María was eleven years old when one of the teachers in her community tricked her into her room, covered her mouth with a quilt and abused her. To keep the girl from the Awajún ethnic group silent, he threatened to kill her. Without anyone knowing, shortly after the attacker left the native Tutino village of the Cenepa district, Condorcanqui province, Amazonas, a Peruvian region of the northern jungle that borders Ecuador. Emboldened by impunity, the subject returned four years later, in mid-2015, to plunge María into terror. He raped her again, got her pregnant and made her repeat second year of high school.
The baby was not born, but María’s life was suspended in pain. She is one of the 524 students (men and women) in the Condorcanqui province who between 2010 and 2024 suffered some type of sexual violence from their teachers, educational promoters or administrative staff at their schools. A complaint that took over the public discussion in recent weeks, and that confirmed not only the vulnerability and risks to which children of indigenous peoples are exposed, but also the contempt and indolence with which they are treated by the higher-ranking public authorities.
The Minister of Education, Morgan Quero, maintained that the violations in the Amazon are “a cultural practice to exercise a form of family construction” and that therefore they would be very cautious in how to approach the matter. His statements unnerved the population and They unleashed a new crisis in the Government. The Minister of Women, Ángela Hernández, supported her words and advised adolescents to “postpone their sexual relations” and, if they had them, asked them to protect themselves. Immediately, various indigenous organizations issued statements rejecting it, highlighting that using culture as an excuse is a way of perpetuating impunity and making the seriousness of these crimes invisible.
The magnitude of the problem not only lies in the high number of victims and perpetrators (524 each) – this is a fact verified by the researchers – but also in the inability of the judicial system: only four teachers were temporarily dismissed and only 111 were dismissed. . Seventy-two were acquitted, 195 had their cases prescribed, nine were filed and the rest were either not subject to any administrative disciplinary process or their cases are still pending investigation. And there could be more, since more than 2,500 files were lost in a fire in the offices of the local educational management unit (UGEL) of Condorcanqui, in mid-2022.
These days, the most powerful voice, without a doubt, has been that of Rosemary Pioc Tenazoa, the president of the Awajún and Wampis Women’s Council. She was the one who made the public complaint and managed to get the issue included on the agenda of the news and the Executive. These are her last hours in Lima before embarking on the long trip to the district of Nieva, in Condorcanqui—27 hours in two buses and a bus—and this tan-skinned woman is giving her eighth interview of the day, at nine in the morning. night, in a cafe, after meeting with UNDP executives and other United Nations counterparts who have taken an interest in the case and have promised him concrete support. For example, preparing the first Gesell camera in the area – a room conditioned to allow observation with people that is used in police stations – which will allow better handling of investigations and will also prevent re-victimization.
“Our people are very indignant with the ministers’ statements. Let them apologize publicly and resign. They have no heart,” says Rosemary Pioc, who says she has been threatened by some of the teachers involved and even by colluding judges. “My parents fear for my life, but I feel strengthened because I know I am doing the right thing. The abuse has to stop,” says this bilingual teacher, of Jíbaro blood, whose only bodyguard for now is one of her sisters.
Although he will soon ask for guarantees to continue his fight, the request that is most on his mind is to arrange a screening for the entire population of Condorcanqui to rule out HIV, the main aggravating factor in the case. “There are complaints that there are teachers with the virus who have infected several students. We have counted 60 adolescents who have been infected, but it is a very delicate matter, so we want an accurate diagnosis,” explains Rosemary Pioc. While the national prevalence of the human immunodeficiency virus is 0.3%, in the Awajún population, the second largest ethnic group in the Peruvian jungle, it is extremely higher: 1.8%. Only between 2010 and mid-2022, 222 deaths were reported in the Condorcanqui Health Network due to advanced HIV.
Condorcanqui, furthermore, is the seventh poorest province in Peru. The precariousness is absolute. Until a couple of years ago, according to the Salud con Lupa portal, 87% of the 71 health facilities in the area did not have doctors, so to attend to simple operations such as removing the appendix they had to travel—even for three days. , crossing rivers, in the case of the most remote communities—to reach the most solvent hospital. “The shortages are so great that many girls do not have money to buy sanitary towels and toiletries. Several of these teachers asked them for sex in exchange for pads for their menstruation. It is unheard of,” questions leader Rosemary Pioc, revealing a modus operandi.
In September 2023, Pioc received a complaint from a sixth grade student, where she says that a teacher offered her 130 soles (35 dollars) for having sexual relations and another 50 soles (13.5 dollars) for the expenses of her party. primary promotion. Another student, fifteen years old, reported that she was not going to class because her tutor told her that she wanted her to be her crush and he had not been calm with her “no” response. There is a pattern in these crimes of harassment and sexual violence: most have happened in student residences, designed for children who live in the most remote places. However, in practice, without having the proper infrastructure, they have become spaces where they are at the mercy of sexual predators.
The problem becomes even more complex if we take into account that in several Awajún communities they are still governed by a precept: a member of the town is not reported to the Prosecutor’s Office or the Police, but to the apu, who determines lenient sanctions such as lock the culprit in a cell for a few months or fine him between 2,000 and 5,000 soles (between 540 and 1,350 dollars). This is also what Rosemary Pioc, the president of the Awajún and Wampis Women’s Council, faces. This Sunday the 23rd, she will lead a march in the Nieva parade ground and will distribute a donation of 250 packages of sanitary towels. She is still waiting for a public apology from the Minister of Education.
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