty. Natilla, a creamy spiced custard dish, is the festive dessert par excellence. You might also come across manjar blanco, a flan-like sweet treat and torta negra, a dense fruit cake.
A very typical Colombian Christmas treat, buñuelos y natilla.
After the food coma abates and midnight strikes, the narrative is that baby Jesus arrives and takes his place at the nativity scene, which mean that presents can finally be opened. Following this, fireworks will begin to light up the skies across the country, in all their multi-coloured glory – despite being largely illegal.
When December 25 eventually rolls round, most people are understandably exhausted, hungover, broke or some combination of all three. So, expect a quieter day that is nonetheless family-orientated. Many choose to hit the cinema, go for a walk in the park, or rustle up an outdoor barbecue.
Of course, the celebrations don’t stop there. In the downswing after ‘Nochebuena’ there are still several events and traditions to follow.
December 28 is officially known as ‘Día de los Santos Inocentes’, a commemorative occasion to honour the biblical child massacre by King Herod. It may sound bleak, but it will come as no surprise that Colombians use this day as an opportunity to have fun. Expect pranks to be pulled and practical jokes to be had. This is a day that closely resembles April Fools’ day, where creating humour at your expense is the name of the game.
Finally, New Year’s Eve or ‘Nochevieja’, the day that pulls much of the festivities to a close, will come around. Whether you need money, luck or love, there’s plenty of quirky traditions to embrace – find out more on page 21.
However you choose to celebrate – and regardless of whether you choose to take part in any or all of the traditions, food and dance that Colombians are accustomed to – we hope you enjoy the festive period.
Expoartesanías is one of the largest handicraft fairs in Latin America and is a ‘must’ for any fans of Colombian culture. Here are five tips to on how to get the most out of it.
Many colourful handmade articles are at display at Expoartesanías this year.
One of the biggest design and craft shows in Latin America marks the beginning of the end of the year and acts as a one-stop shop for Christmas bargains and presents. Expoartesanias is one of the most-attended annual fairs at Corferias and a highlight of the year for many visitors. You can wonder at the diversity and richness of Colombia’s art and cultural heritage through handmade articles, ranging from jewellery, fashion, interior design, and paintings. For artists and vendors travelling from all over Colombia, this is their annual pilgrimage to proudly showcase their crafts to around 70,000 visitors.
Corferias will fling open the doors to its seven main halls for this 29th edition of the fair. Whether you are going as a shopper or collector, as a handcraft connoisseur or casual admirer, or you’re doing your friend a favour and humouring them and helping to carry their shopping bags, here are some tips on how to navigate the fair.
1. Treat this fair as a deep-dive into Colombian culture and heritage experience. Many regions and indigenous groups are represented here through their own particular and unique crafts. See first hand the creativity of Colombian hands by witnessing how they set colour into fabric using natural dyes, forge tree roots into hanging lamp shades, or construct meticulously woven handbags from dried banana tree leaves. It is as if taking a trip to each corner of Colombia, so use it as a chance to interact with the artists, ask them questions about their craft and regions. The names and location of origin on each stall can also serve as inspiration for your next travel destination in Colombia.
2. Carry a large, comfortable and practical bag, preferably something with wheels, think of your grandma’s shopping cart. This will be a full day on your feet, walking back and forth between stalls and large halls, carrying multiple purchases from small items such as magnetic bottle openers shaped into hummingbirds to heavy and larger objects such as Ráquira ceramics. A rucksack with multiple zipped compartments will also help, so you can safely divide the breakables from bulky items and say no to those single use plastic bags. Do not bring anything aside from cash (some stalls do not accept cards though there is an ATM), a few energy bars to keep you going and a refillable water bottle. If you’ve got an eager friend, you can take it turns to carry and watch the bags.
3. Draw up a shopping list beforehand and set a rough but flexible budget, which saves you from overspending in a shopping frenzy. Expect to knock a few things off your Christmas shopping list and happen upon a few spontaneous buys, as you discover a newfound appreciation for Colombian art. The risk of overindulgence is high inside the walls of Expoartesanías. The few pesos you spend on those cute little sombrero-shaped rings for all your co-workers, can easily turn into withdrawing from your savings to buy a hammock for a summer home you’ve dreamt of but don’t even own. To create a list, check the galleries and videos from the event’s principal website to get inspired and focus on your must haves. You can also search through #expoartesanías for even more inspiration.
4. Detail your game plan. Upon receiving your visitor’s guide and map when entering Corferias spend a few minutes targeting which halls you want to spend the most time in. Each hall exhibits a new type of craftsmanship with ranging price tags. The largest hall showcases traditional art spread out on two floors, the bottom with the most economical options and the top with the more expensive finds. Other halls display the latest fashion pieces and delicate handmade jewellery.
5. Be an early-bird to avoid the crowds and ensure you have enough space physically and mentally to keep your mind focused and fresh. Make the most out of the fourteen days that the feria is open for and avoid the busy weekends. Consider going at the end of Expoartesanías as you may be able to negotiate on final pieces. Though bear in mind that you may not be left with the best articles to haggle over.
Expoartesanías Corferias, Carrera 37 #24-67 December 4-17 Monday to Sunday 10am-8pm (except December 4 when it opens at midday) COP$15,000 for adults, COP$4,000 for children
Professors democratise knowledge with free public event.
A diverse crowd gathers in Parque de los Hippies for Clases a las Calles to learn about topics related to the national strike. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
If education is a public right, why should classrooms be restricted to confined spaces in the hallowed halls of academics? To combat this exclusivity, a group of professors at Bogotá’s Universidad de Los Andes is working to democratise knowledge through the Clase a las Calles (classes on the streets) initiative.
Los Andes history professor Ana María Otero-Cleves started the Clases a las Calles initiative back in 2016 ahead of the infamous Colombian referendum on the peace accords. Since those first open-air course offerings, the group has given over 200 free lectures throughout the city, led by professors from several of the city’s institutions.
On Tuesday, at Chapinero’s Parque de los Hippies, the group hosted a national strike-themed version of Clases a las Calles titled: “What is at stake in this strike?”
David Soto, who described himself as an “unemployed student,” attended several of the day’s lectures, including those that covered the implementation of the peace accords and the state of the environment.
“I’m interested in getting to know the different points of view of those of us who support the strike,” said Soto.
“Like the petitions that we’ve made and they ‘why’ of it all. I want to educate myself on the ‘why’ of the strike and not just rely on broad strokes.”
The event kicked off at 10.30am in Bogotá’s blistering December sun with Professor Marc Hoffstetter’s talk on what is really at play in Colombia’s tributary and pension reform processes. The main theme of the discussion was to question who should be contributing to the system, and how much.
Then, professorial duo Darío Maldonado and Fabio Sánchez took on the complex topic of the state’s educational goals, emphasising the slowness of the government’s implementation of education initiatives like the expansion of public higher education. Following were talks titled “Where are we with the implementation of the peace accords?” and “Corruption and the management of public resources,” before professor Juan Camilo Cárdenas wrapped up the day with a fact-filled, comprehensive discussion on the future of the environment.
Cárdenas, who holds a PhD in Environmental and Resource Economics from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is a known scholar of the environment and its intrinsic relation to politics, economics, and social inequality. One of the major questions we face, according to Cárdenas, is how much we’re willing to give up in the short term in order to slow down the damage we are doing to the planet.
“To favour the future, we have to sacrifice the present,” said Cárdenas.
He localised his talk by discussing issues like potable water sourcing and gold deposits in the Páramo of Santurbán and the environmentally disastrous effects of Colombia’s ranching industry.
Cárdenas went on to posit that, as a society, we are not ready to tackle the epic scale of the environmental consequences we have created and that ultimately, social inequality is at the root of these issues.
After the event, industrial engineering student Juan Bastidas was sitting on a patch of grass with his friends, enjoying a free oncesitas snack courtesy of health food purveyor, Slow Foods Bogotá.
“You see it here with [the food] they’ve just handed out, you really see the unity of the people. Especially in these kinds of activities, these kinds of more critical activities that invite people to march with more specific motivations and feeling more informed,” said Bastidas.
“I think it’s really awesome because these things make the strike less exclusive by maybe including older people, more kids, and involving more people overall. It gives another face to the strike.”
Indigenous groups have been arriving in the capital in recent days and are participating in the third national strike.
The Guardia Indígena arrives at the Plaza Bolívar in the centre of Bogotá to continue the protest. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
Members of the CRIC and CRIHU tell us about the problems being faced by indigenous communities and how they hope their visit to the capital to join in with the protests will help bring about positive change.
Fabian, who is one of the indigenous leaders here in Bogotá tells us, “We don’t want war. It’s always the same story. Those who want and start the wars are the higher social classes, whilst those who are out there fighting and risking their lives are the lower social classes. We’re just being used like cannon fodder.”
On the afternoon of Sunday, December 1, crowds gathered at Parkway to take part in a march with indigenous leaders. Around one hour in, despite the wiphala flags, posters, and banging of pots and pans, there seemed to be no sign of a march, or indigenous leaders. Then, all of a sudden, marching south down the road we saw a crowd of people cheering and chanting, with a red and green flag being held up at the front of the multitude. The atmosphere magnified tenfold as everyone in the park made their way to the street to take photos and join in. It was so busy that it was slightly disorientating, but the energy could be felt all up and down Parkway.
The indigenous march made quite the impact in Parkway. Photos: Steve Hide
After nabbing the number of Fabian, one of the Guardia Indígena’s leaders, The Bogotá Post later met with these indigenous organisations, namely the CRIHU (Consejo Regional Indígena de Huila), and the CRIC (Consejo Regional Indígena del Cauca).
Walking through the Universidad Nacional campus on the way to our meeting, there were a handful of workshops and activities taking place, ranging from indigenous hand-made jewellery being sold on the university steps, to a dance performance in the main square, watched by dozens of students. Once we caught up with the Guardia Indígena we spoke to Fabian about why they have chosen to travel so far from home to take part in the marches here in Bogotá.
Parkway was full of people, rolos and indigenous alike, holdings up wiphala flags and posters.
Fabian told us that they had arrived the previous day, after 12 hours of travelling by Chiva (we didn’t ask them if it came with music included, but we did get offered some chicha from a bottle that one of the men pulled out of his pocket so we can imagine that helped the long journey), and that we can expect around 2,000 indigenous marching in the next couple of days.
After the long trip, Fabian assured us that they have been made to feel very welcome here in Bogotá so far. The only thing they haven’t been too keen on, he tells us, is the cold weather. Understandable. This sentiment was later echoed by Robert, leader of the Guardia Indigena who arrived on Thursday and told us that not only has the reception in the city been great, but that it has also given everyone, regardless of background or social class, an opportunity to “come together as brothers and share our cultures, our words, our stories, our roots, where we’re from and where we’re heading.”
Robert, leader of the Guardia Indígena
Fabian and Robert come from the Nasa community, which we were told has a population of around 247,000 who speak the language of Nasawe (‘we’ meaning language). Interestingly, we were also told that it is mainly only the men who also speak Spanish, many of the women in these communities do not.
For these people who have spent their lives in Colombia’s rural settings, coming to a huge metropolis like the city’s capital city would seem daunting, but most of the people we spoke here in Bogotá are on their second, third, and even fourth visit.
Fabian also pointed out that despite the huge disparity in lifestyles, the protests have shown that indigenous communities and those from the city share more in common than they may have previously considered. He said they “are all demanding a change, all want an end to corruption, to exploitation, want changes from the government and are all united together to make this happen: students, teachers, indigenous and afro-colombians. They want to be heard and want changes to take place.”
Luz who has travelled to Bogotá from Caquetá
We also asked Fabian and Robert, who are from Huila and Cauca respectively, about what the protests looked like back home. They said that student protests are still taking place, especially in Neiva and Popayan, and that another action of protest has been blocking off the Pan American highway, a major national and international route. Robert told us that both lanes have been blocked off, and that this was done with the aim of putting pressure on the government.
We also heard that there have been some confrontations between indigenous communities and the ESMAD, whereby bengalas (flares) have been thrown into these communities, causing damage. Fabian told us that the reason they are here in Bogotá is because they are fed up with the killing of indigenous leaders and farmers.
He told us that what they want is control of their lands, to be able to look after and protect these lands, and defend them from not just armed groups but also from multinationals who want to exploit the areas and extract their resources. Whilst discussing the confrontations, Fabian assured us that their communities aren’t afraid.
He said “For me, it is those who show up with big guns and shoot from afar who are scared, not us. All we have are our batons, which are special to us because they’re symbolic and sacred; they provide us with a direct connection to Mother Nature.”
Members of the CRIHU and the CRIC
During our chat, two older women came by to ask where they could drop off their food donations, and were directed to the university’s stadium, which from what we could peek, was filled with dozens of camping tents. Robert told us that people have dropped by to donate food and clothes, and that these donations can be made directly at the Universidad Nacional or in ‘la casa del CRIC’ which is located in La Candelaria. Fabian and Robert tell us that they’re not sure how long they’ll be in Bogotá for, but that it’ll be until they start to see some positive changes.
Strike leaders announce ‘El Paro sigue’ after meeting with the government does not reach consensus on key issues.
The protests continue as Colombia has its third national strike in two weeks. Photo: Michael Marangos
A meeting between members of the national strike committee (CNP) and the Colombian government ended today (December 3) without progress. Calls from strike leaders to ban ESMAD from the marches and allow them a television appearance were rejected.
The idea of the talks had been to agree on a roadmap that defined how the talks could move forward, although the CNP were already insisting that tomorrow’s national strike would continue as planned.
Diego Molano, who was appointed by Duque to lead the National conversation, called on the CNP yesterday to cancel tomorrow’s strike so that it would stop damaging the country’s economy.
ESMAD presence in protests
Speaking to El Tiempo today, Molano labelled two of the strike leaders’ demands “impossible”. One of those is that the controversial ESMAD riot police not be present during the marches tomorrow and the other is that the strike leaders be given a place on television to discuss unemployment.
Molano insisted that that ESMAD needed to be on the streets to safeguard the people and again voiced the government’s position that this should be a broad dialogue with all sectors, not just a discussion with the strike leaders. The government have not yet issued a formal statement following today’s talks.
One of the strike leaders and president of the central workers union, CUT, Diógenes Orjuela told press that the talks had not moved forward because there were “discrepancies” in how the two sides see the negotiation.
“We maintain the criteria that we are negotiating in the context of the demonstrations that are taking place,” he said and continued: “We will march peacefully, with colour and a Christmassy atmosphere.”
Even before the meeting, leaders were insisting the December 4 strike would go ahead. “We are willing to talk to the government, but we will not suspend the strike,” tweeted student leader Jennifer Pedraza.
Tenemos disposición de diálogo con el Gobierno, pero no suspendemos el paro del 4 de diciembre. Por el contrario, ampliamos la convocatoria para salir a las calles con mayor fuerza en defensa de las exigencias del Comité Nacional del Paro. #NoEntendieron#PudieronONoPudieron
Wednesday’s national strike will be the third in two weeks. There have been daily demonstrations since the first national strike on November 21 when 250,000 people took to the streets. The second national strike on November 27 marked an uptick in protest activity as tens of thousands of people paid tribute to student Dilan Cruz. He died after being shot by ESMAD riot police.
Strike action is set for 11 am tomorrow across the country. Bogotá mayor Enrique Peñalosa has reversed his decision to ban protests on Plaza de Bolívar, where many of the recent protests in the capital have convened.
Five marches big marches have been announced in the capital, starting from Héroes, Parque Nacional, Universidad Nacional, Parque El Tunal and Av. Boyacá with Av. 1 de Mayo. They all meet at Plaza Bolívar in centre. Two other marches will lead from the headquarter of Universidad Pedagógica Valmaría on Calle 183 #54 and from Calle 72 to Portal Norte.
In addition, more rallies are planned, especially in the north of the city. At 5 pm, strike supporters will gather around Calle 100 #15 with their preferred transportation, whether it’s car, bicycle or roller skates. Roads are expected to be blocked at Usme, Portal Norte and on Autopista Sur to Villavicencio.
It’s likely that TransMillenio will be affected by the strike as well, especially services at Suba, Héroes and Calle 80 in the north and Américas and Usme in the south.
The protests will be suported again by the indigenous guard who arrived in Bogotá at the end of last week. One of the Nasa people gathered at universidad nacional today told The Bogotá Post that as many as 2,000 of them would be marching in the capital.
There has also been an increase in anti-strike rhetoric, with government supporters saying they will wear white tomorrow to show that they do not support the strike.
In addition to tomorrow’s mobilisation, protest activity will continue this weekend. On Sunday the capital will see a big concert joined by several top Colombian artists to support the national strike, including Bomba Estéreo, Doctor Krápula and Totó la Momposina. It is set to start at Planetario Distrital at 8am.
Talks between the government and strike leaders will continue on Thursday at 2pm. But as the conversation continues, so does the strike.
Steven Gutiérrez was an eyewitness to the fatal wounding of Dilan Cruz, a young student shot with anti-riot ammunition by ESMAD riot police during Bogotá’s national strike. Since denouncing the attack – and making an official statement – Gutiérrez has received death threats. He talks to The Bogotá Post.
People pay respect to Dilan Cruz at the place of the shooting. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
The Bogotá Post: What happened after you saw Dilan Cruz shot during the protest march on November 23?
Steven Gutiérrez: After Dilan was shot we went directly towards the ESMAD officers to confront, and to film their badge numbers with our phones; so they left and took us with them; we were not doing anything, just recording them. Then they took our mobiles, they erased everything from them, and threatened us saying they had taken our pictures. I’d posted [on social networks] what had happened that day.
The Bogotá Post: You are saying you were taken by the ESMAD. Where did they take you to exactly?
Steven Gutiérrez: We don’t know exactly where because they put us in the truck, and they lowered the curtains.
The Bogotá Post: You’re saying they erased everything from your phones; did this happen inside the truck? How many more people were retained with you? Where did they drop you off?
Steven Gutiérrez: Yes, this all happened inside the truck. They erased all my videos and those of the people who were with me. That’s invasion of privacy; I also think it was illegal for them to take us that way, we had not done anything. There were five people, including me, young people. I’d decided that day to go march on my own, and I uploaded videos of what was happening; one of those is a video in which you can see ESMAD shooting at point-blank range. This video is on my Facebook homepage.
The Bogotá Post: When did you decide to make an official statement on what you witnessed when Dilan Cruz was shot?
Steven Gutiérrez: I started reading on these social networks people saying URIs – Unidades de Acción Inmediata [justice department Immediate Reaction Units] were receiving testimonies of what had happened to Dilan. I decided to go there and denounce what had happened. No-one knew I went to the URI, only members of my family who advised me not to tell anyone else.
Everything was fine, until I was sent a threat on Facebook which read: ‘We know you went to the URI…watch what you’re saying…,’. But no-one knew I had gone to the URI, only members of my family.
That’s why I took this threat very seriously. I was scared; as soon as I read the threat, I posted on my status that I had been threatened. People started posting saying they would support me. And since this happened, I feel people backing me up; I’ve received a lot of moral help and strength, and I know if something were to happen to me, there’d be proof of it, of what happened, and who did it.
The Bogotá Post: What made you go to the URI legal unit to give a statement?
Steven Gutiérrez: I did it because I feel it is my duty to tell the story of what happened so that Dilan’s case does not go unpunished. Besides, we saw what was stuck in Dilan’s head was a white cloth of sorts with pellets, ‘a recalzada,’ same as in Oscar Salas’ case which is unpunished ESMAD need to take responsibility for this [Salas was a student shot and killed by ESMAD in 2006 using anti-riot ammunition].
The Bogotá Post: You said you have received threats. Can you say more about what kind of threats you have received and how it has impacted you?
Steven Gutiérrez: On Facebook and on my mobile; I had to change my mobile number.
The Bogotá Post: The Fiscalía are interviewing witnesses – have you been called to give testimony? What do you think about the investigation?
Steven Gutiérrez: I haven’t been called by the Fiscalía.
The Bogotá Post: How have you been coping with everything that happened?
Steven Gutiérrez: I have been receiving legal assistance to denounce [the threat] to the Fiscalía, even though I don’t trust any institution of the state at the moment. I might leave the city as I am not living with my family here.
The Bogotá Post: Were you were friends with Dilan; did you know each other?
Steven Gutiérrez: No, I hadn’t met him. We were simply partners in the protest and struggle for a better future for young people. Our paths crossed at the same point. This has become a reason for me to go and march, so that we are not killed for our right to education.
As theCacerolazo Latinoamericano calls for equality and human rights in the region, one of the Chilean activists who joined in jokes that Colombians ‘have more rhythm.’
The protests continued in Parkway on December 1. Photo: Steve Hide
Some thought the national strike would have come to a stop by the first of December, a date when Colombians famously begin their month-long Christmas holiday celebrations. On the contrary, December 1 brought the Cacerolazo Latinoamericano, a call for discontented citizens in Colombia and all over Latin America to unite in a symphony of pot-banging.
“In Latin America lately, it seems like there’s an awakening in terms of what our recent governments are doing. So, through social media, we have agreed to a very symbolic, coordinated protest,” said Paola Andrea Peña, aCacerolazo Latinoamericano participant in Bogotá’s Parkway.
The call, which started circulating on social media about a week ahead December 1, was for “real policy for the progress and dignity of all Latin American people.”
The coordinated cacerolazo also sought to protest inequality and the violations of human rights throughout Latin America. Needless to say, this has been catalyzed by protests and unrest here in Colombia, as well as in Chile, Ecuador, Bolivia and Haiti.
Various activist groups, including a collective of various social justice groups in the region,La Confederación Sindical para las Américas, the Syndicated Confederation for the Americas, told El Espectador they’d coordinated the eventto express their support for social justice activism in the region.
Latin Americans living outside of the continent also joined in to show solidarity, coming together in Paris, on the Champs de Mars in front of the Eiffel Tower, and in several Australian cities, including Sydney and Melbourne. One of the participants told RCN that the aim was to “accompany, from a distance, the national strike developing in Colombia and in other parts of Latin America.”
This wasn’t the first time that Colombians abroad participated in the paro nacional. On November 21, people came together in New York City’s Time Square and in several other cities around the world to support the strike from afar.
“This is something for the same purpose but [within the context of] the bigger picture,” said bogotano Iván Rodríguez when we asked him about the Cacerolazo Latinoamericano. “Because at the end of the day, the same economic issues are coming up throughout the whole region. I think this moment is too special to let it pass by.”
At Sunday’s Cacerolazo Latinoamericanoin Parkway, husband and wife Victor Manuel Alvarado Cárdenas and Esther Nieto de Alvarado expressed their ardent support for the event. “How great that all of these countries are supporting each other and are rising up against their governments that aren’t supporting young people,” said Nieto de Alvarado.
Victor Manuel Alvarado Cárdenas and Esther Nieto de Alvarado joined Parkway Cacerolazo Latinoamericano. Photo: Tasha Sandoval
She went on to explain why she supports Colombia’s national strike overall, and why she made the effort to show up to Sunday’s event. “We are protesting for the students, so that young people can have more opportunity. They are on the streets because they don’t have enough opportunity to study. That’s why there’s so much ignorance and so much unemployment,” said Nieto de Alvarado. “It’s for our grandchildren!” she added.
