Land of the Lost

Displaced by war, millions of Colombians live in squatter settlements, trapped between poverty and fear.

BOGOTA, Colombia - The hills of Soacha echo with small explosions, but there's little to fear — just the possibility that one of the men playing "tejo" might be a little too drunk and accidentally toss his two-pound metal disc in the direction of someone's head rather than into the mud pit where it belongs.

Tejo is a backyard weekend game; the men have a few beers, talk and try to hit a small gunpowder charge buried in the pit, which rewards them with a modest "bang."

But for many here, there is another objective: to forget for an hour or two that they may never return to their homes.

In the squatters' settlement of Soacha in south Bogota, nearly 80 percent of the people have been displaced from their hometowns and villages because of Colombia's decades-old conflict.

They are just a small portion of the estimated two million nationwide who have lost homes, land, family connections and livelihoods because of the clashes between government forces, left-wing guerrillas and right-wing paramilitaries.

Many of those in Soacha are black, like 47-year-old Hector Cordoba, from Choco Province along the Caribbean coast.

Cordoba says he came to Soacha a year ago after being forced from his hometown of Bojaya by paramilitaries. Bojaya was already infamous, a town where more than 100 civilians had been killed after seeking refuge in a church that was struck by a mortar in a rebel battle in 2002.

Cordoba says he was denounced by paramilitaries after he had a business disagreement with a man connected to them. He says he was taken away by men that he knew from the community.

"They put a bag filled with salt over my head," he says. "They tied my hands behind my back and punched and kicked me. They tortured me like this for two hours."

Breaking down as he recalls the ordeal, he covers his face with a handkerchief. "I told them, 'If you're going to kill me, kill me. I've told you everything I know.'"

Finally, Cordoba says, they set him free at 4 in the morning, giving him a little money to buy some aspirin. He says he was beaten so viciously there was blood in his urine.

Soon after the incident he moved he wife, children and grandchildren here, leaving Choco's tropical climate for the cooler, higher altitude of Bogota. In Choco, he says, food was plentiful, with an abundance of fruit trees and fish.

"I don't have any strength here," says Soraida, Cordoba's wife. "At home, we didn't have to think, we could live peacefully. Here you have to think about everything all the time — where will you get food, where will you get water."

Soacha camp

Even though they are far from their hometown, they remain concerned about their safety. Paramilitary graffiti pops up on the walls of Soacha, warning residents that the "Bloque Capital" wing of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, is in control of the neighborhood.

"I've been threatened here as well," Cordoba says. "People know I'm here. But I'm not running away. I'll stay in the fight."

Like Cordoba, Raymond Renteria Gonzalez, 37, was forced from his land more for business reasons than politics.

Gonzalez says he had over 12 acres of prime agricultural land in Choco, which many neighbors wanted. So they found a way to get it by leveraging the conflict.

"My neighbors were telling the paramilitaries things that weren't true," he says, "because they were jealous. They wanted my land."

He says more than a half-dozen uniformed paramilitaries game to his house early one morning and told him he had to leave.

"We left that afternoon," he says. "We left everything in the house and left only with the clothes on our backs."

He came to Soacha five years ago and now lives with his wife and six other people in a three-room shack made of tin and cinder blocks.

"When I left I thought I'd never see my farm again," he says. "If things get better, maybe we'll go back, but right now things are not very good."

The Colombian government has provided some vocational training for the displaced, but is a long way from creating the confidence and security the internally displaced need to return home.

It has also tried a controversial program of arming villagers, creating "strategic hamlets," an American strategy used during the war in Vietnam.

Robert Camacho

Robert Camacho, forced from his home ten years ago by FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) guerrillas, says he doubts he'll ever see his home again. He just doesn't want to be forced out of his refuge in Soacha.

He has invested heavily in the community, building his own home here over a four-year period. With his brother Raymond, he's helping to construct a library for the community.

"Even though we've been here for so many years," says Camacho, "we're still not legal as far as the government is concerned. We don't have any services like water or garbage pickup. They could tell us to leave at any time."

Observers say that's unlikely. With so many displaced already, the government would be hard pressed to find new locations to settle them.

Meanwhile, for Hector Cordoba and his family, the memories of home are still too hard to give up.

"I dream about going home," he says. "I think about the fish, the crops, the fruit — but the situation is still not good. There's been no effort by the government to change things."

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