Mexico.- Heidi Mariana, 5 years old, was murdered during a confrontation between Sedena officials and suspected criminals in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas. A stray bullet found her.
Heidi is part of the 1,116 murders of girls, boys and adolescents in the country registered until November 2022. The human rights of children are still waiting for the State to act in favor of a third of its population, criticized activists and experts.
lives at stake
According to the Annual Balance of the Network for the Rights of Children in Mexico, of these murders, 257 were femicides and intentional homicides of adolescent girls and women and 859 were intentional homicides of children and male adolescents. The figures represent a 3 percent increase compared to 2021.
The disappearance does not exempt infants either, since during the same period, every day 16 people between 0 and 17 years of age were reported missing. Until January 5, 2023, 18,390 infants still did not appear in the country, according to historical records.
Militarization
Tania Ramírez, director of the Network for Children’s Rights in Mexico, told Debate that the data in terms of homicides and feminicides of children and adolescents are part of the challenges you face Mexico.
He considered that attention to the crisis of violence and armed violence is not being adequate. “The decisions to militarize the public space through the strategy of attention to this violence, by the security forces, is not a good bet,” she said.
The activist considered that normalizing trucks with soldiers and weapons makes this something more constant in the lives and subjectivity of girls and boys. “We need the Army to be in its barracks, not in the streets, because otherwise, also from the State, that symbolic power is being used to show children what is the way to do, to act, to have,” she exposed.
violence in stages
Victoria Alva Lugo, a specialist in law, highlighted that in general terms, violence against children is divided into three parts.
In the first stage, from 0 to 4 years, while they are under the care of their parents or their caregivers and that can even start from birth with obstetric violence.
The second stage, classified it within the period of beginning of the school cycle, from 4 to 7 years, where they can be victims of poor nutrition or neglect.
The third phase, according to Victoria Alva Lugo, runs from 7 to 14 years of age, in which they will develop adolescence and pre-adolescence and may face sexual violence. “When minors continue with phases of depredation of their rights, it will be difficult for them to access an education that favors the integral development of their personality,” she pointed out.
So far, what does the law say? The specialist added that Article 4 of the Constitution states that children must be guaranteed a life free of violence and that all State institutions must ensure the best interests of children to fully guarantee their rights.
Reform
He indicated that in order to combat, curb, prevent and punish this type of harmful conduct against minors, the General Law on the Rights of Girls, Boys and Adolescents was created. Through the reform that took place in 2011, a perspective is changed and minors begin to be perceived as people who have complementary rights and who must be comprehensively protected. The name of the eighth chapter of this same law speaks of a life free of violence and personal integrity.
“It is very important that in the normative part it is already catalogued, typified and a type of action for the victims, but what we need is to specify those steps so that no child who finds himself in these situations has to live another day that way,” he said.
Budget 2023
The Balance of the Network for the Rights of Children in Mexico estimates that the Mexican State presented a budget project for the year 2023 in which 899.5 billion pesos were allocated to the Transversal Annex of Resources for the Care of Girls, Boys and Teenagers.
In this regard, Tania Ramírez explained that this resource is not even enough to balance with the calculation of the inflation that is projected. He considered that public institutions need to put themselves at the service of children, not only at the service of adult beneficiaries of social programs, nor to satisfy the demands of adults, but to listen to the demands of girls and boys to comply with the fact that the State is the guarantor of their rights.
“Girls, boys and adolescents make up a third of the country, more than 38 million girls and boys. Can we perhaps say that they take a third of the public attention from the institutions? No. The third part of the budget? A lot less”.
backing missing
The human rights expert lawyer Victoria Alva Lugo pointed out that the challenge to reduce the incidence is set by the law itself. He indicated that children who have any of the aforementioned forms of violence are anxious for someone to come and extend a hand, “not to solve their lives in a couple of hours, but to really offer a formula for them, because they don’t want to live that way,” he said.
Ramírez agreed and argued that the recipe is already there and the Protection System for Children and Adolescents, the Sipinna, is created by law and all that is needed is State support. In this regard, he added that this body will complete two years in March without a headline in charge at the federal level.
Morena’s disdain
According to the law, this protection system must be chaired by the head of the Executive, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador; however, Ramirez He criticized that throughout the Morenist administration, the executive has not sat in any of the Sipinna sessions.
For the Network for Children’s Rights, acts of apparent concern for children must materialize in effective actions to recognize and protect their rights, especially by public servants.
Cases that show violence in childhood
Only a few cases of violence against children and adolescents make national news. Here the most relevant of 2022.
In February 2022, Lulú, a 13-year-old teenager, was abused and murdered in Zumpango, State of Mexico. The authority reported that it was a femicide after a 20-year-old man pleaded guilty.
In April 2022, at the age of 6, Victoria Guadalupe was found lifeless and her body wrapped in plastic after disappearing for two days inside a subdivision in Querétaro.
In May, Juan David, from Guanajuato, was the victim of physical, verbal, and emotional abuse. At the age of 11, he was beaten to death by his stepfather, a former municipal police officer. The minor’s body has not been found.
In November, at the age of 15, Joshua Hugo was found dead in Chiapas, with stab wounds and probable signs of torture. So far no one has been arrested.
Context
food deficiency
The National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (Coneval) estimates that 26.3 percent of the population between 0 and 17 years of age in Mexico lacked access to nutritious and quality food in 2020, its latest report presented in December 2020. 2022.
This indicates that 9.7 million children had direct access to ultra-processed foods and sugary drinks. Schools were detected as an entity of consumption of these products, although from the homes it was indicated that there are economic problems to access all food groups, such as proteins and vegetables.
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Migration
From January to November 2022, 23,340 people between the ages of 0 and 17 were repatriated from the United States to Mexico. This represents an increase of 10.8 percent over 2021.
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