Karerina Bayona on the departure of buses from Cusco: "They are sending them as cannon fodder"

Karerina Bayona She is a journalist from Cusco who has seen the development of the marches and the violence. She warns that university students are being sent to the capital on buses to clash with law enforcement to “The Taking of Lima”.

What is the Cusco atmosphere after the protests?

There has been calm since yesterday in Cusco. Things have been able to be done normally, businesses have opened, people have gone out to work as they usually do. A tranquility that we did not seem to be able to reach after 4 days of confrontations. Last night delegations from different provinces said goodbye. The inhabitants of the province of Canchis-Sicuani, after having been in protests and blockades, have made collections to move to the capital of the Republic. Two buses have left last night. In the same way, crying young students said goodbye to their classmates from the San Antonio Abad University. They have been in the Plaza de Armas receiving common pots and have been collecting 10 thousand soles through yape accounts to travel to Lima. This morning the delegation of Liritaca de Chumbivilcas, where the mayor is Guido Bellido’s brother, Richard Bellido, also said goodbye.

What is the reason for coming to Lima?

They are sending them as cannon fodder and I think they are aware of that, because we have seen painful farewells yesterday in the case of university students. They are saying goodbye to their own families, to their companions, to their mothers as if they were going to war. They understand that what is going to happen in Lima is a confrontation, that precisely the forces of order are going to enforce the state of emergency. So, they are going with food, non-perishable food has been brought to them. They know that in Lima they are not going to have the scenario that they have in Cusco. We have even seen a university professor from the Faculty of Social Communication dismissing students.

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Who are sending them?

We are talking about the student federation of university students from Cusco who have left the San Antonio Abad University. Let us remember that this Federation has housed characters like Guido Bellido, so it is the same discourse that they use. There is a person very close to Bellido who speaks to the local press as if he were a leader and that is Mr. Ruberio Monje. He is giving directives to the university students that they have to go to Lima, that a new Constitution and the resignation of President Boluarte are needed.