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The road to Anapra, Juarez’s infamous shantytown, hugs the border, stretching west from downtown Juarez. Many of the murdered women are from this slum—six were found on a hill in the distance.
As the paved road becomes dirt, the bright orange sand and plateaus clash with the plastic-and-plywood reality of Anapra. No grass, no white picket fences. Barbed wire separates the home of Martha Cecilia Contreras from the street. Children with no shoes play in stagnant puddles in the front yard.
Contreras’ home is the size of a tool shed. The house is clean despite its dank construction. Contreras brushes chopped onions off the kitchen table, wiping her hands on her shirt that reads “July 4th Celebration” before sitting down. She has five children in school, and she bounces her 8-month-old granddaughter in her lap. The little girl has light skin and blue eyes. Contreras’ daughter and son stand nearby, using a large bucket used to wash dishes.
“I tell (my children) that if there’s a car following them and saying they will give them candy, don’t listen. Don’t talk to people,” she says. “If someone goes to school and tells them their mother is sick, don’t go with them.”
One and a half million families who live in situations similar to Contreras’ moved to the Mexican border at the beginning of the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994 according to Global Trade Watch. NAFTA slashed trade restrictions between the United States, Mexico and Canada.
Juarez as a whole has seen a population explosion since the beginning of the trade agreement. Although the Mexican government census has the city at 1.3 million people, the real population could be close to two million because taking a census of its migrants is nearly impossible, says Victor Muñoz, the co-director of the Coalition Against Violence for Women and Families on the Border .
Although Anapra is crowded with makeshift homes and thousands of residents, there aren’t any police officers visible, no police stations. Esther Chavez of Casa Amiga says the lack of police presence in this area makes it easier for women to be abducted on their way to or from work. Combining the lack of justice with the desperate living situations has had a huge effect on the culture of the area, Chavez says.
“All the poverty here joined with alcohol—it’s like a bomb that makes men kill women,” she says.
A missing poster hangs from a shrine dedicated to the missing
women of Juarez that stands in downtown on 15th of September
Street in downtown Juarez.
A Second-Class Culture
The only way to solve the problems in Juarez is to completely change the way women are perceived in Mexican culture, Chavez says.
“A month ago, a 16-year-old girl was raped by two men. We denounced it, and the police denounced a man,” Chavez says. “He was freed because he said he was with a prostitute all night. What this man, a drug addict, told police had more weight.
“In the United States, people abide by the law. The guilty are penalized. Our laws are not respected. We need to rehire all the police and not just hire men who need a job to feed their families.”
The women of Juarez continue to fight their government, pushing for the political and social reforms needed to be safe. After more than 10 years of murders, few believe a solution is in sight.
On a busy street near a bridge that separates Mexico from the United States, an 8-year-old girl in shorts and a T-shirt blocks traffic. She is begging for her dinner, knocking on car windows and leaning through the driver’s side. She holds up one finger, uno peso por favor. Car after car screeches away from her. Still, she continues to knock on car windows, holding out her hand.
Lindsay Gebhart is a senior newspaper journalism major. This is her first time writing for The Burr.
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