To talk about Soraya Bayuelo is to talk about struggle, commitment, integrity. The National Peace Prize of Colombia (2003), along with its Colectivo de Comunicaciones Montes de María Línea 21, participates in FiSahara 2020, as further evidence of how important and possible it is that we all join #BreakingTheSilence together.
Bayuelo’s life is marked by the history of his country, Colombia. She saw her loved relatives die during the armed conflict, witnessing how innocent people fell during the confrontation. And in the same way that nine years ago, the Abidin Kaid Saleh Audiovisual School -which this year is co-organized by FiSahara- was created by FiSahara so that it was the Sahrawi people who told their story in the first person through the cinema, Bayuelo created the Colectivo de Comunicaciones Montes de María Línea 21, becoming a communication platform for all the inhabitants of the region, to share their dreams, experiences and desires with the rest of the world.
This social communicator is a firm convinced of the involvement, of the communities participation, and so it was they who created a radio program, a local news program and, of course, itinerant cinema with which to recover the community spaces that the war had taken them away. As colleage Francisco Javier Flórez Bolívar pointed out in an article in the Revista Metro two years ago, they carried out “a genuine exercise of resistance through culture”.
Bayuelo is a true defender and promoter of Human Rights and Peace and, as a result, she participated in the third Delegation of the 60 Victims who attended the Peace Dialogue Table in Havana (Cuba). She and the group she leads have managed to empower the communities of the Montes de María and build an unofficial memory of the conflict. Her work today goes beyond, and accompanies processes of production of audiovisual content and construction of Historical Memory through the Itinerant Museum of Memory and Identity of the Montes de María.
Among other recognitions, Bayuelo was the National Journalism Prize for the SEMANA Magazine (2007) and in 2016 it was also distinguished by the Leadership Foundation for Colombia, Semana Magazine and Movistar within the 28 Best Leaders in Colombia.
Attending the next edition of FiSahara, from April 14th to 19th, at Bayuelo’s meeting with other Sahrawi activists or the Palestinian Naila Ayesh will undoubtedly be one of the most magical moments of this year. Book your place and be a witness of that historical moment!