In Mexico City, teacher and activist Camilo Rojas participated in the Cacerolazo Latinoamericano with fellow Chileans, Colombians, and Ecuadorians. As a Chilean activist living outside of Chile, Rojas has been helping to organize demonstrations, talks, and cacerolazos since mid-October.
“The Chilean community here has been protesting for so long that we’re a bit tired. So it was really nice to see the big contingent of Colombians and to hear their chants and their rhythm,” said Rojas. “They have more rhythm than us,” he joked.
“Something that was really beautiful about this event is that it was an opportunity for us [as Chileans] to unite with other people from Latin America. I feel that Latin America is very beaten down right now, very hurt. This is a pain known throughout Latin America. Something that I’ve learned from fighting the Chilean cause here in Mexico is that we all need to be more conscious and learn about the history and politics of the rest of Latin America.”
The small business community is feeling the effects of the protests, but many still support the movement.
Photo: Tim Mossholder, Unsplash
According to national merchant’s federation Fenalco, the Colombian economy lost more than COP$150 billion daily in the strike’s first week, between November 21 and 28. They also calculate that COP$50 billion of the money lost can be directly attributed to disruptions in Bogotá.
The US dollar also shot up significantly in the last week, as foreign investors got nervous about the protests and their potential economic consequences. As of Monday morning, December 2, the dollar is at COP$3,515.
The hospitality industry has been particularly hard hit, as tourists and business travelers have cancelled their plans. According to la Asociación Hotelera y Turística de Colombia (Cotelco), Colombia’s hotel and tourism association, the industry has lost an estimated COP$1 billion since the strike began.
To express their discontent with the economic slowdown, business owners in the central business district of San Victorino protested against the strike on Thursday, November 28. People expressed frustration at how much the strike has slowed down business, as limited transportation and fear of getting caught up in a riot kept many bogotanos off the streets.
Eneldo 100% Natural, a vegan restaurant across the street from la Universidad Nacional, has had to shut its doors often since protests began. The restaurant, which has been open for a little over two years, has served the Nacional community, as well as its surrounding neighborhood of El Recuerdo, offering no-frills vegan lunches.
Eneldo 100% Natural had to shut its doors on November 29. Photo: Tasha Sandoval
Despite the instability, the restaurant’s owners, Ingrid Alejandra Castro Caro and Diego Armando Jimenez Parra expressed unequivocal support for the strike. “My husband and I have always supported the strike,” said Castro Caro.
“Whenever we can, we march with the youth, but there are consequences. These are consequences and we knew going into it, being surrounded by a public university, especially la Nacional, that this kind of thing happens. It’s something that’s always going to happen. We support the strike because if the government listens to the people who are protesting, it’s going to be for the betterment of all of these young people, to all these people that will come after us.”
“And so we support the strike 100%, but we small business owners have to look to other opportunities.”
Ingrid Alejandra Castro Caro, vegan restaurant owner
Castro Caro explained that due to a combination of circumstances, Eneldo 100% Natural closed its doors on Friday, November 29. Slow service during the long student strikes at La Nacional in 2018 caused the restaurant to close for weeks on end or open and serve less than ten lunches per day. After the strike ended, business never picked up again.
“There just isn’t real stability,” said Castro Caro. “And so we support the strike 100%, but we small business owners have to look to other opportunities. We have to try to not get angry and not think ‘Oh no, now I have to close up shop because of these young protesters.’ No, we have to see it as hope that something is going to change in the future. And as they say, as one door closes another one opens.”
Marcela Orozco, owner of dance studio Suculenta Escuela de Baile in the North’s El Retiro neighbourhood, has also felt the effects of the strike.
“What happens in the city, what happens in the country, affects everyone’s mood, even when it comes to something as fun as going to dance class,” said Orozco.
She first cancelled planned dance classes on the night of the national strike of November 21. Transportation throughout the city became so complicated that she went on to cancel her classes, which go from 5 to 9 pm, for 8 consecutive days.
“It amazes me, really, that a lot of people who you might think would never be willing to go out and march for their country are maybe doing it this time”
Marcela Orozco, dance studio owner
“It was worrisome to leave at that time and not know if we were going to be able to get transport. That’s the fundamental reason that we decided not to have class the day of the strike,” said Orozco.
Orozco added that she also “understood that the mood of the people and the city’s conditions weren’t in line with going to dance.”
Despite the effects that it has had on her dance studio, Orozco fully supports the strike, and expressed optimism about its possible effects.
“It amazes me, really, that a lot of people who you might think would never be willing to go out and march for their country are maybe doing it this time,” said Orozco.
“People think that you can’t change things by banging on a pan but I do think that the fact that everyone’s going out on the streets and that people are uniting under the same sentiment can be the beginning of the government starting to take on a different attitude. I think that strikes are an extreme measure, but I also think that this time, it’s been different.”
We dip into the national conversation with a look at what was talked about in yesterday’s environmental discussion.
The environment was also a topic during the protests. Photo: Otto Berchem
There are two ‘national conversations’ taking place in Colombia at the moment. One is on the streets where the protests continue, and the other is the official ‘national conversation’ that the government announced over the weekend.
Strike organisers have said they won’t participate in the national conversation which started on Tuesday because it does not address the reasons that people are protesting, which they’ve shared in a manifesto. But what is being discussed in this national conversation? And who is joining those discussions?
On Wednesday, they talked about education. Today was about transparency and anti-corruption. And yesterday was about the environment. Since there’s not a lot of coverage of what’s happening in those debates we translated and summarised the account from Camilo Prieto, spokesperson of the Movimiento Ambientalista Colombiano who took to Facebook live to share his perspective.
Prieto, a surgeon and philosopher who “dreams of a country where education and the protection of the environment are vital axes”, presented a summary of the conversation held yesterday with the ministers and the president. The surgeon and activist says in his video stream that he does not intend to substitute the general conversation, but rather act as a conduit so we can all understand, and in turn, share this understanding of the environmental issues besieging the country. He’s invited the general public to contribute to this conversation by exerting pressure in a respectful, non-violent yet vehement way.
The meeting was attended by the president, the ministers of mining, and the environment and representatives from different environmental organizations. A number of environmental organizations decided not to attend. Prieto talked about the three specific proposals he and his movement have, and about the conclusions to the meeting.
Issue 1: Deforestation
According to the Movimiento Ambientalista Colombiano, this is the most serious environmental problem Colombia is facing, and one which damages the climate stability of the country both now and in the future.
Deforestation is one of the main generators of greenhouse gases, because of the scale at which it is destroying the forests. This releases even more carbon into the air than heavy industry. He said this not new information, but stressed that 70% of the deforestation in Colombia is concentrated in the Amazon – and this is dramatic. According to Prieto, studies conducted by Fedesarrollo state that 60% of that deforestation is connected to extensive livestock production. In Colombia alone, 38.9 million hectares are used for livestock production alone, in an unsustainable manner, and within a framework that is almost feudalistic.
The movements’ proposal is to migrate livestock production to something called a silvopasture system – a mutually beneficial way to integrate forage, trees, and animal grazing. According to experts, this diversifies farm income sources as well as the overall viability of the farm. It also expands the abundance and diversity of wildlife, and contributes to carbon sequestration and climate change mitigation.
According to Prieto, the president’s answer to this suggestion was: “People will be given the chance to voluntarily migrate to silvopasture systems.” The environmentalist was not satisfied with this answer. For him, this is not about giving people the chance to voluntarily migrate to those systems, but about creating public policies which lead the country to more sustainable cattle-raising. Prieto also called the National Development Plan’s target that allows 220,000 hectares of deforested areas per year totally despicable, and inadmissible.
Issue 2: Public Health, and Environmental Degradation
There is no denying the alarming degree to which environmental degradation has harmed public health, not only in Colombia, but around the world. Dr Prieto commented on the absence of the Ministry of Health at the meeting. He was concerned as he feels public health needs to be tackled through a joint effort involving both ministries and there is no consensus as to the amount of money spent on health issues stemming from environmental degradation.
Prieto invited the president to check the three reports available at the website of the National Planning Department (Dirección Nacional de Planeación) which portray very different expense figures in that respect: COP$15.6 billion in one, COP$12 billion in the second one, and between COP$2-12 billion in the last one.
“In Colombia, we don’t have the slightest idea of how much environmental degradation is affecting the health of Colombians, and how much it is costing us,” says Prieto. “This demonstrates a disconnect between the ministries.”
Issue 3: The Escazú Agreement
The regional Escazúagreement was signed last year to increase access to information, public participation and justice in environmental matters. The treaty “aims to combat inequality and discrimination and to guarantee the right of every person to an equal environment and to sustainable development. In so doing, it devotes particular attention to persons and groups in vulnerable situations, and places equality at the core of sustainable development”.
Speaking more in layman’s terms, Prieto explained at the meeting that the agreement compels governments to be more transparent with the environmental information available, not only the academic information, but also that which relates to environmental conflict.
This agreement was signed on three main axes: sharing environment-related information, sharing judicial information related to environmental conflict, protecting environmental leaders – a key aspect. Prieto reminded the audience in his live video that Colombia is the second most dangerous place in the world for environmental activism. He invited the president to enter the agreement, to which Colombia is not a signatory, but a mediator.
If the government signs the agreement, it would mean committing to transparency on environmental data. Prieto states that there are big interests that often trump the flow of the judicial proceedings in this respect. He provides a simple example why this matters: Only people in Bogotá and Medellín have access to open data about air quality.
Prieto says no conclusions were reached at the end of the meeting, and the government did not make any commitments regarding these three issues. His only hope is for more people to help feed the protests with arguments, peacefully, and to share this information to exert a vehement, solid, categorical, and unrelenting pressure on the government. When it comes to the environment, our country needs to be re-routed and change its mentality.
The country has seen over a week of mass protests. Here’s a quick rundown of some numbers that stand out from the national strike so far.
Thousands of Colombians joined protests on November 27, for the seventh day in a row. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
When the National Strike was announced for November 21, no one could really say what was in store for Colombia. As the protests enter their ninth day, here’s a quick wrap up of what’s happened so far.
In preparation for the first day of the strike, the government employed 170,000 officers for security enforcement and closed all of its land and sea border crossings. Two days prior, police also searched the homes of 27 people thought to be involved in the protests.
Thursday, November 21, brought a conservative estimate of 250,000 people from all backgrounds out onto the streets across the country to join the paro nacional or national strike. The day began peacefully in the capital, where at least 34 different marches took place but saw some ugly scenes in the afternoon when riots between protesters and ESMAD riot police erupted.
The events of Thursday left 68 bus stations vandalised and the TransMilenio remained out of service on Friday. It also moved the government to enact a curfew in Bogotá from 9pm–6am on November 22. The last time that happened was in September 1977, when the capital faced labour riots which left 13 dead, more than 100 injured and more than 4,000 arrested.
So far in this national strike: According to the BBC, at least four people have died and 533 were injured – 351 of them were protestors and 182 police. The Fiscalia says that 172 people were arrested.
Colombian protests in numbers. Credit: Lukas Kaldenhoff
The death of 18-year old protester Dilan Cruz shocked the nation. He was shot by ESMAD riot police on Saturday and passed away on Monday after several days in intensive care at San Ignacio hospital. According to the autopsy report, he was killed by the impact of so-called ‘bean bag’ shots which caused severe and irreversible brain damage.
Earlier this week, the national strike committee published a list of 13 demands to the government. The manifesto includes the withdrawal of the draft tax reforms, dissolution of ESMAD, and a call for the government to fully implement the peace agreement signed in Havanna in 2016.
Members of the committee met with President Duque on Tuesday but left because he wanted them to participate in the Gran Conversacion Nacional rather than discussing their manifesto. They told press immediately afterwards that the protests will continue and insisted that the government needs to listen to the demands of the Colombian people.
As we head into the ninth day of protests, there is no end in sight.
A tempered conversation on women in journalism quickly became a heated debate as panelists hurled opposing opinions at one another and audience members interjected with frustrations and jeers.
So unfolded el Conversatorio Mujeres Poderosas, the Powerful Women’s Talk, a flagship event for the sixth annual Ni con el Pétalo de una Rosa festival.
Ni con el pétalo de una rosa,which translates as “not even with a rose petal” is a multidisciplinary festival that promotes respect and the rights of women and girls. Colombian actress and Casa Ensamble founder, Alejandra Borrero, has been spearheading the two-week festival since 2013 and has been hosting the Conversatorio Mujeres Poderosas for eight years.
The talk featured an impressive panel of some of Colombia’s best known women broadcast journalists: María Elvira Samper (RCN), Vanessa de la Torre (Noticias Caracol), Camila Zuluaga (Blu Radio y Noticias Caracol), D’Arcy Quinn (Caracol Radio), and moderated by María Elvira Arango (Caracol Television).
Women can inspire women
According to the festival’s website, the talk’s aim is to be “a space where women can inspire women and where women can demonstrate that through their leadership in different spaces, women have been able to break barriers and flaunt their female power.”
Arango started out asking some simple questions about the journalists’ experience as women in journalism. The critical feminism of Zuluaga, the youngest woman on the panel, stuck out as she first questioned why there are still so few women in leadership in journalism.
“As a woman at the table, I felt that my opinion was valued less than that of the men,” said Zuluaga in reference to her early years in journalism.
Arango lost control as moderator early on, as Zuluaga and de la Torre went head-to-head on several subjects, including their opinions on womens’ emotionality and the gender pay gap. When Zuluaga expressed her frustration at finding out that she was getting paid less than a male colleague in a lower-ranked position, De la Torre responded by suggesting that in these situations “maybe the man really has more experience.” This provoked disdain from much of the crowd, who responded indignantly and shouted “No!”
On feminism, De la Torre stated that women of her generation have an obligation to be feminists. However, she went on to suggest that women should stop complaining, focus on moving forward, and pay homage to the women who came before them. Zuluaga took a much more radical approach, arguing that women are often mistaken as too emotional because they have to be.
“We are fighting to exist and succeed in a man’s world,” said Zuluaga.
When Arango asked the panel about the topic that has most stook with them, the subject of war came up multiple times. D’Arcy, daughter of American journalist Tom Quinn, talked of the emotionally-scarring professional experiences she went through when covering the war in Colombia in the 1990’s. Samper expanded on this with her own account, reminding audiences of her news coverage during the 1990s, a time of heavy narcotrafficking-related violence known as la epoqua de las bombas or the bomb era.
“The war has affected us deeply. And the sad truth of it is that we haven’t learned everything that we should have learned,” said Samper.
Borrero chimed in on the subject of war when closing the event, remembering the way she used to always carry boots in her truck, just in case they came for her.
To close the panel, Arango asked the women to reflect on today’s political situation as it relates to the field of journalism.
“We have to try not to stoke the fire. We have to try to find windows of opportunity, beyond staying within exaggeration and violence and what doesn’t work,” said Samper.
D’Arcy added with a similar sentiment.
“I think that it’s time to reconsider activism and go back to journalism. Social media is capable of generating mass panic. We need to dedicate ourselves to finding the truth.”
When asked about what focus Colombian journalists should have during these trying times, Zuluaga turned to social inequality. “Asking ‘why’ is really important because we have a lot of social issues here,” said Zuluaga.
Despite the strong disagreement and obvious political incompatibility that existed on the panel, the event managed to end with an amicable, hopeful tone, when Borrero expressed that the conversation had only hit the tip of the iceberg.
Director Rian Johnson takes a break from the Star Wars saga to craft an entertaining whodunit, which serves as a tribute to the crime novels of the great Agatha Christie, while also adding some new twists to the genre in Knives Out.
Knives Out gathers a cast of familiar faces including Chris Evans and Daniel Craig (Captain America and James Bond, respectively), as well as Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Shannon and newcomers Katherine Langford and Jaden Martell.
The story revolves around the mysterious death of Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plumber), a highly-successful crime writer and patriarch of the Thrombey family. A few days after Harlan’s passing, private detective Benoit Blanc (Craig) comes into investigate the Thrombey family and identify if there is foul play involved, which he suspects.
The nature of the film means it’s hard to talk about it without giving away any spoilers. But from the very beginning Rian Johnson hooks you in with a relentless pace.
Despite the ensemble of Hollywood heavy-hitters, the role of the protagonist in this story – or at least a character the audience can root for and identify with – is played by Ana de Armas as Marta Cabrera, the nurse who took care of Harlan and was also his confidante. Armas’ captivating performance manages to support the film and turns it into a cohesive tale we can follow.
To solve the mystery, Johnson uses a variety of cinematic elements that are often found in these type of murder-mystery movies: different point of views, missing pieces of overheard conversations, false allies, false leads or mistakes that will risk the life of the protagonist.
But the director doesn’t underestimate the audience either, he’s not afraid of explaining everything and then leaving some room for the audience to connect the dots. That, however, often leads viewers to the wrong conclusions since the screenplay keeps at every twisting at every turn – but all without ever becoming illogical.
The overriding purpose of Knives Out is to tell an entertaining mystery story, but that doesn’t mean some deeper themes aren’t lightly touched on, like the current migration crisis in the United States, class divides and the lack of real emotional connections in modern families who prioritise material possessions over honest relationships.
Knives Out is, for my money, one of the best movies of the year, taking you on an exciting ride from the initial logos to the end credits. Rian Johnson manages to deliver an excellent crime mystery tale, supported by some of the most in-demand A-listers of the moment. This is a movie that keeps you at the edge of your seat, inviting you to form your own theories and try to solve the mystery by yourself, using the many hints delivered throughout the runtime.
How this peaceful protest method originated and how bogotanos are making it their own.
Natalia Gordillo and Katherin Martinez attended the protest concert, “Toquerolazo de Queda” on Sunday to express their support of the protests.
If you’re one of the many protesters that has been out five nights in a row banging on a pot or pan for hours on end, you might be wondering – who had this idea in the first place?
When asked, several city residents attributed the origins of the cacerolazo to 20th century protests in Chile and Venezuela. It turns out that the history of this radical, nonviolent form of protest can be traced much further back all the way to 19th century France.
France
The July Monarchy, which took hold of France from 1830 and 1848, was very controversial, especially for the Republicans who opposed it. Republicans started banging on pots and pans in front of government buildings to jeer at July Monarchy public servants. France took up the cacerolazo or la casserolade again just two years ago, when many took to the streets of Paris to protest President Emmanuel Macron’s planned labor reforms.
Chile
In the early 1970s, the peaceful protest method somehow made its way across the Atlantic, over the Andes all the way to Salvador Allende’s Chile, where upper-middle class women started banging on kitchenware to protest the socialist government. Specifically, they were expressing their discontent with the food shortages the country was experiencing after US-imposed economic sanctions. In 1971, anti-socialist women filled the streets of Santiago in a march that came to be known as La marcha de las cacerolas vacías, or the march of the empty pots. This seems to be the first time the cacerolazo took on its obvious symbolism: making noise with kitchenware was an expression of hunger and frustration with food shortages.
Following Allende’s demise and Pinochet’s rise, Chile took on the cacerolazo again in 1983, when labour groups protested Pinochet’s dictatorship by banging on pots and pans from the safety of their homes, under the cover of night.
Argentina
In 2001, well-to-do Argentinians took to the streets of Buenos Aires to express their frustrations with the country’s economic collapse when the Argentine peso’s extreme devaluation caused many to lose their life savings.
Quebec
Student casserolades broke out in May 2012 in Montreal, after the provincial government introduced Bill 78, a bill that would place strict restrictions on the right to protest. This was in response to increasing student protests regarding ever-increasing university tuition fees. The human rights commission eventually issued a fierce condemnation of the bill and after a government change in September, the controversial bill was repealed.
Catalonia
In 2017, when Catalonians were getting ready to vote on their referendum on independence, 15-minute long cacerolazos broke out nightly in Barcelona. Catalonians who were expressing their support for independence were influenced by the many Argentinian immigrants living in Barcelona who had lived through the cacerolazos of 2001.
Venezuela
In Venezuela, the cacerolazo can be traced back to the late 1980s and early 1990s when citizens protested the economic reforms of then-President Carlos Andrés Pérez. Disapproval of President Pérez culminated in the Cacerolazo of 1992, when a large contingent of working-class Caraceños filled the streets with the defiant sounds of pot-banging and horns.
On its last legs, this pan has felt the pangs of social unrest for four consecutive nights.
More recently, the Venezuelan cacerolazo evolved into a less public form of protest. Discontented Venezuelans banged on pots and pans from their homes and from out of their windows, without necessarily gathering en masse in the streets. Cacerolazos became an almost commonplace occurrence throughout Hugo Chavez’s entire administration, including an exceptional demonstration in 2012, when Chavez mocked the movement by getting out of his car and dancing to the rhythm of the banging. Citizens have expressed their disapproval of President Nicolás Maduro and their desperation in the face of Venezuela’s situation with cacerolazos as well, most recently with one in January of this year.
Colombia
Since the night of November 21, Colombia has been making its own mark in the history of this revolutionary form of peaceful protest. To date, protesters have made themselves heard for five consecutive nights of cacerolazos in the capital and around the country. Though most protesters, often students and young people, are steadfast in their commitment to continued nightly cacerolazos, other residents have expressed their discontent – they just want to get a good night’s sleep. Beyond the controversy, one thing is clear: Colombia is making noise and the world is listening.
On Sunday, calls for a cacerolazo Latinoamericano next Sunday, December 1, started circulating. The flyer for the event calls on all of Latin America to protest peacefully and in unison, “Because we are calling for real policy for the progress and dignity of all Latin American people.”
In their own words: Young bogotanos tell why they are participating in the cacerolazo and what the movement means to them
Sebastián Rojas, English teacher
What does the cacerolazo mean to you?
“For me, the cacerolazo is a movement… all of the proposals that the President had during his campaign haven’t been accomplished and well you know, the government has been influenced by the extreme right, and so people are tired of it.”
Why are you protesting?
“We’re trying to show that we have a voice. We want to do something. We have a voice and we’re trying to show that we’re not just objects that can be manipulated by the government.”
“The cacerolazo is just a call. People bring out whatever they can to make noise. If voices are not enough, than noise can be something that the government might listen to.”
What would you say to residents who are complaining about the continued noise and the disruption to their daily lives?
“I would have to say that they have to stand it. I would say that the majority of the Bogotá
population is very involved in it.”
Natalia Gordillo, Ilustrator
What does the cacerolazo mean to you?
“It’s a subversive, non-aggressive way to show that there’s something wrong with your country. It’s a way of making noise without resorting to violent methods.”
Why are you protesting?
“The first is for the assassination of social leaders and the second is because young people aren’t going to have job security, especially if we don’t have access to a pension, even less if they start paying us hourly.”
What would you say to residents who are complaining about the continued noise and the disruption to their daily lives?
“Don’t let privilege cancel out your empathy.”
Silvia Bastidas, Textile designer
What does the cacerolazo mean to you?
“I feel that we’re using pots and pans as a revolutionary act. That it comes from the tradition of expressing hunger, that there’s no food, but that in this moment, we’re just doing it to be heard – to make noise and to protest. The day of the curfew, I found it delightful to see how we all left our homes to make ourselves heard. Neighbours all went out from their balconies, because it’s necessary that they hear us.”
Why are you protesting?
