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In rejection of the massacres, deaths in the territories, dispossession of land, community members of the Misak, Nasa and Pijao peoples, knocked down the statue of the colonizer and slave owner Sebastián de Belalcázar, in Popayán. sss
(You can read: Mayor of Popayán says that the statue of Belalcázar will be restored)
“The fatigue of the peoples is evident, today our Misak brothers after announcements of mobilizations have taken a first step, They have given us no choice but to demonstrate. Faced with the imminent project of death, the mobilization for life is reborn ”, said the coordinator of the Human Rights area of the Association of Indigenous Cabildos del Norte del Cauca (Acin), Eduin Mauricio Capaz.
The Indigenous Regional Council of Cauca (Cric), asserted that to date 55 massacres have been registered in the country and they are already tired of “Death in the territories go on horseback, motorbike, pickup trucks, helicopters and take lives, feelings, people …. They knocked her down because that man, mounted on his horse, is the symbol … “, said the organization.
The indigenous senator Feliciano Valencia expressed that “a symbol of 500 years of humiliation and domination of the native peoples falls.”
Martha Peralta Epieyú, national president of the political movement (Mais), affirmed that the site where the statue was located was a sacred site for the Misak and in its place, there must be a monument of the chief Payán, to whom the city owes its name.
“They claim the memory of their ancestors killed and enslaved by the elites. Also in protest of the threats they have received ”.
Faced with these events, the mayor of Popayán, Juan Carlos López Castrillón, spoke out rejecting the action and indicated that the statue will be restored.
(We recommend: In photos: Misak indigenous people demolish the statue of Sebastián de Belalcázar)
“Discussions about our cultural differences can occur and we have always been willing to generate this type of space, we cannot justify violence becoming an instrument to express our disagreements, “said the Mayor.
In videos, the moment was recorded when a group of indigenous people of the Misak ethnic group, linked the statue of the Spanish conqueror, and knocked it down.
Luis Enrique Yalanda Hurtado, governor of the La María Reservation, Piendamó, said that so far this year, more than 100 citizens have been violently murdered in their territories.
“It is the duty of the government to achieve peace, as the constitution says,” said the native leader.
The act was committed after a march for life that went through the main streets of the capital of Cauca.
Indigenous authorities, in an extraordinary board of directors held at the Autonomous Indigenous University of Popayán, decided to reactivate the Suroccidente minga and indicated that in October “They will rise up with more force to call for impeachment of the current government of the Democratic Center.”
(We suggest: Indigenous people tried Belalcázar and demolished his monument)
“Adjusting measures due to the risk of the pandemic, the actions of the public force in the face of social protest and other factors, the communities say that they prefer to mobilize, raise their voice of rejection rather than die silent before the injustices caused by the current government of President Duque ”, adds the statement.
Finally, they say that they will not abide by the presidential measures whereby students in the territories are ordered to return to classes, “nor will they leave behind their own contingency measures, which have made it possible to avoid a greater impact on communities in these times of pandemic due to covid-19 “.
Michel Romoleroux
For the time
Popayan
