Matagalpa Nicaragua AFP - Cony's usual work clothes are tight-fitting outfits that show off her curves as she waits for clients at the bar. But today she has put on a modest flower-print dress to attend her first law class, one of 60 sex workers who are training to become volunteer "facilitators" in the Nicaraguan justice system. Cony -- short for Concepcion Jarquin -- learned early on to survive in a hostile world, and now hopes to use her street sense to help others defend themselves.
Raped by a neighbor at age six, she dropped out of school in shame and left home to escape the rebukes of her mother, who blamed her for what happened. Forty years and countless humiliations later, this lively, smiling woman is studying part-time in a conference room at the Supreme Court to learn the basics of the Nicaraguan civil and criminal codes. She will then be sworn in to act as a liaison between residents of her impoverished neighborhood and an often inaccessible justice system.
The free, year-long course, which meets once every two months, was organized by the Sunflowers Sex Workers' Association, a group set up three years ago to help prostitutes get medical care and professional training. It is part of a broader initiative that has trained 4, facilitators across Nicaragua in the past 17 years to mediate in neighborhood conflicts -- arguments between neighbors, disputes over money, etc.
The program has been so successful at reducing the caseload of the overburdened court system that eight other Latin American countries have adopted it. For Cony, it is a chance to serve her community and regain some of the dignity lost doing her other job. It's not a dignified job. But that's how we feed our children," she told AFP at the small shack made of scrap wood and plastic where she lives in the city of Matagalpa.
Cony, who has light brown skin and delicate features, turned to prostitution to raise her two children, and continues working to support her three grandchildren. She has slept with men of nearly every kind imaginable, she said: Often they are abused by clients, targeted for rapes and muggings, have no health care and face discrimination by the police.