“The president can’t be indifferent to this call. We’re marching for a lot of things: the environment, food prices, pensions, labour, student unions – we can’t continue to be mistreated. I also feel that he should at least sit down with one person from each labour union that is marching. Not just make plans to meet with businessmen, who aren’t the ones who need change.”
What would you say to residents who are complaining about the continued noise and the disruption to their daily lives?
“If they don’t like it, well it’s up to them to stay home in agreement with all of the bad things that are happening. But they should respect us and try to understand all that we’re trying to do. This isn’t just about art or to make noise, but also about so many other things that also concerns and affects them, in so many ways.”
“You can’t do anything else but support or open your eyes. That’s why I invite them to fight. If not now, than on the first of December, when there will be a Latin American cacerolazo. We’re all going to get together for a cacerolazo that is heard around the world.”
Toquerolazo de Queda: Local musicians add a new note to the protests.
Los Fumadores playing at the Toquerolazo.
A number of independent musicians performed on Sunday night in the main square of Calle 85. Local bands such as Los Viles, Aguas Ardientes, Montaña and Los Fumadores added their music to the drum beat of banging pots in an expression of unity and strength.
The bands used their music and songs to demand change and express solidarity with the protestors. And time and again the demand for change and rejection of violence came from the crowds.
Despite the cacerolazo making it difficult to hear the concert, thousand or so people in attendance seemed happy to be united behind a common cause, hitting their pots and pans and holding up their handmade signs. The Bogotá Post spoke to some of the crowd about the event and what the strike means to them, and here’s what they had to say.
Toquerolazo: Signs reading ‘You don’t deserve us. We’re love, not hate. We’re peace, not war. We’re us. Not Duque. Not Uribe.’ and ‘I had the good fortune of studying and working, that’s why today I’m standing up for those who have not been able to.’
“It was impressive to hear the cacerolazo because it having started from the city centre, I never imagined that it would reach my area, but it did, and it was exciting […] I love that everyone is protesting peacefully. Millions and millions of us Colombians are saying that we need a better quality of life, we need pensions, and we need education. We’re also out protesting against the violence that took place yesterday at the hands of the police, because we’re fed up of being attacked, fed up of being killed, and we’re saying “enough is enough.” We want to make a change. – Natalia
‘Four-day strike’
“[This protest] is a way for us to express ourselves to the government. We’ll see what happens after all of this but I think it has the potential to solve a lot of issues. […] The protest is very peaceful. Look around, everyone has been protesting in an artistic way: through music, through art, and very few have been violent. We don’t want violence to be a part of the protest. That’s not our aim. Our aim is to be listened to.” – Joan
“Thursday was the biggest day in terms of the protests […] There were marches happening everywhere and I think that it was a historical moment for Colombia in terms of the magnitude of people who came together that day. […] This country has a lot of problems, all of which are important and need to be addressed: The corruption, the insecurity, the violence taking place in rural areas, the fact that 18 children were killed in a camp when their presence was known beforehand! […] I think that the President must be afraid right now, not because of violence but because of the magnitude of people that are demanding change, not just here but in all of Latin America. – Benjamin
“This protest is about dialogue; it’s not an attack. Because despite some of the chaos that’s taken place, there have also been so many recreational spaces, filled with dance, song, art. For example the cacelorazo, which has involved so many people and become contagious in many ways. It’s become a huge wave rippling through the city, and in other parts of the country, too.” – Luis
‘Duque has us like Britney Spears in 2007’
“It’s so cool that we’ve reached a fourth day of protests. There are a lot of problems here and we need a change. […] Everything that’s happening in Latin America seems to have also opened Colombia’s eyes. […] It’s great because before, protests weren’t as strong. Now, it’s so much better because people are more unified. […] I think this kind of event, with small independent bands, is a great way of protesting and it’s really beautiful, because it brings together all different kinds of culture and of course different kinds of people. musicians, graffiti artists. It’s cool, really cool.” – Natalia
Toquerolazo: Hundreds of young people gathered in the square to participate in the protest with their pots and pans’
“There are a lot of concerns regarding this government, but one of my biggest concerns is that of animal rights, for example the recent increase in shark hunting quotas. It’s important for us to speak up for those who don’t have a voice. […] Events like this are fantastic, it’s through art and love is how we should express ourselves and show the world that we’re not the vandals that they try to portray us as. We’re all here dancing, singing, shouting, expressing ourselves in all kinds of different ways and look, there’s no violence, there’s no vandalism, we’re not doing anything, we’re all here in peace. It’s beautiful. – Juan
Dilan Cruz, who was shot by ESMAD on Saturday, has died in hospital.
People have been paying their respects at the place where Dilan was shot. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
Yesterday should have been Colombian teenager Dilan Cruz’s graduation from high school. He didn’t attend. He was far from home in hospital at San Ignacio, with grave injuries which he later succumbed to. His injuries were not from a misjudgement of his or some terrible accident, they were entirely avoidable. He was killed by a person who was ostensibly there to protect the peace, but who instead recklessly killed a citizen he was sworn to serve.
He was killed in a callous fashion. This was no running battle or even a true heat-of-the-moment decision. Video footage is being widely circulated which shows Dilan moving away from the scene of the conflict. This was not a violent clash between protesters and police, just a clearing of the area by ESMAD. He didn’t move as fast as his friends, and one of the ESMAD forces levelled his tear gas grenade launcher and fired a grenade directly at the young man from close range. It penetrated his skull and he fell immediately.
Last night saw an impromptu commemoration for Dilan Cruz. Even at nearly midnight, a large crowd turned out to pay their respects.#DilanCruzpic.twitter.com/ytm95Aaur1
Dilan was on the streets of central Bogotá to protest for better access to educational opportunities. He wanted to study administration at university, nothing more. An ambition that many of our readers take for granted, but a dream that would have changed Dilan’s life. That dream died on Monday, November 25.
It is not that the policeman intended to kill Dilan. Talk of deliberate murder is exaggerated. But he acted in a way that makes it clear he did not value the young protester’s life. He took an action that no moral human being could possibly justify, an action that had catastrophic results and was entirely and absolutely unnecessary.
It is a testament to the peacefulness of the thousands of protesters who were on the streets when we learned that Dilan had died that the demonstrations continued peacefully. In many countries that would have been the spark that ignited the tinderbox.
Dilan was not throwing rocks, he was not threatening the riot police. He was unarmed and did not have any protection. He was shot in the back of the head by a man clad head to toe in armour, who wanted to clear a crossroads for little discernible reason. This was not police responding to aggression, this was a complete and utter disregard for the lives of those that were in their way.
I’m not going to pretend that I knew Dilan; I didn’t. But I know a lot of people like Dilan. When I see his face, I see the face of hundreds of students that I have taught and who I continue to teach. This week I will be in class with students exactly like Dilan, students who justifiably wonder if they can trust the country in which they live.
This death is a tragedy for a family, but it is a tragedy also for a country. Many people in Colombia know or are someone like Dilan. He may have been one student, but he represents a generation. A generation whose lives are not valued. A generation who feel they have no support. A generation who want to change the country. A generation who are being repressed for that desire. Where do we go from here?
Representatives of the National Strike Committee say strikes in Colombia will continue and ask president Duque to listen to the demands of the country.
Colombia’s strike leaders walked out of the dialogue with the President because he did not want to discuss their original manifesto. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
As we enter the sixth day of demonstrations across Colombia, commentators were unsure as to whether the press conference held by the National Strike Committee (CNP) would herald an intensification of the protests or an end to them.
The uncertainty did not last for long however, as leaders of the protests arrived fresh from a meeting with President Iván Duque – a meeting they had left after he refused to agree to their demands. They announced that negotiations had fallen through and that the marches would continue.
Fabio Arias, the head of the central workers union, CUT, said that the government did not want to discuss the manifesto which is at the heart of the national strike. Instead the government proposed that the strike leaders join the Gran Conversación Nacional along with business leaders, the Attorney General, Congress and the rest of Colombian society.
“So we said we would not be in that dialogue,” said Arias. “Because we want to discuss the manifesto which was the reason we called the strike.”
The National Strike Committee’s manifesto includes the eradication of the ESMAD riot police, who Arias described as a “state organ of assassination.” They also asked the government to get rid of Decreto 2111 enacted on November 24, which creates a financial holding company that CUT says opens the door to privatising 16 public companies.
They demanded the government pay attention to what the people want: “The country is saying here, we have a different agenda. We have translated it into this manifesto. Listen to it. It’s in the street. Listen to it. We don’t want your agenda.”
The leaders said that demonstrations will continue today (November 26) – including a national cacerolazo at noon and a velatón at the usual sites, and would intensify on Wednesday in tribute to the “symbol of this national strike, Dilan Mauricio Cruz Medina.”
“We will say to the government, it already cost us a dear, young life,” said Arias, adding, “the only thing he did was to peacefully protest.”
The Wednesday protests will also serve as an opportunity to demand the dissolution of ESMAD, police reforms, and the withdrawal of the reforma tributaria.
El Comité Nacional de Paro ha decidido reforzar y elevar la protesta y la movilización. Convocamos a Paro Nacional este 27 de noviembre en una nueva Jornada Nacional
Strike leaders call for nationwide strike again tomorrow November 27.
The CNP said they would hold assemblies for various interest groups this weekend across the country to better coordinate the demonstrations. It aims to form a permanent coalition organization to take part in the national negotiations.
The list also called for daily CNP meetings at 6pm at Fecode, and for participation in the plenary sessions of the House and Senate on November 27 and 28, respectively.
For his part, Duque tweeted that he had met with the strike leaders and he invited them to join the national conversation. He also reported that an anti corruption bill had passed its plenary session. He continues to stress that the government is working to improve the health, education systems and it is ready to listen to all sections of society.
In an effort to stem the tide of protest, President Duque has laid out plans for four months of national conversations.
Despite Duque’s call for a Conversación Nacional, people aren’t satisfied so marches continue on Monday. Photo: Lukas Kaldenhoff
President Iván Duque held a meeting with the country’s incoming mayors and governors at the Casa de Nariño on Sunday, in a bid to calm country-wide tensions.
The national strike that began on November 21 shows no signs of stopping and the meeting – originally scheduled for later in the week – was the government’s attempt to pour oil on troubled waters as we move into the fifth day of unrest.
Duque assured the local leaders-in-waiting that he wants to work with them to respond to the needs of the citizens, who have taken to the streets with a litany of complaints and frustrations.
The new mayors and governors, who will take their positions at the start of next year, arrived with a range of proposals. From Medellín’s mayor-elect, Daniel Quintero, who called for a constitutional assembly which would change the country’s constitution to Claudia López from Bogotá who advised the president to meet with protest leaders.
During the meeting Duque launched a Gran Conversación Nacional (a national conversation) which he said would last until March 15. The conversation will include meetings with citizens from different economic, political and social sectors across the country, including students, academics, Community Action Boards, unions, churches, social leaders, workers and entrepreneurs, as well as indigenous, Afro-Colombian and rural communities. There will also be a platform online where people can share their thoughts.
He said the dialogues would serve as a space to generate more confidence between citizens and the country’s institutions, and to work to close social gaps. The Colombian Workers’ Union, CUT, hit back at Duque’s proposal and called for the strike to continue.
In a press statement, they said: “The government of Iván Duque has not specifically resolved any of the reasons for the strike and the national police continue to make use of excessive force against the general population.”
Starting tomorrow, the Gran Conversación Nacional will centre around six themes: growth with equity, transparency and the fight against corruption, education, peace with legality, environment, and strengthening the country’s institutions. Diego Molano, director of the administrative department of the Presidency, will coordinate the initiative.
After previously trying to dismiss protesters as guerillas and extremist forces, the president softened his tone towards them and their demands for employment and education. He said that while he was concerned by the demonstrations, he also viewed them with “admiration”.
“The citizens of Colombia are expressing themselves, those who are marching and those who are not marching,” he said, adding that “they have accumulated dissatisfaction for years, for decades.”
At the same time, he defended his government, noting that it has already been working hard to meet the needs of all Colombians through its National Development Plan, which focuses on social justice and equity as well as opportunities for better access to healthcare, education, housing, water, sanitation, and roads.
“Inducing citizens to aggressive expressions is not how democracy is built. The conversation has something very positive, and that is that in conversation we put ourselves in the shoes of the other, we understand the reasoning of the other, we understand the concerns of the other,” he said.
The president added that he wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to have a wide-ranging constructive conversation on how to collaborate moving forward, and would listen to the concerns and proposals of the governors-elect while also following up with visits to different departments.
“The success of the mayors and governors is the success of our country,” he said.
Following the meeting with Duque, Claudia López, mayor-elect of Bogotá, called for humility on the part of the government to acknowledge its mistakes, and to make changes and concessions before the official end of the Gran Conversación Nacional on March 15. She also criticised the use of excessive force on the part of the ESMAD police force against nonviolent protestors and spoke of the importance of direct dialogue with citizens and organisations rather than with government officials.
As the protests in Bogotá enter a fourth day of high tensions, we’ve heard a lot of stories from around the city.
Bogotá protests: Protestors express themselves in creative ways. Photo: Otto Berchem
With the current chaos that’s engulfing the capital, pretty much everyone in the capital has been affected in one way or another. On social media the likes of Residente and María Fernanda Cabal have been predictably active, but so too have plenty of ordinary folk around the capital.
What’s clear is that there’s no one single story on the protests in Bogotá. From the people who couldn’t reach the main action on Thursday because the TransMilenio stopped working, to terrified communities in conjuntos during the curfew, to people who couldn’t go clubbing on Friday night. But what’s also clear is that a lot of the stories are third hand – a friend of a friend of a friend told me… We spoke to a cross section of people who’ve been affected by the protests in Bogotá to get some first-hand accounts. If you want to add yours to the mix – or message us live from the protests in Bogotá today – comment here, get in touch or ping us on social media.
In today’s ciclovía I saw very few people. The comments I heard as I pedalled around were that people were calm. It seemed like a tense calm, though, that people wouldn’t let the protests change their routine. As the morning went on, more people started to come out, but the feeling stayed the same. At the end of my ride it seemed as though everything was just as it normally was.
‘Everyone was carrying a cacerola’
Kevin Pérez, Avenida La Esperanza, Saturday night
This march was a very peaceful protest compared to all of the other ones today. Almost all of us were students. We met at the Maloka Park and from there we walked to Corferias. Everyone was carrying a cacerola, and lots of people from the Salitre conjuntos joined us along the way. At the end, a guy recited the principal intentions of the strike and invited us to another protest on Monday.
‘It was a fun atmosphere’
Hans Luyckx, Parkway, Saturday night
It was a fun atmosphere, happy happy joy joy, lots of music, singing and dancing. There were actually two cacerolazos in Parkway – one on the crossroads of 45th and 24th and one in Parkway itself. Mostly young slightly alternative people at the crossroads and a more diverse bunch on Parkway. They had huge speakers out on the Parkway playing ska and rock en español. At about 10.30pm two police buses came this way but then took off again.
‘It was all manipulation through fear’
Heinner Rodríguez, Ciudadela Colsubsidio, Friday night
At around 9pm the alarms of the conjuntos close to me in the 80th started to sound. In seconds the neighbours were united with bats, sticks and even chains. A few minutes later the alarms sounded out all over, near and far. At one point tension increased as people started to spread the word that groups were coming towards us. I decided to fly my drone and go to the points where the vandals supposedly were coming from. There was nothing. The barrio was empty, completely empty. It was all manipulation through fear, I could see very far with my drone and there was nothing there, just scared people.
‘The people ran… and afterwards calm descended’
Mildred Méndez, Villa Luz, Friday night
Here it passed exactly like they said on social networks: The alarms sounded, the administrator of the building went out with a megaphone telling everybody to come out with sticks. The whole place came out and reports arrived that many vandals were coming from all sides, the people ran… and afterwards calm descended. It was like that a few times. Fortunately nothing happened. I didn’t see anyone. There were rumours that people were coming down from other barrios, that they were coming to us, and really nothing at all happened.
‘Vandals tried to enter the conjunto’
Adriana Buitrago, Tintal, Friday night
For my part I was a guard with my neighbours. Vandals tried to enter the conjunto in four vulnerable points but weren’t able to get in. I saw them trying to enter and quickly called some men from the apartment. They came immediately and with machetes pushed them back. The vandals tried to come through the rubbish chute as well. We divided ourselves inside the conjunto to stay alert. I was on guard until midnight and afterwards other neighbours took their turns. I haven’t been able to sleep for fear. It’s a terrible lack of calmness, I haven’t rested at all.
‘A lot of chaos and fear’
Carolina Rubio, Centro, Thursday/Friday
I left work at six o’clock on Thursday and met a friend to go to Plaza de Bolívar. Everything was in chaos – protesters attacking ESMAD and vice versa. I had so much fear but at the same time a desire to follow what they had already started. Friday was the same, a lot of chaos and a lot more fear, because the government wanted us closed down. It was for that reason that they did what they did in the day. And, in the night, total uncertainty. Everyone united and armed with sticks, with machetes and even guns.
‘Tired of injustices’
Marcela Lizcano, Torcoroma, Thursday/Friday
My concern really was for the builders I work with, because all of them live far away from the site, in places like Usme, Soacha, 20 de Julio. Returning to their houses was a problem because in the afternoon everything was complicated due to the security problems. They’re regular guys and hard workers that need to work to sustain their families and they had to walk a long way, arriving home very late. Also, on Friday I was scared because my son’s teachers rang me to say that outside the kindergarten everything was being destroyed. That was scary. I think that all of us are tired of the injustices from the government of this country.
‘Spontaneous protest, full of rage and joy’
Otto Berchem, Chapinero, Thursday night
I was helping to put my son to sleep. Tired, after marching to Plaza de Bolívar, and walking back to Lourdes in soggy sneakers. Just as my son was about to go down, there was a racket coming from outside. I got up, and saw a neighbour from across the street, leaning out of the window clanging a pot. My wife asked what was going on, and before I could answer she shouted “¡Cacerolazo! Quick, grab a pot or pan!” There I was, banging a frying pan with a wooden spoon, my wife at the window to my right, my oldest daughter at the window to the left doing the same, other neighbors joining in across the neighborhood. The spontaneous protest, full of rage and joy, is something I’ll never forget.
‘I couldn’t breathe’
Lina Vargas, Avenida 26, Thursday
We were eating in the Gran Estación square when a big squadron of ESMAD came from a side street. When they set foot on the floor of the square, we were a little confused, we didn’t know what they were about to do, then they started throwing tear gas grenades even when we were just resting. In that moment, I couldn’t breathe, I covered my mouth and nose with my hoodie and ran as far as I could. During the march, I had met a lot of friends, but in that moment everyone ran to different sides. We ran all the way to the other side of 26 street but we were cornered. A man was in the middle of the street sharing water with magnesium milk, when we washed our faces with that, we could breathe normally again. We started walking with our hands up to go to the 26 street, this time looking for our way back. The ESMAD continued to throw gas, so we walked with our eyes closed and hands up screaming ‘SIN VIOLENCIA’. Once we made it, we started our way to Plaza de Bolívar through the rain. It was a very long walk.
Accounts have been translated from Spanish where appropriate and lightly edited for clarity. If you are joining the Bogotá protests today, keep in touch on twitter.
Young protestor Dilan Cruz was struck by a grenade on Saturday night, leaving him fighting for his life.
UPDATE: San Ignacio hospital have announced that Dilan passed away in the evening of November 25.
People pay respect to Dilan where the shooting took place. Photo: Oli Pritchard.
An 18-year-old student is in critical condition tonight after being shot by ESMAD riot police on the third day of the national protests.
After he was resuscitated at the scene, Dilan Cruz was taken to the San Ignacio hospital where his condition is described as critical but stable. The most recent medical report at the time of writing (9.30 pm) stated that Dilan had suffered a penetrating head trauma and his neurological status is still uncertain due to secondary effects following resuscitation.
His blood remains on the tarmac at Calle 19 with Carrera 4 where he was shot and people have been leaving flowers and candles at the scene in the centre of the city. A minute’s silence was held during the evening’s cacerolazo in several parts of the capital. At 9pm, a large crowd gathered at the site in a candlelit homage.
Candles are being around the place where Dilan Cruz was shot. Photo: Heinner Rodríguez
Manifestantes encendieron velas y se acostaron en el piso rodeando el lugar donde cayó herido #DylanCruz a manos del ESMAD. Dylan está en estado crítico con pronóstico reservado en UCI del H. San Ignacio. Marchas avanzan, cacerolazos retumban. ¿Nos matarán a todos? #EsmadAsesinopic.twitter.com/tcYIpyPc80
According to media reports, Dilan had recently graduated from Colegio Ricaurte and was marching for the right to access an ICETEX loan so that he could go on to study administration at university. That dream may now never be realised.
Various videos on social media show police shooting the young man from the other side of the road, in what appears to be an indiscriminate act. His friend told Semana that they were trying to get away from the tear gas when it happened – about 4pm today.
#23Nov#ParoNacional Student protestor shot by ESMAD riot police in the centre of Bogotá. He was resuscitated at the scene and is now in hospital fighting for his life. https://t.co/L8pUrvCtPF
Speaking outside the hospital, the capital’s mayor-elect Claudia López told reporters that the doctors are doing everything they can. “The whole city is thinking of Dilan and his health,” she said. “He’s in the best possible hands.”
When asked about the protests and the actions of ESMAD, López said she rejected all forms of violence and stressed the need for dialogue. “The object of these peaceful protests is not disorder, it’s dialogue,” she said.
The Attorney General has opened a disciplinary investigation into the case.
Friday 22 November saw a whirlwind of news hit Bogotá during the curfew, both true and false.
On a sunny Saturday morning that feels like a Sunday, Bogotá woke up with a hangover from fake news. Last night saw a whirlwind of information and alerts along with plenty of conspiracy theories. Sifting the fact from the fiction has been hard to do. We’re trying our best here at the Post.
We’re not rejecting the accusations of state interference out of hand – in the country of falsos positivos, that’s absolutely a possibility. Equally, it’s absolutely believable that criminal gangs would take it into their own hands to roam around certain parts of Bogotá in invasion scenes resembling The Purge. So, what to believe?
What are the narratives? Vandal hordes or government conspiracy?
There’s a strong media narrative being pushed to support the idea of ‘vandal hordes’ (hordas de vándalos) roaming around the city. This explains the curfew and shows the authorities as protective. The video of a bus reversing into an Ara supermarket, shown from both the inside and outside, certainly backs this up.
Momento en que vándalos que robaron bus del SITP rompen, con el bus, la entrada de un ARA en el sur de Bogotá y entran a saquear. pic.twitter.com/e4qCdBopXj
Fears were stoked by a flurry of messages that claimed the emergency phone number – 123 – had stopped working. And supposed ‘official’ warnings circulated earlier in the day that organised groups were ready to rob ‘everything they could.’
This narrative led to calls for people to band together and arm themselves with sticks so they could fight back – vigilante homeowners ready to fight off the marauding gangs. Or at the very least all wear white clothes to better spot the evil dark-clothed invaders.
There’s also a narrative that says this is a government conspiracy – that the ‘vandal hordes’ have been organised by the authorities themselves in order to justify their own curfew and control the population. These supporters point to the fact that little was stolen in any of the invasions. The videos showing vandals being dropped off in vans, which the police have denied, add weight to this story.
