00:00And we say in Ecuador as in Imbabura after the 31-day national strike in 2025, the resistance
00:07did not retreat when the roads emptied. It organized, reorganized, it took shape in words
00:13in the ancestral language. Her colleague Elena Rodriguez brings us the story of communities
00:18that facing state repression and historic neglect decided to stand strong.
00:22Kaki Amaru raps in Kishwa. Her voice is not a show. It is territory. It is living memory.
00:38During the 31-day national strike, she joined the protests in Imbabura. Today,
00:43she supports the resistance that refuses to accept silence as their destiny.
00:47We were in Quito during the protests in previous strikes, and they were very aggressive,
00:57but never like what we experience here. And what happened to Efrain was like the first seed,
01:02the one the state killed.
01:04EFRAIN FUERES, The First Fatal Victim of the Strike. Here, he is not named as an absence,
01:10but as a seed, because they affirmed that those who died at the hands of the state did not disappear.
01:15They multiply in consciousness, in organization, in resistance.
01:20I believe that one of the best things we do is resist, and that is something the government
01:24does not understand. We are here. We are people who have sensitivity, we have empathy,
01:30and more than anything else, we have solidarity. We all support each other because we are an AILU.
01:39The AILU is the foundation of Andean Organization, a social, economic and territorial unit
01:44where life is conceived collectively. The authorities sought to cut their braids to
01:48domesticate identities and erase memories. But here, they bred them again, saying it is done
01:53with consciousness and rebellion, the way the land is prepared before planting.
01:56EFRAIN FUERES, The Trumpling of human dignity, the right to protest,
02:01the right to protect our territories, that scar, will always remain an open one, because we will
02:07always be under a constant threat from the government power, that want to take away the wealth that we
02:12and our people have.
02:13EFRAIN FUERES, Wealth that can be seen in these fields that feed the cities.
02:20Here, they warn that a country that turns its back on its farmers is heading towards its own collapse.
02:25EFRAIN FUERES, The country will not move forward if the president does not change direction. He has
02:34to change direction. He has to start working with the organizations.
02:37EFRAIN FUERES, Organizations that refuse to surrender. The failure of the popular referendum
02:42promoted by President Daniel Novoa is seen here as a direct consequence of the strike.
02:46EFRAIN FUERES, That more than 60 percent of the Ecuadorian people said no to all the question
02:53was, for these communities, an expression of support, affirmation and collective dignity.
02:57EFRAIN FUERES, I see people so determined that we have won the referendum so resoundingly,
03:04that we have President Novoa out of the country and unable to return, without being able to justify
03:10himself. So I see a people determined to fight for what is right and just in life.
03:14EFRAIN FUERES, In Imbabura, the music played again,
03:17this time as a living memory, as a form of denunciation.
03:19EFRAIN FUERES, After the strike,
03:26communities strengthened their assemblies, care networks and alert systems.
03:30They maintained that the danger has not passed,
03:32and know that violence can record if it's forgotten.
03:35EFRAIN FUERES, In Imbabura, Juan Carlos Jativa, Elena RodrÃguez,
03:38based on 14th and January 2020 at 1924,
03:41Ola Bern, thank you very much.
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