Village Security

Girls at the school playing soccer.

I was shocked to recently hear about the security fears for one of our partner church’s primary schools.  We’ve all heard about girls being kidnapped from schools in countries where terrorist groups have established control of large areas.  But not in a relatively peaceful country like ours!  

The past year has had a lot of negative things in the news for our country, including a few very isolated attacks on foreigners that have meant that Westerners aren’t allowed to drive out of the capital without a security detail with them.  Fortunately the violence of has been a long way from our city in the center of the country, and so moving around isn’t a problem for us once we’re here.  And things have calmed down even more now that the presidential election has been ratified with the first transfer of power without a coup d’état going before it since Independence in 1960.  So we are feeling just a safe as we have for the past few years.  

But I think the security for the average citizen living out in a village has decreased in the past couple years.  It’s especially difficult for those living along the borders of the country where there have been lots of attacks coming in from lawless neighboring countries, which have killed many villagers at a time.  

Kidnapping is another serious issue for those that live near borders.  The school I mentioned earlier is the oldest school of our partner church, which is well established with boarding students.  But it’s in a small town in our region a small distance from the border.  Unfortunately, there is nothing but a sparse “forest” area between it and a neighboring country’s state where bandits have been operating un-checked.  Now they are coming across the border and taking children from small villages in that area.  The local police chief has alerted the school that they might be a big desirable target and so they need to take some serious security measures, like a wall surrounding the open property.  The director of the school asks us all for prayers for protection and that they will find a way to increase security in this difficult time.

-- El Padre