So, as you might be aware, I got an email this weekend from the consul of Colombia in San Francisco; he was inviting me to the consulate because Francisco Santos (the Vice President of Colombia) was going to give a talk on Monday at 6 pm.
So after some thinking, I decided to go, I thought I would meet some other Colombians and have some contacts.
The Vice President gave a talk about how things have improved under the current administration: the economy has been growing at large rates, the institutions have been made stronger (supporting the campaign motto of "Giving the people back the confidence for their institutions"), and how the crime rates have lowered: less kidnappings, less killings. He acknowledges there are still a lot of things to do; they claim that open economies grow faster than closed economies, and so, this is the reason that they are trying to get the new open commerce treaty with the US (el tratado de libre comercio). He was saying how other countries like Peru and Guatemala were already in the treaty, and if we didn't fight for it, Colombia was going to be left behind. He kept saying that Colombian economy had improved a lot in the last years, and that it was now very similar to the Chilean model of an economy. He cited Chile's model several times, and I found this comparison a bit risky and controversial, since Chile's economy started to grow after the military coup: the turn from a left government, to a completely right-winged government with human right abuses.
This is a dangerous comparison given the current claims of Colombia's right-winged government and the current "parapolitica" accusations. Francisco Santos has been a controversial figure of late, because he has been recently accused by paramilitary members, of having tried to enlist their support to fight guerrillas.
I thought everyone would ask him about this issue, but curiously enough, no one did... maybe they didn't want to start a polemic debate (like me for example, I lack the self-confidence to do this kind of things).
They did asked about the use of pesticides to attack cocaine plantations, and its effects on nature. He said that the effect of "glifosato" to nature was minimum, and in fact coca growers were using malicious pesticides to claim that the damage to nature was actually done by the government. He also said that there was no other way to do this; reminding people that when they tried to do a clearing of a coca plantation by hand, the guerrilla killed several people, and recently they bombed a bus with 13 police officers when they were trying to give protection to the workers.
They also asked about the legalization of drugs, and he said that it was difficult for several reasons: 1) it difficult to calculate the real effects of such a measure, 2) public health problems would increase 3) Internationally there has been a constant move to decrease consumption of cocaine.
They also asked about the political scenery in the US, about incentives to bring Colombians back from the US, about his visit to Schwarzenegger (oh wow, I am so good! I managed to spell Schwarzenegger correctly... just now I checked via Google and I had spelled it wright [Update: unfortunately I don't seem to know how to spell "right," right] ! I am becoming so Californian :-P) ... anyways
Then people just mixed and started talking to each other. I tried to talk to some people but I couldn't really speak to anyone there... I am not sure if it was me, but it reminded me of my old days in Los Andes, and me trying to mix with people in Industrial Engineering... although some of them were really nice, some other were very arrogant... and somehow I think several people invited were arrogant. Well, at least the ones I tried to talk to... except maybe for one nice guy who was trying to start his own website... he said it was like "mercadolibre.com" but their focus was on helping merchants exchange goods between countries: e.g., between Colombia and Venezuela.
Anyways, I left early since I didn't feel comfortable (how unusual). But well, at least it gave me the excuse to write a blog entry :-P
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
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6 comments:
Cool, just hearing Francisco Santos explanation should be cool.
I hope their research on "glifosfato" is true... but I know that the hand eradication was not going anywhere :(
I'm more curious about the legalization of drugs. Did they touch on what could be the benefits, and how would it impact the conflict going on right now?
Also funny that is in California where they ask that... DUUUUUUDE
Congratulations on Schwarzenegger.
If Colombia legalizes drugs it would not impact the conflict. The US and Europe would still consider cocaine illegal and so in Colombia there would still be organized crime trying to reach those markets illegally.
The only way to impact the conflict is if the US and Europe legalize drugs... but that is not going to happen: public health problems and uncertainty are the most dangerous side effects to them, and I do not think they care what happens in Colombia too much.
Crap... but uhm... Netherlands allow it... right?
So there is no way out of conflict just depending on ourselves :(
It is difficult to end the conflict on ourselves when the conflict itself is being supported by people taking drugs outside our country.
But wait, why would there still be organized crime in Colombia if drugs were legal there? I think that Colombia can't legalize them becuase the US and Europe would put a lot of pressure and not allow it. It's a lost cause if you ask me.
If drugs were legal in US and Europe then there wouldn't be organized crime in Colombia. Drugs, however, won't be legal, and we end up trying to stop this illegal market.
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