Latin American women have taken to the streets this Tuesday using creativity to remind their governments that there is still a long way to go before there is equality and justice.
They have taken to the streets in one of the most unequal and violent regions in the world for women: in 2020, a total of 4,091 women were murdered throughout the region, according to data from the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.
In Mexico, a country where the call for 8-M has become an increasingly massive protest in recent years, feminist groups even resorted to heaven to tell their rulers that they continue to kill them.
“10 daily femicides, none in oblivion”, could be seen on Monday in a zeppelin that flew over Mexico City.
Colombian women, who began the year with the decriminalization of abortion in a historic decision by the Supreme Court, have lived the day as a call to defend the rights they have won.
In Argentina, where strict restrictions imposed during the pandemic curtailed demonstrations for two years, it was an opportunity to "take back the streets" and show the strength of the feminist movement.
Chile lives a week of expectation for the investiture of Gabriel Boric,
the youngest president in its history, who has already appointed a Cabinet with a majority of women;
and Brazil counts the hours of the Government of Jair Bolsonaro.
This is a review of the day of demonstrations for 8-M in Latin America together with the journalists of EL PAÍS throughout the region:
Mexico: a massive call in the face of violence
That violence against women be stopped is the main demand in Mexico, which has counted 30,000 murdered in the last decade.
Given the inaction of the authorities, women have risen up in recent years as one of the main opposition movements to the Government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who in his public statements tends to diminish the drama of femicides in the country and charge against feminists.
"I make a call so that there is no provocation and there is no violence," the president asked on Monday.
This Tuesday, a few hours before the massive call for the demonstration, the president made a lukewarm demand for "equality at all levels (...) for men and women", shortly before the Mexican women took to the streets.
Women's groups painted MEXICO FEMINICIDA on billboards placed by the government in front of the National Palace in Mexico City.
Monica Gonzalez
Throwing out Bolsonaro, an absolute priority in Brazil
The absolute priority of the women who have marched this March 8 in São Paulo is to remove Jair Bolsonaro from power now.
That is, in the October elections.
For protester Laudiceia Reis, 31, the current president is "without a doubt" the main problem for Brazilian women.
"Because his sexist politics permeates everything, it represents hatred of women and minorities," explained this Tuesday afternoon the health official on Paulista Avenue, one of the main arteries of the city.
Reis believes that, if Lula wins, as the polls predict, "we will be able to dialogue again, to think about moving forward and not going backwards like now."
Although feminist groups were among the conveners of the demonstration, a large part of those present raised banners and flags of political, union and social movements linked to the parties of the Brazilian left.
Women marching in Rio De Janeiro.
MAURO PIMENTEL (AFP)
And reproductive rights or abortion, which Brazilian feminism has not been able to place in the public debate unlike its colleagues in Colombia, Argentina or Chile, have appeared on some banners but in a clear minority compared to the "Fora Bolsonaro" or " Lula, president.
The demonstrators have also unfurled banners against the Russian invasion in Ukraine and the sexist statements about Ukrainians that a state deputy made a few days ago during a solidarity trip to Kiev.
Surrounded by women who cried out against machismo, racism or femicide, the agronomist Lucía Salles, 60, has opted for the practical: she has come with a chair, a small table, a computer and a banner offering help to get her degree of elector.
"In the US and in Chile, the abstentionists who went to vote made a difference, they achieved the return of the progressives to power."
Recently retired, she intends to emulate that strategy.
Colombia defends the ground gained
In Colombia, the marches and events organized by women in the main cities of the country had the motto "to stir up the hornet's nest": a wake-up call for rights, to denounce sexual abuse and femicide and insist that the recent ruling be implemented. of the Constitutional Court that last month decriminalized abortion until the 24th week. “We have insisted for a long time, the living conditions of women in Colombia continue to be at risk: during the first two months of 2022, more than 40 abortions have been committed. femicides and more than 35 transfeminicides between 2021 and 2022. At the same time, we continue to disproportionately carry out care work and represent double the unemployment rate.
78% of unpaid care tasks are assumed by us,
Dozens of women marched through the streets of Bogotá.Natalia Pedraza (EFE)
Argentina returns to the streets after two years of restrictions due to covid
"Recover the streets" is the slogan for this 8-M in Argentina against the sexist violence of the Ni Una Menos collective.
After two years without public demonstrations on this date due to the pandemic, in which violence against women intensified, feminist movements march again to remind the State that it owes a great debt to half of its population and demand public policies more active in pursuit of gender equality and the eradication of violence.
This year's demonstration is marked by the outrage caused by the gang rape perpetrated eight days ago against a 20-year-old girl in one of the most touristic neighborhoods of the Argentine capital.
A group of women paste posters with slogans in the streets of Buenos Aires.
JUAN MABROMATA (AFP)
Chile, before the expectation of the "feminist government" of Gabriel Boric
In Chile there is expectation on the part of the women's movements before the investiture of Gabriel Boric this Friday.
The president, who in the campaign that led him to the presidency assured that his would be a feminist government, has already given two signs that he does not want him to be left alone in a declaration of intent.
The first, by appointing a cabinet with a majority of female ministers (14 out of 24) and, the second, by including the Ministry of Women and Gender Equity, with Antonia Orellana at the head, in the political committee, the first ring of the decision making.
Two women perform during the protest in the streets of Santiago.
