Esmeraldas hurts us, the forgotten province of diverse Ecuador, athletes with impressive physiques and malnourished children. No schools, but that makes every little field, street, beach and abandoned land a playground. No man’s land where assassination is a life option and children and youth are soldiers of the cartel war who use them as disposable objects.

On the same day that the devastating floods occurred – we are just at the beginning of the El Niño phenomenon, which can be devastating -, on the island of Trinitaria, a place where many Esmeraldeños live who have made Guayaquil their home and refuge, a massacre left almost a dozen dead and seriously injured. Almost all of them come from the Green Province, the land of encocada, marimba, smiles, dance and blackness that came from mother Africa.

Esmeralda has a structural historical vulnerability. The capital city has a high population density, affected by a lack of adequate housing, a lack of drinking water in good condition and ravaged by insecurity and shortcomings in the areas of education and health. Its proximity to the border creates problems with violent irregular groups from the neighboring country, given the permeability of border crossings.

The earthquake of 2016 had consequences and impacts that were not treated for reasons, above all, of a political nature. The country was even removed from the island of Muisne, which many considered a strategic decision favoring the free transit of drugs between Ecuador and Sinaloa (Mexico). The current devastating flood crisis reflects the lack of recovery from previous disasters. The zero forecast increased the vulnerability of the entire population and the difficulty in mitigating the devastation due to the lack of adequate infrastructure of shelters, hospitals, etc.

The community cannot function normally nor has the capacity to face these own resources. You need fast and efficient help.

The state, which in recent years has proven ineffective in “peacetime” times, has even less chance of being so in times of emergencies and disasters.

The first thing to do is to save lives, then protect people and ensure their return to function as citizens in the full and dignified exercise of their rights.

The urgency of immediate allocation of resources and creation of a recovery plan within an action framework for all actors: national government, GAD, civil society organizations, universities, private sector, international cooperation agencies It seems almost impossible in the transition phase. survive, and it will be the same for the new government, which will certainly have to deal with similar problems in other parts of the country.

If the state declares a humanitarian emergency in Esmeraldas, it recognizes the need for international aid and opens the door to receiving it.

The principle of subsidiarity is applied: what I cannot do is done by others, other communities, other actors, other countries that do not relieve the authority of the state, but help to fulfill the goals of development and human dignity that the province and the city need. (OR)