Jorge Medina Barra (; 24 April 1968 – 23 November 2022) was a Bolivian civil rights activist and politician who served as a member of the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourb ...

from

La Paz La Paz, officially Nuestra Señora de La Paz (Aymara language, Aymara: Chuqi Yapu ), is the seat of government of the Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bolivia. With 755,732 residents as of 2024, La Paz is the List of Bolivian cities by populati ...

, representing its special indigenous circumscription from 2010 to 2015. Raised in the

Afro-Bolivian Afro-Bolivians (), also known as Black Bolivians (), are Bolivians who have predominantly or total Sub-Saharan African ancestry and therefore the descriptive "Afro-Bolivian" may refer to historical or cultural elements in Bolivia thought to ema ...

community of the tropical Yungas region, Medina became active in the Afro civil rights movement after moving to the city of

. He was a founding member of the Afro-Bolivian Saya Cultural Movement and co-founded the Afro-Bolivian Center for Integral and Community Development, two organizations dedicated to promoting public and state recognition of Afro cultural identity. Having succeeded in securing the inclusion of Afro-Bolivians in the 2009 Constitution, Medina was later elected to represent La Paz's minority indigenous peoples in the Chamber of Deputies, becoming the first Afro-Bolivian to serve in either chamber of the Bolivian legislature. In parliament, Medina spearhead Bolivia's flagship Law Against Racism and promoted other pro-Afro pieces of legislation. He was not nominated for reelection.

Early life and career

Jorge Medina was born on 24 April 1968 to Paulino Medina and Sergia Barra, an

family from the rural community of Chijchipa in the La Paz Department's agricultural

Nor Yungas Province Nor Yungas is a province in the Yungas area of the Bolivian department of La Paz. During the presidency of José Manuel Pando the Yungas Province was divided into two parts, the Nor Yungas and the Sud Yungas Province, by law of January 12, 189 ...

. Medina completed his primary schooling in the nearby town of Tocaña before moving with his parents to

Caranavi Caranavi is the capital of the Caranavi Province in the Yungas region of Bolivia. On 23 December 2009, part of the province was detached from the municipality of Caranavi to become the municipality of Alto Beni.Alto Beni, where he attended the city's Martín Cárdenas School. After graduating in 1988, Medina moved to the city of

to pursue college education; he studied

business administration Business administration is the administration of a commercial enterprise. It includes all aspects of overseeing and supervising the business operations of an organization. Overview The administration of a business includes the performance o ...

at the

Higher University of San Andrés Universidad Mayor de San Andrés or UMSA () is the leading public university in Bolivia, established since 1830 in the city of La Paz. UMSA is the second-oldest university in Bolivia, after the University of San Francisco Xavier de Chuquisaca ( ...

and took courses in

systems engineering Systems engineering is an interdisciplinary field of engineering and engineering management that focuses on how to design, integrate, and manage complex systems over their Enterprise life cycle, life cycles. At its core, systems engineering uti ...

at the University of Aquinas. In the ensuing years, Medina worked a number of odd jobs, spending six years as a chauffeur for the Golden Eagle Mining Company before being employed as a mechanic at a local workshop, and later as a laborer for a nearby paper company. He also spent short stints as an employee at YPFBthe state-owned petroleum enterpriseand the

Ministry of Labor A ministry of labour ('' UK''), or labor ('' US''), also known as a department of labour, or labor, is a government department responsible for setting labour standards, labour dispute mechanisms, employment, workforce participation, training, and s ...

Activism and organizational leadership

Medina's entry into the Afro-Bolivian civil rights movement was precipitated by his early experiences residing in La Paz, a city "devoid of Afro-Bolivians...

here Here may refer to: Music * ''Here'' (Adrian Belew album), 1994 * ''Here'' (Alicia Keys album), 2016 * ''Here'' (Cal Tjader album), 1979 * ''Here'' (Edward Sharpe album), 2012 * ''Here'' (Idina Menzel album), 2004 * ''Here'' (Merzbow album), ...

it was not uncommon for other Bolivians to be oblivious to the existence of black people". Recognition of the Afro-Bolivian population was niche, limited in academia to Western scholars studying the

African diaspora The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from List of ethnic groups of Africa, people from Africa. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West Africa, West and Central Africans who were ...

