As announced by the Central Command in the March 10 Insurrection Magazine, the VI National Congress defined the ELN’s anti–patriarchal character, in articulation with the anti–capitalist, anti–imperialist and anti–colonialist struggles.
This is not a minor or incidental definition, but it is the result of deep reflections and debates led with the life and revolutionary example of great guerrilla women, who gave their lives to the cause of national liberation; and who, with their example, today lead the ELN to build an anti–patriarchal policy as a revolutionary strategy for the whole of society.
Setting an example
For the ELN this discussion is fundamental, because, as Alexandra Kollontai put it, the urgency for women’s liberation is not only a cultural or practical aspect of social transformation, but above all an integral part of the proletarian struggle for liberation. It runs through not only the revolutionary program for Colombia, but also involves a permanent exercise of revision, debate and training in all our guerrilla structures, in every fighter and command of the organization. We recognize that while capitalism and patriarchy are embodied in everyday social discourses and practices, their transformation requires permanent work and discipline within our own organization.
Our commitment to the liberation of Colombian women has been expressed in the important participation of peasant women, workers and youth from all regions of the country in the ELN. The ELN women have helped build an insurgent organization in which the daily tasks and political and military responsibilities of our guerrilla struggle are distributed without gender distinction. Men and women have the same obligations and rights: to train, to work, to care for and to fight.
Violence against women is prohibited and not tolerated in the ELN. Any act of physical, psychological or sexual violence is sanctioned on the basis of our Statutes, applying revolutionary justice which provides for severe punishments for aggressors.
However, our organization is aware of the persistence of violence and macho practices that we learn and inherit from the patriarchal system, we are not strangers to these. We have great challenges to be an anti–patriarchal organization, because we are aware that the struggles and contributions we make to eliminate violence against women in society will be legitimate and meaningful as long as we are witnesses and examples of it.
The lethal duet
The women of the ELN are clear about the place from which we take our fight against machismo. We understand that capitalism and patriarchy work hand in hand, to steal women’s work associated with reproduction and the care of life, work without which society could not be sustained. They act together to deprive communities around the world of the goods of nature, usually defended and protected by women. They work together to prevent women’s participation in politics and decision–making, because the global bourgeoisie, white, patriarchal and warlord, knows that the active and determined participation of working women and the working class puts at risk its supremacy.
We are part of the ELN because we live the lives of the majority of the country’s women in the countryside and the cities. We are 51.2 percent of the national population, but only 26 percent of the land belongs to women. More than 40 percent of the poor in the country are women, so for every 100 poor men in Colombia we are 121 poor women; when in the best case we manage to insert ourselves into the labor market, we do so from precariousness and absolute exploitation or facing huge wage gaps: in Colombia, for every 100 Pesos a man earns, women earn only 60 Pesos doing the same work. Poverty has our face.
Patriarchal violence gives us no respite. In Colombia, every 3 days a woman is killed by her partner, ex–partner, family or close people, our daughters are raped and abused in contexts of total impunity, which is why numerous feminist organizations and women’s rights defenders have agreed to declare a Humanitarian Emergency for sexist violence in the country.
For these reasons we became guerrillas, for these reasons, 60 years after the founding of the ELN, we have succeeded in getting an insurgent organization to recognize and take on the challenge of depatriarchalizing and depatriarchalizing society; we became insurgents to radically transform this capitalist and patriarchal society.
Amalia Santana
Source: Eln Voces