The current Colombian administration is denying the kidnap, torture, and murder of thousands of citizens. In an interview this past Wednesday, 23 March, Defense Minister Rodrigo Rivera spoke with certainty about what he called a definitive reduction of violence and delinquency. This so-called “certainty” is worrisome considering there is nothing to be certain about regarding the topic since there are so many disappeared persons in Colombia.
If an individual is disappeared, the whereabouts and what may have occurred to the person is most likely unknown (or at least not being plugged as a numerical statistic in a row or column that is not labeled “disappeared”). Nevertheless, if we are to look at our own history or the history of other countries that have been hit with high levels of forced disappearances – like Chile and Argentina in the 20th century – then we can at least infer that a significant number of such disappeared individuals would have most likely been subjected to crimes against humanity and human rights violations that by any statistical measure would be recognized as an increase in violence, not a reduction.
When Mr. Rivera was asked point blank about the many critiques he has received regarding the issue of security in Colombia, he responded with the following statement:
“The statistics clearly show an improvement, a reduction in crime. But we are in an election year, we are in a time when citizens rightly claim the events that happen in certain places. I believe that a society that protests against crime is a society that has the basic element to be successful on offense. I would worry if people were indifferent. Before, there was no concept of security. Ten years ago that didn’t exist.”
But the person being indifferent is Mr. Rivera. There are (at least) three things that are alarming regarding his statement. First, instead of directly addressing the critiques brought against him, Rivera passed the blame to it being an election year and that we should be happy people are even talking about security. This move directly avoids the legitimate concern regarding the statement that crime has “clearly” been reduced.
If anything, Mr. Rivera should unpack and elaborate on the claim. What kind of crime? How is he defining crime? Has all crime been reduced? Have other forms of crime seen an increase? What periods is Mr. Rivera comparing to claim with such certainty that the statistics clearly illustrate a decrease in crime? And so on.
Second, to always compare current Colombia to a time in the country’s history where it was on the verge of potentially becoming a failed state is irresponsible. Why not compare today’s Colombia to, let’s say, the Colombia of 2007, 2008, 2009, or 2010 instead of the situation in the late 1990s and early 21st when the country was on the verge of collapsing because of an internal armed conflict? The Colombia of the past four years is a better comparison when we are looking at today’s Colombia, even for the sole reason that during those years talk of “security” existed – as Mr. Rivera already claimed – and that this range of years is a better sample for comparison to 2011 when we are looking at reasonably immediate fluctuations in crime.
And, third, if we do compare security and crime to these more recent years, what will we find? Will we find statistics that clearly show an improvement in a reduction of crime and delinquency? No, we do not find clarity, especially if we zone in on recent statistics of those identified as disappeared.
Though it cannot be sure what happened to disappeared individuals (i.e., torture, murder, kidnapping), an April 2009 preliminary report by the Colombian Justice and Peace Unit of the Prosecutor General declared that almost 50,000 Colombians have been identified as disappeared/missing. This contradicts the previous government figure of only 10,584 missing persons. Other reports by groups such as Latin American Working Group (LAWG) claimed that the figure is much higher than 50,000. The 2009 Prosecutor General’s 2009 finding is almost double the figure of disappeared persons in Argentina during its Dirty War. If the experiences from Argentina’s desaparecidos are any indication of what may have occurred to Colombia’s missing persons, we can be sure that human rights violations on every level have occurred.
The term desaparecido, as Marguerite Feitlowitz suggested in her book A Lexicon of Terror: Argentina and the Legacies of Torture, is “a way of denying the kidnap, torture, and murder of thousands of citizens.” As Primo Levi, in The Drowned and the Saved, pointed out after his experience at the hands of the Nazis, the three purposes of concentrationary systems are “slave work […] elimination of political adversaries and the extermination of the so-called inferior races.” Much of what Feitlowitz and Levi wrote rings true to what is going on in Colombia: forced disappearances are occurring for similar reasons as Levi suggested (human cleansing campaigns, elimination of those that threaten the attainment of self or group interests, etc.) and, in line with Feitlowitz’s view about the term “disappeared” used by governments, the Santos administration is using the term (or not even using it, for that matter) in order to deny the “kidnap, torture, and murder of thousands of citizens.”
