A few days ago, from somewhere in the United States, we received the news of a boy hero who had saved the life of his younger sister, confronting a dog that ended up attacking him and causing various bites and wounds on his small body. We must recognize the guts, bravery, and courage that Bridget Walker did on her part to overcome this unpleasant situation. When he was interviewed days later he said in the simplest and most honest way that «if someone should die, it must be me, I am the older brother.» He lives in a nation that will be able to repair his scars both on his body and soul.
In our country, because of the same pandemic, there are many children like Bridget who face, perhaps not a dog, but the misfortune of losing their mother or father infected by a virus that came from a place in the East and probably stays with us for a long time.
Mr. Vizcarra‘s government did know what was coming and there is plenty of evidence of it that will be used against him in a future trial or a Truth Commission. During the first months of the blindly imposed quarantine by this government, many parents had to go out and find food for their children because their only breadwinner is their informal work on the streets of Lima and the provinces of Peru. The repressive and harassing measures used by Vizcarra and followers as the press that acts with impunity in their favor, caused many to end up infected and in the end, lose their lives. There are more than fifty thousand Peruvians killed by COVID-19 and there are many Peruvian Bridget Walkers who will no longer be able to see their parents, who will be unable to study and their lives, unlike the American boy, will become a nightmare every day. and every night.
When politics breaks into health issues, in terms of life and death and instead of fighting the latter, promotes it, we are faced with a criminal and genocidal policy that must be punished legally and morally. Thirty years ago, the messianic folly of two terrorist groups, the Sendero Luminoso, and the MRTA, unleashed the extermination of more than 25,000 innocent victims. Today thirty years later we return to attend these totalitarian practices at the hands of officials who were chosen by Mr. Martín Vizcarra to confront COVID-19. Quite to the contrary, these criminals knowing that by the month of May 2020 there was already an undetermined number of deceased who did not appear very conveniently, in their statistics, kept their secrecy and their figures well below the actual figure that, at the date, already adds more than fifty thousand dead.
For these Peruvian Bridget Walkers, there will be no Christmas, there will be no Father’s Day or Mother’s Day without them having to repeat themselves, over and over, «if someone had to die, it must be me, not my father or mother.» No one else should die in Peru due to cruel and abusive political issues. No one else should die in the name of this epidemic called Vizcarrism that only means mediocrity, moral lowliness, and waste of money that should have been used to build schools, hospitals, and more work, and instead went to the pockets of inept and corrupt friends of Mr. Vizcarra. Peru must not let these abominations pass as part of our cultural, political, and social landscape without making the great decision to punish those who have allowed the Peruvian Bridget to be orphaned and without a father or mother who will never see or embrace again.
A Requiem for the Peruvian Bridget that this Christmas will mourn their unjust and irreparable loss.