. Their presence in public often promoted

racial discrimination Racial discrimination is any discrimination against any individual on the basis of their Race (human categorization), race, ancestry, ethnicity, ethnic or national origin, and/or Human skin color, skin color and Hair, hair texture. Individuals ...

, including physical harassment, due to the superstitious belief that pinching a black person would bring good luck. "It was 'lucky negro'; they surrounded us... and fought among themselves over who saw us first", Medina recalled. Starting from the late 1980s, Medina became active in promoting the '' saya'', a style of Afro-Bolivian folk songs mixed with drums, which the Afro movement had begun using to generate cultural visibility. During this time, Medina also distinguished himself as a popular ''saya'' composer and performer in his own right, writing the songs "Flor de Alelí", "Ser Líder de un Grupo", and "Guarachera de Cuba", among others. Along with other activists, Medina founded the (MOCUSABOL) in 1988, which became one of the country's leading Afro-Bolivian civil rights and awareness organizations. He served as vice president and later president of the body for five years between 1999 and 2004. Despite MOCUSABOL's successes in spreading the ''saya'' popularity, Medina soon grew frustrated with the growing perception that Afro-Bolivians were just "'the negros who dance.' That made me angry because we are not only good at dancing we can do other things", he stated. In 2006, together with Marfa Inofuentes, Medina founded the Afro-Bolivian Center for Integral and Community Development (CADIC), of which he served as executive director. The organization actively worked to advance Afro-Bolivian

civil and political rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' political freedom, freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and ...

, taking a leading role in attaining state recognition of the Afro community during the 2006–2007 Constituent Assembly, which was then redrafting the Bolivian constitution. By the end of the process, CADIC was successful in securing the same

minority rights Minority rights are the normal individual rights as applied to members of racial, ethnic, class, religious, linguistic or gender and sexual minorities, and also the collective rights accorded to any minority group. Civil-rights movements oft ...

for Afro-Bolivians as those granted to the country's indigenous peoples.

Chamber of Deputies

Election

With minority groups increasingly encouraged to participate in politics, Medina was nominated to contest a seat in the

on behalf of the

Movement for Socialism Movement for Socialism – Political Instrument for the Sovereignty of the Peoples (; MAS or MAS-IPSP), is a socialist political party in Bolivia. Its followers are known as ''Masistas''. In the 2005 Bolivian general election, December 2005 el ...

. Given the offer, Medina recalled stating, "

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

is president of the United States; why should an Afro not be able to be in parliament here in Bolivia". He ran to represent the La Paz Department's newly created special rural native indigenous circumscriptionan innovation of the 2009 Constitutiona district with constituents comprising the department's Afro-Bolivian, Araona,

Kallawaya The Kallawaya are an indigenous group living in the Andes of Bolivia. They live in the Bautista Saavedra Province and Muñecas Province of the La Paz Department but are best known for being an itinerant group of traditional healers that t ...

, Leco, Mosetén, and

Tacana people The Tacana people are an ethnic group who live in the Beni department of Bolivia. There were 18,535 of them in 2012, of whom 559 speak the Tacana language natively. Background and social organization During the process of Inca expansion towar ...

s. He received one of the highest vote shares of the entire election cycle, winning nearly ninety-two percent of the popular vote, becoming the first Afro-Bolivian in history to serve in either chamber of the Legislative Assembly.

Tenure

As a parliamentarian, Medina was instrumental in drafting what became the Law Against Racism and All Forms of Discrimination. Promulgated by President

Evo Morales Juan Evo Morales Ayma (; born 26 October 1959) is a Bolivian politician, trade union organizer, and former cocalero activist who served as the 65th president of Bolivia from 2006 to 2019. Widely regarded as the country's first president to come ...

in October 2010, the new legislation imposed varying penalties for perpetrators of racism and discrimination, identifying Afro-Bolivians as a particularly vulnerable ethnic minority group. In the years following its enactment, the law faced numerous challenges and shortfalls, including difficulty of enforcement and lack of knowledge from both the general public and the judiciary regarding what exactly constitutes a prosecutable offense. According to analyst Henry Stobart, "newspaper reports from 2014 characterized the law as 'not worth the paper it was written on', arguing that there had been no prosecutions, despite the hundreds of complaints received". On the other hand, Professor Sara Busdiecker pointed out that "despite its flaws and limitations to prevent racism outright,

he law He or HE may refer to: Language * He (letter), the fifth letter of the Semitic abjads * He (pronoun), a pronoun in Modern English * He (kana), one of the Japanese kana (へ in hiragana and ヘ in katakana) * Ge (Cyrillic), a Cyrillic letter cal ...

