Liliana Cardona Marín
The renowned international relief movement has also been present in the department, for 48 years and on the occasion of this global anniversary, the executive director of the Risaralda Section, Juan Camilo Álvarez Rendón, referred to some aspects.
The Red Cross is made up of three organizations that are: the International Committee, better known as the ICRC, which is what people have normally seen in the armed conflict and with the kidnapped, the Federation is in natural disasters and the Red Cross, as such in the other activities but in the same way they can also participate in the other events mentioned.
“There are three of us who do the same thing, but in different scenarios. We all live off donations and intergovernmental businesses, for example”.
A campaign that transforms
To institutionalize the day of the Red Cross and very much in the Colombian way, the day of the Banderita was created, for years people put coins in the piggy banks that the volunteers carried in exchange for a sticker that they proudly wore on their chest and showed the solidarity character with those who helped the most in emergencies, was only done on a day like today.
But it was another Colombia, smaller and the logistics gave results, now to cover a city like Pereira, many volunteers are needed for the activity and the donations are fewer, apart from the fact that people know more institutions that need to be helped and that have increased.
Delivery of school kits at the Azufral Educational Institution, Caimalito headquarters.“La Banderita survives in the municipalities, where with what is collected in the piggy banks some activities are subsidized. In Risaralda, we have nine offices in the 14 municipalities and we are always ready for any eventuality,” said Álvarez.
One or another company or educational institution can advance the campaign with the piggy bank and invite the people who make it up to donate throughout this month. “It is done in a very representative way, especially with mayors, governors or the President of the Republic, we still manage the piggy banks, we still have the stickers, but in modern times donations are made to the current account of Banco de Bogotá No. 141039820 – 6 in the name of the Risaralda Sectional Red Cross”.
The movement in Risaralda
About the number of people who dedicate more than time, life itself to this work, the director commented that “It is composed from two points of view: we have volunteers and officials, we all make up the Risaralda Red Cross, 35 officials and 239 volunteers together we integrate it and in the municipalities where we do not have a physical presence we carry out humanitarian activities and we have antipersonnel mine projects”.
Mine control is carried out in Pueblo Rico, which is a municipality where they are not, but they are in Apía and Mistrató, there is no physical presence either, but they are in Belén de Umbría, strategic locations in municipalities that allow them to arrive in 15 or 20 minutes to the headwaters of those municipalities.
“In the different humanitarian action fronts, what we seek is to reduce the incidence of affectations in people due to the conflicts that the country is experiencing and generates for the state agency Descontamina, some alerts for municipalities with the presence of explosive devices or unexploded ammunition . Our project is called ‘Contamination by weapons’, with which awareness is raised in the communities and we do all educational-preventive work, there we are working with 17 volunteers who last year worked in Mistrató and Pueblo Rico, this year they are going to work exclusively in Mistrató, because they are going to approach the village of Monpay and the corregimiento of San Antonio del Chamí”.
Health and well-being activities developed by students of the Nursing Assistant Technician, in the community of Samaria I.$2.800 million were allocated by the Federation for equipment and supplies necessary in the event of the emergency caused by Nevado del Ruiz.
Given
In Mistrató they have just delivered 504 emergency humanitarian aid and another 500 are pending delivery.
58 people have just registered in Pereira, to join as volunteers, there are established entry dates, but people can express their interest whenever they want.
Between May 14 and 17, a meeting of neighboring sections will take place at the training center in this city to articulate the response to the volcanic threat.
Before the volcanic emergency
“We as the Red Cross have a distribution of call chains, in this case we are the first line of response, understanding that those affected are Caldas and Tolima. We entered to support the humanitarian actions that Caldas will need on the one hand and on the other hand, we are in the worst scenario that must be had for this type of affectation by the Nevado del Ruiz Volcano, one can come to think that Chinchiná It would be isolated from the rest of the municipalities of Caldas, if the Chinchiná river’s rise was such that the two bridges that connect them with the department were affected, Risaralda would enter to carry out health actions directly”.