Anne Klein Women's Award 2018: In her acceptance speech, activist and this year's award recipient Mayerlis Angarita discusses the role of the women's movement in the Colombian peace process.
Original language: German
Good evening!
First of all, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to everyone here, to the Heinrich Böll Foundation, to Barbara, and to all the other people who made our visit here possible and who are willing to exchange ideas with us about our experiences and our emancipation as women and as survivors of the violence of the armed conflict in Colombia.
As you have just seen, the 840 women of the organization “Narrar para Vivir” (Telling Stories to Live) are a testament to courage and bravery. Eighteen years ago, we decided together to share our stories—and we did so in an environment marked by gunfire, massacres, torture, enforced disappearances, sexual violence, fear, hatred, and despair. In the midst of this spiral of barbarism, a light emerged from women’s resistance and the power of the word.
Words were our only tool to confront the attacks by armed groups, to cope with deferred grief and the loss of meaning in life, and ultimately to find a way out of the role of victim in which the perpetrators of violence had left us. So we began to tell our stories in order to keep living: Amid a maze of dirt roads, muddy backyards, and secret mass graves, we began to use our words to demand truth, justice, and full reparations.
Today, we have developed our own methods for providing psychosocial care to women. We have established a mobile school where 2,000 survivors in 15 districts of the Montes de María region can continuously expand their knowledge. We have founded a clothing company that enables 140 women to earn an income and thus become economically empowered. In addition, 40 women work on our own livestock farm. Most importantly, however, we have succeeded in transforming our social environment and that of our communities. We have made our voices heard so loudly that we have been able to gain a foothold in public policy at the regional and national levels and in the decision-making bodies that address our local reality.
Particularly noteworthy is the important role of the women’s movement in the peace process, as well as the way in which Narrar para Vivir was able to contribute to the Havana peace negotiations through the Subcommittee on Gender Issues. We are women who think politically, and we are organizing to take power. We are now part of the world’s first and only high-level body for gender issues within a peace agreement. We are active participants in the process of collective reparations, and we influence the government in the creation of gender-specific protective measures.
We have saved the lives of women who had lost everything. We have filed complaints against the perpetrators. We have supported hundreds of small farmers in their demands for land. This work has led to 42 attacks against us, ranging from threats and assassination attempts to arson attacks on our homes. However, we have not allowed ourselves to be intimidated.
We can rely on the Colombian government’s commitment, but this commitment must be translated into guarantees and concrete funding for women. We did not ask to go to war; we did not choose our tormentors; we did not ask to become the living victims of this humanitarian tragedy that has engulfed our entire country, nor did we ask to endure all the atrocities that have befallen us.
Today, however, we raise our voices to express our desire to participate in rebuilding the social fabric of our country. We are called upon to build peace: We women are the ones who give life, and we are capable of freeing ourselves from our pain.
We are the ones who were regarded as spoils of war, and today we are working for a lasting, sustainable peace. We must not let this unique opportunity to implement the peace agreements slip away. That is why this award is so important to us—because it gives us the strength we need and makes us visible.
We will not let anyone take away our joy and our desire to dream. They thought they could bury us, but they did not realize that we are the seed—a good seed—that has sprouted and borne fruit even in the remotest corners of our country.
