A five-month-long labour and community mobilization against embattled oil giant BP, in Casanare, Colombia, has undergone its latest twist. Workers had been on strike since 23 May, for the second time this year, due to BP’s ongoing failure to address their social, environmental and labour demands. On 4 June, BP and the Colombian government pressured the National Oil Workers’ Union to call an end to the strike, promising that then they would restart negotiations. But just four days after the strike was called off, 200 workers involved in the strike were sacked, in what looks like retaliation. ‘The presence of BP in Casanare has not brought development or employment, but rather poverty, militarization and environmental disaster,’ explains Pacho Eslava, a community leader. ‘We demand changes for the wellbeing of our communities, and not for investors’ economic interests. We dream of a region where human life and our environment are respected.’
Since oil exploitation began in Casanare 20 years ago, more than 3 per cent of the population has been killed or disappeared.1 Community leaders have been murdered, persecuted, threatened and displaced by state-linked paramilitaries operating around BP’s oil fields, often in partnership with Colombian Army leaders. BP provides support to the Colombian Army’s 16th Brigade, despite their long cruel history of human rights violations.2 A preliminary public hearing on BP’s activities in Colombia stated that ‘there is sufficient evidence to conclude that BP has a case to answer that it is complicit in the extermination of social organizations in Casanare as part of a direct strategy to maximize profits.’3
