DOCUMENT OF THE KOKONUKO PEOPLE IN THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL HUMANITARIAN MINGA FOR THE DEFENSE OF LIFE, TERRITORY AND THE TOTAL AND INTEGRAL PEACE OF THE PEOPLES
MUNICIPALITY OF CALDANO, EL PITAL CAUCA FROM APRIL 26 TO 29, 2023
The Law of Origin of the Kokonuko People is the foundation that allows defining the origin of the communities that make it up from, wisdom and ancestral knowledge, orality, worldview, spirituality, rituality, and the experiences of natural beings, human and spiritual that allow us to identify ourselves as millennial indigenous people of our territories.
The Greater Law, collects the guidelines and decisions of the communities from the local and zonal level such as: Mandates of the Community Assemblies, Congresses, Boards of Directors, Resolutions and Agreements from their own; In addition, the recognition of the national legal framework product of the resistance process arranged with the National Government where it is located: the Constitutional Block and other laws that govern our rights.
THE KOKONUKO PEOPLE AS PEACE ACTORS
The political and cultural defense of the Kokonuko people, from the colony to the present, the struggle to claim our rights and the survival of our identity has cost lives and generated wounds that are still open in the hearts of our communities. Our people have actively participated in the process of recovery of lands and of all our rights, of which it was a pioneer and is still in force, included in the motivation of some peace processes as well as in more early stages of the formation of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca. and its platform of struggle, based on Unity, Land, culture and Territorial Autonomy, of government and its own economy. Processes that despite the adversity represented by the social and political context of the department of Cauca and the central zone, have bravely faced the harsh consequences of the confrontation with the State during the land recovery process and the armed conflict.
In the exercise of self-government, autonomy and territorial control, the Kokonuko people have forcefully rejected the presence of armed actors, as well as participation in them, managing to prevent disharmonies in our territories and counteract the advance of illegal economies.
Along the same lines, from the fortress of governance, legislation has been passed on the prohibition of cultivation for illicit use within all the territories of the Kokonuko people and mandates have been
severe sanctions against this type of disharmony, which have been in order to avoid the presence of armed actors that are related to drug trafficking and other groups outside the law. As the Kokonuko people, we have actively participated in the mobilizations and actions in defense and protection of life, territory, human rights, integrity, and dignity as an ancient people.
At first, the presence of the legal armed actors (police and army) who were, together with the so-called “birds” hired killers at the service of the landowners, the main perpetrators of the Kokonuko people during the land recovery process and later , the presence of illegal armed groups (guerrillas and paramilitaries) in the framework of the Colombian armed conflict, since we are a people of peace that has its own organizational structure based on harmony and peaceful coexistence within the territories.
This governance strategy contributes significantly to building peace not only within the nine territories of! Kokonuko people but of all of Cauca, if one takes into account the alarming figures regarding the presence of crops for illicit use that have become fuel for the war that is plaguing the entire region.
It is important to highlight that due to the exercise of territorial control and the climatic variety of our territory, most of the families live from agriculture and the livestock sector, but there are also ancestral crops such as the traditional orchard, integral crops of native food seeds, medicinal plants, vegetables, garden plants, coffee, panela cane, cassava plantain, banana avocado and a variety of fruit trees and minor species, among others, and the productive activity of the Kokonuko is linked to the local, zonal, and regional.
After 60 years of war, which our country has lived through and with more than 12 peace negotiations between the insurgency government and after 7 years of FARC-government of President Juan Manuel Santos negotiations, the Kokonuko people demand the right to peace (article 22 CN ) and direct participation in these new negotiations as well as civil society.
Political, social, cultural and economic reparation from
- Real diagnosis on land issues and their acquisition.
- An agrarian policy with guarantees. (transformation research among others)
- Own economic model
- Strengthening of road infrastructure
- Protection and safeguarding of living spaces
- Rural housing programs
- Protection and safeguarding of the fundamental rights of the Kokonuko People
The Kokonuko people, as actors of peace, propose our territories as a space for dialogue, coexistence and negotiation to achieve total peace.
TRADITIONAL AUTHORITY OF THE ANCESTRAL TERRITORIES OF THE KOKONUKO PEOPLE