April 2018
Dear Friends of Atzin and Tlamacazapa,
Each year the Atzin team summarizes "the numbers" for each of our programs in Tlamacazapa, Mexico. Have a look at the Special Needs Program during 2017 from a numbers perspective. While the administrative procedures, intensive training and accounting activities are done by the team based at the Atzin House in Cuernavaca, Morelos, the day-to-day program activities are carried out in Tlamacazapa by local village women, called "promoters." Each takes responsibility for specific activities in a program. Total of program promoters: 21.
The Special Needs Program (SNP) serves those most in need of support because chronic health problems, acute poverty, malnutrition or family crisis. From January through to July 2017, participants in the SNP included:
JANUARY TO END JULY 2017
Of those 123 people,
From August through to December 2017, participants in the SNP included:
AUGUST TO DECEMBER 2017
Of those 53 people,
You may have noted the drop in number of individuals between July and August - a major supporter of the SNP withdrew funding; the organization had shifted its priorities in programming to women's groups. We had no option but to comb through registry and continue to work with those with the most acute needs, while seeking to build up the program funding base once again.
A report of the numbers captures only part of the SNP story but gives an idea of the participants and the activities. For any of us who has had a family member with a special need, we know first hand the tremendous amount of effort that is required to access treament, address personal and social needs, and keep stress at bay. All of you reading this note have donated to help the folks with special needs and living in acute poverty in this part of Mexico. Stay tuned for my next update from the field.... and thank you once again
As always, Susan
Executive Director
Atzin Mexico
Special Needs Program Report. The following account about a young village mom and her small daughter highlights the critical importance of health, education and mutual support.
A young mother, Martina, reads aloud, using her index finger to highlight each word while her eight-year old daughter, Rosa, listens and prompts her mom on occasion. Let me tell you about the remarkable story behind this photo.
Four years ago, Rosa - thin, pale and weak - was diagnosed with leukemia. Overwhelmed and afraid, Martina tearfully asked the Atzin team in Tlamacazapa for help. We said yes, and Martina and Rosa moved into the Atzin House in Cuernavaca; Rosa’s extended treatment started at the regional children’s hospital with financial and moral support from Atzin and lots of accompaniment.
Suddenly everything was new and stressful for Martina. All her life, she had lived with her parents and five siblings in a crowded palm hut with a dirt floor, cooking over a smoky three-rock fire, never leaving the village. All were illiterate and weavers of simple palm baskets, just barely surviving from day-to-day. Then this health crisis hit and they feared the worst. Martina’s only option was to learn to handle life in the city - taking buses, cooking on a gas stove, answering a phone, and most importantly, managing the confusing hospital systems and caring for Rosa while memorizing the many medications and procedures. We witnessed her determined courage to save Rosa, and Martina gradually made herself indispensable in the Atzin House, proudly earning a daily salary, until Santa Rosa recovered completely and returned to live in the village.
There is another layer to this story. Martina wanted to read. “How much simpler life would be,” she said longingly, “if I could just read the medicine labels, the bus signs, the instructions. Imagine If I could read to Rosa!” In response, Lupe and Ana, both living in the Atzin House with a scholarship to attend high school, began teaching Martina to read and write in the evenings as part of their community service. It was slow going, more difficult for Martina than managing the bus and the hospital. Lupe and Ana tutored Rosa as well, and despite her many absences from school, Rosa can now read and write well, having quickly surpassed her mother’s ability. She continues to thrive. Mother and daughter read together, each having helped the other, and their futures are forever changed for the better.
Martina and Rosa’s story illustrates a long crisscrossing thread of people helping people. In a similar way, we can trace the influence of Atzin’s programs. They are interconnected, allowing families to participate in different programs as needs arise. For example, a pregnant woman can be seen by the midwife; her children attended by the dentist; her son enrolled in the tutoring program to help him pass his grade in school; her toddler with special needs registered in the young child stimulation program.
These programs have evolved over time in constant consultation with villagers. They are successful because we carefully listen to people and respond to the best of our ability. Our small Centre in Tlamacazapa overflows with people and materials - the noise can be deafening! There is so much to do, always. Please support us as best you can, and thank you for all your help.
As always, Susan
P.S. Santa Rosa now 11 years old is doing well and recently joined Atzin as our youngest volunteer helping in the Special Needs Program. How cool is that?
This project report is a submission to GlobalGiving's 2017 Fail Forward Contest. Organizations are asked to share a story of when they tried something new that didn't go as planned and how they learned from it. Here is our story of Reweaving a Life in Mexico: Failure on Two Fronts.
