Véronique de Geoffroy

The objectives of this first visit to Colombia were the following :

• "contact ALNAP members in the field
• distribute ALNAP and Global Study leaflets
• Analyse the security situation
• Prepare a context typology in order to select areas for the field visits
• Identify possible local consultants"

For this purpose, Véronique de Geoffroy (team leader) went to Bogota from the 14^th to the 28^th of June. Karla Levy (research assistant for the Global Study) joined her from the 20^th to the 28^th

About 30 people from 19 different organisations were met. This group of organisations is representative of the humanitarian actors in Colombia:

• State institutions (la Red de Solidaridad Social : RSS),
• The Red Cross movement (ICRC and Colombian Red Cross),
• United Nations agencies (HCR, OCHA),
• International NGOs (IRC, MSF, OXFAM, CARITAS…),
• Local, secular NGOs (CODHES) or NGOs with a religious affiliation (CINEP, Programa para la Paz)

Among this group, a number of organisations are members of ALNAP, such as : CARITAS, ECHO, ICRC, OXFAM, HCR, OCHA. Other ALNAP member organisations are present in Colombia (notably SCF, UNHCHR, USAID, World Vision) but it was not possible to contact them during the preparatory mission. The team will not fail to meet them in the next mission for the study.

After the usual presentations of Groupe URD and ALNAP, the study was presented in detail. These presentations were completed by the distribution of documents (Groupe URD leaflet, ALNAP leaflet, Presentation of the Global Study, most of which were translated in Spanish). The person interviewed would then be asked about three issues: the programmes run by the organisation that s/he represents (objectives, project sites), his/her point of view on the issue of participation (definition, advantages, limits), and the possibilities of establishing partnerships for the purpose of the study (project visits, contacts, logistics).

The study was welcomed and the topic was considered very interesting, in particular for the case of Colombia. None of the persons met knew about Groupe URD or ALNAP, but the description of the work and objectives of these research networks met with considerable interest. The websites of the 2 organisations will certainly be visited in the following weeks.

The promise to organise a feedback seminar at the end of the study and to send the results of the study in Spanish was a key element to establish a relationship of trust and to "open doors".

The study mission should thus be able to count on a satisfying number of « research fields », that is, of projects from different organisations (International and local NGOs, International organisations, ICRC, RSS,…) thereby enabling the implementation of the research.

 

Given the security conditions in Colombia today, it was not possible to go to distant areas during this first mission. All long-distance movements must be done by plane. MSF-Spain nevertheless invited us to participate in a day of work on the project in Soacha, a suburban quarter of Bogota, where a large number of displaced persons are coming. This has enabled us to apprehend more concretely (though still superficially) one of the facets of Colombian reality, that is, the impact of the crisis on urban areas in terms of the "invasion neighbourhoods", which are partly populated by the displaced. This day also enabled us to become more acutely aware of a number of constraints that will need to be managed during the study (security constraints, interview methods, etc. See below).

 

In order to complete the team, a series of steps were undertaken. Contacts were established with the National University (centre of social sciences) in order to advertise the positions and obtain CVs. The organisations we met also put us in contact with potential candidates. The last two days were partly spent interviewing candidates. Seven people were interviewed, out of which two were retained; one senior profile for one month (an anthropologist specialised in urban segregation) and a junior profile (young person who recently completed her thesis in anthropology, specialised in community-based approaches) for the whole of the study.

The direct impact of the political crisis which the country is going through is that the population is taken hostage by the conflict. It is in the cross-fire between the various parties to the conflict: the various guerrilla movements (FARC, ELN) and the paramilitary which are fighting the Colombian Armed Forces. The different parties to the conflict are fighting throughout the national territory, but in specific areas, in a "pin-pointed" type of configuration. They aim to take or keep the control of territorial zones for several reasons (weight factor in the negotiations, control of illegal production, control of geographically strategic zones, access roads and strategic corridors, etc.) and for this they seek to control, through various means, the populations in the concerned territories.

The stakes in the conflict are expressed in a series of direct impacts on populations :

• Intimidation, threats or even hostage takings, homicides, massacres of civilian populations;
• displacements of individuals or communities (estimate of 1,500,000 displaced persons)

But also :

• destabilisation of host areas (villages or large towns)
• difficulties of return after having abandoned the site of origin for several months
• blockade areas

The Colombian Government recognises the state of internal conflict and the humanitarian crisis. It remains the first humanitarian actor in the country and takes on the various related responsibilities. The texts regulating emergency assistance, the rights of displaced persons, the role of the various ministries are among the most elaborated in the World! The informed reader will be surprised by the level of protection offered by these texts (Deng principles completely applied in Law 387 on forced displacements, second protocol of 1977 on the rules concerning the conduct of hostilities and the protection of populations in internal conflicts, etc.) and by the level knowledge the civilian population has of its rights as stated in International Humanitarian Law!

The main government actor in humanitarian aid is therefore the Red de Solidaridad Social (which depends on the President’s office). The civil society is extremely well organised, and numerous NGOs and organisations are active in responding to the crisis. The international aid community comes in to complement these actions, which is a very particular situation, compared to most crisis contexts.

These different actors’ interventions are essentially centred around :

• Protection issues (the usual activities of the ICRC) and an international presence for the monitoring of human rights or IHL, protection of populations, etc.
• Emergency humanitarian aid, following the forced displacements (food aid, hygiene kits, return kits, etc.)
• Medium-term aid when return is not possible (micro-projects, agricultural rehabilitation activities in rural areas, etc.)
• Return assistance (food aid, agricultural rehabilitation, micro-projects)

Participation in Colombia is above all understood as a political concept, which was explicitly integrated in the 1991 Constitution, and the significance of which impacts on humanitarian action. Indeed, since the main actor is the government, which is legitimately responsible for the populations in terms of humanitarian assistance, the concept of participation in humanitarian action has naturally been integrated in the relationship between the civil society and the State.

