May Day marches are traditional all over the world and Bogota is no different. Here, however, the police seem to act with a certain amount of impunity that is rarly seen elsewhere (unless we count the recent G20 debarcle in London). Three years ago the police came out in such force that they killed a young boy who was peacefully taking part in the march.
Swine flu is on the agenda everywhere and, despite no confrimed cases here yet, the face masks are out. The government even tried to stop the procession due to risk of the infection spreading. Hmmm, nice try.
The march is undertaken by union members and other civil rights groups who take the time out to demonstrate their general disgust for the way things are run here. Today was no different. We knew several groups that were taking part: 'Por Nuestros Medios' were there with a gazeebo and some of the kids they are teaching who were interviewing passers by and some of the marchers. Some other guys that we know pitched in and hired a truck and a sound system to parade in. They were championing several good causes: the first was the death of a young boy, Nicolas Neira aged 15, three years ago - his father Yuri complained to the police and then began to investigate seriously the death of his son. He found out that his son died due to multiple blows to the head and he started to kick up a fuss. The long and short of it is that Yuri has been chased from the country by both threats made to his life and actual attempts on it- The second cause was what is here called 'Falsos positivos' (false positives). This is where the army pick up youths and take them to other cities, dress them in revolutionary gear and kill them before claiming a moral victory for the armed forces. This caused quite a following behind the truck and it is in itself quite a dangerous ploy to so blatantly challenge the authorities here.
The general feeling I took from the march was positive. Our friend Richie, who helped organise the truck, never looked comfortable and said that he was worried about what could happen. Relax I said, it's all going smoothly. As Nick and I wandered up and down the parade I was almost constantly filming. It was amazing to see such an array of colours and hear such great music. Everyone was highly negative about the current administration and the way things are run out here but it was peaceful all the same.
Until our truck came to a certain point a little ahead of us. I was still filming when someone smashed the window of a bank and then the mod passed by police with riot shields and it all kicked off. A water cannon sent most of the crowd running back towards us and we turned and took flight too. Our truck promptly left the march - it turned off the street and sped away - leaving an army of punks running left right and centre.
Nick and I headed up into the old town in search of our friends and stopped on a small side street to make a call. Suddenly the street was filled with police motorbikes, dozens of them, with riders on the front and what are known as robocops riding pillion. You can probably imagine what they look like, heavily adorned in black armour and helmets and with weapons to boot; really they are called ESMAD, a form of extreme riot police. I was filming it all and it was intimidating to say the least as they passed on down the street, stopped, turned around and then passed back by us. Following the commotion was easy as the loud bangs of tear gas shells being fired came from the streets just around the corner from us. Several street battles ensued but we only stayed around to film the goings on: the robocops would charge the youths who would run away before the motorbikes swooped down to pick up the robocops and take them to the next group.
As teargas began to sating our nostrils it was a welcome sight to see a group of peaceful clowns succesfully see off the confused robocops with whistles and dancing. After that we headed toward the truck where the party had begun under the watchful eye of Swedish international observers.
Richie was right, a couple of days before he had said that there had been real tention in the capital over the last few months and that he thought it might boil over. It did, and it was interesting to be witness to it, thankfully we look so much like gringos that the robocops payed us no attention. Their targets are the people who protest on the streets once a year in a vain attempt to better conditions in this country. Fortunately no one was seriously hurt for their cause this year.
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