Kápar

Liz Tasa (1988, Peru), She has been a finalist with this project in PHOTO IILA - XI Edition IIL and POY LATAM 2019

Kápar, according to the Quechua language, means to castrate. It is a word that in the Peruvian Andes is applied to animals but not to people, because in the andean cosmovision the fertility, both on land and in women, is of utmost importance.

Even so, when Alberto Fujimori was president of Peru, between 1990 and 2000, the National Program of Reproductive Health and Family Planning was executed. The main goal of this program was to reduce poverty and it was aimed at rural women with high levels of poverty that were mostly peasants. According to the Ombudsman's Office, 272 028 women were sterilized through this program, of which 2166 that were affected reported having been subjected, through deception or threats, to these methods of sterilization.

This was a systematized program in which the doctors complied with sterilization fees and made direct reports to the president. Given the urgency of reaching the goals, a high level of negligence was committed. Due to malpractice many have died and others have cancer of the uterus or strong infections in the womb that prevents them from working and producing the earth as before. «You can not die, you can not heal», are some of their testimonies.

These women coexist with strong physical and psychological traumas. Their husbands and community marginalize them because they have lost their reproductive faculties. Those are the reasons why my photographic project seeks to narrate visually, through analogies between the earth and the wounds, the physical and, above all, psychological consequences of the victims of forced sterilization.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Under the Family Planning program, 272,028 Peruvian women were sterilized and 22,004 men underwent vasectomy. The program was aimed primarily at indigenous, peasant and poor women. They no longer feel strong enough to help their husbands work in the fields and generate money. The main objectives of this campaign was to reduce poverty levels by reducing the birth rate in the poor but the results was the opposite, the fact that they can not work the field or its tissues as before affects their economy, their relationships with their husbands and their health.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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In Pampaconga (Cusco) Juana was the victim of forced sterilization as well as her cousin Josefina Quispe and her deceased sister Fernanda Quispe (who died of cancer of the uterus as a result of poor sterilization). Juana tells that the doctors questioned her about why she had children if she was not going to be able to keep them. Although she did not want to have any more children, the nurses convinced her husband, who could not read, to sign the permit. Now her husband regrets becasuse she is not the same.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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There were no previous medical examinations, results of the operation or follow-up even though their bodies looked affected daily by strong hemorrhages, stomach pains and cancer. The Defensoria del Pueblo en Peru has registered 18 deaths as a result of the bad operations in the comunity clinics. "They are feeling bad. In the comunity clinic they do not want to attend them because they already know that the women always complain about the same pain. We only want government support because many of my partners are dying”, said Cecilia Champis , president of victims forced sterilizations in Pitumarca, Cusco.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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In the Andean cosmovision Las Paqarinas are the access roads with the world inside (Ukjupacha), where the germs of creation are concentrated: plants, animals and human beings. The earth represents one of the sacred beings that make up its universe and to which it is attributed, mainly, the capacity to allow the reproduction of life as well as the woman.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Ikumi (a woman whitouh child) Caption This Woman are marginalized within their social environment and are known contemptuously as the "Machorras", thats mean a sterile female. Since fertility is importance in their comunity ,womans are abandoned by their husbands because they can't give them more children. "At that time when my neighbors found out I had been sterilized they called me in the streets" Machorra ". You are a mule, a capona (referring to a castrated woman like the animal). Why do you think your husband has left you? Surely you have been operated to be with other men", is the testimony of one of the victims.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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The case of forced sterilization in Peru is a serious violation of women's reproductive rights, constituting a serious case of violence, since it implies aggression and affects their physical integrity and safety "They insult you, they say: 'You want to have children like a pigs.' Then they assure you that you will heal quickly, but it is a lie.The scar heals fast outside, but not inside, because we do a very hard job, with a lot of strength ".- Hilaria Supa

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Many of the doctors who performed these operations were not well trained to carry them out, leaving in the wombs of the victims the trace of their malpractice. The physical consequences of forced sterilizations still remain, many of them present intense pain in the abdomen, loss of strength, headaches or general malaise, in addition to psychological consequences such as depression.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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"They took me between two people and leave me in the health care center in Limatambo, Cusco. They asked me how many children do I have. Five, I replied. They shouted, "Even that you want to have children as a rabbit? I started crying and asked them what are they going to do. They answered that it would only be an injection, then I lost consciousness. I got up scared, my hands numb, my belly hurt. ¡I'm thirsty, I said!. The nurse took a candy and put it in my mouth and sai “that will be enough”- Josefina Quispe.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Tecla Quispe (55 years old). Tecla was sought by the nurses in her village of Combata (Cusco) to take her to the post and sterilize her since the operation he feels a lot of belly pain, she can not work the land as before, so now he only dedicates himself to household activities. She is very afraid to go to the post after what happened to her so now when she has pains she is cured with medicinal plants like the Yantén or Diente de León. “You can not die, you can not heal”, she said.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Having children means to they establish the social position corresponding to adulthood. The fertility of men is a sign of virility and domination over their partner, or as an informant man stated: "having sex and many children is a sign of the power and control of a man." In addition, more children allow a stronger work force for the work of family farms. For this reason, men feel threatened by contraceptives, as they give women greater control over conception. This has been one of the reasons why husbands have left their wifes and look for another family

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Given that their crops and animals represent their only source of economic income for the women of these communities who have been affected, some have had to sell their livestock or land to cover the operating expenses for extraction of the uterus. The operation can cost between four thousand soles. Women who can not afford this operation continue to suffer the consequences of these operations.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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The Family Planning program was applied mainly in the mountains of Peru, as in Cusco, Piura and also in the Amazon. The majority of those affected did not know how to read or write. The nurses took advantage of that to make them sign the documents where they gave the consent to sterilize them without them being aware. In other cases it was the husband who signed the consent to be sterilized if they did not have to do the vasectomy to him.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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The government established to the doctors monthly sterilization fees and economic incentives to reach the goals. There were "festivals" of tubal ligations and vasectomies which created a climate conducive to committing many abuses by health personnel in which women have reported being victims of medical negligence, having been led by deception and bribes. The precariousness of the operating rooms where the surgeries were improvised and the massiveness with which the interventions were made refer, in some cases they could reach 60 operations in a day.

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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"Since I was sterilized, I am sick, I can not work, my body is paralyzed. For me there is no work because it can not be strong, which is what is required in field work . We dont exist for the goverment", Narcisa Huamán

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Cecilia is a leader in her community. She takes control of all victims of forced sterilization in her town in Pitumarca, Cusco. She is in charge of registering the new complainants organize meetings where they see the progress of their complaints or organize their to be interviewed. "All of them are bad, in the state medical center they do not want to attend them because they already know that they always complain about the same pain. "We only want government support because many of my partners are dying”, said Cecilia Champis .

© Liz Tasa - Image from the Kápar photography project
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Until now, more than 2,000 complaints have been filed by the Fiscalía de la Nación and several judicial proceedings have been initiated against Fujimori and other members of his Government; however, the cases have been shelved because no criminal responsibility has been proven. Only in 2018 the case has passed to the International Court of Human Rights. However, activists and ONGs persist in the fight for justice and their pressure led the Government of Ollanta Humala to create, in December 2015, a Registry of Victims of Forced Sterilization

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