Antonio Tejeda | Ethnic-differential approach in digital public policies | Tumaco, Colombia
Intervention by Dr. Antonio Tejeda Encinas, President of Comité Euro Americano de Derecho Digital — CEA Digital LawHe and CEO of META Channel Corporation.
Dr. Antonio Tejeda Encinas On October 30, 2025, he participated in the VI Afro-Colombian Congress of Interdisciplinary Studies, held in San Andrés de Tumaco, within the framework of the founding process of the future Afro-Colombian University. His intervention highlighted a key message: the sovereignty of the 21st century is disputed in data, algorithms and digital infrastructure, not only in physical territory.
During his lecture, Dr. Tejeda Encinas warned of the growing risk of a new digital colonialism, in which the identity, culture and ancestral knowledge of Afro-Colombian communities can be used, processed and monetized without community control or return of value. He underlined the need for a strategy that merges two complementary strengths: the advanced regulatory method of the European Union and the robust recognition of collective ethnic rights that distinguishes the Colombian constitutional framework.
His proposal was articulated in three fundamental operational tools:
Habeas Data Etnico Operativo: recognition of the right of Afro-Colombian communities to the management, audit, control and benefit of their collective data.
Digital Prior Consultation: adaptation of prior consultation to audit algorithms, review biases, determine ownership of intellectual property and guarantee tangible benefits before any technological deployment.
Digital Airbag: Algorithmic governance mechanism that automatically blocks discriminatory content generated by AI systems and activates mandatory human oversight.
Dr. Tejeda Encinas highlighted that responsibility for AI always falls on the authors, configurators and supervisors of the systems, and never on the machine. Traceability, supervision and accountability must be non-negotiable.
This intervention in Tumaco is framed in a decisive moment: the future Afro-Colombian University has the opportunity to position itself not as a passive user of external technology, but as a governing entity, auditor and producer of ethical-digital standards, building a model in which there is no technology without identity, and in which digital sovereignty is an effective community guarantee.