La Policía no transporta vándalos, es FALSO, vea aquí la realidad de lo que pasó. La Policía en Bogotá y Cali ha llevado a los ciudadanos a sus residencias en camiones y vehículos. #FakeNews fuente: Entérate Cali https://t.co/dQr96oRsk7pic.twitter.com/N7aqP5c25j
There were definitely large groups of sometimes armed men moving around the city last night and attacking various conjuntos, especially towards the outskirts of the city like La Castilla, Engativá, Patio Bonito and Pontevedra, as well as Tintal, Hayuelos and Villas Granadas among others. These invasions are undeniable. The questions are who they were, why they were there and what they were doing in the invasion? The message is the same – suspiciously so – from all around. Vandals are invading conjuntos and trying to get into buildings. Gunshots are often also reported.
It’s a bit of a coincidence that all of these terrified people wrote pretty much exactly the same thing.
Some videos feature vans arriving with the invaders jumping from them. The police have said these are fake news. Of course, it’s possible that people were simply cutting and pasting each others’ messages. The same videos are tagged with different locations and it’s unclear if they are even from last night’s disturbances.
It certainly seems strange that so few actual robberies have so far been confirmed. Peñalosa himself admitted that there had been few robberies and that this was an “orchestrated plan to cause panic.” What motive is there for armed groups to go all the way into a conjunto and then leave with nothing? They were carrying guns, apparently, yet were pushed back by citizens with sticks?
The accusation is that the vandals were paid and that the social messages were orchestrated to sow fear among the population. And to link the protests to mindless violence, to personalise the fear by striking directly at people’s emotional core – their literal homes. The other accusation is that this can be used to justify increased police and military presence and powers, which is of concern when one of the reasons that people are protesting is a lack of faith in state institutions.
A platform for racism
For sure, some Venezuelans were involved in some of the disturbances and invasions. That appears to be a simple fact. The question here is to what degree this is connected to nationality. Many reports focus on Venezuelan involvement, with various tweets mentioning the “unmistakable accents” of those involved. The authorities have also pushed this link, even before the protests started.
It would be unthinkable if no Venezuelans had been involved in the events of last night, given the numbers of Venezuelans currently in Bogotá. But it’s certainly not the majority of Venezuelans causing trouble, and the invasion gangs do not seem to be solely made up of Venezuelans. It ties nicely with the supposed fears of castrochavismo and of the Foro de Sao Paulo that is being pushed by Uribe and the Centro Democrático.
Did the curfew work?
The curfew seems to have been sporadically enforced – people were walking in the streets as late as 23:30 seemingly with little trouble in some zones of the city, mainly the more affluent parts.
And, while we’re on the subject of narratives, many commentators question the justification for the curfew itself. There were certainly violent clashes and buildings were damaged on November 21, along with a slew of transmilenio stations. But given that over 200,000 people went out to demonstrate, it really does represent only a fraction of the protests. This focus on the violence and the curfew itself moves attention away from the reasons people are angry and effectively silences the legitimate protestors.
Aside from a few altercations in the centre, where the police limited access to the Plaza Bolívar and tear gas was launched at peaceful protestors in the late afternoon, there were very few clashes between police and protestors yesterday. Our journalists were out in several parts of the city and what we saw was peaceful – pot banging, dancing and banner waving.
So what should we believe in the end?
In truth, while we journalists like to have one clear black and white story, things are rarely that simple. Someone clearly stirred up a storm of fear on social media last night, but whether that was the government, the Russians or any number of groups with vested interests, we’ll probably never know.
And given the governing Conservative party in the UK rebranded their twitter account to ‘factcheckUK’ in an attempt to deliberately mislead the public, perhaps we can all remember to take what we read and see on social media with a pinch of salt. And of course, anyone can put a label of fake news on anything they don’t agree with. What we can do is try to get as much information as possible on the reports we receive and be as truthful as possible.
We are a volunteer-run organisation with no agenda beyond telling the truth as best we can. But if you ever think we get it wrong, please tell us – and if you want to help keep independent media alive, please get in touch.
Out and about in last night’s cacerolazos as spontaneous demonstrations break out across the country.
As stories started to come in of violence after a day of largely peaceful protests, ordinary people stepped out of their houses and reclaimed the streets. Photo: Oli Pritchard
It’s 10 at night, and yet I’m walking down the Séptima in the middle of the road, late at night. There are no cars around and next to no businesses are open. It should be eerily quiet, yet the sounds of street parties drift through the cold air both ahead of me and behind me. All around Bogotá, people had taken to the streets around eight o’clock, banging pots and pans in what are called ‘cacerolazos’.
These totally spontaneous demonstrations broke out as a continuation of the earlier protests, which ended in sometimes brutal repression. They consist of ordinary citizens simply banging pots and pans to make a disturbance, somewhat like ‘the music’ of medieval Europe, although the actual clanging sounds somewhat reminiscent of early Einstürzende Neubauten. Some people took to the streets while many more supported from the safety and comfort of home.
Despite the negative reasons for hitting the streets, there was a carnival atmosphere all around. At 46 with Séptima an impromptu bonfire was lit, and Parque de los Hippies at 60 had a team of drummers helping out the pot-bangers. Hastily made barricades blocked cars from passing easily and the streets were turned back into pedestrian space. People beat their pans in a concerted fashion, coming together to raise the tempo whenever a helicopter passed over and raising their middle fingers in salute.
A neighbourly bonhomie was the overwhelming feeling present. Neighbours saluted me as I strolled around and people shared drinks and snacks. My phone lit up every minute with alert after alert telling me of protests in barrios nearby and throughout the city. Each of these alerts showed another video of ordinary people making their feelings known, and my friends and acquaintances commented on the solidarity being shown. These were not just the traditional protesters, but a real cross-section of the barrio.
Story continues below the videos
The protests continue at 65 with Séptima, some marching, others banging pots and pans pic.twitter.com/F6YCMeLKLk
“First time our neighbours have done anything together. This is actually awesome,” commented one of our team in San Luis, while a friend in Bosa posted a video saying she was “proudly from Patio Bonito” as people shrugged off the drizzle to march down the street there. The narrative now had changed – from an earlier washout, to violence and now to what should have been. Wildcat protests all over the city, decentralised and organic, not pushing any particular point, but a dissatisfaction with the leadership of the country. Even friends in Rosales reported cacerolazos and some of the Séptima protesters were drifting down from the pricey apartments in Chapinero Alto.
Those that felt the streets could be dangerous due to the earlier police aggression had little to fear. State control was conspicuously absent as the police kept themselves at their CAIs, not venturing out far to try and regain control of the city. This was not a time for citizens to meekly follow the orders of the state – the streets had been reclaimed.
We joined the protesters on the streets of Bogotá on Thursday to hear about their hopes and concerns.
Colombia protests: The rain didn’t stop the Plaza de Bolívar in Bogotá from filling up with protesters. Photos: Lukas Kaldenhoff
The November 21 protests will remain in the memories of Colombians for years – even decades – to come. Hundreds of thousands of people filled the streets of Bogotá, and towns and cities across the nation, holding signs and yelling chants of discontent in what as one of the largest Colombian protests in recent years.
The people we joined in the Bogotá marches were protesting over various long-standing grievances including labour reform, education, violence against indigenous communities and the implementation of the peace agreement. Many also shared their anger about the murder of the eight children in Caquetá.
A number called for the departure of President Ivan Duque, with numerous protesters touting signs with pig imagery and slogans playing on his now infamous interview in which he responded “¿De qué me hablas, viejo?” to a journalist in reference to a question about the murdered children.
Throughout the day the sound of explosions of gas canisters punctuated the chants calling for Duque’s resignation. The heavy rain did not deter the marchers who were of all ages and backgrounds.
The streets of Bogotá saw people protesting for many reasons.
Several protest routes culminated in Plaza de Bolívar, where thousands of people stood in the pouring rain, huddled under umbrellas as leaders on a central stage roused the crowds with complaints and calls to action.
Colombia protests largely peaceful
While protests were largely peaceful, images of government violence circulated on social media, with one photo from El Tiempo showing police kicking a protestor. In the capital, there were violent clashes between the ESMAD riot police and students at locations near the Universidad Nacional, as well as the road towards the airport. Tensions also ran high with clashes in suba and the roundabout on calle 53 with carrera 50.
Valentina Laguado, a 21-year old Universidad Cundinamarca student said a police officer hit her and sprayed tear gas in an area where children were present. She said her and her friends were dissatisfied with the country’s healthcare, especially the long waiting times for appointments, and with government proposals to lower the minimum wage.
When fear dies, freedom is born.
“We want to create a revolution in Colombia. And for all of Colombia to come together. Because here there is a lack of unity and that’s why they are always attacking young people and saying they are vandals,” said her friend, 20-year old Universidad de Cundinamarca student Jessica Díaz. “But they don’t understand this is a battle for everyone. For their pensions, work for their kids, everything. It’s for the people.”
These sentiments were echoed by journalist Rodolfo Alarcón: “We’re here first for the bombing of the children in Caquetá, second for labour reform, third because I’ve never had a decent contract in this country. It’s always been [temporary] contracts for the provision of services.”
“Also because I’m against all of the armed violence, for the deaths of the indigenous people in Cauca and that [the government] isn’t saying anything. For the reaction, the indolence of this government that I didn’t choose,” he said, adding his frustration with social inequality and environmental degradation.
Lida Rivera, an archive manager said she was marching for better healthcare, for free education, for an end to corruption, unemployment and for the ousting of President Duque. “My hopes are that the quality of life improves,” she said.
One of many banners at the protests in Bogotá “We are love, we are resistance”
Others also cited dissatisfaction with how the government was handling the implementation of the peace agreement with the FARC, and a fear that the country would revert to civil war.
“Since my childhood I have always lived in war. And that has changed, but now it feels like it’s coming back,” said Julian Amaya, the owner of a software development company. “And I don’t want the new generation to live what I lived when I was younger.”
Government reaction
Many protestors also expressed anger and frustration with the government reaction to the protests, and expressed suspicion that they would send infiltrators to cause chaos and discredit the march.
“I feel like they’ve been trying to make this just a political march and it’s not. People are really unhappy,” said Amaya. “It’s not like I’m from this party or something. We are not happy with the way the government is working.”
Human rights lawyers Laura Baron-Mendoza and Estefania Vargas wanted an end to armed violence, implementation of the peace accords, and lamented the deaths of social leaders, ex-combatants and falsos positivos.
Protestors in Bogotá aren’t put off by the rain.
We are not afraid
“They are afraid of us because we’re not afraid,” said Baron-Mendoza. “We’re not terrorists, we’re not guerrillas who are going out to march. We are people with hope, with aspirations for a different country. And we are tired, tired of being stigmatised just for thinking differently.”
Protests continued into the night, with crowds coming down Séptima as late as 8pm and increased reports of violence after night fell. As many demonstrators returned to their homes, a “cacerolazo” or cacophony of residents banging pots and pans out of their windows filled the streets in some areas for several hours. Whole families, some in their pyjamas took part in what appeared to be an organic demonstration. Pot-bangers in the north of the city said they would go to the President’s house.
The paro nacional included protests all over the country, including in Medellín, Cali, Cartagena, Barranquilla, Bucaramanga and Santa Marta. Cali was the city that saw the most difficulties, as several policemen were injured in confrontations with the protestors and we received reports of looting in parts of the city. This is why mayor Maurice Armitage imposed a 7pm curfew, according to the Ministry of the Interior.
It remains to be seen what Friday will bring. Bogotá mayor Peñalosa has already announced that the TransMilenio will not be operational, and today’s protesters were talking about continuing to march.
Tensions have been rising in the run up to Colombia’s national strike (paro nacional), which will take place tomorrow, November 21. It’s the first national strike in three years, and a multitude of disaffected groups will take to the streets to protest across the country. We take a look at who will be protesting and why, and why the government is so concerned about what might happen.
Students protesting university budget cuts last year. The marches were mostly peaceful but clashes did occur, often between ESMAD riot police and masked agitators. That won’t be different at Colombia’s national strike tomorrow. Photo: Steve Hide
Who’s striking?
This year, as with many recent years, we’ve already seen protest action from students, trade unions, indigenous groups and many more. Tomorrow’s strike is a national strike, which means it’s not organised by any one group – rather, a mixture of all of them.
Over 40 workers’ unions will strike tomorrow, along with peace activists, women’s rights groups, student campaigners, indigenous groups, environmental organisations and of course ordinary people.
Why are they striking?
Just as there’s no single group taking part in the strike action, there’s not one single reason for striking either. A recent Gallup poll put President Duque’s disapproval level at 69% compared with an approval rate of just 26%. The disapproval rate has grown from 37% when he first took power in August, now reaching its highest level.
There is a frustration about a rise in living costs – especially in comparison with the minimum wage – corruption, the VAT increase, issues with the health system and the cost of petrol. The Gallup poll showed that in general, Colombians are not optimistic about the future (70% believe that things are getting worse) and that an increasing number of people are concerned about guerrillas, especially following the announcement that certain dissidents will return to arms.
One trigger for Colombia’s national strike was a proposal from the national association of financial institutions (ANIF) to pay young people 75% of the minimum wage. Another was a proposal by former president Uribe – who supported Duque in his presidential campaign – to reduce the working week, which could also impact people’s pensions. And a third was the possibility to increase pension contributions and change the way Colpensiones works. The government has denied it has plans to implement any of these proposals.
Threats to indigenous groups
As we reported last week, 135 indigenous people have been killed since Duque became president. Four died in a recent massacre in Cauca, sparking national and international calls for action. While the government has promised to send more troops, the Nasa people in Cauca say that increased military presence is not the answer. They are demanding real long-term measures to protect their communities.
Social leader murders
Somos Defensores, a human rights group, recorded 591 attacks on human rights defenders between January and June this year – up from 397 in the same period from the year before. It estimates that over half (53%) of the attacks were carried out by paramilitary groups and 28% carried out by unknown perpetrators. FARC dissidents, the ELN and security forces were responsible for the remaining 19%. This is just one example of the increase in armed group activity since the peace process was signed and the continued rise in violence, especially the attacks on community leaders, is of concern to many Colombians.
Peace process implementation
The assassinations of social leaders and attacks on indigenous communities are two of the most visible aspects of the surge in violence in rural Colombia. While it was always going to be challenging to end half a century of conflict, many Colombians and former FARC fighters are frustrated by the weakening of several aspects of the peace accord.
Student promises
The government ended nationwide student protests that had gone on for over two months last year by committing to increase the education budget. Students have already mobilised again this year, accusing the government of breaking its promises. Adding to that was an expenses scandal at the District University which the ESMAD riot squadron reacted to in a heavy-handed manner, sparking further protests. Many universities have already cancelled classes for tomorrow.
What’s the government saying?
The wave of recent unrest in other Latin American countries has put the Colombian government on high alert. It’s been on what could be described as a two-pronged offensive. One is a PR and media campaign to try to counter claims being made by the protestors and win people over. The other is an activation of state forces in preparation for possible violence.
Duque has appeared on television, radio and social media to reassure the public. In fact, he’s launched a new programme called Conéctate con Duque which will be broadcast every fortnight. In the first episode, he stressed that there is no plan to pay young people less than the minimum wage, and committed to work to close social gaps, improve the economy and protect the environment.
On the other side, he’s hit out at those calling for violence and social resistance on social media and repeated the message several times that security forces will “take preventative measures to guarantee public order.”
To this end, Migración Colombia closed all river and land border crossings with Ecuador, Peru, Brazil and Venezuela midnight on November 19. They will reopen at 5am on November 22. The head of Migracion, Christian Krüger, also announced ‘verification measures’ to ensure any foreigners participating in the protests do so peacefully.
The Bogotá police reported they had carried out 27 raids in the municipality of Soacha, arresting two people and seizing explosives (for making potato bombs) and spray cans. Peñalosa announced there would be 120 ‘coexistence managers’ on the streets, along with 4,000 police officers, working to ensure the safety of those who participate in the marches.
What can Bogotá expect during Colombia’s national strike tomorrow?
Rain. One thing that’s pretty certain is that the storms of people on the streets will be accompanied by storms of the meteorological variety. As with previous days, electrical storms and heavy rains are forecast. Transport may well collapse, so make sure you have warm and waterproof clothes as well as somewhere to shelter if needed.
The marches are scheduled to start at 9am with over 30 meeting points across the city, several of them finishing in the Plaza de Bolívar. A number of companies have told employees to work from home due to fears that the protests might escalate. There’s almost certain to be tear gas, so if you are out on the streets, bring a scarf or something to cover your face.
While many of the strike groups on social media are calling for peaceful marches, authorities are already preparing for things to turn violent. In addition to strengthening the armed response, the interior ministry has announced that local authorities will have the power to impose curfews and ban the consumption of alcohol.
For the first time since the 2016 peace agreement, the Colombia’s political elite fared poorly in the first round of local elections, notably losing out in Bogotá and Medellín.
Headlining the results on Sunday, October 27 was Claudia López’s victory in Bogotá’s mayoral race. The Alianza Verde (Green Alliance) and leftist Polo Democratico Alternativo candidate became the first female and openly gay mayor of Bogotá, the position considered to be the second-most influential in the country after the presidency.
Celebrating her triumph in the capital, she exclaimed: “Bogotá voted to defeat sexism and homophobia. Let there be no doubt that change and equality are irrepressible.”
A fervent campaigner for anti-corruption measures, López’s policy stances include increasing police presence in the streets, improving public transportation, and fighting child labor.
Another surprising election outcome came out of Medellín, Colombia’s second-largest city and traditional, conservative, Uribismo stronghold, where the independent candidate, Daniel Quintero, emerged victorious. The 39 year-old defeated the right-wing Centro Democrático candidate, Alfredo Ramos, by nearly 70,000 votes, demonstrating the vulnerable state conservatism currently finds itself in.
Speaking to Latin America Reports, director of the political risk consultancy Colombia Risk Analysis, Sergio Guzmán explained that he views each city’s results as symptomatic of a growing national tendency for voters to move away from traditional elite-based parties and towards “more ideologically driven candidates.”
In many ways, this anti-incumbent sentiment is a continuation of the broader anti-establishment current running through the region of Latin America against right-wing and left-wing governments alike.
Guzmán went on to tell Latin America Reports that López has a much better chance of achieving change in Bogotá than Quinteros in Medellín. “She has twelve seats in the city council which is going to give her a much clearer mandate,” he explained. Meanwhile, Quintero’s lack of backing in the Medellín city council will complicate his endeavors to implement policy, Guzmán believes.
Quintero’s predicament is not so uncommon. In Cartagena, left-wing and anti-corruption candidate William Dau successfully fended off the political elite on Sunday, but with virtually no support from the city council, he is likely to struggle to make the changes he proposes.
Colombians, however, should not be discouraged by this state of affairs, Guzmán said. “[These victories] do show signs of change at least in voters’ preferences in Colombia.”
According to Guzmán, the short-to-medium term outcomes of the new local governors are dependent on whether the political elite are willing to make concessions in light of their defeat, or if they decide to dig in their heels.
Caption: Saffron-crowned tanager — Photo courtesy of Pedro Arturo Camargo Martinez, Biologist with Asociación Calidris
At sunrise last Saturday, birders and biologists across 171 countries took to the woods and wetlands, racing to count bird species in what could be described as the “Olympics of birdwatching:” Global Big Day. Colombia was ranked the bird-iest country on earth for the third year running — and for the country’s conservationists, the victory is about more than just bragging rights. It’s also about showcasing the value of the country’s spectacular biodiversity at a critical moment for the future of Colombia’s rich natural habitats.
Caption: Urban birding — The Bogotá Post joined the Ministry of the Environment in Medellín for a Global Big Day excursion in the city’s most biodiverse park, Cerro El Volador, home to 93 species of birds.
As the country’s rural areas are opening up for the first time after decades of guerrilla presence, conservationists hope to use Colombia’s growing fame as “the country of birds” to combat intensified deforestation — and advocate for sustainable alternatives for local communities.
Why Colombia wins for bird diversity (with flying colors)
During last Saturday’s event, 1,542 bird species were registered in Colombia in one day alone. Compare that to the 713 counted in the United States, which is more than eight times the size. In total, Colombia is home to 1,934 bird species, or about one fifth of all known bird species on Earth, packed into just 0.8% of its land area. Of these species, over 80 are found only in Colombia.
Birds thrive in Colombia for many of the same reasons tourists seem to — the climate, the year-round access to fruit and flowers, and the incredible range of landscapes within a small geographic distance. When the Andes mountain range reaches southern Colombia, it splits into 3 branches, slicing the country up into an astounding number of distinct geographic zones — each boasting a richness of unique ecosystems.
Caption: Long tailed Sylph — Photo by Jeisson Zamudio, bird researcher at Asociación Calidris
Due to decades of armed conflict in Colombia’s rural zones, many of these ecosystems were long considered unsafe to live in, or even travel across. Large stretches of forests remained nearly pristine, teaming with a diversity of birds few people or even researchers were able to see.
Birding soars with the peace process
After the FARC peace agreement, signed in 2016, thousands of troops have moved out of the region and Colombia’s forests became accessible for the first time in decades, explains Jeisson Zamudio, a bird researcher at Asociación Calidris, a Cali-based research and conservation organization and BirdLife‘s Colombian partner.
Jeisson recalls that several years before the peace agreement, as a student, he participated in a research excursion that was cut short when paramilitary soldiers ordered his team out of a forest near the border of Chocó. Recently, he was able to safely go back to the same spot after years of anticipation.
“In what used to be a violent conflict zone, you can now be there listening to the birds, enjoying the forest, and hearing the stories of the locals” explains Jeisson. “There is this new feeling of optimism,” he adds, “the growing confidence to explore our forests and their bird life.”
As forests grew safer, birding was quick to spread its wings. A growing number of foreigners flocked to the country each year to see unusual birds like the Andean Cock of the Rock and the Multicolored Tanager — so much so that the supply of bilingual bird guides is only recently catching up with demand.
Deforestation accelerating in former conflict zones
But bird lovers haven’t been the only ones taking advantage of the reopening of Colombia’s rich ecosystems. Cattle ranching, logging, mining, and cultivation of African oil palm trees have also expanded rapidly, clear cutting forests at an accelerating rate. Cattle ranching alone clears 500,000 acres of forest annually — threatening not just Colombia’s bird species, 160+ of which are endangered, but also migratory birds from other countries.
As Diego Ochoa, a spokesperson for the Audubon Society tells The Bogotá Post, “Colombia plays a fundamental role as a resting place for migratory birds coming from the US and Canada. They depend on our ecosystems as places to spend the winter, or as stopovers on their journey south, making conservation efforts in Colombia absolutely crucial for these species.”
Bird tourism offers a sustainable alternative
The Audubon Society and Asociación Calidris are optimistic that birds themselves could offer a vital defense against deforestation. For locals living in zones of high biodiversity, birding and ecotourism can provide a range of economic opportunities — that rely on the conservation of forests, as opposed to their destruction.
Pedro Arturo Camargo Martinez, a Biologist with Asociación Calidris, comments, “Beyond the economic opportunities, bird tourism offers people a way to conserve their air quality, clean water, and forest, which is tied to their quality of life. It can benefit communities just as much as birds.”