has given people pause to think before acting and speaking in some circumstances", producing a "social 'hesitation' of sorts" because "even if ffendersdo not understand all the details, 'they know there is a law. For his part, Medina echoed that sentiment, stating that the legislation's intention was never to "fill the prisons with those who discriminate" but rather to promote conciliation. For the duration of his tenure, Medina continuously worked to promote the recognition of the Afro-Bolivian population. He facilitated the passage of numerous symbolic laws recognizing Afro culture, including one declaring 23 September to be the National Day of the Afro-Bolivian People and another establishing the ''saya'' as part of the country's

cultural heritage Cultural heritage is the heritage of tangible and intangible heritage assets of a group or society that is inherited from past generations. Not all heritages of past generations are "heritage"; rather, heritage is a product of selection by socie ...

. The 2012 census was held midway through Medina's term, a notable event, as it was the first time the government had ever tabulated the Afro-Bolivian population in its history. Using this data, Medina put forward the concept of creating a majority Afro-Bolivian municipality to give greater electoral representation to its inhabitants, though the concept never got off the ground. Upon the conclusion of his term in 2015, Medina retired from politics and returned to the direction of CADIC.

Commission assignments

* Rural Native Indigenous Peoples and Nations, Cultures, and Interculturality Commission (President; 2011–2012) ** Rural Native Indigenous Peoples and Nations Committee (2010–2011) * Plural Economy, Production, and Industry Commission ** Industry, Commerce, Transport, and Tourism Committee (2012–2013) * Social Policy Commission ** Social Security and Protection Committee (2013–2014) * Planning, Economic Policy, and Finance Commission ** Financial, Monetary, and Insurance Policy Committee (Secretary; 2014–2015)

Personal life and death

Medina married Miriam Iriondo, an ethnic Afro-Bolivian ''saya'' performer from

Chulumani Chulumani is a municipality in Bolivia. It is the capital of the Sud Yungas region. Agriculture dominates the area, which produces bananas, coffee, and coca leaves. Chulumani is subtropical with warm temperatures and high humidity. Although the c ...

in the

Sud Yungas Province Sud Yungas or Sur Yungas ( Aymara: ''Aynach Yunka jisk'a'') is a province in the Bolivian department of La Paz. It was created during the presidency of José Manuel Pando on January 12, 1900. The capital of the province is Chulumani. Geograph ...

. The couple had two children: Adin Dube and Malaika,

Swahili Swahili may refer to: * Swahili language, a Bantu language officially used in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda and widely spoken in the African Great Lakes. * Swahili people, an ethnic group in East Africa. * Swahili culture, the culture of the Swahili p ...

names meaning "strength and passion" and "angel", respectively. His relative, Tomasa Medina, also gained notoriety in the Afro-Bolivian community, though as an opponent of the MAS and its efforts to expand its influence over the Yungas-based

coca Coca is any of the four cultivated plants in the family Erythroxylaceae, native to western South America. Coca is known worldwide for its psychoactive alkaloid, cocaine. Coca leaves contain cocaine which acts as a mild stimulant when chewed or ...

market. Outside of his work at MOCUSABOL and CADIC, Medina was also active in radio, hosting the talk show ''Raíces Africanas'', which began airing in 2001. In film, he starred as a supporting actor in 2005's '' American Visa''. Medina died on 23 November 2022, aged 54. His passing was commemorated by various Afro-Bolivian organizations and by the Chamber of Deputies.

Electoral history

References

Notes

Footnotes

Bibliography

* * * * * * * *

External links

Parliamentary profile
Office of the Vice President . {{DEFAULTSORT:Medina, Jorge 1968 births 2022 deaths 21st-century Bolivian male actors 21st-century Bolivian politicians Afro-Bolivian people Bolivian composers Bolivian engineers Bolivian folk musicians Bolivian male film actors Bolivian radio presenters Chauffeurs Civil rights activists Higher University of San Andrés alumni Members of the Bolivian Chamber of Deputies from La Paz Movimiento al Socialismo politicians People from Nor Yungas Province Systems engineers