In Mi Comuna 2, current news is replaced by stories such as Doña Mariela’s delicious flakes or Doña Isabel’s poems. “What comes out in this medium is the daily information of people in the neighborhood. There is no attempt to get the information or to commercialize it,” says Christian Álvarez, 28, director of this monthly publication from Municipality 2 – Santa Cruz in Medellín, one of the most marginal areas of the Colombian city.
Álvarez, together with Rodrigo Aristizábal (24), Felipe Machado (27) and Michael Rincón (17), all from the neighborhood, leads this communication project that was launched in 2008 thanks to a grant from the Medellín City Council that the neighbors received decided to allocate a portion to this publication. At first they only created a printed version, but over time they began distributing content online and on radio and television. The team of journalists, made up of boys and girls, work on a volunteer basis and agree that Mi Comuna 2 is much more than a newspaper, it has become a force for change, fighting prejudice and strengthening community bonds.
To make the project a reality, these young people revived an abandoned building where the dilapidated walls hide their cracks with murals and protest graffiti. As the journalists discuss the next topics they will publish at a round table full of newspaper copies, the boys and girls run through the halls. “There is no cultural center, libraries or parks here, which most communities in Medellín have,” emphasizes Álvarez. Proof of this is that Municipality 2 has only 2.75 square meters of public space per resident, a value far from the 10 to 15 meters recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Two words are repeated in this editorial: community journalism. “For me it is the possibility that people can tell for themselves, because external people have always told us. “The news about this part of the city used to relegate women to prostitutes and men to assassins and thieves,” explains Machado. All of this, according to this editor, created an important stigma in the community. “We want the lady who tends her garden to be the one who can write the story of her process and show that there are other possibilities in this neighborhood, not just the negative things,” she adds.
For the director, this type of journalism is synonymous with roots and identity. Álvarez also emphasizes the project behind it: “We do it for the people, by the people and for the people.” All of us who are part of this project live here,” he emphasizes. It also insists on changing the historically dominant narrative about this region. “This area has always shown itself to be violent, precarious and futureless… We allow ourselves to show strength, resistance, the alternative and the proposal,” he emphasizes.
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According to the Medellín mayor’s office, Comuna 2 is not among the most violent in the city in terms of the number of homicides in 2023, but residents are burdened by their neighborhood’s reputation as a violent place. “I’ve never traveled through this part of the community because my parents didn’t let me,” admits Rincón, the youngest of the editors. “However, I got to know the ‘parceros’ (colleagues) and realized that many of the things they had told me were lies,” he adds.
In addition, this community at the foot of the Medellín River has one of the highest rates of school difficulties and absenteeism in the city. This medium therefore also has an educational function. “As a community medium, we not only have the function of providing information, but also of training. “We take on a more educational role on many topics because the conditions in the community require it,” emphasizes the newspaper director.
In this sense, they also managed to get boys and girls talking in “El Noticiero de Manolo”. In this area, they are the ones who think about their own problems and potential in the community.
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Local elections are taking place in Colombia on October 29th and this group of young people are dreaming of a Medellín that relies on collaborative, alternative and popular media. “Without a doubt, the elections have an impact on how the processes take place in the city and it is obvious that those in power are trying to influence the media to cultivate their image,” says the director of this newspaper. The goal of this group of young people is to maintain their environment for many years to come. “At the moment we have it and we are working hard to keep it that way,” he explains.
In its years of existence, this newspaper has already managed to bring about changes that are important at the local level and have made a significant difference in the lives of its neighbors. An example is a study in the Sinai settlement, one of the most disadvantaged areas of Santa Cruz. “This area is separated from all health and education services by a main street. To get to school, the boys and girls had to cross this street and were at risk of being run over, which is why they asked for a long time for a traffic light,” he says.
The Sinai district, accustomed to evictions and under constant threat of eviction, did everything to protect its children and used the information published by the newspaper as evidence. And they got it. “Our task is to ensure that something can be achieved with our articles,” he emphasizes.
Álvarez stresses that it is unlikely that another media outlet would have provided similar coverage of this situation. “They look at it as minor things that affect a small population in a neighborhood that no one ever cared about… If this happened in a wealthier neighborhood, it would be covered,” he laments. “We live on the edge of journalism and on the edge of the city,” he adds.
Your effort is also worth it for stories like that of Doña Isabel, a poet from the commune who used to shy away from sharing her work publicly. “We told him that we all have the ability to write; Some cultivate this ability more than others, but we can all do it,” recalls Álvarez. Now Doña Isabel not only organizes concerts in the neighborhood, she has also published her first book and is already thinking about the second. Or to tell the life of Doña Mariela, who raised her five children by selling hojuelas, a traditional sweet. Her daughter Daniela grew up with her mother’s perseverance and Doña Mariela will share her secret recipe with her when she grows up so she can carry on her legacy. “When her daughter saw the article we wrote, she contacted us and told us. “This is my mother, thank you very much,” says Álvarez excitedly. Other people also told them that in Mariela’s story they saw her mother, her grandmother and many women around her. “People see themselves reflected and that’s very nice,” emphasizes Álvarez.
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