Peru’s child workers stake their claims
Luis-Jaime Cisneros, journalist in Lima, Peru
A child shells corncobs in the Urubamba valley in Peru’s Cuzco department.
Young Peruvians set
up a pioneering movement for working children and teenagers
They’re called “Nats”,
the acronym of Niños y Adolescentes Trabajadores–Child and Teenage Workers.
The term mainly refers to needy children in towns and cities, although there are
more child workers in the countryside. Poverty, unemployment and family problems,
including violence, have pushed them onto the streets. Often it isn’t possible–or
even desirable–for them to return home to their parents. They frequently work in
very harsh conditions and are exploited and mistreated.
The International Labour Organisation reckons there are 17.5 million child workers
in Latin America, but some NGOs say there are between 25 and 30 million, including
1.5 to 2 million in Peru. The United Nations has criticized Peru for being the only
country in Latin America to legally allow children to work from the age of 12, instead
of 14 as elsewhere.
The Nats in Lima, Peru’s capital, were the first children in the world to organize
themselves in a social movement. In the early 1970s, members of the Christian Workers
Youth Movement opened centres for street children in the city’s poorest neighbourhoods.
Most of the centres looked after children who earned a living doing odd jobs in open-air
markets.
A national
charter
But when Lima city council threatened in 1976 to sell the land on which the street
children’s centres stood, there was an outcry. In the southern part of the city,
the children, their parents, grandparents and others got together to defend the centres.
They also demanded that the centres be connected to water, electricity and sewage
services. The children and teenagers called for access to school places and health
care.
The protests brought the children’s centres together into a loose network, and gradually
the movement took shape. Its supporters developed the idea of “protagonism”, i.e.
considering children as responsible people, defending their right to work, and believing
in their ability to act for themselves, organize and generally improve their own
situation.
The Movement of Working Children of Christian Workers (MANTHOC) was set up in Lima
in 1978. “Our aim was to strengthen a movement established by and for children and
geared to their specific needs,” says Nelly Torres, the founder of MANTHOC. “We wanted
them to share their experiences with the majority of street children, who weren’t
organized.” The movement slowly spread to other towns, even though it still only
involved a very small number of Nats.
Today Torres runs the National Movement of Peruvian Young Workers’ Organizations
(MNNATSOP), a federation set up in 1996 representing nearly 10,000 children between
7 and 14 living in 18 towns all over the country. It has drawn up a national charter
for the rights of Nats. Its members point out that because the school dropout rate
is very high, children are better off working rather than hanging about the streets
all day long. A job can even help keep their families together by providing extra
income.
MNNATSOP believes that the essential thing is for the Nats to earn respect, and encourages
them to associate in production workshops to demand better working conditions. A
credit system has been set up to enable the most vulnerable Nats to reduce their
working hours so they can study or enjoy themselves.
MNNATSOP considers it very important to develop good relations with the authorities.
Last year, it scored a success by signing an agreement with the Lima city government,
which promised to create 600 jobs for Nats over the next two years. Negotiations
to win social security rights are also going on, though so far without success. However,
a number of ad hoc agreements have been signed with hospitals and clinics which have
agreed to provide child workers with free medical care.
More progress seems to have been made on the educational front, thanks to efforts
by NGOs and by the government. MANTHOC opened the first school for Nats in 1986 in
a south Lima neighbourhood. It was geared to child workers’ hours and interests.
In 1996, the ministry of education started special programmes for Nats in 9 of the
capital’s primary schools.
MNNATSOP also has a scheme to protect young workers called Colibri, which is run
by the national police force. “We try to protect street children from delinquents,
but also from abuse by city officials who might, for example, seize the wares of
unauthorized child vendors,” says Col. Luis Hermosa Ortega.
“I ran away from home because my dad’s new wife beat me,” says Pablo Ortiz Vicuña,
a 12-year-old being looked after by Colibri officials. “Now I live at the house of
a friend who washes cars like me. Sometimes I go begging but only when I don’t have
anything to eat.”
