The gobernación building and the soccer field (the "stadium"), seen from
the tank in the Berlin neighborhood. Notice the green of the surroundings.
The housings are almost all the same. One day I went up the aqueduct tank (of more than 25 meters high) and I could see that most houses in Inírida have lot. It astonished me not to find the gray and the tile color typical in the roofs in Cali, but the green of the lots covering almost everything. Normally the people in Inírida dedicate almost half of the lot to fruit-bearing and ornamental trees. Only the richest have eliminated them and they have filled it with rooms for rent.
Anyway, they are few houses that stand out for their size or luxuries. Everybody knows who's the owner of the town, Tiberio Mora, and where is located his big house in main street. In the remainder, all the iniridense neighborhoods look like each other in their medley of half rich, half poor and poor. The biggest difference is among the few neighborhoods that have sewer system, and those that are flooded in a small portion in every winter.
In the whole population they were discovered small murals, colored on the white walls of the public buildings. They were full with color, plane forms and thick lines, like in the Mexican murals, in a very Latin American style. There were some in the hospital, others in the main square, in the school and in the culture house. Their author was a hippie like caleño(e26) who works as teacher in the school. There was also one that painted Botero(e27), the only time that he was in the departamento. It was in a wall of the school, a bit more rustic one, in black and white. It represented a fat woman, with a big doted dress and mountains as bottom.
The gobernación building and the soccer field (the "stadium"), seen from
the tank in the Berlin neighborhood. Notice the green of the surroundings.
The two store buildings are few, almost all at the commercial sector. There is only one that stands out in the whole town: The Palace of the Gobernación(e28), previously the Comisarial Palace. It is the only one surrounded by green areas and its roof is above all the other. It occupies a whole block, in the same heart of the town.
The construction of the palace, the government of Belisario Betancur and other works in neighborhoods and communities, meant the climax of the political career of "Doña Graciela Ortíz de Mora". Her, the almost for life representative for Guainía, spoke with pride of their aids and she assured to have given of suckling to the region. Together with Gilberto Brito, the liberal representative, she managed the political knots and the local bureaucracy. Each one planned subtle attacks between liberal and conservative, moved their records and threw rumors and pamphlets.
The governor and the mayor had the luck of being chosen in a "multiparty" movement, but they could not hide their conservative origin. Most liberal of the assembly already knew about it and the departamento became headstrong at times. The liberal blocked the governor's proposal, they denounced that several people had been fired from the gobernación because they were liberals and they demanded that he continued with the previous government's development plan (the former was also liberal). The governor was criticized to be so slow in proposing a development plan and he made conciliatory calls and he release explanations. He spent time in Bogotá and in the Corpes meetings, looking for funds.
The national big disorder has a political background and Guainía could not be an exception. They were many employees of the municipality that didn't receive salary during the municipalities' financial crisis(e29). More than one was hung looking for help amid this or that political party.
In Inírida trade and politics mix in defense of their own interests. Everyone that had their little business was probably also communal leader, councilman, deputy or he had a relative involved in politics that looked after his businesses. The only one that seemed to be a base town man was a shoemaker, well known more for their limp. Exactly he used his popular origin to be made choose deputy. But complaints were already heard among their followers because he was one in campaign and another in the assembly. They said things like «just you choose him, just you stop to see him»; although they still considered him one of theirs, they felt that he already spoke only with the "five pesetas".
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