Jesus Emilio Tuberquia discusses fighting for peace and defying the worldwide "Death Project"

Jesus Emilio

Jesús Emilio Tuberquia is a short, wiry man with bronzed skin and sober, piercing eyes. Yet, behind his stoic gaze rests a kind and almost humorous twinkle. Standing in the Colombian’s presence, and hearing his message of non-violence, it doesn’t take long to see that he is a man with an immense heart. Many of us care about people. Many are concerned about social ills and denounce injustice. But most of us would be lying to say we have his strength. Most of us could not even begin to imitate his courage. Preaching non-violence doesn’t mean that you are willing to die in the name of peace. Jesús Emilio, however, is willing — and ready.

In 1997 he helped establish the Nobel-Prize nominated San José de Apartadó Peace Community in northwest Columbia. Jesús Emilio and about 800 other mestizo peasants and farmers in the war-torn South American nation declared their territory a neutral civilian community. With this act of non-violent defiance, they refused to pick up arms, or provide armed groups (including the Colombian military and police) with information or support.

As a consequence, in more than a decade, the community, now numbering about 1,000, has endured massacres, kidnappings, unjust imprisonment, torture, rape, robberies and economic embargo at the hands of various armed groups, especially the Columbian military and police. More than 170 members of the community have disappeared since San José de Apartadó was founded.

Jesús Emilio, 48, serves as a legal representative for the community. The role places him in the scope of those who would respond to non-violent resistance with bombs, bullets and machetes.

He hails from a family of farmers. He says his father “was a lover of the land,” who was passionate about social justice, detested violence — and instilled that same fire in his son.

“True violence is that which happens when people don’t have access to education, health, employment or land,” Jesús Emilio says. “War itself and weapons is something that will happen afterwards.”


Columbia has endured more than four decades of civil war, with actors on all sides, whether it's been guerrillas on the Left, paramilitary groups on the right, or the Colombian state itself, contributing to violence that has displaced millions and resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths.

 The people suffering the most in this ordeal are typically the poorest and most vulnerable groups in the country. Those are the type of people living in San José de Apartadó. 

Jesús Emilio came to Chicago on April 18 and 19 for roundtable discussions and a public lecture about San José de Apartadó’s ongoing struggle. I had the opportunity to sit down with Jesús Emilio and interview him with the help of Loyola professor Elizabeth Lozano, who served as a translator.

What makes you think that a peace community such as yours is a viable way to bring change?

For those of us who struggle within the community, we think it is viable. For us it is very important as members of the community to actually have the true, real experience of another form of system that is different from what is the normal or general system, which is truly a system of death.

*Lozano explained to me that to Jesús Emilio  and other Colombians on the Left, the Death Project, or System of Death, refers to the worldwide system of capitalism, which they allege has disproportionately benefitted the wealthy while causing suffering and death amongst the poor and peasant populations of the world.While I don't personally believe in all instances that capitalism is a system of death, I can agree that many lives have been ruined or lost because more value was placed on profit than on the value of human lives--especially in the 3rd world. And let's face it, the U.S. government, and U.S. corporations, have put money in the hands of people and entities who are responsible for horrible human rights abuses. So don't be surprised that a South American farmer views the Western vehicle for economic development as a sinister device. But let's get back to the show, folks...*

It’s to try to let humanity understand that there is an alternative to the Death Project. It is possible to create a society without injustice in which human rights will be respected.

Why do they join your community?

I believe they have joined because of a sense of struggling for the lives of other human beings. And because they have been victims of social injustice and the power of weapons.

Why then are peaceful people seen as a threat, as people to be slaughtered?

Because to the System of Death, it is offensive that there will be a proposal for a culture for peace.

Can you define this System of Death for me?

The system of death is a system that doesn’t care about the life of human beings and is determined by money. So it is a society working within a system that is determined by money. A society where every single individual has been somewhat told that a piece of paper with numbers on it is more important than millions of human lives.