Defense Minister Rivera cannot be as certain as he is that violence, delinquency, and crime have clearly improved. I repeat, he cannot claim this with certainty when in 2007 there were 4,323 disappeared, when in 2008 there were 15,696, and while in 2009 there was yet another increase to 18,236 disappeared. Assuming these statistics paint at least a partial truth, just in those three years – an increasing trend, mind you – there were 38,255 disappearances. If they are disappeared, and he recognizes that there are disappeared persons in Colombia, then Mr. Rivera CANNOT be certain that such an improvement in the security of the country is happening.
But even the statistics from 2007-2009 do not yield clarity and certainty. The numeric value of 38,255 does not amount to a rise in disappearances, but the amount of reported complaints. After the paramilitaries demobilized more people felt they could file a report on old cases. These old cases distort the numbers. However, though we cannot be certain, when Colombia Reports staff, for example, goes out to talk to people in the popular comunas of Medellin and other neighborhoods of the city, what the people report to us suggests at least two things: (1) People are still being disappeared and (2) some are still afraid to report complaints of disappearances.
One woman Colombia Reports spoke with whose husband was disappeared just weeks before in September told CR that on her block alone three people had disappeared within three weeks. Further, I spoke to another woman only a month ago – who was displaced in Medellin because of death threats – who alleged that there was a mass grave in her comuna of about 15 persons of which the government is not aware. The reason for the government’s lack of knowledge? Though many of the friends and family members of the missing persons know exactly where their beloveds’ remains are buried and at the hands of whom, they do not speak up because they fear they too may become a disappeared – displaced, kidnapped, tortured, killed and buried in a common mass grave, etc.
What does this mean? It means that Mr. Rivera’s claim of certainty is clearly ill-founded as it is based on the following: (a) limited, distorted, and/or false evidence; (b) illogical reasoning; and/or (c) a desire to manipulate and mislead. You be the judge.
My tone is angry because I believe that a government that withholds information in order to manipulate its citizenry is a government that lies to its people, which is exactly what is going on here. What is the government trying to manipulate us for? I can only speculate as Mr. Rivera already has (up-coming elections?). But it is obvious that the lack of transparency and the picking and choosing of statistics to disseminate to the public is selective and calculated. We need to ask the right questions to unpack the layers a little more and potentially catch glimpse of a glimmer of truth.
I am looking at the statistics, Mr. Rivera, and the only way your statement may potentially make any sense is by neglecting to consider any disappeared persons in your assessment of reduction of crime in Colombia. It is obvious that if one does not know what happened to a disappeared person that that individual cannot be explicitly inserted into a statistic of, let’s say, homicide or kidnapping. However, to not even publicly consider the possibility that such vast number of disappeared persons could very well be part of that statistic (as Colombian history clearly suggests this is a great possibility), then we are being mistreated with data forwarded to misinform and mislead the public.
This being an election year, a misinformed citizenry will most likely vote for individuals and policies that harm them, the city, and the state if such manipulation continues because things are not as peach-y-keen as you, Mr. Rivera, would like us to believe. Only by recognizing an ailment can we begin treatment. Pretending there isn’t a problem won’t make the problem go away.
It is for this reason I claim that the administration the Defense Minister represents is denying the kidnap, torture, and murder of thousands of citizens, in turn lying to us, trying to manipulate and sell us a portrait of “security” that does not exist and that every day looks more and more like a painting from the French Impressionist painters – where there is slight emphasis on the accurate depiction of light (truth/reality) in its changing qualities – than a piece of realism art whose effort is to depict objective reality, without embellishment or interpretation.
Julián Esteban Torres López has a BA in Philosophy, BA in Communication, and MA in Justice Studies from the University of New Hampshire. He is currently a Ph.D. candidate at the University of British Columbia Okanagan concentrating on Political Science and Latin American Studies. A Medellín native, he is presently working on his dissertation, which focuses on trying to find feasible paths for political conflict resolution in Colombia. You can follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