MARTIN BERNETTI (AFP)
"The Ministry of Women and Gender Equality is going to have an office in La Moneda and from there work side by side with all the ministries of the political committee to be able to lead this Government with a gender perspective," said Camila Vallejo, who will be at the in front of the General Secretariat of Government, at a press conference offered together with other future Boric ministers this Tuesday, before the marches called in the country began.
For her part, the future Minister of the Interior, Izkia Siches, promised "a very powerful agenda to be able to bridge the gaps that exist in lactation rooms and in terms of care" for working mothers.
Venezuela protests against violence and precariousness
The agenda of feminism in Venezuela is crossed by the prolonged humanitarian crisis that the country is experiencing, which has caused the migration of more than six million Venezuelans in the last year and hits women much harder in terms of access to basic rights and also to employment.
This Tuesday, the health and education unions, pensioners and activists came together to denounce the precariousness in which they live due to the policies implemented by the Government of Venezuela.
The main slogan was for decent wages.
In Venezuela, despite the recent increase in the minimum wage decreed by Nicolás Maduro, remuneration does not exceed one dollar per day, which does not allow paying for the basic food basket.
This also encourages unemployment: between 2014 and 2021, the inactivity of Venezuelan women went from 57% to 67%,
according to data from the Survey of Living Conditions of Venezuelans.
"I've lost 20 kilos because I can't eat enough," a pensioner denounced this morning before the media cameras in the middle of the protest.
They also demonstrated against all violence and had to face it in the same place where they met on March 8.
A woman shouts during the March 8 march in Caracas.
Ariana Cubillos (AP)
The women gathered in the Parque Carabobo, a square in the center of Caracas in front of the Prosecutor's Office.
The activity, which had an important call, was silenced by a political event that Chavismo organized in the same place also for Women's Day.
Loudspeakers sounded slogans in favor of Nicolás Maduro, while the women shouted for his demands.
PSUV militants intimidated a group of women calling them violent and occupying the place where they were.
"They told us that feminism is Chavista and that is not the case, nor that women are violent for demanding our rights," the activists denounced on social networks.
A part of the group continued the protest, but they had to go underground.
In a nearby station of the Caracas Metro they sang,
Demands for justice and food security prevail in Peru
Thousands marched for International Women's Day in the center of Lima, Cusco, Trujillo and Cajamarca last Saturday, in the main concentration of 8-M, although on Tuesday afternoon groups of activists again held sit-ins and walks in Arequipa, Puerto Maldonado (in the south of the Amazon), and in front of Congress, when the cabinet of Prime Minister Aníbal Torres asked for a vote of confidence from the Legislature.
“Neither a macho Executive, nor a patriarchal and neoliberal Congress”, were the slogans.
"Out with the machistas of Congress," read one of the banners.
In Saturday's mobilization, the leaders of the common pots of Lima, survival networks that have re-emerged in 2020 due to the economic crisis caused by the pandemic, joined the feminist groups.
A statement signed by the Open Assembly #8M, made up of more than 120 groups of activists from all over the country, calls on the government to urgently allocate resources for these food safety networks in the cities.
In the marches, the protesters have demanded that the State take action against sexist violence due to the increase in femicides and missing persons, since in 2021, of 12,984 complaints, 7,010 girls and women have not been located;
the figure was more than double that of the previous year.
In 2021, there were 147 femicides, according to official figures.
The presidential silence on abortion takes the march in Ecuador
Although the Constitutional Court of Ecuador decriminalized in 2021 abortion in case of rape, the law that regulates how to access the interruption of pregnancy is pending.
It was approved by the National Assembly but is not in force because it awaits the pronouncement of President Guillermo Lasso.
The conservative politician, declared defender of life from conception, announced and ratified this March 8 that he will veto the text.
He has not specified how or if it will be a total or partial veto of the regulation that allows minors to abort up to week 18 and adults up to week 12. Always and only in cases of rape.
Activists from the Red Moon organization march through the streets of Quito.
Jose Jacome (EFE)
Ecuadorian feminist organizations took to the streets and social networks a request to the president to respect the step taken by the Constitutional Court.
Despite the fact that the day of demonstrations was clouded by the heavy rain, Guayaquil and Quito came out to claim the debts of the State with the feminist struggle.
Sexist violence, lack of labor and salary equality and judicial impunity were the protagonists of the cheers of the protesters.
"There is nothing to celebrate or congratulate," they stressed.
It is a day of vindication.
Bolivia wakes up to the wave of femicides
In Bolivia, the day was part of a wave of rejection of the justice system due to the scandal caused by the premature release, in exchange for money, of several murderers of women sentenced to 30 years, the maximum sentence under Bolivian law.
In 2020, 113 femicides were registered;
108 in 2021, one every three days.
In addition, three out of four Bolivian women acknowledge having suffered violence, according to UN data.
Aymara women arrive in the city of La Paz, after a walk that began in the neighboring city of El Alto on the occasion of International Women's Day.
Martin Alipaz (EFE)
There were marches in most of the country's capitals.
The main protest took place outside the courts of La Paz, the administrative capital.
María Galindo, a referent of Bolivian feminism, spread out a “carpet of shame” with the photographs and the names of the prosecutors and judges who benefited the criminals.
"Shame must change sides" was her slogan.
Galindo declared that the national military service must be changed so that it ceases to be a "school of violence and machismo."
In Bolivia, attendance at the “barrack” is compulsory for men.
In rural and popular sectors, it is the main rite of passage to adult life.
On the other side of the country, in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, activist Guadalupe Perez was pleased that feminism is going beyond its traditional audience, the middle classes,
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