III.
COLOMBIA

Source: Yves Materne, ed., The Indian Awakening in Latin America (New York: Friendship Press, 1980, 113-127).

THE INDIAN CLAIM OF CULTURAL AND SOCIAL AUTONOMY

The Regional Indian Council of Cauca (CRIC) is in fact the foremost expression of the Colombian Indian movement; it is likewise at the origin of the creation of an "Indian Commission" within the "Asociacion Nacional de Usuarios Campesinos, " the ANUC (National Association of Tenant Farmers).

Within the framework of the Third National Congress of the ANUC held at Bogota from August 31 to September 4, 1974, the CRIC published a manifesto concerning the place of Indians in the peasant movement. At the same time it held a "Meeting" with 400 Indian delegates from Colombia, from September I to September 4, 1974; in October it published the final resolutions.

1. THE PLACE OF INDIANS IN THE PEASANT MOVEMENT: A MANIFESTO*

Even though there are great differences in the economic structures and grades of integration in the dominant economy between the various Indian groups, it is a fact that almost all Indians are campesinos who cultivate the earth in order to sustain ourselves.

We also have problems and needs in common with the non-Indian farmer: first, defense and recuperation of our lands; second, the struggles against exploitation by the middle-man; third, the necessity of credit, technical assistance, etc. Our enemies are the same as those of the rest of the rural population, namely: the landowners, the businessmen, the usurers and all the apparatus of the State and Church which are at their service.

We Indians have become well aware of the broad bonds which unite us with the rest of the rural population and with the exploited class in general. For this reason our struggle in recent times has been within the framework of the larger campesino movement. Without a doubt, our place is in ANUC, the faithful expression of the needs and desires of all the poor of the rural area.

Along with all the common bonds we have with the rural ,,population of Colombia, we have others which are distinct. These arise from the fact that out communities are strongly rooted in their territory, most often predating the arrival of the Spanish. Traditions of centuries translate themselves into characteristics which are economic, cultural and political. These must be taken into special consideration.

View of the Land

We Indians do not consider the land only as the object upon we work and the source of our food but rather as the center of our lives, the base of our lives, the base of our social organization and the origin of our traditions and customs.

Our communities have forms of work and holding of land 'which we have followed for centuries. Even though recently they at times may have been suddenly snatched away from us, they continue to be an essential element in our world view and have repercussions upon the content of the struggle which we are now beginning.

An example of the foregoing is that, along with our brother campesinos, we are concerned with the recuperation of lands. Frequently this recuperation takes on its own form, both in the struggle as well as the use of this recovered land. For instance, some sectors of the rural population have individualistic conceptions of landholding or work, whereas for us the concept of community ownership and work is not a new structure to be learned patiently but rather a basic component of our accustomed way of life.

Another important element is our Indian concept of Nature. Practically all of the Indian communities have developed peaceful and balanced relationships between man and Nature which have permitted us to live and grow through the course of centuries. Lately the external pressure of "civilization" has forcefully modified the way of life of some groups but the idea of the destruction or unmerciful exploitation of Nature is repugnant to our way of thinking.

Although the continual penetration of the culture by our exploiters has notably affected the life of many of our communities, we have conserved in greater or lesser degrees the social organization of our ancestors, our government, languages, customs and beliefs.

For us the basic concept of culture cannot restrict itself to the sum of some elements taken out of context, like language, belief, myths and legends, music and dance, but from the whole global framework of our life where the land is the departure point and where our form of government and social control assure that all of these factors remain a unit which will permit an evolution toward the future.

Toward the Future

Many sectors think that the Indian struggle constitutes a mere defensive action performed to maintain outmoded ways of life which progress will eventually eliminate.

We admit that many of the wider struggles of the Indians in the last centuries have had this defensive character but have been, nevertheless, quite positive because of the strong blows inflicted upon the enemy and also for the conservation of strong and combative nuclei within the exploited sectors. Recent actions make it evident, however, that the situation has changed. More than battling against proximate extinction, the struggle now looks toward growth and development within the framework of a new society, the same one which the rest of the oppressed classes of the country hope to construct.

The specific Indian achievements have played a determining role in recent struggles as can be appreciated from the principal flags (tribes) which have recuperated and amplified the guards, the creation of reserves, and strengthened the brotherhoods and the other forces of indigenous government, plus the resistance against cultural penetration both from national and foreign groups. Traditional elements have been revitalized with external support, and the Indian movement has placed itself firmly in the larger framework of the campesino struggle and the struggle of the people of Colombia in general.

