The visit to the department of Huila by the President of the Republic, Gustavo Petro, has been announced for tomorrow, Friday. As has been reported in these pages, the Colombian president will arrive in the municipality of Palermo in the afternoon to lay the first stone of a rice processing plant that includes pre-cleaning, drying, storage, threshing and packaging. This is an ambitious project promoted by the Ministry of Agriculture that, at a cost of $14,000 million, will be at the service of small farmers in several towns.
The event in which the head of state will be present will be attended by, among others, the governor of Huila Rodrigo Villalba Mosquera and mayors of Neiva, Campoalegre, Rivera, Yaguará and Palermo, municipalities influenced by the rice project. Union leaders and businessmen from the region will also attend.
“The arrival of President Petro tomorrow is the right moment for the governors, the politicians, the union leaders and the businessmen themselves to respectfully demand that he make decisions that restore peace of mind to the people of Huila.”
The presence of President Petro must be taken advantage of by the leaders and leadership of Huila to demand actions from the national ruler that allow the authorities to act forcefully against the FARC dissidents. As a consequence of the ceasefire that Petro decreed with this illegal group under the command of ‘Iván Mordisco’, terrorist attacks and extortions have ‘skyrocketed’ in Neiva and a wide region of the department. Selective homicides do not stop, nor do the displacements and recruitment of minors. Even the operators of the School Feeding Program, PAE, are being intimidated.
The Huilense leadership cannot remain silent and end up becoming an applause committee for the presidential visit. Tomorrow’s arrival of President Petro is the right moment for the rulers, the politicians, the union leaders and the businessmen themselves to respectfully, but with courage, demand that he make decisions that restore peace of mind to the people of Huila.