Who is benefitting from this system of death?

The great economic powers of the world, and the corporations.

Can you name some of those entities?

The economies of Europe, the United States and China. Multinationals. As well as politicians from different states.

*Lozano took a moment to mention briefly one of those multinationals, Chiquita Brands International. After a little research I found that the company has been under fire from a number of groups because of alleged involvement with violent paramilitary groups. Check this out!.*

Has the United States’ role in Columbia been in the interests of the peasants, or the bigger powers such as the government, military or corporations?

The U.S. has a big role to play in the Columbian war, because it’s actually the U.S.  that provides the weapons, airplanes, the bombs, and the training of militaries in Columbia. Basically, the U.S is a big designer of wars in the world. Not all wars, but a lot of the wars of the world are designed by the United States. The United States also has played a big role in the state of poverty of many developing countries.

*Note: The U.S. has contributed billions of dollars to Colombia through the last several decades, and more than $6 billion since the year 2000 — despite cries that it is the Colombian state itself that perpetuates much of the violence against the lower classes, and despite substantial reasons to believe that the military there is sometimes in cahoots with right-wing groups who terrorize the peasant population.*

I want to get back to talking about the peace community. Tell me, what are the threats to the community?

Where to start…

The threat is the physical extermination of the members of the community.

By who?

By the Colombian state. The other threat is the expropriation of all of the lands of the people of the community and other adjacent peasants.

How does the state act violent toward the community?

Against us, all forms of violence that you can apply against a human being have been applied.

For example?

Massacres, disappearances, selected deaths, threats, torture, robberies, false accusations, unjust imprisonment, economic embargo, rape.

How do you respond to the violence in a constructive way?

Against injustice what we have to do is justice. So when there is injustice against human beings we need to do what is just to human beings.

Such as?

Helping people without food, land, health. If they are in danger of death, protect them. If they have no job, help them find a job.

Do you walk around in your day-to-day life with the fear of dying in this conflict?

Well, sometimes one will feel fear or be anxious, but one must control one’s self and seek a way of keeping our minds busy with some other things.

What do you do specifically to exist without having that constant fear?

I think that the life in the community is the best therapy. Just participating in the life of the community and being in the community that’s there.

Do you have hope that you’ll see peace in Columbia in your lifetime?

No. I will not see that. No, the country is not going to change. The country is going to get worse and worse. The only peace I will know is the peace I will have in not being a part of the war. But I don’t see that, that peace is going to happen in the country.

How likely do you think it is that you will ultimately die because of all of this?

That’s what I weigh every day. Minute to minute. I am very clear that I am offering my life for the sake of many people. It can happen any day.

But what would be wrong with saying, I’ve had enough, I’m walking away?

The issue is not the value of my life. The issue is the value of a human society and the value of teaching a human society that it is possible to live outside of the Project of Death. That there is an alternative. And that peace is constructed exactly where you are — you don’t have to go seek it anywhere else. In the city, in the university, in any place, we can create the experience of peace and reject the practice of the Project of Death. In the U.S. as well as Europe, China and also in Colombia, it is a matter of one making a decision to stand for an alternative that is peaceful, or an alternative that is violent.

Author’s Note

I left that interview feeling very impotent. There I was, a self-righteous college student at a university (Loyola University Chicago) that preaches social justice, speaking to a man who was actually in the trenches, fighting for many of the same exact things I believed in.  Jesús Emilio could be dead at any moment for his cause. All I was doing was writing. However, what I’m able to do is pass his words along to anyone willing to read them here, with the hope that they might help you cast your eyes and hearts toward struggles ordinary people are facing in a volatile part of the world. Then, consider how massive a problem violence is for humankind, period. It’s not just in Colombia. And after you do that, I ask that you take a look inside. Because as Jesús Emilio told me, “It is a matter of one making a decision to stand for an alternative that is peaceful, or an alternative that is violent.”

Where do you stand? And will you stand silent?