Mr. Speaker, there is vote buying and vote selling, misuse of identity documents, illegal possession of identity documents and stolen documents. This is all part of the election in Colombia.
There is coercion and intimidation of voters. My gosh, this is what democracy is all about in Colombia. Fraud is committed by polling officers at the polling stations, wow. There is obstruction of the electoral observers so they cannot go and see what is going on. There is control over public transportation to prevent voters from getting to the polling stations. On top of that, there is an absence of educational outreach to voters to teach them about the importance of citizenship and participation.
Is this the Canadian vision, or the Conservative Party or maybe the Liberal Party's vision, of democracy and an election that is fair and free?
This kind of report came from several countries, including Canada, United States, Germany, U.K. and Mexico, participating in an extensive pre-electoral observation mission. Their reports talk about widespread fear among the Colombian population in this region because they are worried about their lives, intimidation, and what would happen to their financial resources.
The government manipulates the social programs for its own political ends. It says, “If you don't vote for me, you're going to get cut off from the families in action benefits”. That is not a fair and free election. That is not what democracy is all about. If the residents and voters do not attend political meetings or vote for the governing party's candidates, they can have their benefits cut off. That is not what democracy is all about.
The other situation is that funding is transferred from drug trafficking to finance campaigns. That is criminal behaviour. There were agreements between candidates, government officials and companies to award government contracts after the election if they donated to their campaign.
Occasionally, we see this here in Canada. It becomes a scandal. We have heard about brown envelopes over restaurant tables, or sometimes a meeting at a certain bar or maybe with certain mutual friends or former MPs, I do not know. Certainly, this kind of behaviour cannot be tolerated. That is not what the New Democratic Party of Canada's definition is of a fair and free election, and that is not what democracy is all about.
Democracy should not be about fear. That is what is happening in Colombia. Apparently, the mission recommends that the nation update its electoral census to avoid situations reported in which the dead vote. I know that occasionally some MPs go and sign up people who may be dead to become a member of certain parties, but that is not what should be tolerated.
We have seen report after report. Two years after the Conservative government started on this free trade deal, what has happened? There is more fear and increased intimidation. This is according to a 2009 report of the office of the United Nations high commissioner. Regarding human rights in Colombia, he said that the office located in Colombia had observed an increase in the number of intimidations and death threats by letters and emails against human rights defenders, social and community leaders, and members of other marginalized groups.
I keep hearing that the more we engage with the Colombians, the safer it is for them. Actually, the opposite happens because the government is tolerating it, even encouraging it through its secret services.
It is given encouragement by these free trade deals, by the Liberal Party and Conservative Party in Canada and the Conservative government, that we will reward the Colombian government even though it continues to intimidate its opponents, The elections in Colombia are not fair nor free. We will reward Colombia by providing even more trade. That is the exact opposite of what Canada should do.
Canada should send a clear message to the existing government of Colombia and say that we believe in democracy. We should send a clear message that we believe that elections should be fair and free, and that when the Colombian government sends secret services to intimidate opponents, to fabricate allegations against its opponents, to sabotage and inflict terror upon its political opponents and citizens, that when secret services that are condoned by the government conduct smearing campaigns, we will not reward such behaviour. We will say no to any free trade agreement with a president and a government that is of this nature. If not, the message we are sending is that we will support criminal behaviour and elections that are conducted in a way that is totally undemocratic.
What we should be calling for instead is a halt to this trade agreement. We should be calling for an independent and comprehensive human rights impact assessment, not done by the government itself but by an arm's length agency. And until that kind of assessment takes place, we should not proceed by saying to that government that we will have a trade relationship with it. If not, those people who have been jailed, terrorized and forcefully displaced will feel that justice is not on their side.
Since 1997, between 2.6 million and 6.8 million hectares of land in Colombia have been acquired by violence, most of them through the paramilitary strategy. Not only does this kind of government intimidate its citizens but it has forcefully removed land from people, so it certainly is not a government we should support by negotiating free trade with it.
We have also noticed, with two successive terms of this government, that it has focused on intensifying the wall. We can always tell what kind of government it is. Does it rule by hope or by fear, and can we examine its defence budget? In these two terms, the Colombian government's defence budget has risen from 5.2% of the GDP in 2002 to 14.2% of GDP, that is $11 billion in 2010.
That is a lot of money that could have been used to help feed its people, to help bring some of the 4.9 million people who have been displaced by force in the last 25 years back into their country. It could help some of the people who are starving, who are being intimidated by the secret services. Instead, it is putting its money into the defence budget rather than the education budget. The education budget is only 13.9% of GDP. Its defence budget is even higher.
That is why we should vote against this free trade deal with Colombia.