People's Right to Move - Voices From Colombia's Confined Communities
It's the Children Who Suffer Most
In many zones of confinement the schools are closed because there are no teachers. Some teachers are afraid they will not be allowed to leave and so they decide to never arrive. Others are afraid to enter a zone where there is fighting, especially when they know that many colleagues have been murdered by the paramilitaries for "subversive" teaching.
One of the most serious problems is that there are no teachers. The schools get used by the armed men as places to stay and they arrive to recruit our children. (Female resident of the Catatumbo region)
The army and the paramilitaries impose restrictions on medicines saying that people will give or sell the medicines to the guerrilla. Most confined communities are rural villages and have no medical services, relying on clinics and hospitals in distant towns, and on the medicine that people sell in local stores. When they are prevented from leaving, the consequences can be fatal.
Angie was three years old, with big eyes and a turned up nose. On Saturday morning - it was Saint Ignacio's day - she died. Her grandmother, María Adela, begged that they let her see the girl and when she did she fainted from the grief. Angie died of an intestinal infection. There had been no medicine anywhere Friday night when she was sick. Her grandmother had brought two hens to sell to pay the trip to the Yondó hospital, two hours by boat, but the illness didn't leave her enough time. In the whole region of Cimitarra it is forbidden to have any medicine because they say they could get to the guerrillas." (Communication from Francisco de Roux S.J., Pertinentes del Magdalena Medio. Angie Catherine y la zona de Reserva Campesina, August 2, 2004)
In 2003 there was a yellow fever epidemic and there was no way to get there or for people to leave the urban centres because there were guard posts all along the road. There were places where the vaccine couldn't get in. (Former public official in the Catatumbo region)
Confinement can lead to humanitarian emergencies, and ultimately many people feel that they have no option other than to leave their homes. Sometimes this is the objective of the armed actors who want to take control of the land either for military or for economic reasons.
With the blockade how much time do you think we can endure if things don't get better? In this community I can't say. The food - it's finished. There are no eggs, there is no sugar, there is no food from outside. People are surviving, but badly and with so much fear. This community is lucky that there has not been any fighting here yet so people have stayed, but they will have to leave. (Female resident of San Juan, Chocó)
| Reviewed July 31, 2009 |  |
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