Migrating parents leave 1 million children behind
MARACAIBO, Venezuela — In their final minutes together, Jean Carlos, 8, held his mother’s hand like an anchor and promised to “take deep breaths” so he wouldn’t cry. His sister, Crisol, 10, hid angrily in the kitchen. His brother, Cristian, 12, hauled a blue suitcase into the yard.
Past the family gate, Aura Fernández, 38, a single mother of 10, beat back a surge of tears. Her bus came rolling down the road. Then she kissed her children, climbed aboard and disappeared.
“I love you,” she said just before setting out. “Study hard.”
Seven years into an economic collapse, Venezuela’s migrant crisis has grown into one of the largest in the world. Millions have already left. By the end of 2020, an estimated 6.5 million people will have fled, according to the United Nations refugee agency — a number rarely, if ever, seen outside of war.
But hidden inside that data is a startling phenomenon. Venezuela’s mothers and fathers, determined to find work, food and medicine, are leaving hundreds of thousands of children in the care of grandparents, aunts, uncles and even siblings who have barely passed puberty themselves.
Many parents do not want to put their children through the grueling and sometimes very dangerous upheaval of displacement. Others simply cannot afford to take them along.
The exodus is so large that it is reshaping the very concept of childhood in Venezuela, sending gradeschoolers into the streets to work — and leaving many exposed to the swirl of abusive players who have filled the vacuum left by the collapsing Venezuelan state, including sex traffickers and armed groups.
By one assessment, conducted by Caracasbased aid organization CECODAP and polling firm Datanálisis, migrating parents have left behind nearly 1 million children.
“You grow up fast,” said Fernández’s niece, Silvany, a 9yearold with long hair and a husky voice. Her mother went to work in Colombia in October.
Since then, Silvany and her cousins have remained with her ailing grandparents. And the fourthgrader has assumed many of the responsibilities for her little brother, Samuel, 1, feeding him and cradling him at night.
“I’m his sister,” she said, “but really I’m the nanny.”
In rare situations, children have been passed from grandparent to cousin to neighbor, with each caretaker migrating or disappearing, until young people finally have found themselves alone.
“This is a phenomenon that is going to change the face of our society,” said Abel Saraiba, a psychologist at CECODAP, which provides counseling to Venezuelan children. These separations, he added, have the potential to weaken the very generation that is supposed to one day rebuild a battered Venezuela.
The departures are overwhelming community organizations, many of which have seen their donors — middle and upperclass families — flee the country just as they need them most.