Gender-based violence knows no borders: finding common ground in Lugo and Santiago
 |
| Mural by survivors of GBV, Vagalume |
Aliad Ultreia in Lugo
On the morning of 13 October, before putting our packs back on and walking out of the city, we met Paula Castro Meilán, a psychologist with ALIAD-Ultreia. Bernadine Bacher, Director of the Saartjie Baartman Centre for Women and Children in Cape Town, joined us by video.
ALIAD-Ultreia was established in 1984, focusing initially on addiction and people in and leaving prison. Around 2000 Lugo was shaken by a major human-trafficking case involving about 1,000 women from different parts of Latin America who had been brought into the area for sexual exploitation. For a city of about 100,000 people, the scale was startling. ALIAD-Ultreia responded to this need and developed the women’s programme in which Paula now works.
The organisation’s approach is multidisciplinary. Its team includes psychology, social work, legal support and employment counselling. It works particularly with migrant women and now has three broad areas of intervention: women in abusive relationships; women in prostitution and survivors of trafficking for sexual exploitation; and women experiencing labour exploitation.
Paula explained that ALIAD-Ultreia respects the way women identify themselves, while the organisation itself works from an abolitionist perspective: it does not see prostitution simply as work like any other, but as something that has to be understood within wider structures of gender inequality and violence.
 |
| Paula, Bernadine on phone, and Lala |
Different continents, familiar patterns
Listening from Cape Town, Bernadine recognised much of what Paula was describing. The contexts are very different, but the conversation kept circling back to familiar forces: patriarchy, unequal power, substance abuse, economic dependence and the way trauma can shape how people survive.
Paula spoke powerfully about women in prostitution who use alcohol or drugs as a way of disconnecting from what is happening to their bodies. That is why ALIAD-Ultreia works from a trauma-informed approach rather than treating addiction as a separate problem.
Bernadine described the work of the Saartjie Baartman Centre: 14 programmes, a first-stage residential shelter with 120 beds for women and children, second-stage accommodation, legal and psychosocial support, prevention work in schools and a strong economic-empowerment programme.
Economic independence was one of the clearest points of connection. At the Saartjie Baartman Centre, women can gain practical and accredited skills, earn money through products they make while at the Centre, and build some financial security before leaving. In a country where unemployment is exceptionally high, simply telling a woman to “find a job” is often not a realistic route to independence.
Paula explained that ALIAD-Ultreia’s employment work is more individually focused: understanding each woman’s needs, helping her prepare a CV and supporting her to find work in the wider labour market. Different labour markets require different approaches, but the objective is the same — giving women greater control over their own lives.
Walking, nature and the body
A moving part of the conversation came when Bernadine spoke about the relationship between Blocktober and the Centre. Blocktober’s walks with survivors began organically in 2020. Women at the Centre often come from communities where opportunities to walk in forests, climb mountains or spend time at the beach are limited. Taking women onto Table Mountain became about much more than exercise.
Bernadine spoke about community, about survivors being seen and heard during these walls, and about the knowledge that other people care. She described the walks as deeply therapeutic, and explained how the Centre has since expanded this physical dimension of recovery through the gym programmes provided by the OptiFit SISSA program.
Paula immediately connected with this. As a psychologist, she said that therapeutic work too often concentrates only on thoughts and emotions: “We forget about the body.”
ALIAD-Ultreia already includes trauma-informed yoga in its work. Paula’s coordinator is trained in the approach, which treats movement and bodily awareness as part of recovery. What we took from the discussion was that Paula also saw scope to develop this further, learning from the Blocktober/Saartjie Baartman experience.
For us, sitting in Lugo after almost two weeks of walking the Camino Primitivo, the connection was meaningful. Camino Blocktober is built around the idea that walking can carry a message, create community and connect people who might otherwise never meet. Here was a psychologist working with survivors in Galicia describing the same body-and-mind connection from another perspective.
Programme Vagalume (Firefly) in Santiago
 |
| A mural at Vagalume, strikingly like the mural at Saartjie Baartman Centre |
Paula told us that ALIAD-Ultreia is part of a Galician network of organisations working against trafficking for sexual exploitation. She put us in touch with Vagalume, based in Santiago.
On 20 October, we met with Vagalume, a program jointly managed by Caritas, the social arm of Catholic Church de Santiago and the Oblate Sisters. They provide comprehensive assistance, guidance, and protection to women trapped in prostitution or who are victims of human trafficking for sexual exploitation. We met with their Director, Lourdes Paco, who has worked here for 21 years, and social educator Tatiana, who has worked here for 10 years.
They explained how they work with migrant women from Latin American involved in prostitution. These women often come to Spain through informal networks, as Spain is also a springboard for prostitution to the rest of Europe. They come from poverty and need money to send back to their families in need. Vagalume provides comprehensive support including access to skills to enable women to enter into employment like services in restaurants or cleaning and mental health support to break dependency on drugs.
One of the clearest things we took from this conversation was that assistance is not a simple, linear process that begins only when a woman leaves prostitution. Vagalume tries first to become a safe and trusted point of reference - a place women know they can return to. Support can include help with health and legal rights, social and psychological support, emergency accommodation, and guidance towards employment and greater independence. For migrant women, that support starts from recognising them as people with rights, irrespective of their migration status or whether they have left prostitution.
Lourdes stressed that women who remain in prostitution should still be supported to have the safest possible conditions. Longer-term success is about women gaining greater control over their lives and, where possible, building an ordinary life beyond prostitution while keeping the supportive relationships they have formed.
Solidarity knows no borders
It was a powerful continuation of the conversation Paula began with us in Lugo: support is not a single intervention, but a relationship built around dignity, rights, trust and the possibility of greater independence. As Lourdes put it at the end of our meeting, despite the physical distance between Galicia and South Africa, the shared goal is the same - helping people reach a better life and escape the violence surrounding them.
There was a sobering side to this work. Paula explained that there is a shortage of resources available to NGOs and the intensity of working day after day with people in situations of extreme vulnerability. Staff can become exhausted. Burnout is not abstract; it affects the people trying to hold together systems of support for others.
That made the generosity of the meetings feel even more important.
We arrived with a simple idea: to meet local organisations working against gender-based violence as we walked through Galicia. We left with something much richer — a connection between ALIAD-Ultreia and the Saartjie Baartman Centre, and with Programme Vumalume, between different ways of supporting women whose lives have been shaped by violence and exploitation.
The circumstances are different. The scale is different. The languages are different.
But gender-based violence knows no borders. Neither should solidarity.
Read other blogs in this series https://stepsforsaartjie.blogspot.com/2025/10/read-other-steps-for-saartjie-blogs.html?m=1
Donate using this link https://www.backabuddy.co.za/campaign/blocktober-and-saartjie-baartman-centre-2026
Blocktober:
No comments:
Post a Comment