Colombia’s largest rebel group, the FARC, on Wednesday expressed solidarity with the thousands of coffee growers currently on strike while criticizing the government’s neoliberal economic model for
BACKGROUND: Thousands of Colombia’s coffee workers go on strike
“The government says it will not negotiate with troublemakers and the Ministry of Agriculture justifies the brutal repression with the false [claim] that the FARC are involved, they are stirring up trouble, they are [involved with the strike] and are exacerbating the situation,” the message continued.
Though the protests erupted Monday, the problem has been years in the making. Poor weather conditions that led to leaf rust beset several coffee growing countries in Latin America. Falling international prices coupled with massive amounts of foreign investment due to mining and oil booms led to a “dangerously” high peso. The three formed an almost perfect storm of adverse conditions for Colombian coffee farmers. Though the FARC acknowledged the merit of some of these arguments, they claimed they were just the symptoms of a systematic illness.
Juan Manuel Santos promised to turn each Colombian peasant into a prosperous and smiling Juan Valdez, with his donkey and coffee sack, like the one in the publication stamp of the powerful National Federation of Coffee Growers…but where is this Juan Valdez?…He is being persecuted by the bullets and tear gas of the repressive squadrons of the [riot police] in the country’s villages and roads where thousands of coffee growers protest against the [government’s] abandonment of their sector. From Havana, [we express] our solidarity with the struggle of the peasants, [with] their dead, [and the] dozens of wounded and imprisoned.”
While the protestors believe the government is not doing enough, the insurgents claim they themselves have put forth concrete proposals on farmers’ behalf.
In addition to criticizing the government’s handling of the coffee protests, the FARC said that the ongoing strike at the Cerrejon coal mine in northern Colombia and the possible truckers union strike reinforced the problems of neoliberal economics.
On his trip to the western port city of Buenaventura to announce that the government was donating over 500 free homes Wednesday, President Santos
MORE: Labor dispute at Colombia’s most productive mine continues