Caption: At a Calidris-led workshop at the Cali Zoo, participants learn the names of bird parts in English. Photo by Kendra Hasenick, Asociación Calidris.
But bird tourism involves a lot more than just setting birders loose in the forest with binoculars. Asociación Calidris and the Audubon Society have joined forces to provide crucial resources in the development of a national birding route, with support from the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism and the Critical Ecosystems Partnership Fund. Since 2015, they’ve ramped up workshops for local communities and tourism services in English language, business management, ecology, and bird identification. The goal? To empower communities to run their own nature reserves and bird tours. Pedro estimates that so far, they’ve developed about 30% of the national birding route.
Another top conservation priority for Asociación Calidris and the Audubon Society, however, is a bit more difficult to quantify: sensitizing communities to the immense value of Colombia’s birdlife and wildlife. And that’s where Global Big Day comes in.
“Global Big Day is an opportunity for us to open doors for communities to get involved,” explains Pedro. “Each year, we see more people interested in going out with the experts to participate and learn about birds.”
And the impact goes well beyond local communities.
Rufous-tailed jacamar — Photo by Jeisson Zamudio / Asociación Calidris
“The growing awareness of the incredible richness of birds and wildlife in our country is helping generate greater interest in conservation,” explains Carlos Andrés Galvis, Head of the Animal Collection Department at the Cali Zoo. “Birding is helping grow this love for the natural world. If it is managed well, it can help us combat threats like destruction of habitat and illegal animal trafficking, and a great diversity of species, not only birds, could benefit.”
Colombians negotiated a landmark peace agreement that slowly crumbled as the State was unable to live up to its promise of economic development, democratization, truth, and reconciliation. Opponents of the peace agreement were so enraged by what they considered were government capitulations to criminals that when they eventually took power, they managed to roll back key provisions in the agreement, all but guaranteeing its demise and a return to conflict. This does not reference current events, instead, it is carefully narrated in Robert Karl’s book “Forgotten Peace: Reform, Violence, and the Making of Contemporary Colombia” on the failed implementation of the 1957 agreement to restore democracy in Colombia.
It may sound counter-intuitive but we have been here before. Colombia has already negotiated an unprecedented and internationally lauded peace agreement between ardent adversaries who had committed gross atrocities towards one another. While the agreement held, there were a number of government initiatives meant to restore rural economies through agricultural and land reform programs, re-organize the political establishment at the local and national levels, and put in place a commission to study the core causes of the conflict, but then it failed.
In spite of the efforts of liberal Alberto Lleras Camargo to lead a bipartisan effort to move the country forward by establishing a power-sharing bargain with the conservative party, members of that party – in particular Guillermo León Valencia (grandfather of Democratic Center senator Paloma Valencia) – had many reservations about the implementation of the peace agreement and instead promoted a hardline approach. The agreement was short-lived because the conservative government made sure not to follow through on the government’s promises.
If this all sounds too familiar it is because we are currently in the process of rewriting a similar episode of Colombian history. Robert Karl’s book “Forgotten Peace” is a stark warning of the risks of the government not following through on its word and the very probable return to conflict it may entail. Before our eyes, the peace agreement with the FARC is being taken apart piece by piece by its opponents. Are they right that the transitional justice chapter of the agreement is too lenient with war criminals? Perhaps. Are they justified in not wanting to give their enemies an opening in conflict? Maybe. But undoing this peace agreement will have lasting consequences for the future of the country. What is most concerning of all is the new cycle of violence that dismissing the current framework for peace – imperfect as it may be – could be responsible in creating, as the implementation hangs by a thread and all the elements for conflict are alive and well in Colombia.
The peace agreement that transitioned Colombia from a dictatorship to a flawed democracy was an imperfect one. It granted amnesty to war criminals (back then the Treaty of Rome was not a thing) allowing many left-wing bandoleros and right-wing landowners to literally get away with murder – it opted for a strategy to rehabilitate criminals rather than punish them. In doing so, the government provided guaranteed financing to former warlords in order to transition them from conflict into agricultural activities. It invested government funds in radio stations to guarantee communications, mounted police to be able to provide security, and named new judges to strengthen the rule of law. It also granted political rights to both Liberals and Conservatives who swapped the presidency for 16 years, between 1958 – 1974, which was at the time innovative but also deeply undemocratic.
The government of Lleras Camargo also set up an independent Peace Commission to investigate the causes of the violence throughout the country, especially to understand the origins of the fratricide conflict and to offer mediation between armed groups. With an improvised agenda and no working framework for post-conflict and truth commissions – as there is a state of the art today – the commission did the best it could with what it had. The commission produced no formal report but instead presented its findings to the president and the cabinet for them to implement practical solutions.
Clearly, not everyone was happy with the resulting “Paz Criolla”. In 1959, conservative senator Alvaro Gomez (who would later become one of the chief architects of the 1991 constitution) argued how it was unfathomable for “monstrous criminals” to receive government assistance. Members of the church were highly critical of the book that was published by one of the peace commissioners documenting threats to exact an ecclesiastical punishment for what they considered a wrongful interpretation of history. Finally, when it became the turn for the conservatives to preside over the country Guillermo León Valencia – the man selected by the party to fulfill this duty – proved to be disastrous for the peace, not least because of his disdain for the agreement as well as his poor managerial abilities.
El histórico pacto por el Frente Nacional. El Bipartidismo como política en la segunda mitad del Siglo XX. pic.twitter.com/hwUuTPyrWf
— Historia de Colombia (@colombia_hist) June 17, 2016
Reading the book, I couldn’t help but notice the parallels with our current juncture: an imperfect peace agreement, the perception of impunity and unfairness in the implementation of the agreement, and the reticence of the subsequent administrations to follow through on commitments made by their predecessors. It was an incredible opportunity to move forward, unfortunately, short-term political judgment got in the way. History behaves in strange ways, coincidentally, the protagonists of today story are very much the same as they were in the 60s – often people belonging to the same families. It is important for them to realize that they will be judged in the eyes of history, much in the same vein in which we are currently observing their ancestors. J
#ElTestigo un reconocimiento a Jesús Abad Colorado. Increíble trabajo dar visibilidad a las víctimas del conflicto colombiano pic.twitter.com/YfxyyIfdZG
The book gives a detailed look to the efforts made by key stakeholders including politicians, church officials, and sociologists during the 60s and 70s to lead a democratic transition, promote rural development, and understand the root causes of conflict. Their efforts were short-lived, and the inability of politicians at the time to embrace an imperfect agreement paved the way for the conflict that was to follow.
There is a much longer story than what I have just told you – with nuance, source documents, and annotations – which is contained in Prof. Karl’s brilliant book. I would be remiss not to recommend the readers of this column to buy the book, which has been the source of equal parts joy and frustration for me. Joy for discovering a chapter in Colombian history often overlooked. Frustration to know that we were close to turning an important page and we blew it – recognizing that we are in a similar moment today.
Sergio Guzmán is the Director of Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consulting firm based in Bogotá. Follow him on twitter @serguzes and @ColombiaRisk
This opinion column is intended as a space to discuss some of the most pressing issues faced by Colombia and the region in these uncertain times. All opinions and content are solely the opinion of the author and do not represent the viewpoints of The Bogotá Post.
March for the defense of the JEP, Special Jurisdiction for peace in Spanish. Protestants march against the objections made by the president of Colombia, Ivan Duque, to 6 points of the of the JEP. Photo courtesy of Deposit Photos
The standoff between the government and local indigenous communities is in its 18th day. The sides are holding fast to their positions with high political stakes for the side who ultimately budges. The current situation is a result of the tremendous inequality in Cauca, longstanding indigenous complaints and unmet government promises – which threatens to spark a broader national movement. The government can end this protest, but doing so may invite future unrest.
Indigenous communities in Cauca are now in their 18th day of protest against the government. Using the so-called weapons of the weak, communities have taken over the Panamerican highway in an effort to force the government to meet a series of demands – old and new. Among them, longstanding land-reclamations promised by past governments, real progress on the protection of social leaders, and a renewed effort to implement the peace agreement with the FARC. While many of the petitions from the communities are legitimate, some are also nearly impossible for the government to meet in a reasonable time frame.
It’s a real mess. While the government insists on communities ending their blockade of the highway to meet, locals contend that they want President Duque himself to set a date to meet communities before they end their blockade. As time goes on, each side has been reaffirmed by supporters that their position grows in legitimacy. Moreover, politics is now fully embedded in the debate with opponents of the protests contending they have been infiltrated by left-wing groups, while supporters of the communities claim that land-grabbers and special interests support the government.
The government’s unyielding attitude and repressive reaction to what, for the most part, are peaceful protests will hurt its image – particularly with members of the opposition whom Duque refuses to meet with. The government’s conundrum is that yielding to pressure from indigenous groups will embolden others to follow suit and mount a protest movement for similarly legitimate complaints – including Afro-Colombians, coca growers, transporters, teachers, victims, and displaced persons. Ultimately presidents must lead and President Duque should demonstrate with actions that he will be the leader for all Colombians, even if they did not vote for him.
A great debt is owed to indigenous people who for decades, if not centuries, have been ignored by governments. Indigenous communities have been displaced by the country’s conflict, their lands were taken forcefully from them, and their leaders have been persecuted and killed during the growing vacuum of power in rural areas.
Indigenous minorities, who represent less than 3.4% of the 47 million Colombians, have banded together to demand rights and denounce crimes and abuses, with protests that have become frequent in recent years. The communities have used the weapons of the weak that are available to them to call government attention, blockade roads, stage large protests, and yes even temporarily retain people in an effort to demand their rights be met.
In an effort to quell past protests, governments and indigenous communities have signed agreements where the government has made commitments to meet the communities most basic needs in terms of health, education, land ownership, employment, and protection. However, the national government – not only the current administration, but all governments – has been unable to hold up their end of the bargain, which has understandably made indigenous communities angry. A key demand in their protest has been for them to meet President Duque, who has refused to meet with indigenous representatives until the blockades end.
Duque is right in asserting that he will not negotiate with a gun to his head. That indigenous protests are also harming people who have done nothing wrong in Cali, Popayán, and Pasto who are affected by food and medicine shortages as a result of the protests. He is right to say that if he yields to demands to meet with indigenous groups without reestablishing the rule of law first, he will only encourage copycats from staging protests to then demand the president’s attendance to solve issues envoys would otherwise handle.
However, Duque and his supporters have used the protests instead to stigmatize the indigenous movement, vilify their leaders, and accuse the movement of being infiltrated by dissident FARC groups, narcotrafficking organizations, and political opponents.
Translation: ‘Dissent of the Farc supports the minga’:
While the government is accusing members of the opposition of staging a political coup to make the government look bad by not giving in to blackmail, it should really consider its endgame. It doesn’t look good that the government shows an unwillingness to compromise or even dialogue with political groups – particularly as it has been desperate to bend over backwards to see that another affected minority is handled with deference and respect in neighboring Venezuela.
By stalling the inevitable meeting between indigenous communities and the president, the government is buying time to disincentivize other communities from staging protests – especially from other communities who also complain that commitments made by past governments have not yet been met. When the government said it did not recognize agreements made in the past, it wants to be taken seriously. However, when members of the President’s party were in the opposition they were happy to jump at the chance to politicize the protests and accuse the government of the same inflexibility, repressiveness, and lack of compromise they are being accused of today.
El expresidente @alvarouribevel exigía al gobierno de @JuanManSantos sentarse a dialogar con los transportadores en pleno paro y bloqueo de vías, hoy piden a @IvanDuque no ir al Cauca a dialogar con Minga Indígena. Politiqueros inconsecuentes es lo q son pic.twitter.com/hOet8F0YPU
Translation: The former president @alvarouribevel demanded that the government of @JuanManSantos sit down to talk with the transporters in full strike and blockade of roads, today they ask @IvanDuque not to go to Cauca to dialogue with Indigenous Minga. Inconsequential politicians is what they are
It would behoove the government to meet with indigenous leaders, recognize past mistakes and achieve a compromise. Not doing so only adds more pressure to a future protest which will likely become inevitable later on.
Sergio Guzmán is the Director of Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consulting firm based in Bogotá. Follow him on twitter @serguzes and @ColombiaRisk
This opinion column is intended as a space to discuss some of the most pressing issues faced by Colombia and the region in these uncertain times. All opinions and content are solely the opinion of the author and do not represent the viewpoints of The Bogotá Post.
Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP) Photo courtesy of Oficina de prensa JEP
Duque’s objections to the JEP presented the opposition parties with an opportunity to show Colombians that support for the implementation of the peace agreement brings the country together. A nasty Twitter fight over who should lead the opposition and should be “in the picture” made it evident that the opposition in Colombia doesn’t speak with a single voice. To be effective adversaries to the government members of the opposition must stand together. Otherwise, the government will use that lack of unity to its advantage.
President Iván Duque on 11 March made six objections to the law that governs the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), a body of transitional justice framed in the peace agreement between the government and the left-wing Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). His objections come as no surprise, as he had previously hinted disaffection with the peace agreement signed by his predecessor, Juan Manuel Santos.
Members of the opposition were quick to condemn the government’s disregard for the JEP and made first-time use of the “right of reply rule” to counter Duque’s argument. Chosen to represent the members of the opposition in this unique moment was Juanita Goebertus, a Harvard educated lawyer who had previously served as lead negotiator for the transitional justice component of the peace agreement with the FARC. Goebertus’ argumentation suggested that the government was using the objections to the JEP as a political platform to advance its electoral agenda in October and that the body politic should instead be debating pressing strategic issues like poverty, education and closing the rural-urban gap.
What could have become a galvanizing moment for the opposition to demonstrate a unity of purpose became instead a messy fight over who was or was not invited to feature in the video. Gustavo Petro, Senator, and former presidential candidate complained to have been excluded from the video – which was later used by his horde of followers to demean and demerit Gobertus and her video rebuttal. Instead of self-cannibalizing, the opposition should instead focus on the matter at hand: defending the peace agreement and offer viable and constructive solutions that stand a chance of becoming law.
The opposition statute, which was approved last year, states that parties formally in opposition to the government (in this case the Green Party, the FARC, the Polo, the Decency List, Mais, and the Colombia Humana Movement) will have the right to make a reply to televised presidential address to the nation and the opposition as a whole shall be granted the same amount of time as the President to be made effective within 48 hours of the presidential address in prime time.
Under that framework, the opposition parties as a whole would have 12 minutes to rebuke the president’s objections to the JEP. If done separately the Green Party would have 5:11 to give an alternative speech to counter Duque’s arguments. Other parties would have even less camera time including FARC (2:27), Polo (1:55), Decency List (1:05), Mais (0:49) and Colombia Humana (0:33). It would make sense, therefore, that only one spokesperson makes use of the opposition’s 12 minutes to make a compelling argument to the Colombian people.
It would also make sense that the person to make that address be the one who knew the most and could condense the legal arguments to their most basic expression; that a representative from the Green Party, the largest opposition bloc in Congress, make first use of the right of reply; and that a woman make the address, not only because of the lack of gender equality in Colombian politics but also because the date was on the heels of international women’s day. For those reasons and more, it’s fitting that Juanita Goebertus was tapped to make the address.
Goebertus, a freshman member of the lower house, who obtained more than 80k votes and was a former member of the government’s delegation in the peace negotiations, where she led the discussions on transitional justice. Her rebuttal was clever, on message, and compelling. Her core arguments were: 1) That the government’s objections are not only an affront to the peace agreement but to the constitution. 2) That the government is using the objections to advance an electoral platform when it could instead be dedicated to solving core issues such as poverty, education and solving the urban-rural divide. And 3) That for the government to take the opposition’s arguments seriously, the public had to rally in support of the peace agreement and against the government’s objections. She then called for a rally to be held nationwide on March 18th.
Not everybody in the opposition was happy with how things panned out. It quickly became evident that senator Gustavo Petro, former presidential candidate, was not in the picture. According to early reactions from his press office, Petro was away on a family matter when the video was recorded. But then, all hell broke loose when Petro claimed that he was not informed on time that the video was taking place.
Me parece que @JuanitaGoe es la persona indicada para la replica y no me duele para nada que pueda expresarlo, lo que si me parece es que debería contarnos quien le sugirió cambiar la fecha de la movilizacion que se había consensuado con los jóvenes. https://t.co/iChaonrC64
While it is true that Petro is an important voice in the opposition, he is not the only voice. Should he want to run for president in 2022, it would do him well to begin building bridges with other members of the opposition instead of obstructing emerging leaders from expressing themselves.
El liderazgo no se da por dedo ni se nomina. Se gana. Esa es la definición de un líder. Y eso es exactamente lo que se ha ganado @JuanitaGoe y lo que ha perdido @petrogustavo con sus ridículas pataletas
If the opposition wants to stand a chance of surviving in the current polarized landscape, it would do well to join forces and make a common front on issues where there is widespread agreement – the implementation of the peace agreement, the fight against economic inequality, stronger measures to counter official and private corruption. The government holds razor-thin margins in the Congress where the support of independent parties will largely determine if laws pass or not. If the opposition seeks to prevent the independents from siding with the government, it must negotiate, it must agree on concessions, and it must present a politically palatable alternative for them to do so, not the most radical version of themselves.
At a time when polarization is politically profitable in the next elections, the Colombian opposition should take a page from Benjamin Franklin: Members must indeed hang together or most assuredly will hang separately.
Sergio Guzmán is the Director of Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consulting firm based in Bogotá. Follow him on twitter @serguzes and @ColombiaRisk
This opinion column is intended as a space to discuss some of the most pressing issues faced by Colombia and the region in these uncertain times. All opinions and content are solely the opinion of the author and do not represent the viewpoints of The Bogotá Post.
Nicolas Maduro speaking to the Supreme Tribunal of Justice in February 2017. (Photo courtesy of the Venezuelan government)
On Tuesday evening, U.S. President Donald Trump painted an apocalyptic picture of the “national security crisis” on the Southern border of the United States. In his address to the nation, he invoked fear by describing a clamoring horde of violent migrants who were fleeing Central America and bringing with them a melange of deadly narcotics that are claiming American lives at alarming rates. The backlash to the speech from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is that the U.S. president is crying wolf about the immigration issue, amassing fear about a threat that does not exist on such a scale. According to on-the-ground reports, President Trump’s preoccupations of a mass immigration crisis are in fact, misdirected. Approximately 5,378 kilometers from the San Ysidro port of entry between Mexico and the United States is Cúcuta, the Colombian border city between Colombia and Venezuela , where there is in fact, an immigration crisis, although much more complex than an influx of “bad hombres.” Like the immigration situation in the United States, Venezuelan immigration is dominating the news cycle in Latin America, except for the one source with presumably the closest proximity to the issue: the Venezuelan president, Nicolas Maduro.
On Thursday morning, President Nicolas Maduro was sworn in to his second term in office despite a growing front of multinational opposition. The presidential elections, which were held in May, have been deemed illegitimate due to charges of corruption—the most obvious example being that Maduro banned the leading opposition parties and candidates from running.
After Maduro seized the presidency, inflation rates ballooned to 14,000 percent; oil production plummeted; food and medical supplies plummeted; the current monthly minimum wage of $5 continues to plummet; and over three million Venezuelans have fled the country in what has resulted in the the “largest exodus from a single country in the region, in recent years,” according to the UN.
In the weeks leading up to Maduro’s second term, a coalition of countries was assembled to oppose Maduro and his presidency. Two notable absences from this group were Bolivian president Evo Morales and Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who is known for his non-interventionist politics. As for the coalition against Maduro, known officially as the Lima Group, the countries that have joined forces are Colombia, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, the United States, Canada, Paraguay and Peru.
Despite enforced trade sanctions from the U.S. and threatened sanctions from the EU , the Lima Group seems more symbolic than anything. And despite the gravity of the crisis encroaching on borders throughout the region, many countries are hesitant to divest from Venezuela completely. Thus, it’s hard to know what will really come of the public outcry.
What we do know though, is the outcry itself. And thus, the inauguration of Maduro in ten tweets:
Ambassador John Bolton, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (NSA)
The US will not recognize the Maduro dictatorship’s illegitimate inauguration. We will continue to increase pressure on the corrupt regime, support the democratic National Assembly, and call for democracy and freedom in Venezuela.
3. Roberto Ampuero, Chile’s Minister of Exterior Relations
A @NicolasMaduro: en lugar de insultar a un Presidente electo democráticamente como @sebastianpinera, le sugiero preparar mejor su defensa ante la Corte Penal Internacional por las violaciones a los DDHH que perpetra contra su propio pueblo.
Translation: A @NicolasMaduro: Instead of insulting a democratically elected president like @sebastianpinera, I suggest you better prepare your defense before the International Criminal Court for the human rights violations you perpetrates against your own people.
4. Michael Welling, “a Canadian very passionate about Venezuela”
La decisión de @OEA_oficial de no reconocer legitimidad del régimen de Nicolás Maduro, es confirmación de denuncias de Colombia y la lucha del Grupo de Lima para restablecer democracia en Venezuela. Es un llamado a comunidad internacional para cercar diplomáticamente la dictadura
Translation: The decision not to recognise the @OEA_oficial legitimacy of Nicolas Maduro’s regime is confirmation of Colombia’s allegations and the struggle of the Lima group to restore democracy in Venezuela. It is a call to the international community to diplomatically fence the dictatorship
6. Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, President of Cuba
Hermanos de lucha, hermanos de sueños. Unidos a favor de la integración latinoamericana y caribeña. Apoyando al Presidente Maduro, a la unión cívico militar y al pueblo venezolano.#SomosCuba#SomosContinuidadpic.twitter.com/2iFrSufojD
Translation: Brothers of struggle, brothers of dreams. United in favor of Latin American and Caribbean integration. Supporting President Maduro, the civic-military union and the Venezuelan people.
7. Human Rights Watch
Venezuelan intelligence services have detained and brutally tortured military officers and family members of people accused of plotting against the government. The repression continues as the Maduro regime clings on to power. New @hrw & @ForoPenal reporthttps://t.co/eiurBLmU5hpic.twitter.com/SNpx1RXPWE
9. Reuters Venezuela,official account of Reuters in Venezuela
U.S. Secretary of State @SecPompeo condemned Venezuelan President @NicolasMaduro for usurpation of power on Thursday, as the South American leader was sworn in to second term in office that governments around the world described as illegitimate. https://t.co/aqUDNfTlTY
No daré descanso a mi brazo, ni reposo a mi alma, lucharé en defensa de la Constitución, la soberanía y la felicidad. Lo juro por el pueblo, por nuestros antepasados, por el legado de Bolívar, del Ejército Libertador, por Chávez, por Dios y por mi vida. ¡Cumpliré! pic.twitter.com/DNeMhPj3iI
Translation: I will not give rest to my arm, nor repose to my soul, I will fight in defense of the Constitution, sovereignty and happiness. I swear by the people, for our ancestors, for the legacy of Bolivar, the liberating army, for Chávez, for God and for my life. Fulfill!
The killings of social leaders continue unabated in Colombia. The assailants and motives behind the killings vary according to each individual case. Although the government has condemned the killings and pledged to reinforce security for social leaders, the cold hard truth suggests that the killings of social leaders will continue and even grow unless the government makes additional efforts to implement rural reform and fulfil the terms of the peace deal with the FARC.