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"Blood will flow if you continue helping these women to have land in our village," exclaimed one older man loudly, getting to his feet and pointing at everyone present. A second man did the same, shouting, "Yes, this is what will happen."
People listening were stunned into surprised silence. This was a conciliation meeting in 2009 attended by five village women and 22 comuneros, all village men responsible for local land affairs. The meeting was chaired by the State Land Affairs Office (Procuraduria Agraria). Also present were representatives from: the State Ministry of Women; the State Human Rights Commission; the Guerrero Institute of Human Rights/ Tlachinollan; the Municipal Government, and the press. The comuneros all started talking at once; no negotiation was possible and the meeting ended shortly after.
Let me fill in some background. In 2005 after eight years of tough development work in Tlamacazapa, a large rural Nahua village of palm basket weavers, the Atzin team decided to work towards the establishment of a small wellness centre for women. Together with our local team members called promoters (people who carry day-to-day responsibility for program operations), we visualized a space for women to gather, to find their voices, to learn new skills and to offer services to the community. The promoters scoured the crowded village of 6200 people, finally located a suitable plot of land on its outskirts, and quietly started negotiating with its owner for possession by one woman who agreed to represent the group. Historically she would become the first woman to have land in her name in the village. However, this triggered the start of reactive pushback from comuneros who believed that land could only be held by men.
The team dug up records and figured out that, of the 196 registered comuneros, all were men but only 173 were actually alive and living in the village, and only 25% of these had agricultural land themselves (supposedly prerequisites for comunero status). This number represented roughly 9% of adult village men and 0% of women. With legal counsel, nineteen women took the first step of a two step process: they submitted documentation to the Municipal and State Land Affairs offices to be formally recognized as born in, and resident of, Tlamacazapa. This then would establish their eligibility to be named as village comuneras and thereby participate in land decisions.
This was the start of multiple visits to various government offices at village, municipal and state levels, the filing of documentation at each level, and domiciliary verification by officials -- in total, a lengthy and costly process in terms of effort and transport expenses. In May 2010 their petition ended up at the State Land Court (Tribunal Agraria). Outside of court, the judge minced no words: "I see where this is going and I will deny your petition." He washed his hands of the matter and passed it back to the village comuneros who predictably ignored his instruction to hold a village assembly for recognition of the women's status.
So the women lost on both fronts. A crushing disappointment, they were denied status as residents of their own village, and despite submission of formal documented complaints, no disciplinary action was taken by government for continued verbal threats against the participating women by village men. Also, the tires of the Atzin van were deliberately punctured repeatedly and the four screws holding the van motor in place were cut, causing the motor to fall out when later driven home. Our lawyers' advice: there was too much tension to continue; stop all action. The women agreed.
The women had butted up against an unresolved contradiction in Mexican law. The 1917 Constitution and subsequent amendments (1992, 2001) stated the right of Indigenous populations to practice their established norms and customs (usos y custumbres). Â However, articles 22/76/79/82 of the 1992 Agrarian Amendment to the Constitution clearly outlined the rights of women to own and administer property.
Looking back, the group knew beforehand that a woman´s claim to a small plot of land would threaten the dominant status quo and trigger negative reactions from certain comuneros; but they had underestimated the extent of disinterest or (fearful) reluctance of officials to challenge macho customs. They had trusted that due judicial process if diligently pursued would yield at least some progress. Instead, the judge had supported the continued marginalization of women. So what to do when paternalistic, macho norms in an Indigenous community negate the right of its women to possess land?
Under the circumstances the women decided to quietly maintain a presence on the land -- each year they worked together to clear the lot, till the soil and plant corn, and no one came to kick them off. They brushed aside any insulting comments, always walked in pairs and carried on. In the meantime, the Atzin team continued its community programs as well as weekly learning circles for promoters and children about basic human rights and other development themes.
Epilogue. There is a silver lining to this story, one that reframes the failures. Several years later in 2013 a new person was elected as chair of the comuneros. Several promoters approached him to re-open discussions about women, land and the wellness centre. Amazingly he formally recognized their land document and agreed to allocate plots to several female promoters who were household heads. More lessons arose: a new person in a power position can mean new opportunity and, persistence with right timing of actions is crucial.Â
At least twelve individual women now have land and no blood flowed in the streets. The original vision of a women's wellness centre - a goal still closely held by the promoters, one that is biding its time - gradually led to a shift in social attitude and to the possibility of land possession by women albeit in a long and twisting path over nine years.
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