IPS-English COLOMBIA: Violent Society, Violent Schools
 
Date: Mon, 07 Apr 2008 17:10:37 -0700

 
Helda Martínez

BOGOTA, Apr 7   (IPS)  - In a survey carried out in 807 public and
private primary and secondary schools across the social spectrum in
the Colombian capital, 56 percent of students said they had been robbed
within the school premises.

The study also found that 2,583 students had been intimidated or
threatened with firearms, while 32 percent of the respondents said
they had been the victims of physical bullying, being pinched, slapped,
punched or shoved by fellow students. In addition, nine percent had
been threatened with a beating, and three out of 10 admitted that
they had engaged in vandalism in their schools.

The questionnaire was drawn up by the National Statistics Department
in conjunction with the private University of Los Andes, which carried
out the survey among students ranging in age from eight to 22 in March
and April 2006 at the request of the Bogotá city government. However,
the results were not made public until two weeks ago.

”This is a very serious situation, which reflects incidents of sexual
violence, vandalism and verbal violence that society accepts and in
many cases admires,” town councillor Gilma Jiménez told IPS.

”The results of the survey are almost obvious, when violence has
become the chosen route for solving every problem,” said Javier Darío
Restrepo, a journalist who specialises in questions of professional
ethics and has served as ombudsman for the El Tiempo and El Colombiano
newspapers.

”From their earliest years, children absorb violence in cartoons
and grow up with a form of thinking and an attitude that is in line
with that violence,” he told IPS.

”We don't foment tolerance, and today in Colombia it is virtually
impossible to talk about politics without going to extremes,” said
Restrepo. ”The climate is highly polarised. The lack of tolerance
is evident in the activities of our leaders and politicians, who act
superior and arrogant, without reflection, as media coverage shows
and as the country observes.”

One recent illustration of this all-pervasive intolerance was the
criticism levelled by the speaker of the Senate, Nancy Patricia Gutiérrez,
at Senator Piedad Córdoba of the opposition Liberal Party for her
efforts towards brokering the release of hostages held by the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas.

The bad temper of President Álvaro Uribe has also been on display
on numerous occasions, when reporters, especially foreigners, question
him about his alleged ties to far-right paramilitary groups.

Jorge Noguera, the former head of the Administrative Security Department
(DAS), Colombia's secret police, is in prison in connection with the
”para-politics” scandal, as are 22 legislators.

A total of 51 lawmakers, most of them Uribe allies, are under investigation
for their links with the paramilitaries.

”Studies on violence in schools are important because they help us
make the necessary adjustments in our work, but our schools are the
expression of our society,” said Alonso Camacho, principal of the
José Castro school in the Bogotá slum neighbourhood of San Cristóbal,
which has a student body of 2,750.

High rates of poverty and unemployment, the forced displacement of
a large proportion of the population by the violence, and the overall
crisis in this war-torn country generate domestic violence, which
is in turn reflected in the behaviour of students, he told IPS.

”By law we have to design standards and programmes aimed at keeping
the peace in schools, stay on the alert in order to prevent violence
by teachers, and foment values that can have an influence on family
relations,” said Camacho. ”To do that, we have the support of private
organisations as well. But the underlying social problems penetrate
the walls of the school.”

”We implement student development plans, but we do not achieve immediate
results, nor can we turn kids who are caught up in difficult social
contexts into angels,” he added.

Restrepo said that ”newscasts always begin with the latest episodes
of violence, journalists spend a lot of time in courtrooms describing
violent incidents and behaviour, and over 50 percent of the news involves
reports of violence.”

That coverage is carried out ”without self-criticism by the media
and with no analysis or questioning on the part of the recipients
of the news, while our universities tend to train people with more
technical expertise than ethical values.”

The study on violence in the schools was commissioned by former Bogotá
mayor Lucho Garzón (2004-2007) of the leftwing Alternative Democratic
Pole (PDA). But the results of the survey were not reported until
town councillor Jiménez of the Liberal Party, a supporter of former
mayor Enrique Peñalosa, made them public in mid-March.

Her decision to call attention to the study was seen by some critics
as part of an anti-PDA strategy, after Peñalosa was defeated in the
2007 elections for mayor by the leftist party's candidate, Samuel
Moreno, who took office in January.

For her part, Jiménez, who noted that Moreno's campaign manager was
Education Secretary Abel Rodríguez, said that ”I believe the study
was kept quiet for political reasons.”

”It is impossible to isolate students from a society in which there
is a deeply rooted culture of corruption, easy money and the principle
of paramilitarism, which is to defend oneself from violence by means
of violence,” she said.

”The most atrocious crimes are those that are committed against children,
because of their defencelessness and vulnerability,” which is why
there is no justification for having shelved the results of the survey,
she said.

According to Jiménez, ”we have to take a close look at what is happening
and try to come up with formulas for ‘major surgery', with the participation
of parents, teachers, students and society as a whole, in order to
safeguard the lives and integrity of our young people.”

In Colombia, ”only bandaid solutions are applied when it comes to
anything to do with children, and we cannot go on like that,” she
argued.


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+ A Nation Torn - More IPS News on Colombia (http://www.ipsnews.net/new_focus/colombia/index.asp)


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