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Social dialogue: the antidote to violence

2020-10-21T01:24:51.014Z


Leadership is measured by the ability to listen, not turn your back on minorities or those who think differently


A march of indigenous communities in Bogotá, on October 19 JUAN BARRETO / AFP

Violence is a more deadly disease than the coronavirus.

During more than 50 years of internal war, it has left more than 250 thousand dead, about nine million forcibly displaced, thousands of disappeared and a large number of mass graves.

Truth, justice, reparation and non-repetition are loud demands in a country that sees the peace agreement with the FARC languish and seems to return to the past.

We are living in difficult times in which illegal armed actors are waging a strong dispute over territorial control, drug trafficking increases, we hear words that we believed would never be heard again as massacres, the murder of social leaders does not stop and the outcry of the society for social justice, equity and end of confrontation.

The coronavirus pandemic has increased poverty figures, demolished collective trust, skyrocketed unemployment, collapsed industry, bankrupted the middle class and thrown millions of citizens into misery.

Social protest boils in the territories in the absence of the state, its scant response to the demands of the communities and its inability to control the territories.

Against this background, the Office of the Attorney General of the Nation does not look the other way or ignore its constitutional obligation to work to guarantee human rights.

With the Constitution in hand, we assume our commitment to be part of the solution.

Faced with the growing climate of intolerance and polarization, the Public Ministry of Colombia promotes social dialogue as an antidote to violence, convinced that the obligation of the State is to listen to citizens, validate those who exercise the opposition as interlocutors and guarantee the protest social, which is a fundamental right.

Respecting and listening to the demands of the opposition is the essence of a democratic state.

Leadership is measured by the ability to listen, not turn your back on minorities or those who think differently.

A strong ruler listens;

a weak one, represses.

A Democratic leader respects dissent;

don't run over it.

A strong State assumes dialogue as a source of authority.

Consistent with its legal mandate, this Office of the Attorney General promotes social, polyphonic, respectful, purposeful, assertive and productive dialogue.

That has been a vital commitment from day one.

For this reason, we have promoted the Summits of Social Dialogue, to bring the extremes closer, overcome polarization, deactivate the stigmatization of social leaders, convene civil society and address the issues that generate disagreements and motivate protest and social mobilization.

It is a scenario to seek solutions to problems and solutions to the crisis, but above all to build trust.

The Attorney General's Office has successfully convened five Social Dialogue Summits that have concluded in the need for this tool to be elevated to State policy and to be declared of privileged use to process conflicts and avoid the reissue of new cycles of violence motivated by political or political phenomena. social.

On October 29, the Sixth Summit will be held with the hope of advancing in the construction of new consensuses and alternatives to attend to the wounds and revitalize the social fabric of Colombia.

Listening and being heard at the same time is the key to leaving behind the cycle of confrontation that has kept the country in a pool of blood and the State counting corpses and making innocuous statements that do not solve the crisis.

The methodology implemented by the Public Ministry to advance social dialogue is a social asset that must be appropriated by leaders and communities so that it takes deep roots and is established as an effective instrument for the administration and transformation of social conflict.

The Social Dialogue Summits are a response to the invitation that Pope Francis made to the country during his visit to Colombia to generate a “culture of fraternal encounter that allows us to open ourselves to the brothers, discover the richness of diversity, heal wounds, build bridges and open paths for coexistence in justice and in the common good ”.

Social dialogue is an effective and irreplaceable antidote to restore the health of our democratic life.

An antidote that is available to everyone.

Only enough political will and generosity to make it for mass consumption.

Fernando Carrillo Flórez

is the Attorney General of the Nation of Colombia.

Source: elparis

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