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Bojayá
Municipality
FlagSeal
Motto(s): "Creatividad, Trabajo y Decisión"
The municipality of Bojayá within the Chocó Department of Colombia. Its municipal centre, Bellavista Nuevo, is midway along its eastern edge.
Coordinates: 6°31′25″N 76°58′28″W / 6.52361°N 76.97444°W / 6.52361; -76.97444 (Bojayá)
Country	Colombia
Department	Chocó Department
Area
• Municipality	3,693 km (1,426 sq mi)
Population
• Municipality	9,941
• Urban	4,572
	Estimation by DANE - Government of Colombia
Time zone	UTC-5 (Colombia Standard Time)

Bojayá (Spanish pronunciation: [boxaˈʝa]) is a municipality in the Chocó Department, Colombia. Its municipal centre is Bellavista Nuevo.

Bojaya municipality

The Bojaya municipality, according to a 2005 census, has 9,941 inhabitants. 58.4% of the population of the municipality are Afro-Colombian, and 41.4% are indigenous Embera. 95.86% of the population do not have their basic needs met.

The municipality contains part of the Utría National Natural Park.

There has been a long-enduring presence of paramilitary and National Liberation Army forces in the region, with tensions and violence between the groups still a significant threat to its population.

Bojayá massacre

On May 2, 2002, FARC guerrillas conducted an attack on members of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia present within Bellavista. The FARC had established their presence in the town the previous month, with the attack catalysed by the break-out of fighting in nearby Vigía del Fuerte. Amid the fighting, a gas cylinder bomb fired from a FARC improvised mortar, directed at USDFC forces positioned behind the town's church, missed its target, breaking through the church roof and detonating, with the blast killing 79 of the roughly 300 civilians sheltering inside. In full, the attack resulted in 119 civilian deaths, 49 of which were children, 98 injured citizens, significant physical damage to much of the town and the fleeing of its remaining residents. The attack is since referred to as the Bojayá massacre. Now referred to as Bellavista Viejo (Old Bellavista), the town was abandoned, with its returning citizens having been rehomed in a settlement newly-built nearby.

Bellavista Nuevo

The decision to build a new town for the citizens of Bellavista was announced by president Andrés Pastrana five days after the Boyaja Massacre. The attack had resulted in the deaths of 119 residents, left 98 injured, damaged much of the town, and its remaining population were among the roughly 4,000 citizens who fled Bojayá in its aftermath. The majority of the town was in favour of the intention to relocate, but not unanimously.

The project of this new town was assigned to an interdisciplinary group of graduate students studying urban and regional planning at Universidad Javeriana. They selected a site 800 metres from Bellavista, primarily for its lower risk of flooding, a reality not exclusive to Bellavista but rather common to the region. The planned town was to have buildings constructed of concrete, including 265 houses, which were to be connected to a network of utilities and services. Construction began in 2003, and the town was inaugurated in 2007 as Bellavista Nuevo (New Bellavista), and the original town was renamed Bellavista Viejo (Old Bellavista).

After the massacre, only a part of the population remained or returned to Bojayá. Half of the inhabitants of the region live in its municipal centre. The remains of the victims of the massacre are buried in the new town and a mausoleum has also been built in their memory.

Bellavista Viejo

The old town, Bellavista Viejo, is currently completely abandoned. The church damaged in the bombing, San Pablo Apóstol, has been restored after the massacre, and is being maintained in memory of the tragic event. An annual memorial is held in the church on the second of May. During this service el Christo Mutilado de Bojaya, a statue of Christ mutilated in the massacre, is brought from the new church in Bellavista Nuevo to Bellavista Viejo in a procession by river.

Climate

Bojayá has a very wet tropical rainforest climate, as shown in these data from Bellavista Nuevo.

References

1. Municipal area 1985-2020
2. ^ Vergara-Figueroa, Aurora (2018), "They Kill Us, Therefore We Exist?", Afrodescendant Resistance to Deracination in Colombia, Springer International Publishing, pp. 53–68, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-59761-4_3, ISBN 978-3-319-59760-7, retrieved 2020-05-13
3. Utría (in Spanish), colparques.net, retrieved 2017-06-21
4. Fernández, Richard Aguirre (2020-01-03). "En Bojayá vuelven a sentir temor por grupos ilegales". www.elcolombiano.com (in European Spanish). Retrieved 2020-05-13.
5. "Bojayá: La guerra sin límites" (PDF). centrodememoriahistorica.gov.co. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 October 2017. Retrieved 7 May 2017.
6. Semple, Kirk (2016-10-10). "With Colombia's Peace Deal in Doubt, a Battered Town Fears a Return to War". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-02-11.
7. Tiempo, Casa Editorial El (2004-05-01). "EN MARCHA REUBICACIÓN DE BELLAVISTA". El Tiempo (in Spanish). Retrieved 2024-02-11.
8. Bojayá: La Guerra Sin Límites. Bogotá, Colombia: Aguilar. 2010. p. 192. ISBN 978-958-758-024-2.
9. Tiempo, Casa Editorial El (2017-11-22). "De la devastación a la esperanza: así se levanta Bojayá". El Tiempo (in Spanish). Retrieved 2020-05-13.
10. https://web.archive.org/web/20160815025712/http://www.ideam.gov.co/documents/21021/553571/Promedios+Climatol%C3%B3gicos++1981+-+2010.xlsx/f28d0b07-1208-4a46-8ccf-bddd70fb4128

External links

• (in Spanish) Revista Semana: Un Pueblo a la Espera

v t e Municipalities in the Chocó Department
Acandí Alto Baudó Atrato Bagadó Bahía Solano Bajo Baudó Bojayá Capurganá Cértegui Condoto El Cantón de San Pablo El Carmen de Atrato El Carmen del Darién Istmina Juradó Litoral del San Juan Lloró Medio Atrato Medio Baudó Medio San Juan Nóvita Nuquí Quibdó Río Iró Río Quito Riosucio San José del Palmar Sipí Tadó Unguía Unión Panamericana

• Municipalities of Chocó Department