Secondary Indian organizations have risen up as a product of the struggle and have played a fundamental role in its impulse and orientation, such as CRIC (Consejo Regional Indigena del Cauca) and CRIVA (Vaupes). In the future it will be necessary to form a national organization within the scope of ANUC to orient the action of our specific sector.

We do not, however, want to enter into a group formed from above which does not recognize the vast differences which do exist among us, i.e., groups, tribes and even nations. We are quite aware of the diversity which exists within our situation and our own present problems. From this awareness we can have our own meetings to share experiences, analyze possible solutions and offer mutual aid.

We believe that at the present moment we must promote the indigenous organization in each region and look for its consolidation while continuing with the coordination which has existed on a national level. When a sole, unified Indian organization arises, it will have to be one which is a faithful and democratic expression of the needs and desires of the totality of the Indian people of Colombia.

We Indians know we are just a small minority within the exploited masses of the country and alone we cannot accomplish anything, not even our own specific needs.

Our desire is to contribute to the liberation of the Colombian people struggling shoulder-to-shoulder with peasants, workers and other exploited people with their legitimate class organizations.

In the construction of a new society we feel we can contribute something special, similar to the other national minorities who are contributing to the advance of the people and have already learned the road to emancipation.

When we Colombians affirm our new personality as a nation, we Indians cannot be absent, because through the force of suffering and persecution we have preserved the roots of an authentic and millenary culture.

ANUC Indian Commission 
Regional Indian Council of Cauca
Bogota, August 31, 1974.

II. FINAL RESOLUTIONS OF THE BOGOTA INDIAN 
MEETING, SEPTEMBER 1-4,1974, IN CONNECTION WITH
THE THIRD ANUC NATIONAL CONGRESS

A. The Land

For us Indians, the land belongs to everyone. We are not used to living in enclosures like pigs, with fences and barbed wire. For us Indians, the land is like our mother, from whom we get our life.

We all need the land, not only to till it but also to walk on it, hunt and fish, and freely communicate with each other; to pursue our customs and interrelationships; to respect it and not destroy it.

This is why we organize ourselves and struggle to gain respect for our land and our rights. We Indians who live in reservations invaded by big landowners struggle to recover and enlarge our reservation if it is very restricted. We struggle to restore our community organizations that have been dismantled. We Indians who have traditional lands struggle to have the limits of our holdings recognized, and to have them turned back to us in a single large mass rather than in little pieces. We also struggle to be allowed to organize our means of production according to our communities. We Indians who have no land, or live on rented farms, struggle against having to pay land rentals.

We have consistently made clear that those who let themselves be deprived of land are at a dead end. Therefore we should get back enough land to put all of us to work, and so strengthen our communities and permit them to progress. When we get our lands back, it is the community that determines how they will be used.

We always accept community undertakings when they leave us complete freedom to act on the basis of our experience, and to organize as we wish.

On the other hand, we reject the schemes proposed by the Department of Native Affairs, in its centers of so-called education. They only operate to turn us into trinket-makers; they deface our work and they are sources of profit for the government and the middle-men. They are trying to take our attention away from the basics-the land.

B. The Settlers

1. The Present Situation.

For the majority of Indian communities, the settlers have been-or are-a serious problem. We have been attacked by them. They have spoiled our lands, our products and our work. That is why we generally consider them enemies and try to get rid of them or keep them from coming through-for example, seeking to set up reservations.

But there are some settlers (or "colonists") who live in settlements and on certain reservations; they accept Indian community leaders, respect community customs and provide the same services as any other member of the community. These settlers are our friends inasmuch as they do not strive to lord it over the Indians.

There are some settlers also who have their own organization, such as the ANUC, and who fight to defend their interests: land, credit, technical aid or other services from the state. In certain conditions, these colonists can be our best allies and support our battles.

a) Many poor peasants, lashed by violence and stripped of their lands in the interior of the country, have had to seek refuge on the plains or in the forests in their effort to survive. They lacked community organization and defended themselves one by one.

b) The settlers came with the mentality and the education of exploiters that the Indian was worthless and inferior-an they set about to exploit him. Since they had not been able to struggle in an organized way against those who stripped them of their lands, the settlers imitated those who had exploited them This is why their interests seem to be opposed to ours.

c) But very often the poor settlers who cleared the land were in turn exploited by wealthier settlers who bought their improved lands to form huge ranches. Thus they were forced to move farther out and clear new land once again. And, without realizing it, the poor settlers served as a stepping stone for the big landowners.

