Natasha Wilder

Remembering the Past, Changing the Future

An old woman chokes out regrets and promises as she grasps at the dark granite wall that snakes around one shaded edge of San Salvador's central Parque Cuscutlan. Her sorrow weaves down the deep creases in her cheeks and falls onto her faded blue dress. "No fue en vano, mi hijo. Vienen los cambios, te prometo. Los cambios vienen, mi hijo.— It was not in vain, my son. Change is coming, I promise you."

The Monumento a la Memoria y la Verdad (Monument to Memory and Truth) was created in 2003 to remember more than 25,000 Salvadorans who "disappeared" during El Salvador's 12-year civil war and the violent repressions that preceded it. Across each wall panel, the names of thousands of men, women and children silently testify against crimes untried. Though no longer engaged in the war that claimed more than 70,000 deaths before its end in 1992, El Salvador remains a country in conflict and in need.

In March 2008 I arrived in San Salvador to volunteer as an AJWS World Partners Fellow with El Instituto de Investigación, Capacitación y Desarrollo de la Mujer (IMU), a grassroots non-governmental organization (NGO) and AJWS grantee. Out of its office in San Salvador, IMU advocates for the rights of rural women throughout the country and provides training for women's associations on community organizing, sustainable agriculture, micro-enterprise, health education and self-esteem.

The organization was founded in the midst of El Salvador's civil war in 1986 by Norma Virginia Guirola de Herrera, who was assassinated three years later by members of the Salvadoran military for her visible role as a social activist. Today, the 20 Salvadoran women who comprise IMU's core staff maintain de Herrera's vision. Its executive director, Deysi Cheyne, is a high profile speaker on human rights issues and was an outspoken public presence during El Salvador's presidential elections in early 2009.

During the year I spent with IMU I worked with rural women's associations in the regions of Chalchuapa, Ahuachapán and Suchitoto. I facilitated trainings on stress reduction and conflict management, and assisted IMU staff while they coached women to run their own meetings and manage the finances of their communal micro-enterprise projects. In each community I visited, the wounds from the civil war still ached in the collective consciousness. The years of conservative rule since the war have done little to ease this pain, especially for poor populations.

Since the war ended in 1992, conservative politics and neoliberal policies like the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) have stimulated rapid economic growth for the small country while leaving the majority of Salvadorans behind. Despite the veneer of booming foreign factories and luxurious high-rise buildings sprouting up in San Salvador's wealthy neighborhoods, the capital city teems with the activity of informal street vendors struggling to feed their families. Additionally, almost 30 percent of the Salvadoran population lives on foreign soil; most have left El Salvador to seek work in the United States. Remittances sent home to their families comprise a staggering 16 percent of El Salvador's gross domestic product.

Despite the challenges posed by the political and economic climate, IMU continues to be a leader for social change in El Salvador and a champion of human rights for women and marginalized groups. IMU's successes are many: It has organized 13 women's groups in five regions of the country; provided courses on self esteem, relationships and reproductive and sexual health for more than 200 children in public schools in the capital city; and trained community leaders to become articulate voices for the struggles of rural women.

IMU's recent media campaign, seeking to increase the visibility around issues of poverty, has placed billboards along main thoroughfares that feature strong, brown arms hand-washing clothes and rows of Salvadoran women working in a sewing factory. The images from the campaign are a welcome change from the majority of the city's billboards, which feature light-skinned models advertising things like new homes and automatic washers that most Salvadorans will never own.

Just as the old woman prophesied at the Monument to Memory and Truth, change came to El Salvador on March 15, 2009 when Mauricio Funes, candidate of the socialist party the FMLN, was elected president. Funes' win represents the beginning of a hopeful shift for the country in the eyes of those working for social justice. Reflecting on the campaign and the election, a coworker from IMU said, "You can't imagine how intense it has been these past few months, but we did it. Now we can truly begin the work to fight for justice and create reconciliation."

 

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