Creart in Mexico
Creart collaborates with the locals organizations El Rebozo and Tsomanotik providing psychosocial support in addressing the different types of violence suffered by girls, boys, young people and women in the state of Chiapas.
Context
Organized crime, drug trafficking, drug use, the increase in homicides and disappearances, and the growth of violence are causing social decomposition, which puts the physical and psychological integrity of the population of the state of Chiapas at risk, especially in the region of Venustiano Carranza, Teopisca, Socoltenango, Comitán de Domínguez and the municipalities on the Mexico-Guatemala border, where the drug trafficking business grows openly, seeks to expand and take root.
Regions with curfews imposed by armed persons, constant armed attacks on entire communities and the uncontrolled increase in homicides with firearms against children and adolescents create a situation of fear that has awakened alerts in organizations and citizens who demand action of state institutions. The situation is further aggravated in the indigenous areas of Los Altos de Chiapas, where armed violence has impacted community life.
With a high presence of rural indigenous population, the municipality of Tzimol has 16,560 inhabitants and is located within the group of municipalities with the highest marginality in the entire country. 7.31% of boys and girls between the ages of 8 and 14 cannot read or write, a percentage that rises to 24.81% among people aged 15 or over. Illiteracy especially affects women.
Intervention by Creart
We support El Rebozo and Tsomanotik, our local partners in Mexico, through the “Brodart. Weaving emancipation”, financed by the Anelba Foundation. Both organizations are located in Tzimol: El Rebozo promotes the defense and care of life, territories and Mother Earth by building networks of mutual care and community participation, to sow relationships free of violence; Tsomanotik promotes care for nature, sustainability and a dignified life for people through an agroecological, educational and productive center.
Under the common umbrella of addressing the different types of violence suffered by girls, boys, young people and women in the state of Chiapas and within the framework of work in psychosocial support, we work with different groups: on the one hand, with the group of women promoters of the community from Zaragoza la Montaña, at 2,237 meters above sea level. Strong and resilient women who, in addition to carrying the burden of the house and raising children, look for and carry firewood and water every day, are in charge of the family crops and even help their husbands to produce charcoal. Women who suffer a multitude of social, structural and family violence. With the workshops that we have shared, we have contributed to making visible and reinforcing their personal virtues as well as the emotional ties between them from the importance of community mutual support and care in a safe space.
On the other hand, with the teachers of the Jaime Nuno and Rosario Castellano primary schools, both in Tzimol, we have opened creative and pedagogical spaces sharing our methodology and experience in education for Peace through art. This training with teachers opens a work process with children and young people in the face of the growing presence of drug traffickers and organized crime in the area.
As part of the project, we have shared workspaces with local Chiapas organizations that are experts in peace building. Our support has helped to strengthen the network formed by these entities, among which is El Rebozo.
We have also carried out other more specific interventions directly with children, young people and families that have contributed to reinforcing the impact of the social work of our local partner.
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