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Jeanne Gourdon

Josué, Cali, 29 years old.


Josué is on the right during the Cali's manifestation.



Cali, located on the Pacific coast, is the 3rd biggest city in Colombia. Since April 28th 2021, it is the epicenter of the violence suffered by Colombia. It is here that the protests have been the hardest repressed and where the deaths are the higher.



My name is Josué. I am a political scientist from the Universidad del Valle (University of the Valley) and a social leader. The central problem in Colombia is the great inequality and the lack of guarantees to enjoy and benefit from the essential services of the State in terms of social protection and fundamental rights.


Our populations are dying of hunger in many regions and in others, they have been victims of systematic exterminations, enforced disappearances, rape, torture, cruel treatment, among others. This, supposedly sponsored by national industrialists and international companies, and with the complicity of the government apparatus. It is not for nothing that rural and commodity-mining areas have been the hardest hit by the violence.


But this reality is not foreign to the city, the lack of opportunities for young people, the loss of hope and the hostile and violent treatment of social protest by the police have led to the weakening of the pillars of political power in Colombia. Today the government and its entire pre-bureaucratic structure lack "legitimacy" and "civil obedience" has ceased. In this context, there is a national uprising with multiple expressions against the government administration, the center of civil resistance against oppression is the city of Santiago de Cali.


In our country, more than 50% of the population lives in poverty, many households survive with the equivalent of $30 per month. This is why the presentation by the government of a tax reform which maintained exemptions for industrials, big supermarkets and the financial sector for more than 15 billion dollars, and which, on the other hand, put pressure on the economy a high tax rate population was the trigger for this anger.



Photo : Colprensa


I repeat, the police in Colombia are military and not civilian in nature.

We are concerned in many ways, including the fact that we are being killed, that our young people have no jobs, that our young people have no education, that our young people have no food. We are worried for today, but also for tomorrow. We are concerned about the worsening conflict in Colombia, there have been massacres almost every month since 2018 and since the rising of the government of Iván duque. Our demands are concrete and make it possible to avoid the worsening of the crisis, but that does not solve the social problems:


1. The repeal of the tax reform project and the dismantling of exemptions for large industries, supermarkets and the financial sector.

2. Repeal of the labor and pension reform bills.

3. Repeal of the health reform bill.

4. Dismantling of Esmad (equivalent to CRS, but more violent), GOES (special operations unit), and reform of the police, since it is a military type police in Colombia and not a civilian police.

5. Truth, justice, full reparation and the guarantee of non-repetition. That murders committed by the state be brought to justice and that cases of enforced disappearances be brought to justice.


I repeat, the police in Colombia are military and not civilian in nature, which leads to the fact that decisions are under military command and the treatment of the population is military in nature. This organization acted with impunity. The prosecutor's office no longer fulfills its functions as an investigative body and has come to function as a defense body for suspected military criminals. Since April 28th, human rights organizations have listed 47 civilians killed by the police, 963 civilians arbitrarily detained, 12 cases of sexual violence, 548 victims of enforced disappearance (alleged torture and murder), 28 civilians shot in the eye by the police and having lost it, 278 various assaults by the police and 1876 civilians injured recorded. All this in just 10 days.


Colombia wants real peace in the future, which implies not only the end of open violence, but also profound structural changes that allow the population to access, exercise and fully enjoy their rights. . To have housing, to have food, to have access to education, to have a job, to have access to the public health system.


We want to be able to be happy, not only to survive, but also to "live well".

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