Since the left-wing Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrilla group and the Colombian government signed a landmark peace agreement, there were early warnings that the vacuums of power left behind and the historical statelessness in rural areas represented one of the largest risks to peace and stability in the country. Shortly after the ceasefire and the FARC’s concentration in transitional zones across the country the phenomenon of killing social leaders began. What some commenters asserted were isolated and unconnected events became two years later into a full-blown crisis, where close to 430 community leaders have lost their lives between January 2016 and December 2018, according to estimates from the Ombudsman. According to the Colombian nonprofit Indepaz, 226 social leaders were killed in 2018 and in the first eight days of 2019, six social leaders have been murdered.
The murders of social leaders are difficult to pin down on a single actor, motive or region. Additionally, the victims of these crimes also vary significantly from indigenous leaders, Afro-Colombian activists, women’s rights activists, victims rights activists, community activists, human rights defenders, individuals behind land claims, unionists, heads of local environmental associations, local political activists and elected officials. El Colombiano, a daily newspaper from Medellín, compiled an interactive graph that details the victims as well as their geographic location. In synthesis security situation for social leaders in Colombia is a full-blown crisis.
The competent authorities have condemned the killings in the harshest terms, they have also pledged that they will reinforce security for social leaders and strengthen the rule of law in rural areas. Those are the right things to say and the right goals to have. However, regardless it is unlikely that the killing of social leaders will stop unless the government takes rural development including land reform seriously.
Gobierno dice que ninguno de los seis líderes sociales asesinados en lo corrido de este año, tenían medidas de protección ni tampoco las habían pedido #VocesySonidoshttps://t.co/WGzjCQI0cg
There is quite a bit of dispute around three issues on the topic of social leaders. First, what is a social leader? Second, who is killing social leaders and why? Third, how many are actually being killed?
My list for social leader above includes a very broad assortment of individuals. That is because social leaders are mostly rural residents who have leadership qualities and who have stood out for others and their belief in what is right. In a stateless vacuum, social leaders become authority figures and broadly represent interests of local citizens. However, in that same vein, because of their leadership, they also threaten the territorial control and legitimacy of illegal actors who are unbound by ideology or hierarchy.
According to an investigation by the Universidad del Rosario, the killings of social leaders are systematic and largely associated with land claims. Social leaders have been killed in a greater proportion in the places where the FARC operated before handing over their weapons and was in play for other armed left-wing guerrilla groups such as the ELN, narcotrafficking organizations such as the Clan del Golfo, the Caparrapos, the Frente Oliver Sinisterra and other dissident and former paramilitary groups to occupy following the FARC’s departure from armed conflict.
The study also reveals that individuals residing in areas where there are ongoing land restitution claims and have a presence of criminal organizations, the homicides of leaders with respect to the municipal population increased at 0.32 per 100 thousand inhabitants. Land restitution claims, according to the study, increases the average murder of social leaders compared to other areas where there was also FARC presence as well as presence of other armed groups. The study and many political operatives have hypothesized that the killings of social leaders obey entrenched landholding interests from local elites.
Some, like Gustavo Petro, have been quick to jump at the chance to claim that killings of social leaders are a direct affront at his political movement that have been targeted by extremist right-wing forces. That claim, besides being alarmist and misleading, does more damage to the investigations of the killings of social leaders and politicizes them. Although, arguably, the killings of social leaders have long been politicized in Colombia. Although the killing of social leaders is in a way reminiscent of the genocide of left-wing Unión Patriótica members following the party’s formation in 1985, the loose political affiliation of leaders with organized party activity makes it misleading to attribute their deaths to an ideology. Nevertheless, many of the causes advanced by the deceased leaders, such as land restitution, the implementation of the peace agreement, indigenous and afro-colombian rights, unionization and environmental conservation are also political objectives of center-left and left-wing parties.
The Ombudsman’s office reported that 164 social leaders were killed in 2018 (153 men and 11 women). Meanwhile, political organizations such as the Marcha Patriotica have claimed that there were 252 crimes against social leaders, many of whom occupy their political ranks. Others such as Indepaz have a different number in mind when it comes to killing of social leaders. Though I’m not disputing anyone’s figures, it seems that discussing who has the best and most accurate methodology in place is secondary to the discussion of what should be done about it.
What can the government do?
It is important to clarify that the government is saying the right things with regards to the killings of social leaders. The government’s unequivocal condemnation of the murders is reiterated with every downed leader. Discussions are had regarding the early alert system by the Ombudsman´s office as well as the National Protection Unit’s fulfilment of their duty to carry out security assessments of leaders and provide security measures to people under credible threats.
However, the problem runs deeper than that. President Ivan Duque’s principal campaign promise was to make changes to the peace agreement with the FARC which immediately put the implementation of the agreement in limbo. His political appointees – who have expressed their deep running skepticism of the peace agreement – to the positions in charge of the implementation of the agreement, such as the Rural Development Agency and his failed nomination to lead the National Council of Historic Memory have been missed opportunities to reaffirm the government’s commitment to the implementation of the agreement.
The government has also been slow on the implementation of land reform, as contained in the peace agreement. In fact, they have reverted some of the past government’s positions on land reform and land restitutions. Which not only empowers local elites with vested interests in maintaining the status quo, but emboldens actions against proponents of land reform who have been categorized by right-wing politicians as subservient to guerrilla interests. The government needs to recognize the killing of social leaders as a deep-rooted problem, one that can expand and ultimately gain more prominence eroding the security gains made under the peace agreement, first it needs to reign in from its own ranks.
The government, ultimately has to make large investments in rural development. This effort requires a sincere commitment to the implementation of the peace agreement which includes a serious effort to introduce land reform, a rethink of the government’s rural development strategy – in particular crop substitution an aerial eradication – and efforts to make significant government investments in providing a full cadre of basic services to rural areas – which include but are not limited to road infrastructure, housing, electricity, water and sanitation, education, and improvements on rural governance. This is a tall order, one that the government of President Iván Duque will struggle to mitigate. In the meantime, the killings of social leaders will continue in the foreseeable future and signal the government’s inability to provide a safe and secure environment for its people.
This opinion column is intended as a space to discuss some of the most pressing issues faced by Colombia and the region in these uncertain times. All opinions and content are solely the opinion of the author and do not represent the viewpoints of The Bogotá Post.
Sergio Guzmán is the Director of Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consulting firm based in Bogotá. Follow him on Twitter @serguzes and @ColombiaRisk
*El Mohán is a Colombian mythological figure. He is described as a hairy humanoid figure associated with natural forces such as great rivers and the mysteries lying within the forests. It is said, El Mohán was a shaman who had an anticipated vision of the arrival of the Spanish conquerors and the terrors they brought along.
The tech sector in Latin America has experienced a remarkable transformation driven by the rising prominence of women in the industry.
While still work remains, there have been material improvements. Since 2017, Brazil has seen a 12% increase in women working in the tech sector. It is Colombia, however, that has most stood out, with a recent report showing that women now account for over 30% of the country’s tech workforce.
According to the report by Draub, the improvements have been driven by a number of factors, including:
An educational system with a strong emphasis on STEM education, providing women with a foundation to pursue careers in the industry.
A growing culture of inclusivity and diversity in the tech sector, driven by initiatives such as the Niñas Programando program in the country.
Strategic partnerships between organizations and businesses focused on advancing female in the industry.
One company taking a leadership role in this regard is Source Meridian, one of the largest employers of tech talent in the city of Medellin. Today women occupy 47% of leadership positions at the company, according to Project Manager and Product Owner Dani Gutierrez in an interview with Entrepreneur Magazine.
She credited the company’s founder, Mike Hoey, with mentorship being a key reason for the improved representation of females in the leadership team.
The executive also encourages other women in tech advantage of opportunities, even if they don’t feel ready, and to embrace new challenges.
She also highlighted that several studies have shown that diverse teams have better performances, as well as greater staff retention, which translates into greater profits for companies.
This article includes a client of an Espacio portfolio company
Colombia’s government announced this quarter that it will contribute 50 billion pesos, or approximately $12.6 million USD, to the construction of an AI center in Bogotá.
The new center will be operated and managed by SENA, the country’s national training service. The building will be located in Usme, with the aim to promote digital education, close the technological gap and promote the ICT sector.
At the AI center individuals will receive training in areas including cybersecurity, cloud computing strategies, data analytics, and IoT, in addition to other areas.
The Bogotá center is the second one developed by the government of Colombia, following the first in the Zipaquirá Cundinamarca department.
Said ICT Minister Mauricio Lizcano in a statement from the government, “We are going to create another 100 AI centers in conjunction with the city halls, which will become connecting pillars in the regions to identify the potential for the union between actors, strategies and resources oriented toward public digital innovation.”
AI continues to be introduced to the public in Colombia, with the ministry recently announcing its plan to build 300 new innovation centers in the country that will focus on AI.
According Antoine Valentone, an international executive at Prezent, “AI can play a very important role in improving our business communication skills and helping us be more productive. For example, AI will help automate repetitive tasks such as composing emails, scheduling meetings, and summarizing conversations.”
Speaking on how AI can have an impact on SMEs in the region, he explained that automation will free up employee time to do more strategic work that requires a human touch.
He added that while the technology has continued to evolve, precautions should remain. For example, AI is not perfect, and its models can be biased, make errors, and lack the nuanced understanding that humans possess.
If you have a dog in your life in Bogotá, there’s something you need to be aware of. Some of the city’s new bins pose a serious risk to pets. A large pin at dog height has caught many of them unaware. In January, local councillor Samir José Abisambra reported over 300 dogs had been injured by the poor bin design.
In March, our deputy editor’s dog Zoé fell victim. She ripped her side open as she hurtled past a bin in the Parque Nacional. She needed five stitches. That might not sound a lot, but it means general anaesthetic for a 25kg dog. Then, of course, there’s the risk of infection.
Luckily our girl made a full and fast recovery with little to no suffering. It could easily have been more grisly though, so we’re giving you a guide for what to watch out for and what you can do to help stop the problem.
Bogotá bins: What to watch out for
The offending pin
The offending bins can be seen in this photo. The pin that extends out from the bottom is around 30-40cm from the floor and the protruding disc is roughly the size of a COP$1,000 coin. This means a dog running past the bin can catch on it and tear a hole in themselves.
It’s not all bins – the older green models do not have the adjusting pins and it’s tucked under the base on some of the new ones. Some of the poorly designed ones are also placed in such a way that they won’t cause a problem, with the pins together in the centre.
The ones in parks are particularly problematic. The ones on the streets shouldn’t have dogs running past at speed anyway. Watch out for any that have wide open spaces behind them that dogs like to burst into. Also, be careful to look out for bins between spaces – this creates visual confusion for our canine chums.
How you can help
Luckily, there’s something you can do. Pick up some tube lagging from a ferretería or a pool noodle from Dollarcity. Then, as per the pictures, you can cut said tube into little doughnuts. Make incisions into the central circle so the doughnut-shaped foam guard can slip neatly onto the pin and cushion against collision.
We recommend you use a bright colour that is clearly visible to both dogs and humans – blue or purple are best. We used blue, as you can see. And spread the word about the offending bins to other dog walkers you may see out and about. Most importantly, exercise caution with your furry friends if they get too close to dangerous situations.
There will be water cuts in Bogotá, beginning on April 11. Rationing will be zone by zone and will last until at least mid-May depending on weather. Months of low rainfall have seriously depleted the water levels in the reservoirs that serve the city, forcing authorities to take drastic action to eke out what’s left.
Put simply, Bogotá is running out of water. The mayor is calling on everybody to preserve water in any way possible and has also announced rolling 24-hr water cuts throughout the city. The cuts will take place by zone and also impact areas such as Soacha and Chía.
Bogotá mayor Carlos Galán tweeted: “The critical levels of the reservoirs that supply Bogotá’s drinking water lead us to take measures aimed at saving water and reducing consumption from 17 cubic meters per second to 15.”
Bogotá nos necesita juntos por el agua.
Los niveles críticos de los embalses de donde sacamos el agua potable para Bogotá nos llevan a tomar medidas encaminadas a ahorrar agua y bajar el consumo de 17 metros cúbicos por segundo a 15.
The impact of El Niño has been particularly harsh this year, causing forest fires in January and water shortages throughout the country. IDEAM expects the effects of El Niño to last until mid-May or June, meaning water-saving measures will continue for the foreseeable future.
Where are the water cuts in Bogotá?
Water will be cut on a rolling basis in nine zones of Bogotá. On the day when water is cut in your area, there will be no water for 24 hours (from 8am to 8am the following day). The cuts will work on a cycle, beginning April 11.
According to Acueducto, here’s how the cuts will impact each area. EAAB have more details here (pdf).
April 11: Zone 1
Much of Antonio Nariño
Much of Barrios Unidos
Parts of Chapinero
Much of Los Mártires
Much of Puente Aranda
Parts of Rafael Uribe Uribe
Parts of Santa Fe
Teusaquillo
Parts of Tunjuelito
Parts of Usaquén
Cuts continue on April 20 and April 29
April 12: Zone 2
Engativá
Parts of Fontibón
Cota
Cuts continue on April 21 and April 30
April 13: Zone 3
Parts of Barrios Unidos
About half of Suba
Much of Usaquén
Cuts continue on April 22 and May 1
April 14: Zone 4
Much of Bosa
About half of Ciudad Bolívar
Parts of Kennedy
Parts of Puente Aranda
Much of Tunjuelito
Cuts continue on April 23 and May 2
April 15: Zone 5
About half of Ciudad Bolívar
Much of Rafael Uribe Uribe
Much of San Cristóbal
About half of Santa Fe
One barrio in Tunjuelito
Cuts continue on April 24 and May 3
April 16: Zone 6
About half of Suba
Soacha
Cuts continue on April 25 and May 4
April 17: Zone 7
Much of Fontibón
Parts of Kennedy
Also Funza, Madrid, and Mosquera
Cuts continue on April 26 and May 5
April 18: Zone 8
Parts of Antonio Nariño
Much of Bosa
Much of Chapinero
Much of Kennedy
Part of Los Mártires
Parts of Rafel Uribe Uribe
Parts of San Cristóbal
About half of Santa Fe
About half of Usaquén
Cuts continue on April 27 and May 6
April 19: Zone 9
About half of Usaquén
Parts of Suba
Also Chía, Cajicá, Cojardín, Sopó, Tocancipá and Gachancipá
Cuts continue on April 28 and May 7
The water cuts in Bogotá will affect most of the city. Image: Acueducto de Bogotá
What you can do to help
The alcaldía is calling on everybody to use less water, even on days when your taps are working. #JuntosPorElAgua may feel like too little, too late, given that reservoir levels have been falling for some time. Nonetheless, there are steps we can all take to reduce our consumption, especially as water cuts in Bogotá are relatively frequent.
These include:
Take shorter showers. Collect water in a bucket while it is heating up so you can use it for other things such as cleaning floors or watering plants.
Turn off the tap while cleaning your teeth. Similarly, switch off the water when shampooing your hair or shaving.
Don’t clean your car or the outside of your home with a hosepipe. Hosepipes use a lot of water, so if there are activities you’d usually use your hose for, switch to a bucket instead.
Check for leaks and fix any dripping taps or showers. A leaky toilet can waste 30 gallons or more a day, which is both water and money down the drain.
Only use your washing machine for full loads. Make the most of every load by avoiding half-empty machines.
Put a full plastic bottle into your toilet tank. Save money on every flush by displacing some of the water in the tank. Use a clean plastic bottle, weighted with a few stones, and place it in the back of your toilet. That way it will take less water to fill the tank.
How low are the reservoirs?
Bogota gets drinking water from eight reservoirs, spread across three systems, all of which are running low. About 70% of the city’s water comes from the Chingaza system, and the Northern and Southern systems provide 25% and 5% respectively. There are also smaller providers that operate and also have troubles.
While all the reservoirs have issues, levels in the Chingaza system are at 17%. That means the water system that provides the majority of the capital’s water is almost spent. Natasha Avendaño, the boss of Acueducto de Bogotá, told Caracol that the city will run out of water if it does not rain in the next 30 days.
Images of the San Rafael reservoir, before and after, show why there will be water cuts in Bogotá. Photo: Alcaldía de Bogota.
In addition to the environmental challenges and water cuts, the low levels of water present another problem. Bogotá gets a significant chunk of its energy from hydroelectric power. This means we may also see energy cuts and blackouts in the capital if the situation continues.
Water cuts in Bogotá: the bottom line
Find out when the water will be cut in your area and prepare by putting aside water to drink and cook with. In addition, we all need to take steps to reduce our water consumption, else rolling water cuts may be the least of our problems. The water levels in Chingaza are seriously low and El Niño is not yet done.
Fracttal’s executive team. Image credit: Fracttal.
Fracttal, a leading asset maintenance management software that operates across Latin America, including helping manufacturers and logistics companies in Colombia, Chile, Mexico and countries in Central America and the Caribbean, has announced new updates to its Fracttal One software.
Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 was, put simply, a tremendous success. Coming home to Parque Simón Bolívar slap-bang in the middle of the city was a masterstroke, instantly removing the event’s biggest headache: transport. World-class talent abounded, with legends alternating with up-and-coming stars also making statements.
This is now a festival with all the bells and whistles. Like other global competitors, everything is cashless, meaning you pay via wristband. All eaters are well catered for, with veggie and vegan options. There’s a veritable plethora of things to do away from the stages and all the support such as drug testing and chill out spots.
It even has a beach (sort of)
Pricing was fairly on point. Most food places had prices slightly higher than in their restaurants, but the difference was a couple of mil rather than twice the price. Booze was relatively pricey at COP$16,000 and up for a can of beer but that served well to keep loutishness in check.
For an event of this size, things ran extremely smoothly throughout the weekend. Recharging the wristbands was fast and reliable (go here to reclaim leftover money); toilets were clean and plentiful with soap and water on hand; lots of areas to rest and recuperate; limited queues everywhere and easy entrance. The organisers even allowed people in with bottles for water refills.
Access and inclusion was also well organised – wheelchair users commented on the ease of navigating via tarmac paths and access was fully separated to allow direct passage to the mobility-restricted areas. Rainbow and Trans flags abounded and there was a safe space for victims of sexual abuse to make denouncements and receive advice/treatment.
Of course, there were a few hiccups, but that’s to be expected with tens of thousands of attendees. Some complained about water access. But it’s worth remembering that there were three free water fountains, where we wouldn’t expect any. Hardly a surprise to see lines waiting to refill bottles.
We’ve been critical of certain things in the past, but it’s hard to find any major faults with Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 as the organisers seem to have nailed it this year. It’s not to say that it was perfect – large events always have issues – and of course it’s extremely expensive for many. However, it delivered value in abundance.
The music at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024
The South American tour of Lollapalooza is essentially the template for Festival Estéreo Picnic, meaning that it can reliably attract properly world-class foreign artists, while the local talent pool is strong enough that there’s plenty of classy support acts.
Thursday
Zhu shone in the tent
The first day was probably the most eclectic, swinging confidently through genres as a day with something for everyone. It was hard rock that stood out though, with King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard providing the best performance and Limp Bizkit drawing the biggest crowd. Zhu’s set in the dance tent was also first rate.
Fred Durst’s mob literally had the ground shaking as that enormous throng pogoed in unison. Bizarrely dressed in a hi-viz jacket, Durst has lost a lot of his explosive energy but retains a certain charisma. Main stage headliners Kings of Leon were somewhat overshadowed with their plodding set and competent performance that lacked spark.
Before Limp Bizkit on the second stage was King Gizzard, who provided an absolute sonic masterclass of glorious sludgerock. Finishing the night was a limp performance from Bad Gyal. Bringing Spanish reggaeton to Latin America was a brave move, and it didn’t really pay off, simply coming across as a pale imitation.
Future Islands
Maca & Gero did a good job of opening the main stage, although they played to a sparse crowd. The third stage was by far the most interesting. Buha 2030 set down a hard rock (is it jazz infused?) marker, with Kiwis Leisure bringing a Madchester feel and Future Islands providing a dark synthpop finish. Only three bands, but such a sonic range.
Friday
This was probably the day for cool kids. Visitor numbers were still low enough to feel part of something alternative and plenty of fashion kings, queens and gender non binary monarchs in the crowds. Arca was the single most fabulous show, bringing her hi-beat technopop to really set the third stage alight. A small stage featured a swing and all the performance art you can imagine.
Arca is adored by the fans
The big stage headliners were solid all round. Sam Smith did what they do, captivating and connecting with the audience naturally, casually dropping in hit after hit throughout the show. James Blake was slightly more awkward, his posh-kid schtick didn’t really stick. Black Coffee finished off with a banging set that energised everyone as much as his namesake.
Over on the main stage, Phoenix were punctual and loud but not much more, with Greta Van Fleet being the first to really put some power in the stage, leaving things wide open for genre-hopping chameleon SZA. She didn’t disappoint, with a stage setup that mimicked a trawlerboat on the high seas replete with a buoy to lift her into the heavens.
The smaller stages were also packed with quality. Anamaría Oramas and Matar Fuma provided a solid start to the day before Okraa put on a fantastic display in the tent. All three suffered from audience ignorance as the festival took a while to get going. No such problems for Akriila, Overmono and Verraco later in the day, with Four Tet closing things out perfectly.
Saturday
This was the day where the festival really hit its stride in terms of numbers, but also went a little more mainstream. Two rising reggaetonero stars dominated the day, Blessd absolutely tore through the second stage before Feid conquered the main stage.
Feid’s show at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 was spectacular
Karol G’s fella has a big shadow to step out from, which he went a long way towards doing at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. A fleet of drones assembled in the sky to form a Colombian flag which then morphed into his grinning face logo. With awe suitably inspired, the lights came up to reveal a fantastic cartoony set. He went on to drop in cumbia and frequent references to medallo. Repetitive and bland music, but a superstar show.
El Kalvo speaks out
Somewhat more low-key but just as inventive was El Kalvo on the third stage, mocking up a Bogotá street to pay homage to the city he loves. He also found time to call out the genocide in Gaza, collaborator Hi-Kymon running across the stage with a Palestinian flag.
In the dance tent, Penyair brought a rawer, scratchier take on hip-hop. Before them were guitarless trio Homie! who certainly made their groupies happy. It was dance that ruled though. The Blessed Madonna put on an assured set and various Kaputt DJs paid tribute to a sadly missed Bogotá icon. Nuclear Digital Transistor’s dark techno finish was the perfect cap to the night there.
Afro Legends – Pacific style
Earlier in the day, Afro Legends opened the main stage powerfully by being both Afro and legends, with Fruko y Sus Tesos carrying on the traditionalist theme after them. Lolabúm and More were strong early bands, far more inventive than Grupo Frontera on the main stage, whose inoffensive MOR latin-rock makes them a sort of Mexican Coldplay.
Also a bit flat were Placebo on the second stage, Molko’s lyrics a bit lost in an overpowered bass setup. They made little attempt to communicate with the crowd, standing in stark contrast to Blessd, who absolutely put on a show. Pyrotechnics and charisma set him up as a rising star. MIA also had her own “reggaeton moment,” calling up dozens of the audience to dance with her. Opening for Feid wasn’t easy, but she did a good job.
Sunday
By this point, everyone with multi-day wristbands was somewhat dazed and confused, but the lineup was strong enough to bring hordes of day-trippers, making for a bizarre mix throughout the crowd. Both The Offspring and Blink 182 rolled back the years in triumphant performances.
