Mararía celebrated the second day of its 'Volunteering, Social Action and Human Rights' conference, which the association itself called the “reunion meeting”, and focused the debate on the urgent revision of the Law against gender violence, to include coverage for victims of sexual exploitation and in the demand for the abolition of prostitution.
This law is considered by the association as “a form of slavery normalized and legitimized by the money lobby, which also provides coverage for pimping, trafficking in women, surrogate motherhood, sex tourism or the pornography industry”.
In relation to this situation, the pedagogue, trainer of the International Abolitionist School and author of the guide “Silence is not an option”, Laura Pedernera, spoke, who denounced “the impunity of those who profit from the prostitution system” and demanded “the rescue of survivors of sexual exploitation”.
According to Mararía, the other major line of argument in the morning referred “to the human rights of migrant women, who suffer double discrimination due to gender and their status as foreigners”.
The feminist lawyer and activist of the Association for Integral Development, Nuria González, also pointed to the Law against Gender Violence, which “requires an in-depth review” since it protects victims in an irregular situation only when the aggressions come from their partners: “Reporting a rape while undocumented can end in deportation, so most cases are silenced,” she criticized.
González lashed out at local corporations that still violate the right of migrant women to register, “a procedure that is delayed with all kinds of excuses to avoid protecting a group that they believe will exhaust social resources without the consideration of the vote.” And she recalled that, without that certificate, “women in their situation are unable to request any help from institutions, from school books to the food bank.”
NGO Communications
The section dedicated to NGO communications included the intervention of the president of the Federation of Women's Associations Arena y Laurisilva, Olga Barrera, who valued “the networking work and took a tour of the projects and programs with which the entity works on the different islands”, with the aim, among others, that “the money from the state pact does not end up being converted into merchandising.”
The president of the Federation of Young Women, Ada Santana, demanded “a specific political agenda for the age group between 16 and 30 years”, considering that their needs and demands are systematically ignored: “For our group, there was a setback in the Abortion Law, whose reform obliges women aged 16 and 17 to have parental permission to terminate their pregnancy”, she recalled.
She also assured that the conviction that the conquered rights “can disappear at any moment has been an incentive for the mobilization of young people.”
The spokesperson for the Association “For You Woman”, Lucy Polo, described Spanish immigration policy as “slow-motion reception” and said that “there can be no integration in a society that does not open the door for you.” She also denounced that “the new slavery is internal domestic service”, an area in which most foreign women in Spain work.
After the intervention of the vice president of the Mararía association, Carmen Delia Reyes, Patricia Ponce from the Haurralde Fundazioe, an entity collaborating in the organization of the Conference, closed the day.
Ponce provided data from gender observatories, “whose indicators show the impact of violence against women in all its manifestations, the feminization of poverty, displacements due to climate crises, mostly carried out by this group, or the consequences on women's health of the pandemic”.
Likewise, she referred to the sustainable development goals as a general responsibility of humanity. “If women want to lead the change, we must act from our environment, in addition to demanding that public authorities measure up to this global challenge,” she added.
The closing session of the Volunteering, Social Action and Human Rights Conference was dedicated “to collective work in discussion tables on racism, human rights violations in migrant women, the abolition of prostitution and the challenges of human rights in the 2030 agenda”.
Regarding its conclusions, Mararía recalls that “a political document will be prepared for the departments of public administrations that work on equality matters.”
