Once synonymous with Pablo Escobar and unrelenting drug violence, the city of Medellín in Colombia’s Antioquia department has undergone quite the transformation. Today, the Miami Herald is profiling Medellín’s comeback.
A few statistics tell the story: In 1991 Medellín had 6,349 homicides, 381 per 100,000 inhabitants, or nearly 18 per day.
In 2007, the body count was 653, or 26 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants, not quite two per day.
”Medellín went from fear to hope,” said Sergio Fajardo, who served as mayor for four years until Jan. 1 and is widely credited with leading Medellín’s rebirth.
Medellín is not alone. In fact, security across much of Colombia has improved since President Alvaro Uribe took office in 2002. He has the FARC guerrillas on the run, has dismantled most — but certainly not all — of the right-wing paramilitary groups — and has curbed some of the worst human rights abuses by government troops.
”Medellín is emblematic of Colombia’s transformation,” John Negroponte, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State, said at the recent gathering here of the Organization of American States. “It is a testament to the change that Colombia has undergone.”
People everywhere in Medellín avidly discuss the transformación, about how the city of 2.1 million has dramatically improved.
El Parque Botero
The Miami Herald also has a two minute video report on Medellín.
More below the fold:
The Santo Domingo Savio barrio here was once considered perhaps the most violent neighborhood in all of Latin America.
Police entered the hillside neighborhood only when they had overwhelming numbers. Young toughs maintained a tight grip by standing on a ridge, binoculars in one hand and a sub-machine gun in the other.
A five-story library now occupies that spot. The library — which from below looks like three gigantic black boulders — was chosen last month as the best work of new urban architecture in Spanish and Portuguese-speaking countries. Every day, more than 1,000 people use the free computers, children’s play area and adult education classes.
Santo Domingo symbolizes the renaissance of Medellín, believed to have been the world’s most violent city during the 1980s heyday of cocaine cartel boss Pablo Escobar and for a few years after his death in 1993, when right-wing death squads ran amok.
It is the residents of Santo Domingo, 10 miles from downtown, who tell the most striking stories.
Lourdes Medina said both her sons were murdered. One son was killed 19 years ago when he refused a man’s demand that he give him free merchandise at a store he owned. The other son was murdered six years ago when he failed to pay protection money. ”This happened to a lot of families,” said Medina, taking a moment from selling potato empanadas at a street fair to recount her sad tale. ”Now the community has been reborn. It’s completely different,” she said. “The bad people are gone. I don’t fear going outside anymore.”
An aerial gondola that ferries Santo Domingo residents up the hill represents the transformation.
Some 30,000 people use it every day, and the so-called ”Metro Cable” connects with Medellín’s Metro trains.
Consuelo Zea rode it recently. ”That’s where my father was killed,” she said, pointing down to her right. She then pointed down to her left. “And that’s where my brother was killed.”
”Before, you were afraid to go to the store,” said Zea, who makes a living selling sweets from a street cart. “You’d see dead people in the street. Gun battles went on for what seemed like hours. Now I leave home every morning at 4 a.m. without worries to ride the Metro Cable.”
This video in Spanish talks about the changes since the early 1990s.
That I have lived long enough to see the chance of peace in Colombia is something for which I am grateful to Alvaro Uribe. He got the job done.