The Offspring got circle pits going for the first time in the weekend
Formed before most of the audience were born, these two bands still have plenty in the locker. The Offspring were up first and the better of the two, ripping straight into classics, inspiring circle pits and doing extensive crowdwork. Blink had the fest’s biggest single audience but fewer songs to sustain it, not that anyone cared much. They managed to transfer their puerile banter pretty well into Spanish, if that’s a positive.
La Etnnia brought a huge crowd
La Etnnia took the day’s prize for the ‘Why won’t the organisers put local bands on big stages award.’ Thousands flocked to see them on the third (!) stage. Verito Asprilla provided a challenge there, while Los Dinosaurios Murerion Ayer and Volcán played the big stages early but had the quality to be much further up.
Oblivion’s Mighty Trash came from Medellín but were faintly disappointing, as was Esteban Rojas. Kevin Kaarl from Mexico was somewhat better, but it was Arcade Fire that did the job of sustaining the post-Blink energy. Great closers, they had Bomba Estéreo on stage to sing ‘Fuego’ and were a calm bridge from the high to the comedown.
At the end of it all, we were certainly tired and emotional, but also euphorically happy. This is now absolutely an event that fully deserves to be in the festival tourism conversation. It’s so well set up and run that even with no experience of Colombia, the Spanish language or Bogotá itself, you’ll find it easy to navigate. This also goes for Festival Cordillera later this year (September).
The real big draw of the event is simply that you’ll be able to see some really interesting bands that you’d have no chance of catching elsewhere. Add to that a clutch of globally famous stars and you have a potent combination. Plus, the Bogotá scene is enthusiastic and energetic, meaning rapturous responses to everyone.
Electronica wizard Juan Carlos Torres Alonso, better known as Okraa, was born in Bogotá but moved to That London in 2018. He’s back in town for Festival Esteréo Picnic 2024, where he’s lighting up the Colsubsidio stage on Friday night.
Okraa freewheels through a range of styles. He says, “I guess it’s electronic music. What I explore most is soundscaping, but I’m not stuck in a single genre. I like to experiment with all sorts of BPMs and the music can have very dancey vibes or be very ambient. I come from a creative space that feels very free.”
Juan Carlos AKA Okraa in Walthamstow. Photo by Camila Rhodes + Laudrup
Of course, at an event like Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024, there’s a certain style, which he acknowledges too. “While I’m not a guy that wants to fit a mould, I also want to connect with people who aren’t familiar with the project which means finding a middle ground.”
“I’m still ironing out details, he says of his setlist. “I want to include a bit of everything I do. There will be some dark stuff, some ambient, there will be a lot of the electro, garage stuff. I’m still figuring it out. It’s definitely going to be beats-oriented, not just ambient. It’s not that sort of festival, I know that.”
Okraa may no longer be based in Bogotá, but it’ll always be home. “It feels great,” he says, to be back in the city. “The gigs [I played] last year were amazing, there was a massive connection with people, so I’m very excited. At the beginning of the 2010s, people seemed to want to give the local bands hard times so maybe it’s changing for the better.”
His soundscapes conjure up dark, ethereal, mysterious worlds with at times an almost spiritual quality. This is music that few people regularly associate with a country that has so much traditional music with deep roots.
Okraa’s interpretation of Bunde Tolimense, which his family had a hand in creating
I wonder how much musical tradition means to him. “It’s a funny one to answer,” he says. “Because in terms of the type of music I do, the UK is so important, but I’m Colombian, of course. I grew up listening to salsa and I’ve always been curious about Colombian traditional music, which I’ve experimented with.”
“I would be lying if I said cumbia was my biggest influence,” he continues. “But I love it. I love bullerengue too and so much other music and I feel very attached and identified to it. I feel that there are many ways of being Colombian. Six or seven years ago I thought I didn’t use a guaracha or something like that, that my music wouldn’t sound Colombian.”
He rejects fixed notions of national identity, commenting: “There’s this thing in Colombia, I had it at university, where people complain about artists trying to sound like they’re from the UK or US. They want you to use traditional instruments. I gave that a go, and I will continue, if it comes from a creative space and not pressure.”
Okraa has enough confidence to reject that pressure. He says, “I’ve definitely felt that sometimes, like could there be more gaita or whatever. It’s tough, because sometimes you feel like you should do more of that but right now I feel I shouldn’t.” He’s not wrong to resist – his music is an equally valid expression of his roots and sounds beautifully organic.
Why Okraa came to London
He’s a philosophical and considered speaker, taking his time over answers and clearly self-reflective about his career. As a curious student of music, he was ready to search for new things: “By the time I left it felt saturated in terms of urban Latin music on radio and TV. Nothing wrong with that, but I wanted something new.”
Running away from problems doesn’t always work though, as he ruefully recounts: “The funny thing is, I wanted to move away from reggaeton and then when we went to Oxford Circus the first thing we saw was a store with a massive J.Balvin display. London goes reggaeton, I was like ‘Wow’.”
That wasn’t everything, of course, in a colossal cultural capital with dozens of venues: “That’s definitely one of the reasons I left, to find a new landscape, which London is great for because there are ambient music nights all through the week, and they’re packed if it’s good music, so I really enjoy that.”
“At first, it was that most of my favourite artists are from London, but now I think it’s a place where people are really into music. I can spend a whole afternoon at a record shop chatting to whoever’s there and find so much music. Much better than the Spotify algorithm, no offence to them.”
Okraa is also receptive to the behind-the-scenes nature of the business. “I’ve had the chance to learn so much about the industry too, how they run independent record labels which I think is something we can develop much more in Colombia. I don’t want to say there are no small independent labels, but you don’t have a Warp Records or Ninja Tune there.”
This is something he thinks could be a game changer for the local scene in terms of building something with long-term prospects. “I think it would be a great thing for the industry in Colombia to get more well managed and efficient independent labels.”
A colder, harsher soundscape that evokes a November night in London
Of course, making music in a foreign country isn’t always easy: “It’s quite challenging, that’s for sure but there are loads of opportunities. You can keep trying until you find something that works, which I wouldn’t say is the same in Bogotá.” He’s clearly made the most of those chances.
He’s had similar experiences in terms of gatekeepers to traditional music: “I think both places to be honest with you, people try to put you in a little box as a Colombian. There’s a pressure when you’re outside your country to do whatever people think your country is.” That means no bongos and maracas, London philistines.
So how have the notoriously cold Londoners been with him? “More responsive than not, has been my experience,” he says. “People seem curious, especially at ambient music events.” He’s happy and enthusiastic, despite having also been on the wrong end of the famously scathing London wit.
“The sarcasm I find really hilarious,” he says with a chuckle. “It’s a way of bonding I guess. At first, I would sometimes struggle with it, the harsher the banter the more they like you. Now it’s fine, I quite like it.” Classically British understatement there – he’s no doubt popular due to the sheer quality of his musical project. Don’t miss this one, at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 in Bogotá or That London later in the year.
Okraa plays at 5.45pm on Friday March 22 on the ColSubsidio stage at Festival Esteréro Picnic 2024 in Parque Simón Bolívar. Tickets still available here at time of publication.
The country’s best and biggest musical event rolls into town this week in the shape of Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. We’ve got all the info you could ever want, from bands to bars and music to maps.
Getting around Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 is easy if you know where you’re going!
Whether it’s your first time at any event or if you’re a seasoned festhead who is new to Colombia, this guide will make your life easier. Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 is a high-functioning event that is absolutely in line with modern music events around the world.
We’ve checked out the list of restaurants, bar prices and transportation options, all to save you time. Plus, links to some of the best local talent, when they’re on, full lineup guides, and even where to go if you or your mates are monged out.
Getting there and what to wear
Temporary TransMi options
The city is putting on extra nightly routes and services from the TransMilenio service until 4am. There are three different routes. One runs north, one to the centre and another towards Multiplaza. For the last three days, there’ll also be another northern route from Salitre El Greco TransMi station.
Arriving is easy enough. Both Simón Bolívar and Campín stations are not close but not too far. The entrance is at the Calle 60 / Carrera 60 roundabout. Get there with your wristband on and it shouldn’t take too long to get into the site unless you arrive with a mad crush.
Despite some rather optimistic claims from online services that it’ll be dry, poking your head out of the window tells you there’s a good chance of downpours at least on the first day. Take waterproofs if possible and plan to be in tents for some parts of the day. Layers make sense – it’ll be cold at night – and a small bag won’t be a problem either.
A helpful list of no-nos
This being Bogotá, it’s also a good idea to bring sunscreen and sunglasses, both of which are merrily allowed in, as is makeup and minor tools like mascara pens. Unlike Rock al Parque, for example, you can stroll in with belts and all reasonable accessories. A bullet belt might be pushing it, but small chains are unlikely to be an issue.
It’s fine to bring in chargers and or powerbanks for your phone. But leave large scale recording devices at home and be aware that drones are certainly not welcome. You’re not allowed to bring in food and drink nor illegal drugs.
The Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 bands:
Thursday
The weekend kicks off with probably the rockiest day of the lot. 90s megastars Limp Bizkit are Rollin’ up as headliners with Thirty SecondsTo Mars and Kings Of Leon acting as able undercards. For our money, though, it’s King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard that are the pick of the first day.
The opening band of the whole festival on the big stage is Maca & Gero, who spoke to us about friendship and the festival. Elsewhere, Buha 2030 are opening things up with their definitely-not-jazz saxorock on the CeraVe stage.
Full lineup: Kings Of Leon, Limp Bizkit, Hozier, Thirty Seconds To Mars, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Bad Gyal, ZHU, Floating Points, Future Islands, Leisure, The Virginia Valley, Laura Pérez, Maca & Gero, Lucas Hill, Mala Bengala, Buha 2030, Mariscos and Wide Awake.
Friday
This is easily the most fabulous day. Sam Smith and SZA are divas on the two big stages with showstoppers such as Greta Van Fleet loving it up further down the bill. Venezuelan performance artist and superstar DJ Arca is a less familiar name to many but the standout talent of the day at 8.45pm on the CeraVe stage.
We’ve profiled Anamaría Oramas today, opening with her mad jazz strings and woodwind. Okraa spoke to us from That London where he’s carved out a name for himself as a leading light in the ambient electronica scene and Matar Fuma, a homecoming king reestablishing himself in la nevera.
Full lineup: SZA, Sam Smith, Greta Van Fleet, Phoenix, Black Coffee, James Blake, Proyecto Uno, Arca, Four Tet, Omar Apollo, Nothing But Thieves, Overmono, Irepelusa, Verraco, Homie!, Divino Niño, Sa!koro, Akriila, Okraa, Matar Fuma and Anamaría Oramas.
Saturday
We’re not going to be the cool kids today – it’s all about the big name on the bill, Placebo. M.I.A. is another top-rate talent and Feid does what he does well. It’s a stacked day throughout though, with the Blessed Madonna and Dillom on the way up and Fruko y Sus Tesos being genuine salsa megastars.
Local acts today more than rise to the challenge. There’s the big man of rolo rap, El Kalvo, Ecuadorian rockeros Lolabúm and the Pacific heavyweights that are Afro Legends, all of whom we’ve profiled. Add to that More and Penyair and throw in the DJ collectives Nuclear Digital Transistor and Kaputt Takeover to make sure you’ll dance till dawn.
Full lineup: Feid, Placebo, M.I.A., Grupo Frontera, Tainy, Fruko y Sus Tesos, The Blessed Madonna, Whomadewho, Kittin, Poolside, Penyair, Saiko, Dillom, Tornall, El Kalvo, Lolabúm, Nuclear Digital Transistor, Afro Legends, More, Laurél, Swing de Sasha, Kaputt Takeover.
Sunday
It’s a punk day to finish, with not one but two seminal Californian bands in the form of Blink-182 and The Offspring, who taught many to count in Spanish. If you’re not a punkero, the rolo hip hop sound is represented with La Etnnia and Nicki Nicole brings the fire from Argentina. If it’s just alliteration you like, throw in Kevin Kaarl too.
Local bands on the last day include Oblivion’s Mighty Trash, crossing the Magdalena valley to bring their low-fi sound to Bogotá. Then there’s Nariñense sensation Verito Asprilla and more rolo rap in Ruzto. Los Dinosaurios Murieron Ayer are the pick of the rolo rockers.
Full lineup: Blink-182, Arcade Fire, The Offspring, The Blaze, The Vaccines, Kevin Kaarl, Nicki Nicole, La Etnnia, YSY A, Yves Tumor, Latin Mafia, Oblivion’s Mighty Trash, Verito Asprilla, Ruzto, Los Dinosaurios Murieron Ayer, Selene, Volcán, Caballos de Fuerza, Esteban Rojas y DJ Lolita.
Food, drink and how to pay
It’s a cashless festival. Everything such as food and drink will go through your bracelet, which can be charged here or at points within the festival grounds or via Efecty. You may be able to use cash and/or cards at the stalls selling clothes and the like, but anything with long queues will be cashless only. This works well and is efficient, so don’t worry.
Full restaurant list
There are some 50 odd places to eat, with veggie options at nearly half of them and two fully vegan options in the form of Stankov and De/Raíz. This means there really is something for everyone at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. Prices are predictably high but not crazy.
Thankfully, you’re allowed to drink at the event, with bars pretty much everywhere. The range is pretty limited and they don’t want people getting smashed, so prices are high and servings small. You’ll be running $16,000 COP to $18,000 COP for a nacional beer, clocking in at 330ml or smaller. Thankfully, there’s a craft beer area with similarly priced drinks too.
For those that are planning on using drugs, there is an Oasis centre in which you can chill out, drink some free fresh water and get medical help if necessary. They can also scan your drugs to check it’s not cut with rat poison and both advise and educate on drug-related matters. This is great work and highly trustable.
And that’s it. Festival Estéreo Picnic is known as a mundo distinto in Spanish, and this certainly means that you’ll be ready to make the most of this strange world’s various pleasures and delights.
No lyrics, lots of strings and a ton of creativity are the components of Anamaría Oramas’ strikingly different musical offering for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. Her unique sound stands apart from virtually everyone else on the bill.
Anamaría describes her music as “Jazz Colombiano, jazz inspired by the traditional music of the coasts. A lot of gaita, fandango, drums too.” It’s a dizzying whirl of exuberant melodies, with ethereal strings and woodwind crashing into heavy rhythms.
While the Colombian folkloric element is important, she’s adamant that it remains in the jazz camp. “It’s jazz because it has improvisation and modern elements too. Jazz allows for everything, even crazy things. There’s not a structure to a piece of work, so we’re always open to new things.”
Anamaría Oramas is the name of the band, but it’s a team effort, she says: “We are 4, with the woman I’m bringing in on drums. There’s a feminine essence that’s important for the team and for me. Not just on the stage, but also the whole chain of work behind the scenes.”
Her feminist sentiments are backed up by concrete actions, too: “With the money that I receive for work. I always like to give a high percentage to the feminine population. It’s important to involve women in the economy, not just to exhibit them on stage.”
Gaitas are an important part of Colombian culture
Perhaps the most jazz thing of all is to totally remove the need for a singer, not even scat, which she acknowledges is not for everyone: “It’s instrumental music, which is pretty uncommon. In general people like to listen to vocals, but I’m not a songwriter, I’ve never gone into that world.”
At first, she takes the Colombian Mum explanation for eschewing vocals. “I don’t have lyrics porque no,” she says. But then she explains a bit more: “Lyrics can condition you into how you should feel. You might be listening to a melody that’s very joyful, but if the words are about death or whatever the song will make you feel sad.”
I ask if she might change that and she quickly slaps it down, stating with certainty: “For the moment no, I’m happy with what I’m doing.” Why change a winning formula, after all? For people willing to challenge themselves musically, Anamaría Oramas is a wonderful place to start, with her deep and complex sound.
Anamaría Oramas explains the importance of getting high
A lack of lyrics certainly doesn’t mean a lack of emotion. In fact, Anamaría sees it exactly the other way around, describing her work as, “Spiritual and with ritual.” She adds, “I really want my music to invite you to a ritual of the body, that invites you to dance. Movement connects you to the music through your body.”
She loves the freedom and individual connection with instrumental music: “I think it can refresh you because there aren’t so many words. I want my music to allow people to feel whatever they like, the interpretation is different for each person.”
That freedom isn’t simply musical but also in terms of spiritual awakenings. “We have a strong connection to psilocybin and psychedelics,” she says with admirable candour. She continues, “The conscience that’s within me, I hope the music can transmit that.”
Is she saying that a tab of acid is the best way to unlock the secrets of her music? “Um…it could be!” she replies with a wink. “It’s an option. It’s not necessary, but it also helps. Drugs are fine, with responsibility, obviously. I don’t consume all drugs, but when I take acid it opens lots of cerebral paths that have helped me in life, with empathy and human relations.”
Her attitude to drug use is sensible, admirable and above all careful. She is clear that she’s not advocating abuse, but informed experimentation: “Good, responsible use at certain times, I recommend to many people. It allows you to make better communication with other humans.”
Spirituality and ritual are an important part of Anamaría Oramas’ music
What is there to look forward to in her Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 show? “I’m going to work with a VJ that works with themes like plants and yage. There’s a strong message and a lot of content. It’s going to be very psychedelic with lots of psilocybin.”
What better reason could there be to get down early on Friday for this irrepressibly irreverent jazz junkie? You certainly won’t find anyone else on the bill that sounds anything like Anamaría Oromas. It’s the lineup’s most interesting and experimental act by quite some distance.
Anamaría Oramas plays at 3.30pm on Friday March 22 on the CeraVe stage at Festival Esteréro Picnic 2024 in Parque Simón Bolívar. Tickets still available here at time of publication.
Startups in Latin America are recovering from a steep drop-off in the availability of venture capital following record-breaking years for funding in 2021 and 2022. According to a report in The Latin Times, “total investment into South and Central American startups reached $2.9 billion in 2023, an 84% drop from its 2021 peak.”
Leal, a Bogotá, Colombia-based brand loyalty network, was one of the lucky ones. In January this year, the company announced they raised USD $5 million to expand their AI-driven customer engagements for merchants across Latin America, including in Colombia, Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, and Nicaragua.
The company, co-founded in 2016 by Colombian CEO Camilo Martínez and Salvadoran COO Florence Frech, persevered through the pandemic and established itself regionally, attracting the attention of investment funds like Rakuten Capital (the first Latin American company to receive their investment) and LEAP Global Partners, who co-led the company’s pre-Series B round alongside Morro Ventures and Salkantay Ventures.
Among the many tools Leal provides retailers to help grow and strengthen their customer networks, the company recently introduced artificial intelligence (AI)-powered solutions to empower brands to leverage data and implement strategies to improve customer loyalty, boost sales, and effectively manage marketing for business growth.
To learn more about the company, The Bogotá Post spoke with Martinez, who shared their remarkable journey to success after reinventing themselves during the pandemic.
Via: Leal website
The Bogotá Post: Can you share the story of how Leal came to be and what inspired you to tackle the challenges of the retail industry?
Camilo Martínez: Before co-founding Leal, I worked in investment banking at Bancolombia [Colombia’s largest bank], covering the retail sector and all the mass consumption of food and beverages. What struck me was the immense amount of money spent on marketing. These companies spent between 7% and 10% of their sales on advertising and marketing.
The discussions between the finance team and the marketing team always revolved around the fact that from marketing it was not possible to predict how the advertising budget would be reflected in the sales volume. After this experience, I left finance to pursue an MBA in Chicago.
I’ve always wanted to help the retail industry by making their marketing expenses more transparent, allowing them to track the return on investment for every peso spent.
TBP: How did this desire materialize into a solution?
CM: During my MBA program, I met a Salvadoran woman who is now Leal’s co-founder. She comes from a family that has been in the business world in Central America for more than a century, so she knew very well the dynamics of the family business, of the industry. Over the two years of the MBA program, we brainstormed ways for businesses to spend their marketing budgets more efficiently. That’s how we learned in depth what the world of customer loyalty was all about.
What we found was that in the United States, about 65% of the people working in marketing always considered that the best way to grow the business was to bring in new customers. While there are no statistics to support this in Latin America, I believe nearly 100% of regional marketing leaders would share this perspective. Almost no one prioritized understanding their existing customers and encouraging them to return to the store.
So we started looking to solve this through technology with loyalty programs and initially, the company was born with ‘Puntos Leal’, a solution in which we helped each store set up a loyalty program to help them identify those customers at each purchase and reward them so that they would return to the store. However, the pandemic arrived and this forced us to reinvent ourselves.
TBP: How did your company adapt to the challenges brought forth by the pandemic?
CM: At that time we were growing up quickly. Just before the pandemic, we were reaching almost a thousand trade partner brands. At that time, most of our businesses took a huge hit. We lost about 85% of our customers and sales.
We had to rethink a lot about the technology we were offering to our allied brands, and what we were offering as a value proposition to the end consumer, and we decided to rely on the buzzword: we reinvented ourselves.
In this reinvention, we moved closer to the consumer to show ourselves more as an ally in their day-to-day life as shoppers, sending a message that it was possible to receive a reward for every purchase they made, that they could be saving money with us, and that they could make a smart purchase. On the brands’ side, we started to become their partner in terms of data, we understood the need to provide the data that retailers need to make the right decisions, completely based on data and not on intuition.
TBP: What does Leal currently offer to retailers?
CM: We have now managed to strengthen our technology platform quite a bit. We started to implement artificial intelligence tools, which provide certain “powers” that were not accessible with previous technology. Tools with which you manage to convert that data into growth in a validated way. In this new phase, we are solving four things for our partner brands.
The first is that we offer them a Customer Data Platform (CDP), a central repository of their entire customer base. We are focused on determining how we can capture the data of their consumers, by whatever source, and that we have the contactability of that customer, and that this can then become digestible in some way.
The second thing we are offering is a campaign module in which brands can communicate in a very personalized way with each of their customers. Our goal is to send the right message, the right offer, through the right channel, to the right person, at the right time; all to maximize the chances that it will convert into a purchase. We have been investing heavily in Artificial Intelligence to be able to automate many of these communications and make them hyper-personalized and hyper-targeted.
Then we have a customer experience module so we can hear the voice of the consumer, we capture the comments, and all the feedback, so we can transform this into actionable for the brand, know specifically where they need to improve and how they can communicate better with the customer to make them feel valued.
And the last thing is a benefits module in which the points part is only a sub-module. It is not our main spearhead anymore, as we are no longer Loyal points, but a more complete system for merchants. Still, if a merchant wants to offer cashback, a buyback bonus, etc., they can do so.
However, we believe that if a brand has a way to capture customer data and have traceability of their purchases, they don’t need a loyalty program. So what we did was to create these different modules of everything we offer and very focused on meeting the specific needs of each brand.
TBP: What is your vision for AI in the retail industry in general?
CM: For me, companies that do not have Artificial Intelligence in their heart, in their entire operation, are companies that are going to disappear, and not in the long term, I think in five years at the most.
This is because the efficiencies that companies acquire, the optimization, and the competitive advantages are enormous, and no matter how much human factor you may be putting in, at some point the technology ends up being much faster, much cheaper, and more efficient.
