I.E.T.I.

ANTONIO JOSÉ CAMACHO

ENGLISH CLASS - SCHOOL YEAR _______ - ELEVENTH GRADE
FIRST TERM - WORKSHOP 1: Francia Márquez

NAME:_________________________________ GROUP:______ DATE_________

FRANCIA MÁRQUEZ (1981)

Environmental activist and leader of the African-Colombian
communities

Francia Elena Márquez Mina was born in 1981 in Suárez, in the northern part of
the Cauca department of Colombia. She was 15 years old when she decided to
join the protests against the
government of Colombia, which
planned to deviate the river
Ovejas toward the Salvajina dam.
The huge project would impact
the ancestral land of the
African-Colombian communities
very negatively, eliminating their
ethnic and cultural identity.

In 2009 Francia started a process

of struggle and resistance to prevent 6,000 people of her communities from
being expelled from the land, which the government had handed into a
transnational enterprise for mining purposes. Márquez thus filed a lawsuit
against it “for the violation of basic rights”, documenting that the earliest
presence of the community dated back to 1636, and the Constitution recognized
the right of the indigenous people, farmers and descendants of the African
people to reside in their own land. After one year she won the lawsuit and
therefore the government was ordered to comply with the land property rights,
block the resettlements and hold a preliminary consultation to assign the
mining rights. Nonetheless, illegal extraction started to block the region. In 2010
the first excavators arrived, carrying the first illnesses due to the increase in the
level of mercury in water. In the following years, over 2,000 machines perforated
the riverbed in search of gold. After consulting with the international
organizations, Márquez decided to act. In 2014, together with other 18 women,
she started the “mobilization of the black women for the protection of life and
ancestral lands”, that would be later recalled as “The march of turbans”. They
walked from their territory to the capital, visiting along the road other
communities on their road to extinction. In 10 days they walked for 350
kilometers, reaching Bogota with the complete support of 150 women. The
institutions welcomed them, but nobody showed an actual commitment to
changing the situation. So they decided to camp in a “permanent assembly” in
front of the Ministry of the Internal Affairs and the State’s President’s office. The
government accused them of “threatening national security”. But no one dares
touch them. The domestic and international media follow the progress of
Francia’s protests. Thus, the government is compelled to find a dealand publicly
ordered to destroy all machinery that has perforated the region.

Marquez in 2015 received the Colombia National Prize and she was invited to
take part in the peace process in La Havana. Nonetheless, ever since her name
has appeared along with the signatures of the protesters against the government
in 2010, Francia has not ceased to receive threats. Therefore she had to flee and
continue to fight far from her country of origin. Thus she undertook a tour
throughout Europe as an international reference point. In April 2018 in Paris, she
received the Goldman Environmental Prize, for defying the illegal extraction and
the construction of dams in her country. “Europe’s privileges rely on the plunder
of other countries,” said Francia “we ask you to put your development into the
service of the life of our communities. They are killing us, it is a genocide”.

Francia Márquez announced her candidacy for the 2022 Colombian presidential
election in April 2021 and, in the March 2022 primary elections for the Historic
Pact coalition, Marquez reached the second place after Gustavo Petro. She then
accepted the nomination for vice president and, after winning the elections, was
sworn in as vice president on 7 August 2022. She was also designated to take
office as Minister for Women and Equality.

For the first time in Colombia’s history, a Black woman was in the leading cabinet
of the Government and the first Black vice president. Presenting her election,
The New York Times said: "The rise of Ms. Márquez is significant not only
because she is Black in a nation where Afro-Colombians are regularly subject to
racism and must contend with structural barriers, but because she comes from
poverty in a country where economic class so often defines a person’s place in
society. Most recent former presidents were educated abroad and are connected
to the country’s powerful families and kingmakers".

A. After reading the text, underline all the verbs in the text.

B. Match the BOLD words with the pictures:

1_________________ 2__________________ 3___________________

4_______________ 5______________ 6__________________ 7____________