Vicky Johanna Cogua Nova is a Young Colombian woman, who is adviser of PeaceWoman from Colombia, Ana Teresa Bernal (High Counselor for Victim’s Rights, Peace and Reconstruction – Bogota).
She has been working on this position since January, 2012. Before this job, she worked for the National Reparation and Reconstruction Commission.
At University, she was member of a community group. She worked freely collaborating in the training on human rights. They also developed projects.
Victims received humanitarian help and legal advice since their fundamental rights were violated. They also had right to education and right to health.
One of the projects which was very successful was that the community had its own vegetable garden. At present, there are three vegetables gardens in Usme and San Cristobal, towns at the south of Bogota. The community takes care of them and they are becoming in meeting space.
University was a real turning point in Vicky Johanna’s life, since she could link with other people.
Justice and Peace Law was adopted in 2005. The National Reparation and Reconstrucion Commission was established this year.
Vicky Johanna’s first interest is the topic of displaced people and the violence which is associated to the armed conflict. Her Thesis at University was about forced displacement and she started to link with different organizations. After this, she had an internship at the National Commission, where she could work closely with the victims.
Universidad Libre de Colombia introduced her to make a professional visit at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in Costa Rica, which took place in 2010. Vicky Johanna could be part of the legal team and to know the different cases of the Court. She had a direct relation with senior lawyers and with the Judges of the Court.
Vicky Johanna highlights a fundamental right that victims have: access to justice. This right faces many obstacles, but at present there are legal advisers to give legal advice free of charge.
She grew up as a professional and as a human being after her experience in Costa Rica. She could also see other contexts of violence. But she needed to come back to Colombia in order to work with the victims.
More than 6.000.000 millions of people are displaced in Bogota.
When she came back to Colombia, one of the Commissioners called her in order to advise him. She worked directly with the victims. She attended Regional Dialogues with victims of different sectors in order to be included at the Violence Law. The proposals were sent to the Congress and to the Ministry of the Interior and Justice.
Representatives of every political parties had meetings with the victims.
Vicky Johanna also worked with Afro – descendants communities on integral reparation
On January 1, 2012, PeaceWoman Ana Teresa Bernal started to work with the Mayor of Bogota and she called Vicky Johanna. She participated of the establishment of the Office of the Counsellor She felt blessed to work there.
The first team was small and she was the only lawyer. Later Vicky Johanna was in charge of the topic of Collective Reparation. They started to work with political parties and with organizations which were affected by the armed conflict. They were in touch with other communities.
They could realize that in Bogota there is violence associated to the armed conflict: enforced disappearances, murders, which need to be taken into account by the State.
At the Office of the Counsellor, they work with women’s organizations; indigenous people and afro- descendants communities.
On April, 2014, Vicky Johanna was appointed as personal adviser of PeaceWoman Ana Teresa Bernal.
They are working on the preparation of the cities after the armed conflict. The advantages are: vision of peace; need to work on lives’ reconstruction; peace – building. But Vicky Johanna believes that the most important thing is the peace process. It is pivotal to develop strategies in order to rebuild the social fabric.
Vicky Johanna also thinks that in order to achieve peace is important the exchange of experiences with other countries, especially to avoid the emergence of new structures of organized crime.
Vicky Johanna’s life and heart are in her home country. She would like to have experiences in other countries in other to apply them in her beloved Colombia.
This post is also available in Español.