Credit: Courtesy of RedTraSex. In addition, they were recently invited to receive training in political rights and to work as temporary employees for the Supreme Electoral Council in the general elections. The Nicaraguan branch of the network was founded in Managua in November with the support of local non-governmental organisations and social assistance funds from aid agencies. The seed of the organisation was the Sunflowers Sex Workers Association, which initially brought together women who starting in went to informal trainings and lectures on health and sex education.
The organisation now has a registry of 14, sex workers between the ages of 18 and 60, 2, of whom have joined the network. Pajarita from Nandaime not her real name is one of the sex workers who reject any kind of organisation among her colleagues.
This life has taught me that among prostitutes there is no friendship, only competition. She arranges daytime appointments over the phone, working in Managua motels, and is studying tourism in the evenings. On the weekends she goes back to Nandaime, her hometown in the eastern department province of Granada, 67 km from the capital. But the organisation is making headway in public institutions. The national legislature is now an ally, listening to their input when designing laws that relate to labour and social conditions of sex workers.
In April, the vice president of the Supreme Court, magistrate Marvin Aguilar, presided over a ceremony where a pilot group, made up of 18 members of the network, received their credentials as judicial facilitators. He explained at the time that the women were given technical and legal training to help manage conflicts through dialogue, as mediators. In May, the national police named a special chief to directly address the demands for safety voiced by the TraSex network and issued an institutional guideline for their complaints of domestic abuse and general violence to be addressed with the full force of the Integral Law Against Violence towards Women.
In the past, sex workers constantly complained about abuse of authority, harassment, discrimination and persecution by the police.
