Global Women's Voices: Share Personal Stories

Virginia, Bolivia

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The court has condemned her to thirty years of prison without parole. “The murderer should die! The murderer should die!” These are the shouts that were heard during the trial at the Superior Court of the District of the City of La Paz in Bolivia. The news was heard all over the world, it was in September of 2002 when in Rio Cajones of the Yungas in La Paz, when the two lifeless bodies of a boy and a girl. At first they thought it had been an act of revenge by a group of drug traffickers, but after awhile it was discovered that their own mother had been the one who killed them. Since then, the unforgiving voices have crucified this women in front of all society. But what happened? How can a mother arrive at the point where she kills her own children? Seferina, a young, 26-year-old mother became a mother at 14 and later 16 years of age. An orphan living in extreme poverty, lacking any forms of affection, she entered a relationship that generated two unwanted children. In her own words, she says she “killed for love” because she was in a new relationship in which her children unwanted burdens. No one taught Seferina how to avoid conceiving, and no one gave her a chance, but now everyone condemns her. In addition there is another small detail that is so easily overlooked in a society that is so patriarchal and machista like this one. Who condemns the parents of forever abandoned children? Thirty years in jail for Seferina. Yes, but with her should go all hypocritical people who take away women’s right to use contraceptive methods under the idea that this is an unpopulated country that needs more habitants (half dead, starving habitants with not a single opportunity in a world that is cruelly globalized). Also, all those who deny a woman the possibility of obtaining an abortion with dignity even if she is a victim of rape should go to jail. They want jail, ok, but for all of them!

updated: 4/29/2003 1:46:00 PM