3. The Indian's stance with respect to the settlers, therefore depends on the circumstances.

The community should strengthen its, organization to confront its enemies.

When the settler will not join any organization, or when he thinks like an exploiter, he is the Indian's enemy even though he is poor.

When the settler accepts the authority of the community and participates in its organization and its struggle, we regard him as a friend and ally.

The rich settler should not be accepted by the community; it should seek some way to get him off the land.

The community must prevent the coming of settlers who are agents for the big landowners.

When there is an organization for settlers, our community should study it to see whether, at any given time, this group can be seen as allies that support our struggle.

C. Credit and Technical Aid

This commission met at the request of the Narifio delegation which set it up. It reached the following conclusions:

1. The basis for credit and technical aid is land. We must unite, therefore, to recover our lands.

2. Having recovered our lands, we must struggle to form strong and well-organized groups to make plans and apply for credit. These groups will also make use of the technical know-how acquired by our ancestors and our own experience and engage in production for all our communities. Organization is important to enable us to keep our autonomy in seeking credit and technical aid. Otherwise, more credit could mean more dependence.

3. Moreover, if the town councils get together and organize, thought could be given to creating common funds administered by such an organization and forming production and marketing cooperatives.

D. Religion and Missions

As representatives of the Indian communities:

1. We remember the role played by the Catholic missions after to accept the interests of the "civilized people." They destroyed our own civilization, they blazed the way for the settlers, traders, and sellers of trinkets, as well as government agencies. In many places they succeeded in getting rid of us and forced us to take refuge in the hills or the densest forests after they had taken possession of our lands.

2. We analyze the style of operation of the evangelical missions and the Summer Institute of Linguistics which pretend to be interested only in the Bible when they come to study our languages. This is the way they infiltrate our communities which are forewarned against the ways the church works.

But in many places now we have ousted the Summer Institute from our lands because we realized that they destroy our culture, tradition and customs in this way. Moreover, they take advantage of their knowledge about us, our lands and the riches of our earth to inform the foreigners who come later to sink oil wells, mine gold or cut timber.

3. The division that results in our communities between Indians faithful to the Catholic missions and evangelical Indians serves to distract our attention and blind us to the way our real enemies are stripping us of our possessions and getting rid of us.

4. Experience has shown us that we ought not attack each other because we profess one religion or another. To the contrary, we must reinforce our unity and strengthen our organizational bonds so that we win our struggles. And in the struggle we will discover the roots of our beliefs and our own traditions.

E. Education and Culture

1. Education thrust upon us by the missions and the government has been one of the chief ways our communities have been destroyed.

The government has left the education of the Indians in the hands of the Catholic and evangelical missions.

The missions have forced us to give up our own education, saying that it was savagery and witchcraft. They have forbidden us to talk our own languages, wear our traditional dress and eat according to our customs.

The missions use the children in boarding schools to work without pay in domestic tasks, or in the fields and pasture lands run by the missions in the countryside.

2. Education imposed on us by the missions and the government divides our communities.

In our communities there are some who fight against such education by rejecting the schools and refusing to send their children to them. The mamos and the curacas go into hiding so they can continue to practice their science and protect the secrets of their knowledge and traditions. Some Indian chiefs and councils protect our tradition and follow it.

Others have entirely adopted white customs and seek to copy the whites in everything. They have no respect for their tradition, they are ashamed of their language, they despise the knowledge handed down by their ancestors, and they make it easy for strangers to come into the community and divide it more and more.

3. Our communities have their own forms of education.

We have always educated our children so as to preserve our communities and assure their future.

This work of transmitting our knowledge, our customs, our medicine and science is done by the mamos, curacas, carecas, ayvana, payes, piachis and chiefs. They have been supported and directed by our own authorities.

This education is not given in an enclosed place called a school. It is given throughout life through occasions in which the whole community takes part: elders, men, women and children. For example, at general meetings convened by the authoritythe chief or the council-in which problems are discussed and solutions are sought; or in the mamo's cancurua at night or in the yahe's house. Also at the ceremonies that we customarily hold when girls have their first menstruation, or when someone dies or gets married. Or when a crime has been committed in the community and the council deliberates not only about the guilty person's punishment but also the causes of the crime and how to correct them. Moreover, from childhood we learn to work and make full use of our abilities.