Today in the world of commerce there is already technology, artificial intelligence, which dramatically improves all operational processes, all sales processes, all marketing processes, and all accounting processes, and that makes the staff of a company focus on doing the work that is adding value and reduce the operational burden so that this operational burden is already being done by machines, which makes the customer experience much better.
TBP: What are the plans this year after your recent pre-Series B?
CM: We are working in Colombia and almost all of Central America except Belize and Mexico; in the latter, we hope to consolidate throughout this year. Also, we want to deepen our operations in the other markets we are currently in.
By the end of this year, we want to be raising a series B investment, which would be our fifth round of investment, and with this, we could be moving into the South American market.
Whether it’s dancing around a fountain or hanging out in a coffee shop, hanging out with mates makes life worthwhile. María Camila Clavijo and Geronimo Blain, better known as musical duo Maca & Gero, know all about the importance of friendship, having built a career out of it, with their next show on the main stage at Festival Estéro Picnic 2024.
Maca & Gero. Photo by Nestor Pérez
Gero says, “That’s the most special part. Going with friends. That’s something that everyone going to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 will remember, that’s where the magic is in this festival.” There’s certainly a fair deal of musical magic in their work.
Musically, this pair use their voices to great effect, intertwining their different tones in a range of duets. Either can lead and this gives them the ability to take different paths when necessary. Their songs are always, however, characterised by a remarkable depth of feeling, whether that’s the hope of a first date or the melancholy of a collapsed relationship.
There’s an ethereal and light sound to much of their music, lending it a dreamlike quality. Maca isn’t sure, laughing as she says “It could be!?” Gero is more expansive, “We do live in our dreams – singing together, making music together, going to huge festivals. Living la vida loca!”
A new album is planned for later this year, but their relentless creative productivity is providing a problem, according to Gero. “We’re trying to close it out. We’re writing songs every week and we love each new song, so we’re trying to finish the album but there’s always a new song coming.” That sounds like one of those good kinds of problems.
The favourite song of Maca & Gero – for now!
I ask about favourites and Maca says she loves what they’re doing at the moment: “Right now it could be Primera Cita because it’s the last song we released.” Gero agrees, saying “I think also my favourite song is Primera Cita. It’s a different song, a new proposal.” It’s beautiful to see a band so proud of moving on and not looking back.
Gero makes it clear that they want to explore new sounds: “We try to refresh our music, and being able to make some music involving different countries in the world such as this special song, it’s Mexican music so we’re excited.” I wonder where might be next, and Maca jumps to say, “Spanish culture!” Gero adds, “American culture. From Argentina as well.”
Maca & Gero are gearing up for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024
Maca loves the event and is hyped for Festival Estereo Picnic 2024: “It’s our first time. Very excited. It’s a huge festival, we’ve been to the festival in the audience to see artists we admire so it’s awesome to now be an artist at this festival.”
The festival is known for musical diversity, which seems totally on brand for Maca & Gero, and she agrees wholeheartedly: “The variety of different music, genres, artists. You can go and dress like you want.” There really is something for everyone this year, with the lineup covering a range of styles both local and foreign.
Having both been with friends in the past, they have seen a whole slew of bands and artists. Gero says, “Lately I’ve been listening a lot to Martin Garrix, so I think he would be one of my top.” Maca agrees. It’s interesting that their first choice is someone so removed from their own sound.
TBF, we’d be happy with two mojitos by the sea
For the show at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024, they know they have to do the main stage justice. Maca is ebullient about their ability to rise to the occasion: “We’re going to have visuals and lights. It’s going to be a new show, nobody’s seen it before and we’re very excited about it.”
I wonder if that means we might hear things from the upcoming album, and she confirms: “It means new songs, yes.” She then teases some guest appearances, “Different musicians in different parts of the show but we can’t say who. You have to go and see it!”
They’re being called away to a radio interview now, so we have to wrap things up with a cheery farewell and smiles all round. Go and see them on Thursday afternoon at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024, whether you’re with a group or going solo. After all, there are no strangers, just friends you haven’t met yet.
Maca & Gero play at 5.10pm on Thursday March 21 on the main stage at Festival Esteréro Picnic 2024 in Parque Simón Bolívar. Tickets still available here at time of publication.
The west coast of Colombia is where some of the country’s most exciting, powerful contemporary music is born. Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 encompasses the full range of Colombian sounds, so they’ve invited Pacific heavyweights Afro Legends to play.
“The diversity that the Colombian Pacific has is represented in its music.”
Flowsiao, Afro Legends
The band speaks to us from Cali ahead of their trip to Bogotá, three on a single WhatsApp call. Musical maestro Flowsiao takes the lead to explain that, “Afro Legends are from the city of Cali but our essence comes from Chocó, the Colombian northern Pacific.” He’s accompanied by singers Sterling Delpa and Liam V.
Afro Legends are Flowsiao, Liam V, Sterling Delpa (L-R)
Many people consider Colombia’s third city to be a part of the Pacific, thanks to events like Petronio Álvarez festival, but Sterling disagrees. He says, “No, Cali is not Pacific. We are a Colombian Pacific band from the diaspora.”
The region is fertile ground for musical innovation, deep roots providing a strong base for new sounds to flourish and thrive. Sterling confirms this, saying “We, as Colombian Pacific people, were born in music. Speaking from my experience, the importance of music is when people have something to say, whatever it might be.”
There are so many bands from the region, including such names as DawerXDamper, the Afrofuturist brothers we spoke to last year, La Pacifican Power, hip hop starlet Verito Asprilla, rapper Mabiland and of course, the megastars that are ChocQuibTown. These sit comfortably alongside traditionalists like Canalón de Timbiquí.
While they are proud of other regional stars, Flow rejects the idea of a movement as such: “We’re all groups with different styles and genres. You’ll encounter different essences, lyrics, and rhythms. There’s no specific name for it, but there’s the same Pacific essence. The diversity that the Colombian Pacific has is represented in its music.”
Afro Legends mix styles and rhythms effortlessly
Tradition and roots are evidently important to them but never exert a stifling influence. This is forward-looking music that builds on what has gone before rather than simply recreating it. Marimba rhythms from currulao snake in and out of electronic beats and rap or hip hop influences are evident. As Liam V says, “Traditional music reaches people more easily.”
They define themself as contemporary alternative music, sidestepping genre definition. Sterling attributes this to a need to speak: “The musical boom now is because people have something to say. If you look at it, there’s so much alternative music and it’s because people have to tell their story.”
Flowsiao explains their story as one of “ancestral influence and greatness.” He says, “The music, the lyrics, the live performances always give us the symbolism of being kings and queens, gods and goddesses. That’s the legacy that comes from our roots, the work of teaching people with the lyrics of resistance that is aimed principally at Black people, but also for others because music is universal.”
Sterling builds on this: “With Afro Legends, we have sabrosura and resistance, those are the two lungs that power us. The sabrosura is that we dance, move, jump and enjoy the music. On this side, we show what we feel. But on the side of resistance is what we must say, for example with [the song] Negrito, where we want to educate people to change, peacefully and without violence.”
Afro Legends talk about racism in Colombia
That song Sterling references speaks to a contentious term in Colombia. Its use is often defended by non-Black people, but is generally viewed as extremely problematic in the Black community. Sterling explains: “People don’t ask your name, they say, ‘Ey negro, mi negrito’. What is this, ‘Ey negro’?”
Afro Legends confront controversial topics head-on and without any fear
“It’s about the objectification of Black people,” he continues. “For example, if you want to talk about a white or mestizo person you would say ‘el señor in the blue shirt’ but if it’s a Black person it’s just ‘el negrito in the blue shirt’. This is how the diminutive form is normalised.”
Flow agrees, saying, “The song is an invitation to call Black people by their names and not as things. It’s a criticism of the way society views Black people in a diminutive way. Instead of calling us by our names or asking for our names, they use these offensive terms to minimise us.”
I ask about racism in Colombian society and the answer is lightning fast from Flow. “Yes, It’s evident that Colombia is a racist country despite being multicultural and having a large Black population.” Sterling agrees, adding that “It’s a country where racism is normalised.” They pull no punches here, as uncomfortable as it may be for some to hear.
“First you get people to enjoy the rhythm, and then they listen to the lyrics. “
Sterling Delpa, Afro Legends
“More than the propaganda in social networks and on television,” Flowsiao tells me, “The reality is another thing. Black and Indigenous communities in Colombia have to work twice as hard as white and mestizo people, or those with privileges. Structural racism still exists. People say it’s [the term negrito] with affection, but it’s with dominance and privilege. This creates a vicious circle.
He continues, “Racism has been used as a tool to stop Black people taking certain positions or jobs. Through the years it has taken new forms of power, from enslaving people through to occupying spaces and using diminutive terms. Slowly, there are more collectives that are joining the fight for Black people’s rights and to stop others continuing to steal our spaces, both at a national and international level.”
Sterling continues the argument. “White and mestizo people grow up in a bubble where they’re always called señor, niño, whatever, something with humanity. But with a Black person, they always objectify us.” This is an angle that is rarely heard in mainstream Colombian culture, often made invisible and sidelined. Yet it’s clearly true and important as it speaks to the real, lived experience of so many Colombians.
Liam V says that Negrito is, “A necessary song for all Black people and we’ve had a positive reaction to it. We’re telling a truth that we’ve all experienced. For us, it’s necessary to say things as they are.” Sterling has also had positive feedback, “They say ‘Hey guys, thanks for talking about something real’.”
Looking to the future – Festival Esteréo Picnic 2024 and more
“Things are getting better,” says Flowsiao. “It’s a constant struggle, in 15, 20, 30 years, if we as Black people do not educate and empower ourselves, future generations will lose the fight and it will never end. So, thanks to those collectives and organisations that are doing the work of educating the boys and girls who are growing up now. The positive is that there are many who are empowering themselves now.”
Liam V jumps in here: “I will add that we have the task through our music day-to-day of fighting racism in all its forms. We’re here to tell that story.” It’s clear that the band as a whole see their music as important in the process. Sterling says, “First you get people to enjoy the rhythm, and then they listen to the lyrics. Hopefully, then they will reflect and think ‘Hey, I was doing something wrong’.”
Afro Legends always look great
Conversation turns to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 itself and they interrupt each other in their enthusiasm, Liam V winning out: “Exciting!” she says. “This festival is such a big stage for us. We’re really excited and very anxious. We want the public to be with us, to enjoy it, that’s the main aim, but also to teach. That’s the musical responsibility of Afro Legends.”
Sterling agrees. “Up on the stage, Afro Legends always bring the Colombian Pacific to the stage we’re on, so we’re bringing our ancestralidad to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024, all this power. It’ll be a crazy experience.”
Liam V cuts back in to make sure no secrets are spilled, saying: “We have lights, outfits, styles, it’s going to be an impressive thing and you’ll see that it’s very impactful. We can’t give any spoilers about our show but there’s going to be important things there.”
They’re proud to be sharing the stage with some top talents, Flowsiao namechecks, “La Etnnia, Blessed Madonna, Black Coffee. So many people.” Sterling adds in some regional solidarity “Verito [Asprilla] is one of us, she’s from the Pacific to fly the flag high for the region, like us.”
To finish up, I ask them what they recommend for visitors to their beloved Cali. Sterling is quick to cite another Afro-Colombian musical legend “Nidia Góngora’s restaurant, Viche Positiva.” Flowsiao agrees “Any of the Pacific gastronomy, like ceviche – delicious!”
Viche is synonymous with the Colombian Pacific and an integral part of Afro-Colombian culture in the region
He continues, “In the east of Cali you can find semilleros which are groups of women sharing knowledge, traditional music and medicine and so on. It’s sharing traditional and ancestral things from generation to generation, especially for Black people from the Colombian Pacific.”
When you have time, we highly recommend going to Cali, one of Colombia’s most interesting cities and the Pacific region in general, from Tumaco to Nuquí. However, in the short term, get yourself down to Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 for a blast of Pacific sabrosura from Afro Legends. Afro Legends open the main stage of Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024 at 3pm on Saturday March 23 in Parque Simón Bolívar. Tickets still available here at time of publication.
Just halfway into the week, it’s already been a long time in Colombian politics. The government’s proposed health reform to change the controversial EPS healthcare system this week was essentially sunk. Alongside that were spats with the media, the opposition and some political changes.
A hospital in Bogotá
Health reform has been one of the key pillars of Petro’s gobierno de cambio, so this is a big setback for him. It’s currently under review by the Seventh Commission, who now have a majority of their number (8/14) in favour of shelving the proposal. That means it is in effect dead in the water. Norma Hurtado of the U party was the final Senator to decide to support the shelving.
Petro is refusing to withdraw the health reform motion though, claiming it’s necessary for the country. The president of the Commission, Martha Peralta, will decide when to do so. Given that they’ll need two Senators on the Commission to change their minds, it’s hard to see how that will happen without significant modifications or politicking behind the scenes.
Members of the press have also come under fire from the head of state. Petro took the opportunity of laying the first stone of a new Arts building at the National University to criticise RCN and Caracol in particular for “dumbing down and putting society to sleep.” There is now a state-run paper to trumpet government achievements though, to redress the balance and perceived bias.
The president has also taken to social media to criticise the opposition, who he described as “egoistic cannibals.” This is down to their proposal to stop the controversial Jóvenes En Paz project, which pays youths at risk of joining gangs.
Le quieren quitar a los jóvenes pobres oportunidades en la vida. Solo quieren el recurso público para ellos mismos. Es la derecha egoista y caníbal.
Se acostumbraron a matarlos, quitarles los ojos, encarcelarlos y no a ayudarlos https://t.co/UdgNkjpCd5
Last week saw further street protests against the Petro government. The marches were typically divisive, with arguments raging across social media over the numbers of demonstrators, particularly in the Plaza de Bolívar. It’s clear that the numbers are far below those that protested former president Iván Duque three years ago.
For months now, there’s been an ongoing process to elect a new fiscal general for the nation. The deadlock was finally broken this week with the election of Luz Adriana Camargo. But, the move came with another twist as another candidate, Amelia Pérez, withdrew minutes before the vote. She had attracted criticism for her husband’s support of Petro.
Camargo replaces interim Fiscal General Martha Mancera, seen as a continuation of her ex-boss and strong critic of the president, Francisco Barbosa. His term was up on the 12th of February, but the court failed to elect a successor for the best part of a month. Theoretically, there will now be some stability over the next four years with a government-friendly chief prosecutor in place.
The long-awaited Metro de Bogotá has always suffered intervention from the centre. Even as new Mayor Galán announces TransMilenio closures along the Caracas for building work, the president of the Republic is insisting on the viability of sending certain sections underground. This puts them at odds, although Petro says the final decision lies with Galán.
Por primera vez en 80 años, la obra del metro de Bogotá se está ejecutando y nuestro mandato es cumplir con lo contratado. Hoy en @Olimpicasemetio conversamos sobre los avances de la primera línea, que va en cerca del 31% y entrará en operación en 2028. pic.twitter.com/U1wNLmxLSL
The government has also been playing musical chairs recently, and a number of high-profile appointments drew raised eyebrows. Most striking was the return of Laura Sanabria to the inner circle after her various controversies in 2023, alongside the appointment of failed mayoral candidate Gustavo Bolívar and Sanabria’s mate Armando Benedetti.
Another recent arrival in government was Luz Gilberto Murillo, who got the job after Leyva was forced to withdraw in the saga of outsourcing passport production. That saw the president accuse a top civil servant of “betraying the country” for signing a contract with Thomas Greg and Sons.
On top of all of that, there are wider problems. Most notably, crime continues to be an issue for many residents of the country. This week saw the discovery of a tortured and dismembered corpse near Campín in Bogotá, a particularly gruesome example of rising insecurity levels.
Added to that are rocky peace negotiations with a range of armed groups, a problematic gas contract with Venezuela, and a number of worrying economic indicators. Concerns have also been raised over both the problems of dealing with El Niño and the country’s readiness for the likely La Niña.
Originally from neighbouring Ecuador, we’re classing the now Bogotá-based Lolabúm as a local band as they prepare for their performance at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. Singer Pedro Bonfim and bassist Martín Erazo took time out to talk to us ahead of the show. Last year they released their acclaimed fifth album Muchacito Roto.
Lolabúm are recent arrivals in the city
Deceptively youthful-looking, these rock hobbits have only recently come to Bogotá. Pedro explains, “Ecuador is having a difficult moment right now, so we recently arrived here. It’s a place where we feel relaxed and happy. It’s a scene with a lot of movement. It’s a cool moment for us as well to have this platform to put Ecuador in the spotlight ”
Their sound is sad art-rock, with whimsically wistful lyrics underpinned by strong, sometimes abrasively chopping guitars and insistent, urgent basslines hungrily driving the songs forward. They’ve been at this for a while – debut El Cielo was out in 2016, but it was Tristes Trópicos two years later that was their breakout, followed by two more pandemic albums.
Lolabúm took a slightly different turn with last year’s Muchacito Roto. From the jarring opening of Ecuaboi, with its D’n’B style sections and vocoder effects, it’s clear they’re going somewhere else. “Muchachito Roto is our tribute to Ecuadorian pop,” says Pedro. “It’s cool for us to play with that sound.” Martín agrees, adding, “And with our sound too, we’re in dialogue with the contemporary Ecuadorian sound.”
A radical departure for these freewheeling musical magpies
Songs like Nidi are closer to their previous work, an almost ambient lo-fi sound telling a heartbreakingly tender love song that finds the beauty in everyday experiences. This is still the sound of lovelorn teens, but continuing their musical development in a new direction. Wherever they go sonically, the lyrics will always be sensitive.
Transandino: the Lolabúm story
Martín is also enthusiastic about the move to Bogotá, adding: “It’s very inspiring to be here right now. That this festival exists and invites so many bands, including the locals, is so good. Not just Bogotanos either, but from all over Colombia. It’s a very cool platform.” The country isn’t just the capital for them, as they’re keen to point out.
“We’ve played in many parts of Colombia,” says Pedro, before reeling off a list of places they’ve performed. “It’s really diverse, you can be in Pasto, Bogotá or Medellín and they’re completely different places. We’ve been coming for many years to the centre of the country, it’s a part we’ve always liked of Colombia.”
The boys ahead of their Festival Estéreo Picnic show
There’s a lot of cultural crossover between the south of Colombia and Ecuador, says Pedro: “We share a lot of phrases with Pasto and that area, guagua, ñañito, things like that.” Martín explains with a grin that his favourite phrase from his homeland is chuchaqui, meaning hangover.
They clearly feel at home in Bogotá, as Pedro points out. “It’s a place that has always made us feel welcome. It’s also a really effervescent place, which I love. It can be good and bad – it sometimes feels rushed, but with a cool rhythm.” Martín chimes in to add, “The friendliness of the people too – they’ve really taken to us. I have the impression that we’ve always had good vibes here.”
Quito remains in their hearts, though, says Pedro: “It’s a city with a lot of colonial weight. Many churches and religious places. Public transport can be a problem too, even if now we have a Metro. Quito is a lot smaller than Bogotá, there’s less night time activity, people go to sleep much earlier.”
They clearly miss the music of home, as Pedro makes clear: “It’s a really creative scene, and very original too. All the projects, or at least the majority have their own sound. The sad thing is that it’s very complicated to do things like organise concerts because of all the permits etc. It’s really worth a look for anyone.”
Poignant lyrics combined with sharp musical chops have always been a trademark of Lolabúm
When I ask what they miss about home, Martín is quick to cite the culinary delights of home, saying “Ecuadorian food is so delicious.” Pedro jumps in to add: “And volcanoes. And the heat of Guayaquil.” Martín concludes “Everything is so close. You can be on the beach or in the Amazon in five hours from the capital.”
Lolabúm have trekked the Inca trail through the Andes to reach Bogotá and play Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. You only need to make a short ride across the city to check out the vibrant yet sensitive musical banquet they will lay on at the Picnic. Get down there to feast upon their wares.
Lolabúm play at 3.45pm on Saturday March 23 on the Adidas stage at Festival Esteréro Picnic 2024 in Parque Simón Bolívar. Tickets still available here at time of publication.
Few genres divide audiences as much as jazz, which is perhaps why Buha 2030 are so sceptical of the label that was given to them by a previous reviewer. It’s easy to see where it comes from: saxophonist José David Díaz plays a central role. Like many Colombian bands though, they aren’t easy to lazily pigeonhole. Make your mind up at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024.
Ponce and the rest of Buha 2030
“It also combines a strident [sound] with my angelic voice,” says frontwoman Gabriela Ponce ahead of their show at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024. She’s full of energy and bouncing with excitement, frequently bursting into raucous laughter as we talk. She moved from her native Nariño with Díaz and other founder member, bassist Camilo Portilla. They’re joined by new tolimense drummer Juan José Mejía Jiménez to make a powerful four.
Again, they are hard to put in a box. A Bogotá-formed band, but with firm roots miles away in Pasto. This suits them well. It’s a project that deliberately crosses lines and sidesteps labels. “I will say that Buha 2030 is an experiment with rock and improvised music,” Ponce clarifies, “and it is also rock without guitars and so it’s also been grouped in the [musical] vanguard.”
That saxophone is key, according to Ponce, herself a clarinet player, as it means they “connect with a classical sound. We have a wind section which makes it more harmonic.” It makes for a heady mix with a lot of high-end sounds crashing into each other before they twirl off into melodic typhoons that then evaporate to be replaced by another.
Portilla’s bass acts as an anchor underpinning everything and holding onto the soaring sax and vocals. Ponce’s lyrics are also a vital component, as she explains “I’m singing about being fragile. It’s about wounds, nightmares and the bizarre. Intimate poetry, but also shamelessly public.” She sings clearly about fragility and self-doubt on last year’s single Todos Son Ingenuos, with a tender edge.
Todos Son Ingenuos is an example of sensitive and thoughtful lyrics by Buha 2030
What Buha 2030 have planned for Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024
This will be their biggest stage yet for them to play live, which is clearly something Ponce loves. “On the stage, we always have flexible spaces for improvisation, we don’t like to be tied to jazz. It’s not in that language, it’s more rocky and more local. I love to improvise but probably for this show that is so concrete in time I’ll have to be careful.”
In 2021 they released Amoral Inmortal, a striking piece of work that brought them to the attention of rolo music lovers. This autumn will see the launch of their new album Epoca, with a new sound, according to Ponce. “I think it’s less strident and more listener-friendly. Still, it’s anarchic and not searching for validation.” That’s good, because their chaotic side is one of their best, as seen in the intense, dizzying fury of Fea Monosílaba.
Neither fea nor monosílaba, but the track is gloriously chaotic and wild
As for their show on Thursday afternoon at Festival Estéreo Picnic 2024, Ponce shows no signs of nerves. She says, “We’re going to play a couple of new songs like Todos Son Inguenos and Cruzan but also the classics from the first album.” She hints at surprises, so there may be unreleased songs too.
Neither are they purely an aural treat, she claims: “Of course, we’re going to have very cool visuals. As a rock band with wind, we always have a lot of force in the shows and the next one is never the same as the last because we always have this improvisation factor.” Check out what promises to be a unique show at the festival to see what all the noise is about. But – don’t flash your jazz hands.
Buha 2030 play at 5.15pm on Thursday March 21 on CeraVe stage at Festival Esteréro Picnic 2024 in Parque Simón Bolívar. Tickets still available here at time of publication.
