Print Issue: September 26, 2002

Colombia's 'Little Children' Have Atlanta Friends In High Places

By Priscilla Greear, Staff Writer

MARIETTA - CNN en Español senior anchor Patricia Janiot says going to New York as a journalist on Sept. 12, 2001, was a life-changing experience that reawakened in her a serious responsibility to serve the suffering in her homeland of Colombia.

She rededicated herself to Colombianitos, a nonprofit established by Colombians in Atlanta to aid poor children, some disabled and others orphaned as a result of land mines planted in 40 years of civil war.

The Colombianitos Soccer Club was established in June near Bogota, providing first a summer soccer camp and now a soccer league for 300 children. Donations from Atlanta included jerseys and bottled water provided by Coca-Cola. The soccer league provides a healthy, safe outlet for children caught in Colombia's civil strife.

With CNN en Español airing across Latin America, Janiot, who is president of Colombianitos, is grateful to be able to use her credibility for charity.

"(9/11) really made a huge impact on my life. It was a turning point," she said. She says that the outpouring of help for victims of 9/11 made her realize that she needed to get more involved in helping her own war-torn native land.

Rebellion and continued fighting between differing factions of guerrillas, the government and right-wing paramilitary groups has taken place largely in the countryside for many years. "People are getting more aware if we don't solve the problems, we won't have any country in a few years," she said.

Colombianitos (Little Colombians) was founded about a year ago by Juan Pablo Gnecco, a member of St. Ann's in Marietta. It is directed by a board of 10, all of whom are Catholic, and has an advisory committee in Colombia on which Gnecco's father serves. Gnecco is president of the multimedia design firm StudioCom, which- when not working on for-profit projects like Vanilla Coke's Web site as Coke's interactive agency-has designed the Colombianitos publicity materials.

"There's a war going on for many years over there and the children are always the ones that suffer the most," Gnecco said. "People have to move from their country towns because the guerillas come here and they're shooting everybody. Paramilitaries come and are also creating problems . . . People are so scared, they just have to leave everything behind, just run to the city."

Colombianitos' Web site shows some of the children who've received prosthetics and rehabilitative services. The Muñoz siblings, Mónica, 9, and Jonathan, 11, found a grenade near their house, took it home and it detonated while they were playing with it. Both lost their right foot. The fourth-graders received prostheses and are in rehabilitation.

Another girl picked up a land mine and brought it home where it exploded, causing her to lose her leg and killing her brother, sister and father. She's receiving help with prosthesis and she and her mother both receive psychological support.

Colombianitos brings injured children to Bogota where, in partnership with the foundation CIREC, they are fitted with prostheses and also receive counseling. They will be brought back as they grow and need refitting. Supporters may sponsor individual children and communicate with them.

"When children come in, they're extremely scared," Gnecco said. "They don't have any self-confidence. They have just been through an incredible tragedy . . . They lost their dad, their brother, their sister, they saw all the blood. They're not so concerned about their leg, but they're completely traumatized. And they feel they're not going to be worth anything, that they're never going to be able to walk."

"The work is with the parents as well, trying to help them cope with the tragedy. The beauty of the prosthesis is the physical recuperation is almost 100 percent. It's just incredible. They have no leg and suddenly they have a new leg."

Colombianitos is also raising money to build a sports facility on a mountain in Ciudad Bolivar, an impoverished area of Bogota with high crime where displaced families have relocated. It is modeled on a sports facility in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, built in 1998 with government, corporate and community support, which reduced crime, stimulated interest in education and created top athletes.

"Children maybe go to public school in the morning and then in the afternoon they're hanging around, their parents both work, and they have absolutely no food, absolutely no clothes, and they are faced with maybe having to join a gang or steal for money," Gnecco said.

The Metro North Youth Soccer Association in Atlanta has collected used soccer gear and soccer uniforms donated by metro area families to Colombianitos. The nonprofit is hoping to build an athletic complex outside Bogota with fields, courts and rinks for poor children.

Although land is a coveted commodity, the government has agreed to donate nine acres if Colombianitos can raise the construction funds for three soccer fields, a swimming pool, basketball and volleyball courts, a coliseum and a skating rink.

"The lot that we received from the government is worth a million dollars. That was incredible when they said they would commit this," Gnecco said. "We truly believe this is an incredible motivation for children to get out of trouble, be better persons through sports. It's the best way to give self-confidence to kids and create role models."

A soccer tournament there sponsored by Coke helped establish a league for 300 children in June. Soccer equipment is being collected through the Metro North Youth Soccer Association to send to Colombia.

"The children over there, they have absolutely nothing. They play in old clothes, there's no field, there's no balls, there's not anything," Gnecco said.

Gnecco moved from Colombia to Atlanta in 1995 with his wife and three children to open a branch of StudioCom. He decided to stay here when violence at home escalated. He has had friends kidnapped; his house was broken into by armed guerillas. He described how Colombians survive amidst the violence of civil war: "The only way to live with this problem is that you're able to forget."

While making return trips to Colombia, Gnecco's children got very emotional over the street children in Ciudad Bolivar and began giving them Christmas presents. His company then began adding simple Christmas gifts in clients' names of clothes, a ball, snack and toy. "We saw the impact we could have. With very little money my company would spend, we would make happy hundreds and hundreds of children."

He then began talking with Janiot and other metro Atlanta Colombians about how they could help out and Colombianitos was conceived. One problem with relief efforts in Colombia is that people are afraid to donate because funds often don't make it to the victims, but Gnecco said that 100 percent of funds raised by the organization goes to work in Colombia.

Their first fund-raiser, bilingual bingo at St. Ann's, drew 250 people and raised over $14,000. In August Gnecco presented the organization to Luis Ramos, president of the Colombian Senate, who was visiting Atlanta, and received support.

Janiot, a member of Our Lady of the Assumption Church, Atlanta, is planning a fund-raiser for the Spanish-speaking community this fall with Angela Marulanda, who writes on parenting. A grant proposal is being developed to present to companies and potential Colombian benefactors worldwide.

Gnecco is especially grateful for the enthusiastic support among Colombians in Georgia.

"I was raised in a Catholic environment where helping people in need was incredibly important . . . You can change a life with very little. You have to do it. It is your Catholic responsibility. It's given me the opportunity to be a better person," he said.

"Being over here, it hurts a lot to see what is going on over there. The country really is going through some terrible times and we feel incredibly sad about what is happening, we have all our family there. We have the benefit of being in this country, of having all the opportunities that we have here, and we feel we have to do something . . . We have to give back, it's incredibly clear."

For more information, call (770) 541-1131, visit the Colombianitos Web site at www.colombianitos.org or write Colombianitos, 4000 Brockton Close, Marietta, GA 30068.