The Pending Issues in Santa Fe de Ralito
AN OPEN LETTER TO MARIO CALDERóN*
LUIS EDUARDO CELIS
December 1st was the two-year anniversary of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) agreeing to a two-year cease-fire. Two years are an important amount of time for a process of dialogue and negotiation, and also for the opportunity to read up on some fundamental subjects.
We can differentiate between procedural subjects, referred to as those which generate the conditions which make possible a legitimate, dynamic and irreversible process; amongst these subjects are the cessation of hostilities and cease-fire, concentration, international support, citizen participation and information, truthfulness, happiness, and quality.
Procedurally
The cease-fire and cessation of hostilities and the concentration of AUC members are a complete failure. The numbers speak for themselves: the Colombian Commission of Jurists reports nearly two thousand homicides attributable to AUC since December 2002; the Defense of the People affirms that there were 350 murders in a survey of ten districts; and the same statistics from the Human Rights Program of the Vice-Presidency of the Republic also indicate crimes attributable to AUC.
International support is circumscribed to the Mission of Support to the Process of Peace of the O.A.S., which was initiated as a direct agreement between the then Secretary General César Gaviria and President Álvaro Uribe. This was not well received in member countries and prompted some adjustments in the Permanent Council involving the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, following 11 months of MAPP-OEA work, presided over by Sergio Caramagña. But the balance of the Mission is worrisome: it is a Mission without resources – stuck in one of the deepest crises of the O.A.S. due to the resignation of the just-named Secretary General, Miguel Florez Ángel, over corruption charges. Additionally, the Mission yields to the management of the government because it does not take into account the multiple voices saying that the process is not going to lead to peace and reconciliation in the country, but instead to a new cycle of authoritarianism and impositions.
Nevertheless, other possibilities for the participation of the international community exist, subject to the definition of procedural and substantive subjects. For example, the European governments have showed some interest in assuming a protagonist role in the negotiation, but at the same time, they criticize the purpose of negotiations with AUC. Other voices, however, agree to maintaining a marginal European state institutional process and playing a role in appropriate areas.
As far as the participation of the United States is concerned, it is in the development of an anti-drug agenda, pushing for the extradition of several AUC leaders, among them Salvatore Mancuso, one of the leaders with the greatest internal positions. Although U.S. Ambassador William Wood has described members of AUC as 'barbarians', the U.S. has given the Uribe administration its support in the negotiation with AUC. Nevertheless, the war against drugs is followed attentively and is awaiting the 'ace of spades' to brandish against those who believe that they are deserving of 'infinite justice'.
Internally, citizen participation is limited to a few actions of the peace and human rights movements, but fear is present in the atmosphere. Perhaps the reactivation of the National Council of Peace is an opportunity for discussing the process of talks between the government and AUC, since this space is for the expression of participatory democracy.
In this sense, the mass media cover up of the Santa Fe de Ralito process stands out. Nevertheless, it is necessary that the media includes more information and analysis on these issues.
Substantively
In Santa Fe de Ralito the present and the future of Colombia is gambled. The process must solve the monumental restlessness and assume challenges of great depth that create the opportunity to advance democracy. Will it be possible to deter the violence to silence the political opposition and to advance the social and political agendas of certain powerful sectors of the Colombian society? Will we be able to advance the construction of a social and just state that is respected and accepted in all of Colombia?
Amongst the substantive subjects is the land, the heart of this confrontation. In the last 20 years, 600,000 families have been displaced, abandoning four million hectares – a fact that demonstrates the true agrarian counter-reform, which has been, largely, the responsibility of the paramilitaries. But what will happen when the land is returned to its proprietors? What guarantees will there be? The answer given by the paramilitaries is that arrangements will be made for some land to be returned, but that someone must demand them first. A cynical and challenging answer for Uribe's government, but the farmers' and indigenous' organizations maintain their demands with much dignity.
Another one of the questions has to do with impunity: Will there be truth, justice and reparations or will there be an impunity process? In this sense, one gambles on the credibility and seriousness of the process. Senator Rafael Pardo, a Uribe heavyweight, raised the flag of national unity and put on the table the balance between justice and reconciliation, saying that the truth is known and reparation is carried out. But it seems this is not to Uribe's, nor his government’s team, liking because they insist on presenting a law project that is scandalized by lack of rigor: it does not take into account the minimums necessary for guaranteeing the rights of victims and society. The exit strategy of this internal conflict does not have to be synonymous with abuse and the negation of rights. It does not need to continue by imposing on the logic of those victimized, run over and insulted by society and its thousands of citizens with acts of barbarism and horror.
The last questions have to do with the security of the land and its inhabitants. There will be a state presence in the territories that had been controlled by the paramilitaries. Guarantees for the exercise of citizen action will exist, without intimidation and conflict, and with the legalized paramilitary forces, the political opposition will be able to act and try to gain citizen endorsement without fear of ending up in a tomb, as happened with the UP and some critical liberal sectors. The multiple churches will be able to take up the pastoral work that saw their shepherds die. The parish priests can return to the pulpit, and the teachers to the work of social sciences. These are thought of as dangerous because they speak of change, of the movements and having more justice. The young women will wear miniskirts again and the young men will be able to grow their hair long, the homosexuals will be able to live, and the prostitutes will not be exiled or assassinated on street corners. Will, too, the word ‘union’ again mean the farmers together or communal action?
These are some of the challenges of the present and the future that must be explained in Santa Fe de Ralito. But doubts exist as to its materialization, as was admitted in Medellín: "[T]oday, the members of the Nutibara Cacique do not threaten to turn us upside down; it is enough for them to show us their membership card of the demobilized Nutibara Cacique for us to know that they are the owners and masters of the territory”.
The year 2004 ends without Mario Calderón, and all the other faces that are no longer with us today. 2005 will be a year of challenges. We hope that your legacy and that of others will encourage us to follow the path of co-existence and democracy, allowing us to balance the past, present and future, giving us the capacity to understand and assume responsibility for facing and holding back the force, imposition and barbarism that characterizes the Colombian context.
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*Mario Calderón was assassinated with his wife, Elsa Alvarado and her father, in April 1997, by order of Carlos Castaño. Mario was a Jesuit priest, member of Cinep, and advocate of communitarian organization in diverse regions of the country, among them, Tierralta, the epicenter of AUC and where the assassination of his companion, Sergio Restrepo, occurred.
