As soon as the FARC confirmed that, apart from the policemen and soldiers, it had nine kidnap victims, the government rushed to present the official stats of those who remain as hostages. According to Fondelibertad, an office of the Ministry of Defense in charge of creating the policies against kidnapping, there are currently 125 hostages, of whom 66 are held by the FARC, 10 by the ELN and the rest by criminal gangs.
Those stats took many organizations by surprise. País Libre, an NGO created in the 90s by current Vice President Francisco Santos (a former kidnap victim himself), says there are 600 victims and another NGO states there are thousands. They questioned the official stats, particularly because Harlán Andrés Henao, head of Fondelibertad, revealed that around 1,000 cases of which there is little information are still under consideration. It is curious that the stats caused outrage and skepticism instead of optimism. That is so, because there is not a lot of confidence regarding the official stats and, second, because these sort of stats are never precise due to the fact that many people, frightened and wanting to be protected, do not report the kidnappings. Nevertheless, the report by Fondelibertad is based on the popular democratic security policies and on the reality of many places where this crime has dropped dramatically.
Why is it so difficult to believe that Colombia has passed from being the country with the most kidnappings in the world to one with a more moderate amount? Why is the perception about this crime apparently different from the truth?
Kidnapping became in the past in the symbol of how violence had degraded itself in Colombia. This is one of the crimes people most fear and condemn. Drug traffickers used the fact that some of their relatives had been kidnapped as an excuse for creating the first paramilitary groups, like the one known as MAS, in the 80s. Paradoxically, years later those same drug lords kidnapped members of the establishment –former president Andrés Pastrana, Francisco Santos and Diana Turbay- to defeat the state. The ELN guerrilla group kidnapped engineers who worked for the foreign oil companies as a way of coming back to life and the FARC have done the same during its decades-long history to get money.
At the end of the 90s kidnapping became uncontrollable. On the one hand, because the guerrilla did not only use it as a way of financing its activities, but also as a political weapon and a weapon of war. They took policemen and soldiers as prisoners, they kidnapped politicians and organized massive kidnappings, like the ones committed by the ELN on an Avianca plane and in La María church, in Valle del Cauca province.
Apart from that, kidnapping started to be a profitable and sophisticated industry, which moved millions of Colombian pesos and which involved a large list of accomplices. The guerrilla was the center of this business because it controlled the territory in large areas, where it kept the hostages for months or years. During the worst times there were around 3,000 kidnappings a year. This coincided with the peace negotiations in Caguán, the center of a huge demilitarized zone, and with the uncontrolled growth of paramilitary groups.
During this period, the State did not have a clear strategy against kidnapping. Whereas Congress approved in the 90s a law to penalize the families who paid to have their kidnapped relatives freed, the government had an office which, in practice, advised on how to deal with these controversial negotiations.
There was a turning point in the first years of this decade. With the democratic security policies, based on controlling the territory, kidnapping decreased dramatically: 89 per cent, according to official figures. Military operations in Cundinamarca province and in the East of Antioquia province made it possible for the army to take control of areas where the guerrillas used to hide the kidnap victims. Furthermore, the army took control of the main roads, which made it difficult for the kidnappers to transport the hostages from one place to another, it was able to dismantle dangerous gangs and massive kidnappings became rare.
Kidnap victims were for a long time invisible victims. Only Ingrid Betancourt’s ordeal and the assassination of the eleven provincial deputies of Valle del Cauca province moved Colombia. The march of the 4th of February, condemning kidnapping, was historical. Nevertheless, nobody seemed to know how many kidnap victims there were.
All this disorder with the stats only shows that the information between the governmental offices and the judicial system was not working. Offices like Fondelibertad were working with unreliable figures. Now, at least, there is a useful base to start with.
It would be a mistake not to acknowledge the improvements of the last few years. A decade ago kidnapping was skyrocketing g and Colombia seemed to be condemned to live with this problem. Perhaps because of this it is difficult for many Colombians to accept the new figures. And although the controversy about the official stats is needed, it must not be forgotten that these 125 kidnap victims are identified, there are evidences which say they are alive and the families have been contacted. Many of them have been kidnapped for more than a decade.
If five million Colombians marched last year thinking there were 3,000 kidnap victims, those five million people should be able to march again for 125. Kidnapping is morally and politically unacceptable.