Far-right President Abelardo de la Espriella says he’ll wage a ‘counterrevolution’ in opposition to cultural establishments.
Printed On 22 Oct 2026
Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella has introduced he’s spearheading a cultural “counterrevolution” that features eradicating dozens of reveals from the Nationwide Museum, drawing protests and comparisons to United States President Donald Trump.
De la Espriella, a conservative Trump ally, mentioned final week that he needs to forestall cultural establishments from being taken over by what he calls “atheist social communism”.
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Since then, reveals have been taken down that when addressed the historical past of social actions, together with feminist and LGBTQ+ activism, and Colombia’s political violence.
The adjustments have sparked protests by civil rights teams, artists and college students who’ve accused the federal government of censorship and warn that vital components of the nation’s historical past could possibly be erased.
Dozens of demonstrators gathered on Wednesday exterior the Nationwide Museum in downtown Bogota as riot police guarded its entrance.
“I discover it outrageous that they need to erase a part of our historical past,” mentioned Azul Riascos, a historical past pupil.
He mentioned the federal government was selling a imaginative and prescient of Colombia as solely white, Catholic and Spanish-speaking. That picture, he defined, excluded Black, Indigenous and LGBTQ+ communities.
Gimena Sanchez-Garzoli, director for the Andes on the Washington Workplace on Latin America, a analysis and advocacy organisation, mentioned the Colombian authorities’s method displays a broader development amongst Trump allies who’re copying US political narratives and techniques.
Trump has been fiercely crucial of museums in Washington, significantly these tied to the Smithsonian Institution.
The White Home launched a report in July branding leaders of the Smithsonian’s Nationwide Museum of American Historical past as radical activists and has ordered indicators to be put in exterior the museum telling guests that a number of the reveals are inaccurate.
Almost three months after that order, such indicators haven’t been put in. The museum’s director, Anthea Hartig, instructed Congress that the White Home report “doesn’t pretty or precisely characterise the total physique of labor on the museum”.
Sanchez-Garzoli mentioned Trump’s cooperation with allied Latin American governments on security and counternarcotics efforts additionally has an ideological dimension.
“These are imported narratives about terrorism and about being ‘woke,’” anthropologist Arturo Sanabria mentioned throughout Wednesday’s protest, describing the Colombian authorities’s method as a type of neocolonial intervention.
Colombia’s Tradition Minister Paola Holguin mentioned the federal government was reviewing and redesigning exhibitions and curatorial practices at different museums overseen by her ministry.
The Overseas Ministry additionally renamed a courtyard beforehand honouring an Indigenous chief, describing the change as a part of the president’s marketing campaign in opposition to “woke” ideology.
“The federal government is making critical efforts in a cultural battle that in all probability doesn’t exist,” political scientist Estefania Cardozo mentioned exterior the museum. “It’s inventing one to erase identities that can’t be erased as a result of they exist already.”
