MEXICO.- Eighteen years have passed since Irma García graduated to be a police officer in one of the first generations of women who made their way to confront social ills in Mexico with arms.
The presence of women in Mexican police forces was little by little until for the first time this year more than men graduated from Mexico City academies.
Although the former had the opportunity over the years 30 within the police corporations in Mexico their role was more administrative until in the 21st century, they began to have more power in street surveillance , in strategy, direction and intelligence.
“When I started this career, it was more difficult for mothers to leave their children with their husbands, now they accept it more, just like the family: before they told you “you’re crazy; now it is becoming more and more the norm.
In the year 2000 policewomen represented only 3% of total elements; Currently, they represent little more than 24% of the total 232,000 people assigned to public security functions in state public administrations in Mexico in 2020, according to figures from the National Institute of Geography and Information Statistics.
As of mid-February, the Banking Police and the Preventive Police of CDMX announced that for the first time they had more women graduates than men.
Claudia Sheimbaum, mayor of Mexico City, He explained that this statistic “speaks of the changes that the Mexico City Police is undergoing, which no longer only reacts to crimes, but also does prevention and intelligence to avoid sterile armed confrontations.
Irma García (Cuautitlán Izcali, 2000) says that today any policewoman can put “anyone” out of action because they are prepared in various fields.
She herself has been a bodyguard for top-level officials such as secretaries of state, attorneys, etc.; investigative police officer and twice champion in the World Boxing Council and one of the National Boxing Association as a representative of the Mexican police forces.
“I don’t want to seem like an exaggerated feminist but women are disciplined and we try to do things in the best way and equipment”, specifies Irma “Torbellino” who is currently an inspector of the CDMX Public Safety and Citizen Protection Police.
CHIAROSCUROS
According to the survey prepared by the civil organization Common Cause “What do the police think? , applied to 5, 000 state police men and women from all over the country in 2019, the majority of this population works in precarious conditions.
In addition to facing great dangers in their daily lives, they have low wages, work shifts of 24 hours or more, they don’t get enough training and they pay for their equipment. In addition to this, police officers face discrimination and a lack of value for their work.
Worse still, women are even more vulnerable: three out of every 100 of them mentioned having suffered or witnessed sexual abuse. This proportion is reduced to one of each 100 in the case of male police officers.
For On the other hand, 35% of the women indicated that some of their partners had received offensive compliments, comments about their appearance or of a sexual nature, vs. 18% of men.
Under these conditions, why would a woman be interested in this job? The answers are multiple. For Irma García it was a challenge; for others, an opportunity to show their abilities beyond gender.
In Ciudad Juárez, one of the most dangerous cities in the world in the past decade, the Academy of The Municipal Police is now headed by a woman: Adela Fierro Cano, who last year was chosen as Police of the Year by a qualifying jury made up of municipal authorities and representatives of civil society.
Fierro Cano has a degree in International Relations, a master’s degree in Public Security Systems Management and a Diploma in Public Policies with a Gender Perspective. She is also accredited as a Replicator Instructor in the Criminal Justice System.
In other cases, the work has not been option but a salvation, as recently declared in Aguililla, Michoacán, Ángeles Cervantes, the only policewoman in the town hit by the cartel war.
After seven years without police in the municipality because the previous ones were infiltrated by organized crime, a public security corporation was formed accompanied by the Army to restore the rule of law.
“Necessity makes one, not there is work in Aguililla”, Cervantes told the press.
FUTURE
For Irma “Torbellino” García, the future of policewomen throughout the country will gain strength because there is interest from them and , to the extent that they take power there will be more opportunities as is happening now in CDMX with Marcela Figueroa.
“We are in a transition to leave machismo behind”, he specifies.
In March 2021 The secretary of Citizen Security Omar García appointed Marcela Figueroa as his right arm to integrate a professional police force.
The new undersecretary is a teacher in Political Science , with a specialty in Comparative Politics, from the Central European University based in Hungary; she has a degree in Political Science and Public Administration from the National Autonomous University of Mexico; He has studies in public policy and political theory from the University of California San Diego campus.
“The attitude of men in the police has improved and there are more and more comradeship, they trust us, that if we are fellow patrolmen we will answer for them, protect them like any man”, says Irma García. “They no longer put their foot or obstacles because regardless of whether we are men or women, we risk our lives daily.”
Only in the two months of 2022, female police officers from municipal, state corporations and prisons in Chihuahua, Guanajuato, Monterrey, Zacatecas and there have also been accusations against him for abuse of authority, as also occurs in the case of baronial security elements.
But the victory begins because there are no longer gender limits, but humans.
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