Emotivity, This is the best adjective to describe the feeling when everyone listened loudly, the stories of war narrated by the elderly victims, in a memory exercise proposed by the Commission for the Clarification of Truth. There were no tears, but there was the shared feeling that all those painful events Colombians should know.
And the message was repeated. Older people are responsible for telling the stories to know the truth of what happened in so many territories of the country. They are also called to forgiveness and reconciliation, with the heart, as they repeatedly stated in these three days of meeting.
“The years do not weigh me because I’m a very happy man. But I am sad to see my partners in unequal struggles … and at our time it is for rest and soft work. To enjoy the seed, we water … “read José Samuel Bernal, representative of Caquetá Department.
The emotionality continued. Other older adults came from the group ‘CANITAS DE AMOR’, from the Life Center of the city of Cartagena, to remind them that gray hair does not matter, what matters is vitality, courage and the will to live.
At work tables closed the afternoon, socializing the work done by regions, which will become the inputs for the document that will be coordinated between their local and departmental governments, from the lines prioritized in the National Development Plan for the elderly.
The topics worked were productivity and income generation, participation and issues related to housing and health differentially. In addition to the challenges in the processes of advocacy in the implementation of the Law of Victims and the public policy of aging and old age.
To close the meeting, the representatives for the senior citizen approach organized their own cultural agenda, a staging that included songs, songs, dance and a poem by Ana Delina Naranjo, from Casanare:
It’s worth dreaming, looking for peace and love
To leave a legacy, to our generation
To serve as an example, in their life and training
And they can understand the difficult situation
Lived by the violence that hit our Nation
Many people died leaving anguish and pain
How many women raped without any compassion
Children, orphans suffered without a roof and without love
Mothers who live crying to the son who did not return
Because the bloody violence of his home took him
Millions of displaced people in search of a solution
It is very sad to remember, what happened
But faith and hope, violence did not kill
And we are still fighting for a better future.
