En Camino

This mini-documentary, India: the struggle for indigenous autonomy, is based on an interview with Manish Kunjam, General Secretary of the Adivasi Mahasabha. The interview was conducted in Dantewada, Chhattisgarh, on March 9, 2013, during a multi-day pad yatra (march) for tribal autonomy.

Justin Podur, a member of En Camino, was in India recently and met one of the members of a new political initiative called New Path. New Path recently published their manifesto in Kafila:

http://kafila.org/2013/05/24/new-path-manifesto-of-a-new-initiative/

By Emmanuel Rozental and Vilma Almendra
Originally published as "La Paz de los Pueblos sin Dueños" in Revista Contrapunto

We hope that the negotiations between the armed insurgency (FARC for now, but likely ELN as well) and the Colombian government will conclude rapidly with a signed agreement that will guarantee a definitive and permanent ceasefire between the parties. The current balance of forces in this negotiation should be examined in light of the strategic objectives of capital and its dynamics in Colombia on the one hand, and in light of the indigenous and popular struggles on the other. This will help to place us in context and help the popular forces avoid a trap that will help capital in its objective to continue to dispossess people, this time in the name of peace, while continuing war and terror by other means.

As Pueblos En Camino, we urge Prime Minister Harper to meet with Chief Theresa Spence, who is currently on a hunger strike in protest of ongoing poor conditions and to re-establish a meaningful, nation-to-nation relationship between the Federal Government and First Nation people, a relationship that should be the basis of Canadian government and First Nation relations.

By: Tejido de Comunicación - ACIN
Sunday, July 8, 2012*

In Northern Cauca, Colombia, things have never been clearer. Ever. We’ve marched, mobilized, and made every effort to demand that all the armed actors leave our territories. In mobilizations, assemblies, and public hearings, we’ve denounced the abuses committed against members of our community by the army, the police, the right-wing paramilitaries, and the guerrilla.

By: Tejido de Comunicación – ACIN
Saturday, July 14, 2012 18:31

The coordinated actions of our communities have demonstrated to the world that the strength and clarity of our collective efforts can have an impact. As in other occasions, the mainstream media has covered these events without understanding what they actually mean. But we live in a complicated context, one in which there is always someone trying to take advantage. 

By: Tejido de Comunicación - ACIN
Sunday, July 22, 2012

The inhabitants of El Crucero-El Rosario, a village situated in the La Laguna-Siberia reserve in Cauca, Colombia, got up early today. But it wasn’t to go to work in the fields; today, they’re getting together to cook food for the hundreds of indigenous community members and campesinos who have been there for days, accompanying the family of Éduar Fabián Güetio, a young man killed by the Colombian public forces.

By Tejido de Comunicación, ACIN
Thursday, July 19, 2012

It is abundantly clear that where the Colombian public forces operate with awkward ineffectiveness, indigenous communities in northern Cauca have demonstrated their autonomy and decisiveness.

Yesterday afternoon, a group of indigenous guards from the community of Toribío, armed only with bravery and consciousness, headed towards the village of Belén to capture FARC militants who were trying to ready explosives for use against a nearby communication tower.

By Alfredo Molano Bravo
Originally published in El Espectador
July 22, 2012
http://www.elespectador.com/opinion/columna-361599-el-nudo-de-guerra

"At the time of independence from Spain, the landlords attacked them until they were nearly exterminated. In the 1920s, indigenous leader Quintín Lame launched a struggle for control over ancestral territories, mobilizing indigenous peoples throughout the northern regions of Cauca and Huila and southern Tolima. Their uprisings were put down, but it was in this context that the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) was born."

By: Catalina Ruiz-Navarro
Originally published in El Espectador on July 18, 2012

“Muchos Indios” (lit: “Many Indians”) is how a website recently titled a news piece about how the indigenous guard threw the National Army out of their territory in Cauca, Colombia.
In Colombia, the colloquial expression “Indian” is used as an insult, while “White” is a compliment. To be “Indian” is to be ugly, savage, invisible, exotic; indigenous communities are valued only by tourists – always and only when in traditional dress.