24 Oct 2011

MEXICO / HOMELESS

As global population rises, projected to reach 7 billion in October 2011, so does the population of the world’s cities. Thousands of young people live as homeless on the streets of Mexico City, the world’s eighth largest city. Many of them, who had fled their homes because of lack of jobs or family violence now find themselves in squalid and often dangerous conditions. UNFPA

Posted at: October 24, 2011 1:03 pm

Duration: 02:50

Available in: SD

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Full script

STORY: MEXICO / HOMELESS
TRT: 2:50
SOURCE: UNFPA
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGAUGES: SPANISH / NATS

DATELINE: RECENT, MEXICO CITY

SHOTLIST:

1. Various shots, street scenes in Mexico City
2. Various shots, Marisol washing clothes in the street
3. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Marisol: 
"I decided to live on my own on the streets when I'd had enough of living with my father.  I couldn't stand it anymore. I couldn't stand that he was abusing me. He wanted to continue doing this to me, so I left."
4. Med shot, Marisol walking through piles of garbage 
5. Various shots, street drugs 
6. Med shots, street people collecting empty bottles and cleaning car windows
7. Wide shot, pregnant street woman with young boy walking on the street.
8. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Marisol: 
"All of us girls on the streets run the same risks because often men say they'll give us something in exchange for sex."
9. Med shot, Edna Maday with Marisol
10. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Edna Maday, Fundacion Renacimento:
"It's a condition!  If a girl wants to be able to join and become part of a group, she has to let some of the boys have sex with her."
11. Med shot, homeless woman with baby
12. Med shot, UNFPA's Diego Palacios at office 
13. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Diego Palacios, Representative, United Nations Population Fund, Mexico: 
"So that the kids on the street don't feel abandoned, we have to bring their situation to public attention.  The Population Fund is working with the Mexican government to improve the quality of life for young people, especially for these kids who are the most vulnerable."
14. Various shots, Marisol cleaning her son
15. Wide shot, Marisol at dinner with other homeless people

STORYLINE:

As global population rises, projected to reach 7 billion in October 2011so does the population of the world's cities.  More and more people are migrating from rural areas to urban ones in search of a better life. Mexico City is now the eighth largest city in the world with more than 20 million inhabitants.

Marisol is one of the many young people who carve a life for themselves in the squalid and often dangerous conditions of the Mexico City streets. Official figures cite some 3,000 people living on the streets, most of them in their teens and twenties. Many say the figure is ten times higher. A large number of them have come to the capital city from their villages, driven by lack of jobs or, like Marisol, by family violence.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Marisol:
I decided to live on my own on the streets when I'd had enough of living with my father.  I couldn't stand it anymore, I couldn't stand that he was abusing me. He wanted to continue doing this to me, so I left.

She was just 11 years old.  Now, Marisol lives in a flimsy shack amidst piles of rubbish with a gang of other kids she calls her "family." They survive how they can collecting and selling plastic bottles for a meagre 20 cents a day or cleaning car windows. Life expectancy for these kids is about 30.

The drug is an industrial solvent they call "Mona." It eventually rots the body and the brain.  But it kills hunger and temporarily lifts the kids out of the horror of their daily lives.

But, says Marisol, for the girls, even greater dangers await them.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Marisol:
"All of us girls on the streets run the same risks because often men say they'll give us something in exchange for sex."

Edna Maday works for an organisation called Fundacion Renacimiento, which has a shelter for young people who've been living on the city streets. Prostitution to earn money for food, she says, is common. But the girls also have to earn their place in a gang.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Edna Maday, Fundacion Renacimiento:
"It's a condition! If a girl wants to be able to join and become a part of a group, she has to let some of the boys have sex with her."

And with that is the very real risk of contracting HIV and sexual diseases, as well as unplanned pregnancies.

Diego Palacios is the Representative of the United Nations Population Fund in Mexico.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Diego Palacios, United Nations Population Fund:
"So that the kids on the street don't feel abandoned, we have to bring their situation to public attention. The Population Fund is working with the Mexican government to improve the quality of life for young people and especially for these kids who are the most vulnerable."

And one of these is Marisol. But her life is slowly beginning to change.  Now she goes to a shelter daily to get a hot meal and to bath her baby.  Having already had three other children taken away from her and put into care, she fears losing Diego too. Edna hopes that she'll decide to move in and protect both herself and her son from the violent life on the streets.

Filed under MEXICO Recent UNFPA - United Nations Population Fund.