Dr. Manuel Rozenta

Host Tiokasin Ghosthorse talks with regular guest and friend of “First Voices Radio” Dr. Manuel Rozental. Manuel Rozental is a long-time Colombian activist, researcher and community organizer. Manuel’s been involved with grassroots political organizing with youth, Indigenous communities, and urban and rural social movements for four decades. He is part of an initiative: Pueblos en Camino, Peoples on the Path with a mandate to weave autonomies and resistance between peoples. Tiokasin and Manuel discuss the recent, extraordinary story of four Indigenous children who survived a plane crash and spent 40 days alone in the Colombian Amazon. Manuel relays new evidence and details of their experience from the Indigenous point of view. This is a story beyond what the mainstream media and the institutions are telling us.

The truth has come out and is being largely ignored. The children—three girls of the Huitoto nation (ages 13, 9 and 11 months) and a boy age 4—survived a plane crash in the jungle, escaping from threats to their father by FARC dissidents. The mother died in the crash. The children, lead by the oldest girl, survived 40 days in the thickest jungle. Her skills and knowledge of the jungle made this possible. This is something that has astonished everyone. The Special Forces of the Colombian armed forces used all their technology to search and rescue them and failed. Except that they were joined by Indigenous guards and spiritual elders. It was an elder, Rubio, who meeting in ritual with the elder of the forest (spirit) lead to their location, and the Indigenous guard following his guidance found them alive. They are recovering well. Manuel says: “This is a message from the jungle and its people to the world! Women, indigenous knowledge, the Mother Jungle, the spiritual power and wisdom spoke. If we are to survive, we need these skills. A slap in the face to modernity and arrogance. An Indigenous guard who took part in the effort called for the rescue of all Indigenous children from the streets of the cities where they have been turned beggars and miserable, and committed everyone to rescue them from modernity. The story is being and will be exploited, but this truths must be known!” A very special thanks to our friend Manuel Rozental for this important perspective and what we know — and always will remember.