Breathe
By Monica Meltis
Disappearance is a complex phenomenon to measure. The intentionality of concealment represents important challenges for the search that translate into the need to use all possible resources and knowledge.
In this sense, statistics is a key tool for measuring complex phenomena such as the disappearance of persons because it helps us to fill information gaps by approximating new information from what we already know. However, this implies that, unlike other phenomena where there may be a measurement in a laboratory with adequate controls, it is an imperfect approximation. Since it is recognized that it will be difficult to capture the entire universe of phenomena, approximations are sustained to the extent that we are able to make transparent how and from where, under what assumptions, that approximation is constructed.
This implies communicating about possible errors and biases in measurement, such as the way in which data are collected - whether through surveys, censuses, records from complaints, etc. - to the way in which the information is systematized and published. This transparency is fundamental for accountability and improvement through criticism and exchange of views.
The departure of the person commissioned by the Federal Government to lead the search efforts (the National Search Commission, CNB) would be of concern at any time. However, it is of particular concern in the context of his resignation. A few weeks ago it was announced that a "census" would be carried out after President Andres Manuel questioned the figures of the National Registry of Missing and Unaccounted for Persons (RNPDNO).
Since disappearances in the country began to increase dramatically, one would think that the Registry would have been one of the tools that would have been immediately adopted to search for people. It sounds logical: a system to account for the various events of disappearance, but one that also, by being connected to other registries and databases, generates knowledge to understand and address the crisis. It took years and failed exercises but thanks to the impulse of relatives of missing persons, the enactment of the General Law on Disappearances in 2017 envisioned settling the discussion by establishing the creation of the RNPDNO, a registry that would depend on the CNB in order to organize information on disappearances and serve as a key tool for the search.
However, the RNPEDNO has never come to fruition. The President's questioning of the Registry's data responds to a need that the families and organizations themselves have previously denounced: that the Registry should have traceability and transparency features. However, it raises many alerts that this questioning comes from the fact that this administration has already accumulated more missing persons than the previous administrations.
This leads to a paradoxical situation in which there seems to be a dispute over figures.
But let us remember that any underreporting, any gap between the cases that have existed and those that have been accounted for, the lack of a record of an absent person who should be sought, is a failure in the state's obligation to guarantee truth and justice for each of these cases.
It must be understood that the Registry (together with the other databases required by the General Law) is the central search tool of the Search System and that without transparent and accurate information for all citizens, anyone can question its certainty and accuracy.
What are the implications of this questioning?
The Homologated Search Protocol (PHB) establishes five types of searches (immediate, individualized, pattern, generalized and family) that respond to the need to provide the broadest possible protection for the missing person. The types of searches are complementary and respond to a methodological logic. The immediate search, for example, must be conducted regardless of the reason for the person's absence within the first few days. This urgent search logic, in short, is centered on the deployment of authorities, but it is also based on the search by remote tracing that attempts to locate the person through the consultation of various databases such as hospitals and prosecutors' offices.
On the other hand, in the case of the generalized search, the cornerstone is the "collection, organization and systematic collation of information on search scenarios or human remains". According to the PBH "the methods of collection, generation and concentration of information are different for each scenario, but they all share the quality that when they are implemented they are searching, indistinctly, for all the persons whose disappearance is registered". This is key to measure the importance of the RNPDNO: it is a search and identification tool that allows massive confrontation with other information records to try to find matches. That is to say, without this registry, the generalized search is simply inoperative.
To be clear: without an orderly, transparent, traceable and methodologically rigorous registry, we know that any commitment to search for missing persons is synonymous with searching with our eyes closed . Basically, atole con el dedo.
The problem is that there is not enough transparency and that not only makes accountability impossible, but also generates distrust among the families searching for their loved ones and organizations that have been following this issue for years. In that sense -and understanding that it does not mean that the State fulfills its obligation of generalized search only through the RNPDNO, but that there must be other efforts- the recently announced "census" that is being carried out must contain that fundamental element in order not to replicate what has commonly happened in matters of disappearance: to have a public methodology that allows the citizenship to audit and make accountable the search for missing persons.
The government has many opportunities ahead of it to dispel the doubts and mistrust it has generated in the matter of forced disappearances by simply being transparent and ceasing to hide information. Hundreds of relatives are looking for a modicum of certainty that the search for their loved ones is being carried out with commitment, rigor and seriousness. It is about the possibility of measuring the tragedy in which we find ourselves and being able to act accordingly. The RNPDNO is fundamental for the search and should be understood as the central search tool of the National Search System.
Hopefully the government will be able to live up to the crisis we are facing and understand that while they dispute the figures from the Palace, there are hundreds of families looking for their loved ones. Let this dispute not distract us from what is truly important: We are missing thousands.
*Mónica Meltis Véjar is a political scientist and internationalist. She is currently Executive Director of the organization Data Cívica, whose mission is to understand the triggers of violence in order to implement prevention and care strategies based on the use of statistics and technology.
The opinions expressed are the responsibility of the authors and are absolutely independent of the position and editorial line of Opinion 51.
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