Introduction:
The relevance of Colombian experience being the highest cocaine producing nation in the world for India and the North East is immense. Colombians are the financier of the Indian tribes who cultivate the coca, a revered plant used in rituals and drank as a beverage for its mild inebriation. But processed in modern labs located inside Colombia and trafficked across North America and Europe the target of much of the cocaine export to create havoc in the affluent cities. In the bargain the Medellin cartel of Pablo Escobar has given rise to the 'Narcos' the popular Netflix serial depicting the life of Pablo. During his heyday Pablo earned Billions of dollars by controlling 80 percent of global cocaine supply chain. How Pablo created the drug business remains a moot point. Colombia produces 15,000 tonnes of raw coca leaf compared to 60,000 tonnes by Chile and 50,000 tonnes by Bolivia both Andean States of South America. Worldwide production of cocaine touched 1,784 tonnes in 2019. And the figure is rising as more areas are brought under cultivation upto the current year, giving nightmarish time to law enforcement officers globally.In South Asia 120 tonnes of crystal and tablet methamphetamine are seized in 2018. Earlier in the decade approx one third of the heroin found in East Asia and the Pacific was imported from Afghanistan, while today these regions are supplied by heroin produced in Shan and Kachin state of Northern Myanmar. UNODC (United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime) estimates the total value of the regional heroin market ranges from US 8.7-10.3 Billion Dollars annually (UNODC 2019). Being in proximity to the infamous Golden Triangle (Myanmar, Laos, Thailand) North Eastern States are already experiencing much of the turbulence in law and order and spike in crime as a destination and transit states. This article tries to explain the Colombian historical-political perspective of the growth of cocaine smuggling in Colombia, that changed the socio-cultural milieu of the country. Drug fuels crime cannot be more true as the Colombian experience shows.Colombia in early 21st Century is a country where one percent of landowners own more than half of the country's agriculture land. Under the Spanish rule, Columbia's agri was based on the hacienda system, in which sharecropper or landless labourers was the norm to work for the landowners. Land redistribution never happened. Till the 19th C the landlords used its land for agriculture and cattle ranching. From 1850 tobacco and coffee export industries took off. By 1970s political elites in the country's periphery and in the capital Bagota emerged. But the state was largely absent in the countryside, allowing local elites to grow powerful. Up until the 20th C the peripheral centres were poorly connected. During the 1934 President Alfonso Lopez Pumarejo attempted land reform. One rising politician from lower
middle class in Bagota, Jorge Eliecer Gaitan rose to prominence during the banana strike of 1928, going against Colombia's oligarchy But his run of popularity ended in 1948, when he was assassinated, by an unknown culprit.Gaitan's death led to a series of riots that spiralled into the countryside- largely a liberal versus conservative fight against the divide. A military coup toppled Conservative President Laureano Gomez, and brought in Gen Gustavo Rojas Pinffla. Later the Church and the elite industrialists forced Rojas out. This brought rapprochement between the two political parties and became the template till mid- 1980s. This power-sharing between elites to the exclusion of the other gave rise to the guerrilla movement of Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC). They grew out of the peasant self-defense groups that were leftist, proSoviet and hardened during the La Violencia. The National Liberation Army (ELN) existed since 1964 are pro-Fidel Castro group of Marxism-Leninism. FARC and ELN sprang up at the same time and With Popular Liberation Army (EPL) that came up in 1967 the leftist guerrilla groups filled up the vacuum of North and North West and Western fringes areas of Colombia incidentally the same places which are coca producing areas of Colombia.
Absence of State and Smuggling of Cocaine:
The toleration of smuggling is a result of state absence. Political turmoil like La Violencia opened the countryside to gangs who roamed freely. Peasants moved to more remote areas and cultivated poppy, coca as subsistence crops. Cocaine was developed by Colombians and they processed it into a white powder and transported to North of the country. And the pioneer
was Pablo Escobar and his Medellin cartel. This trade helped the elites as they moved in to forge ties with the illicit drug industry.As Francisco E Thoumi says, the infusion of drug money, changed the power structure and nature of elite, what some called a “Norco-elite”. Escobar and his business partner Jose Gonzalo Rodriguez Gacha, alias “El Mejicano” were the narco- elites. And they became targets of the guerrilla forces compelling them to form the precursors of the United Self-defense Forces of Colombia paramilitary army, by joining hands with the traditional elites.At the political level the power-sharing ended in 1986, when Conservatives refused to join the Liberal President Virgilio Barco. Thanks to the drug boom propelled the regional elites for power in Bagota and Medellin.Organized crime helped the elites to hitch to power with drug money at national scale. And they helped the traffickers to gain acceptability. But Pablo Escobar's application to join Medellin city's top social club was blocked by the upper classes.Pablo resorted to violence in 1984 by assassinating the Justice Minister Rodrigo Lara. The violence continued fill 1989 when in the presidential elections, Escobar's assassins killed the Liberal Party candidate Luis Carlos Galan.They later bombed a commercial airline mistaking the plane carried Galan's replacement, killing all on board. Drug trade took toll on politics and government institutions, forcing the government to ban extradition of Colombian citizens in 1991. But the fight of Escobar with the state and the elites proved to be nemesis. Although he managed government acquiesce to keep him in a jail he built for himself in 1991, an alliance of criminal intereasts going by the moniker, Persecuted by Pablo Escobar or
PEPES and the police came together. As through much of 1993 Pablo was facing his existential question, the path is laid for the next level of Colombian criminal enterprise.As the story of Pablo's death is well documented with help from PEPES, it eliminated most of Cali cartel in 1995, thus laying the ground for the next generation of criminals. In the case of Colombia the bureaucratic elites and criminals used each other to grow their power in quixotic ways. Don Berna rose as result of death of Pablo and Norte del Valle Cartel emerged out of the Cali cartel. Don Berna a former associate of Pablo and founder of PEPES took power in Medellin. Similar “cartelitos”, sprang up in the countryside. Right-wing paramilitary groups took a central role in the underworld, coming together under the banner of the newly formed United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) in 1997.The AUC was a by product of the 1980s “self-defense” groups formed by drug traffickers, landlords and military allies. AUC and their hobnobbing with the rising political power of the emerging elites, and their poster boy Alvaro Uribe. Uribe was joined by the old families, in order to keep afloat, among the national ruling clique.Uribe came from Antioquia state, where Madellin is located. In 1990s President Andres Pastrana brought peace with FARC by ceding a 42,000 sq km area. With Uribe's rise, the “outlaws” became the “establishment” as he dealt with shady Medellin cartel before. From the ashes of Norte del Valle Cartel emerged two groups called-Rastrojos and the Machos. Oficina de Envigado took over Medellin. From AUC rose the Urabenos, ERPAC, the Paisas and the Aguilas Negras. The government refers to these
organizations collectively as “bandas criminales” or “BACRIM” or “criminal bands” from Spanish. Urabenos now remains the only BACRIM with a national presence and ability to send multi-ton consignments abroad. A deal with Oficina de Envigado in 2013 for peace helped Urabenos.