What will Gustavo Petro do from La Guajira?
The Colombian president declared an economic and social emergency in La Guajira, a mechanism that allows you to issue decrees that, usually, would have to go through Congress to be approved.
This is a measure that seeks to comply with a 2017 ruling of the Constitutional Court that “declared the State of Unconstitutional Things against the special protection of the rights to water, health and food for the Wayuu indigenous communities of the municipalities of Riohacha, Manaure, Uribia and Maicao”.
During this week, the president plans to deliver property titles to several families, pediatric facilities to treat cases of malnutrition in Wayuu boys and girls under five years of age, and a shelter for pregnant mothers.
La Guajira is the department with the highest figures for child malnutrition, with a total of 1,954 cases of acute malnutrition in children under 5 years of age last year in a region inhabited mostly by indigenous communities who live in very precarious conditions, with access difficulties to water, food and other basic services.
The Colombian government, which is the first time that it has come to govern from this region, is also going to talk with the communities and with social organizations about wind projects in the region, since it is where they are most concentrated, but the communities report that these projects do not benefit them.