Colombian guerrillas often lure away children. Rugby offers youths an alternative.
Carolina Rodriguez, with her son Juan Camilo, walks through the streets of El Valle, Colombia, to remind youngsters of a Rugby 4 Chocó training session.
Adri Salido
El Valle, Colombia
Carolina Rodriguez strolls through the unpaved streets in her blue uniform and sneakers, calling out to boys and girls to remind them that rugby training is being offered today through the Rugby 4 Chocó program.
In El Valle, a town in the Chocó region along Colombia’s Pacific coast, the sport is child’s play – and something more.
Decades of fighting between guerrillas and paramilitaries over territory and control of drug-trafficking routes have made Chocó one of the most unstable areas of the country. Climate change also makes fishing and farming increasingly difficult, further diminishing opportunities for Chocó’s young people. Lacking jobs at home and seeking to escape the region’s high poverty, many youths are enticed to join the violent armed groups.
Why We Wrote This
Children in Colombia’s impoverished Chocó region are often preyed upon by violent armed groups. In the Rugby 4 Chocó program, children learn a different way to belong.
“I am sure that through sport, we can continue to take children away from the conflict,” Ms. Rodriguez says.
Since 2021, the Rugby 4 Chocó program, for which Ms. Rodriguez serves as head coach, has given children a safe – and fulfilling – alternative to the violence roiling the region. Children who participate in the program’s coed rugby training sessions have the freedom to make decisions, program organizers note. There are no aggressive instructions directed at the children, so play can occur in a friendly environment. The children learn the values of trust, respect, responsibility, equity, and inclusion in society.
The program was initiated by the local nonprofit Fundación Buen Punto and is supported by the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund, based in Glasgow. The idea is to “take something fun and see how we can use this to bring people together, to teach them about peaceful coexistence, to teach them about conflict resolution, and give them new opportunities in life in a completely different way,” says Mark Camburn, manager of programs at SCIAF.
So far, more than 1,000 children have participated in the program. The organizers try to conduct at least two training sessions per week.
Thirteen-year-old Wendy Machuca is one of the oldest children taking part in the program. She has helped translate training instructions to other players from the Emberá Dobida Indigenous group, as rugby is still a little-known sport in the remote region.
“I like it because rugby brings many new things that I have never seen before,” Wendy says.