The participation of communities (by this we mean groups of beneficiaries) has been explicitly formulated in Law 387 which governs humanitarian issues for displaced persons. This aspect will be important to study, and is very original in the framework of the Global Study.

As for International Organisations and NGOs, the issue of participation reveals a very rich diversity of approaches and definitions. From training practices to the support of social organisations ready to claim their rights, the range of definitions is very large. It seems to depend partly on the type of programmes, on the institution, but also on the zone of action. All this remains to be looked into further.

As for the beneficiaries, it seems there also that Colombia presents interesting and particular characteristics.

• Displaced persons are organised in « Organizacion de desplazados » which are more or less structured. They regularly organise demonstrations (street walks, taking over of offices such as that of the ICRC delegation, which has been going on for 2 years, or of the Red’s offices in mid-June) or they are invited to participate in diverse meetings, seminars, etc. Some, among the most organised, have directly negotiated with the government their return to their lands of origin. There are round tables for negotiation between the various humanitarian actors and these organisations.
• This level of organisation depends on several criteria which will need to be studied in depth: their place of origin, the socio-cultural origin, the reasons and mode of displacement, the host area (urban or rural), the hopes for the future (i.e. return), etc.

As explained above, the security situation in the country is extremely precarious. The change of government planned for the 7^th of August is feared by many, as Uribe’s future government announces strong measures.

Furthermore, displaced persons are, in many cases, seen as pro-guerrilla or pro-paramilitary partisans. Displaced persons are therefore stigmatised and they therefore fear to declare themselves displaced. This phenomena is especially true in the case of the displacements of individuals towards urban areas.

These first two elements have a direct impact on the choice of method:

• Team movements should be exclusively by plane, and on a limited number of zones,
• Discreet survey techniques with populations (no focus groups above 3 or 4 persons)

Furthermore, humanitarian actors are relatively well accepted and respected by the parties to the conflict, which makes it possible to start the research in active conflict zones, but by being closely associated to organisations present in this zone. Taking this into consideration, mission orders will be prepared and tee-shirts will be made for recognition.

A list of criteria for the choice of zones was elaborated, taking into consideration the elements mentioned above:

From these criteria, three contexts were selected :

• The Uraba region : this region in the North West of Colombia, at the border with Panama presents several characteristics :

• Afro-colombian and Indian communities, which are very organised and attached to their land,
• Issues displaced people, returnees, and old and current displacement zones
• Emergency, post-emergency, return assistance, and protection programmes (example of the Communities of Peace)
• Rural-rural and rural-urban displacements towards Turbo and Apartado,
• Actors present: RSS, ICRC, Colombian Red Cross, CISP, HCR, WFP, MDM, CARITAS, Christian Aid, Peace Brigade International, OXFAM, local NGOs (CINEP, Justicia y Paz, …)

• The Magdalena Medio area : this region in the centre of Colombia is the one with the highest concentration of refugees:
• White, mixed and native population
• Rich area (oil, commercial activities, agricultural production, etc.)
• Issues of displaced people, returnees, old and current displacement zones
• Area where the FARC originated
• Rural-rural and rural-urban displacements, notably towards Barrancabermeja.
• Emergency, post-emergency, return assistance and protection programmes
• Numerous actors in the area, whether they be international or national, including inter-agency United Nations programmes, etc.

• Bogota/Soacha + ?: For the urban context, Bogota is a good case study, notably with the neighbourhoods of Soacha and Cuidad Bolivar.
• Individually displaced persons who wish to « mix in the mob » and seek to remain anonymous ; strong stigmatisation of displaced persons
• Host neighbourhoods in Bogota’s suburban reas, in an already dismantled urban society.
• Few hopes for return
• Paramilitary zone of influence
• More scattered programmes, for both host and displaced populations
• Less numerous active actors in the zone: local organisations, the RSS, ICRC, MSF-Spain, etc.

VG: Véronique de Geoffroy- team leader for Colombia

KL : Karla Levy- research assistant for the Global Study

FL : Federico Lopez- anthropologist

SR: Stella Rodriguez- anthropologist

FG: François Grünewald- director of the Global Study

This first step, which involved the establishments of contacts, and the clarification of the subject has been very important. The mission duration (2 weeks) was adequate. The fact of starting the research only a few weeks after the initial mission also enhances the continuity of the process.

The documents that had been prepared (ALNAP leaflets) were very useful. A shorter presentation of the Global Study is nevertheless lacking. The web site which is currently under construction will be surely useful in this sense.

The translation of documents in the language of the country is very important, and should be maintained throughout the study (for Angola, notably). We should already envisage the possibilities of translating the Global Study final document in Spanish (?). Similarly, it seems essential to propose a feedback workshop, as it enhances the interest of the "partners" (organisations which are open to the study and which are thereby legitimately expecting a feedback).

Another, more complete document will be elaborated in the following days, to explain in greater detail the elements of the context which have led to the choice of the study zones. Furthermore, the chosen methodology for this specific context will be presented in detail. This methodology document, translated in Spanish, will serve as a basis for the research itself, and will enable us to present more specifically to our "partners" in the field what we are expecting from them and what they can expect from us in terms of concrete results.