Hundreds of thousands of Colombians on Thursday took to the streets of the capital, Bogota, amid a general strike to protest the policies of Colombian President Ivan Duque’s right-wing government.
There were reports of clashes and arrests as trade unions, students, opposition parties and the South American country’s indigenous organizations challenged the full gamut of Duque’s economic, social and security policies.
At night, a thunderous chorus of pot-banging, unusual in Colombia, took place in the cities of Cali and Medellin, and lasted for hours in Bogota.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“Colombia won on this historic day of citizen mobilization,” a statement by organizers from the National Strike Committee said, as they requested an “immediate” meeting with Duque to discuss the protesters’ array of complaints.
“We call on all citizens to be ready to take further action in the street if the national government continues to neglect our demands,” they added.
Duque later said that he had heard the protesters’ demands, but did not respond to their request for direct dialogue.
“Today, Colombians spoke. We hear them. Social dialogue has been a main principle of this government and we need to deepen it with all sectors of society,” he said.
The protests came amid social upheaval across South America, as a wave of unrest over the past two months has battered governments in Chile, Bolivia and Ecuador.
The popularity of Duque’s right-wing government — a key US ally in the region — has been on the wane since his election 18 months ago, as it deals with hosting 1.4 million refugees from neighboring Venezuela’s economic meltdown, as well as the complex fallout of a 2016 peace deal with Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia rebels and rampant drug trafficking.
Troops were deployed in the capital and other cities to protect “strategic facilities,” authorities said.
The Colombian office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights voiced concern over the deployment, saying that states must limit the use of military forces “for the control of internal disturbances.”
Spokespeople for several organizations backing the protests said that more than 1 million people had marched nationwide.
Colombian Minister of the Interior Nancy Patricia Gutierrez said there were about 207,000 demonstrators, adding that “in general terms, the participants marched peacefully,” while denouncing “some vandals who wanted to disrupt public order.”
At least 42 civilians and 37 police were wounded in clashes, and 36 people were arrested across the country, authorities said.
In the center of Bogota, clashes took place at nightfall, when people wearing ski masks and hoods threw stones and other projectiles at police, who fought back with tear gas.
A new gathering of people banging pots was called for yesterday afternoon, as young protesters continued to demonstrate into the night shouting: “Long live the national strike.”
The general strike was widely followed in big cities like Bucaramanga in the northeast and Medellin in the northwest, along with Bogota, where riot police used stun grenades to turn back thousands of students walking toward the El Dorado International Airport, one journalist said.
Several separate marches converged on Plaza de Bolivar, the historic center of the capital close to the presidency.
Groups that participated in the strike have taken issue with Duque’s security policy, as well as attempts to introduce a more flexible labor market, weaken public pension funds and raise the retirement age.
Students are demanding more funding for education, while indigenous communities insist on greater protection in remote areas where 134 activists have been killed since Duque took office in August last year.
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