This textile enterprise belongs to victims of conflict who came to the city of Armenia eight years ago, displaced by the armed conflict and who, despite the difficulties, never lost faith.

The Victims Unit through its psychosocial component developed in the city of Armenia the project to strengthen territorial initiatives aimed at complying with the measure of Guarantees of Non-Repetition at the individual level, with the delivery of goods and services to the textile enterprise, of Turbans and costume jewelry "Pacific Style", an initiative of victims of armed conflict who arrived displaced from Buenaventura (Valle del Cauca) to the capital of Quindío, eight years ago.

Within the understanding of the transformative approach, this action of the Victims Unit seeks to eliminate the discrimination and marginalization schemes that contributed to the victimization, under the understanding that transforming these conditions avoids the repetition of the events and lays the foundations for reconciliation in the country, hence this strengthening contributes to women like Francia Mosquera and her group of brave and enterprising women, to continue fighting to get ahead, despite the difficulties they had to endure because of armed conflict.

“This year, France and her friends from the Pacific Style started a process with the Unit through which the G measure was implemented. Guarantees of non-repetition at the individual level to the Pacific Style initiative, through the delivery of goods and services for its strengthening, the psychosocial component has been a very arduous work to achieve what we have today, we hope that these goods and raw materials that they give themselves, give them new oxygen and they can continue to grow personally and as a company”, argued Laura Moreno, territorial director of the Unit in the Coffee Region.

The official also recalled in space: “Material repair, receiving money or machines is of no use to us, if we do not have repaired what is broken in our hearts; for this reason, we also held a series of meetings, through which our psychosocial professional carried out an invaluable job of strengthening the initiative in all aspects and today we are reaping the fruits of that articulated work”.

The Unit delivered a high speed filleting sewing machine, a digital heat setting sublimation machine, an industrial flat sewing machine, display furniture, display case, flannels, ribbons, threads, tags, banners and personalized cards, which will surely place the Pacific Style in another level, in the textile field of the environment, an investment of just over 22 million pesos.

Francia Mosquera, beneficiary of the project: “I did not expect something like this, we never dreamed of something so big, they exceeded all expectations, throughout the process they helped me grow as a person and a businesswoman, it is not that I fell down and stayed there, we can stand up from the hand of entities such as the Victims Unit, so I invite you to believe, thinking that even though we are victims of armed conflict, we can undertake and fulfill the dreams that we have together with our family and friends”.

These types of activities seek to avoid re-victimization and prevent the emergence of new violence, in addition they help to consolidate a shared future different from conflict, which must go through knowledge, reflection and understanding about what happened, and why it should not happen again.

In 2020, 19 socio-productive repair initiatives were selected to be accompanied in their strengthening. Francia´s Mosquera was rated with one of the highest scores to be prioritized, since it has 15 active people of which 13 are included in the Single Registry of Victims and the vast majority are women with ethnic self-recognition.

(Fin/EHB/LMY/AEB)