We share the opinion that we should study our traditions more and seek a way to develop our knowledge, with our communities mutually supporting each other.

4. Our communities need to get to know the "civilized" man's culture and learn from it what suits our interests.

To keep from being cheated, we have found it necessary to learn Spanish and to find out what certain agencies or individuals are after when they offer us "aid." In other words, how does such "aid" fit into a well-made plan in keeping with the white people's way of life (such as a school, clinic, highway, cooperative, monetary system or something similar)?

We know that the current government policy with respect to the Indians is that we should be "integrated"; in other words, to get rid of us as Indians and make us landless peasants, jobless laborers or beggars in the cities.

Government agencies pursue this policy by offering us education and technical progress, so we have to consider what we can accept and what we must reject.

5. Only we ourselves will be the ones to work out a style of education that fits the situation and interests of the Indians.

We need to train Indian teachers who will teach in our own language and with relevance to our situation.

We need an education that protects our culture and is based in our own reality. For this reason we need to study what our real situation is, as well as our history and our needs, so that we can determine what an education that corresponds to our needs would consist of.

F. Organization

1. This commission has identified different kinds of organizations.

There are organizations for the rich which are formed so as to better exploit the poor and uneducated; for example, the liberal and conservative political parties, the landowners' and cattle raisers' associations, the federation of coffee growers.

There are organizations of the rich for the poor, but run by the rich, like Communal Action, Popular Cultural Action, or government cooperatives that serve to slow down the struggle for economic justice.

2. Our Indian communities also have their own organizations.

We who are Arhuacos in the Sierra Nevada have a central governing council and deputies in all the sectors. We also have our mamos who are priests/wise men/medicine men.

We who are Tunebos and Embera are organized around our senior elders and the carecas and ayvana.

We who are Guajibos are organized around our chiefs.

3. We are in agreement that for now the most important thing is to strengthen the particular organization of each of our communities.

We note that the most divided communities are the ones that have the most religious institutions and government agencies. It is important, therefore, for the communities to strengthen their own organizations so they can exercise control over the entrance of such outside organizations and their programs.

In every community there are individuals and groups that oppose our struggle and are satisfied with the status quo. A great effort must be exerted, then, to get them all to open their eyes and help to carry on the struggle.

4. The experience of the Cauca has shown that the uniting of the councils moved forward apace with the progress of the struggle for the recovery of the land. Thus was formed the first Indian organization: CRIC.

5. In this gathering our desire was expressed that some day we would manage to establish a national organization of Colombian Indians. But our discussions revealed that first we need to create and strengthen the organizations in all the communities and at the regional level. When we have eight or ten organizations like CRIC and CRIVA, then we can think about establishing a real Indian Congress at the national level.

To speed up this local and regional work, we can count on the cooperation that is provided through the Indian secretariat of ANUC. After ample discussion we decided to increase this office to four members and named them.

These members are to summarize the discussions of this gathering and send reports on them to all the regions; visit the communities and work out with them a plan of action; facilitate relations among the different communities.

It was emphasized that the designated officers should be under our constant watch so that they are criticized or replaced when they are dishonest or fail to represent our interests.

6. We Indians are peasants and, as such, form part of the general peasant movement headed by ANUC. This is what we declared at the ANUC Congress in the document titled "The Place of the Indians in the Peasant Movement."

7. The participating Indian delegations have agreed as to the need to make laws in accordance with the particular Indian customs and the way Indians live in community and solve our problems. These laws cannot be enforced until there exists an Indian organization at the local, regional and national levels to see to it that all Indians obey the laws.

For now, it is important to begin compiling in all the communities and regions the customs we observe and the laws we follow, so that some day we can collect them at the national level and draw up one code of laws of all the Indians for all the Indians.

October 1974
(Signed): Indian Secretariat of ANUC

*This manifesto is the full text of a Latinamerica Press translation of a position paper of the Asociacion Nacional de Usuarios Campesinos (ANUC), the National Association of Tenant Farmers of Colombia, prepared by the ANUC Secretariat for Indian Affiars and the Regional Indian Council of Cauca for the Third National Congress of Campesinos (peasant farmers).