Colombia's new right-wing government has ordered one of the country's top museums to remove dozens of works alluding to LGBTQ rights and the country's peace process, sparking condemnation from visitors.
In the "Making Society" gallery of the National Museum in Bogota, several walls that until recently displayed works related to the LGBTQ community, the country's violent past and a landmark 2016 peace agreement with FARC guerrillas were bare on Friday morning, an AFP journalist observed.
Workers were painting one of the empty walls minutes before the space was closed to the public by officials announcing that the government of President Abelardo de la Espriella had ordered a "renovation."
In the corridors, dozens of visitors waited for explanations from the museum, a major historical, artistic and cultural landmark in the heart of the capital.
"It's an affront to Colombian society, it's an affront to our memory, to our history," 26-year-old Martin Perez told AFP.
Culture Minister Paola Holguin defended the decision, stating on X that the museum's purpose "is NOT to serve as an instrument of political indoctrination."
{{/usCountry}}Culture Minister Paola Holguin defended the decision, stating on X that the museum's purpose "is NOT to serve as an instrument of political indoctrination."
{{/usCountry}}Without directly referring to the museum, De la Espriella said on Thursday that the "State has the unavoidable moral and political duty to prevent cultural spaces from being captured by atheistic social communism, an enemy of values."
Alongside Holguin, whom he called his "general," he issued warnings against so-called "woke" culture, which he defined as "one of the great cancers threatening national unity."
De la Espriella, a millionaire lawyer, took office in August as a tough-talking right-winger promising to crack down on crime and cocaine-trafficking guerrillas.
The father of four campaigned heavily among evangelical Christian communities.
He frequently ends speeches with the cry "Long live Christ the King!" in what critics argue is a violation of Colombia's secular state.
He has also railed against constitutionally protected rights such as abortion.
"They can do whatever they want, they can censor anything they want but memory is never forgotten and will always resist," said John Fredy Rodriguez, a 34-year-old professor who was accompanying a group of journalism students on a visit to the museum on Friday.
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