Rio de Janeiro`s slum children earn by selling drugs

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: For teenagers in Rio de Janeiro's mean slums, working in the drug trade is a common way to make a living. It's also a fast way to dying. Youths as young as 11 start off as messengers and look-outs for the drug gangs that control the packed shanty towns known as favelas, then earn promotion to soldiers or sellers. Clashes with Rio's paramilitary police force erupt daily. Battles between rival gangs over control of selling points add to the bloodshed. A 2002 study "Children of the Drug Trade," by Luke Dowdney, estimated 5,000 teenagers worked in the Rio business and most were armed. The situation has since got worse, experts said.

The problem has its roots in the poverty and deprivation of the slums. The favelas have long been marginalized from mainstream society in this city of 5 million people and their residents face discrimination from people living outside. Although the teenagers volunteer for the job feeding the cocaine and marijuana habits of the whole city, they do not have many other options -- jobs and educational opportunities are slim.

The pay is also considerably higher than Brazil's minimum wage. And there is a certain glamour and prestige. A young man called Joao, who grew up in Rocinha, Rio's largest favela, joined the traffic four years ago when he was 17. He began as a "fogueteiro," setting off rockets to warn of a police invasion, and made his way up to a "vapor," or seller.

He quit last month with the help of Tio Lino, a Rocinha resident who runs a project teaching art to kids. Joao said that as long as there is easy money and an easy life for the drug dealers, the youth will continue to join the traffic. "As long as there is easy money and this easy life, there will always be young people in the (drug) traffic," he said.

He is one of the lucky ones. A study by Observatorio de Favelas social group said that of 230 adolescents in the trade that it surveyed from April 2004 to May 2006, 45 were now dead. Police killed 23 and nine died in fights with other gangs. Some 57 percent joined aged 13 to 15 and most were black or mixed race, it said. Most had taken part in gunfights. Tio Lino, who gives art classes in a cramped room in the warren of the hillside Rocinha, said that children feel inspired by drug dealers because they have beautiful women, good jewellery and expensive motorcycles. "I ask them what they want to be and they say they want to be a famous drug dealer. But why? Good women, good gold necklaces, good jewellery, good motorcycles. The children become inspired by that," he said.

Social experts and human rights groups say the military police is part of the problem. They confront traffickers with heavy firepower and often resort to summary executions. Official figures show Rio police kill about 1,000 civilians each year, nearly all listed as suspected criminals. And corrupt officers often work in league with the traffickers.

Traffickers frequently employ teenagers because they do not spend much time in detention if caught. They are also agile fighters, running swiftly through the alleys and hiding in shacks. Ignacio Cano of Rio de Janeiro State University said the drug trade is often seen as perverse when compared to a state that offers social assistance, but because the government has abandoned the poor communities since the beginning, the traffic gained legitimacy inside the slums.

"From another perspective, the state's performance is also very violent. So when we think of the traffic as something illegal and perverse, we compare that to the state, as if the state had a positive performance in the communities (slums). But the state abandoned the communities since the beginning," he said.

Given the absence of state institutions in the favelas, gangs often provide community facilities. The teen gunmen believe they are protecting the people, studies say. Social workers reject characterizing them as juvenile delinquents or child soldiers, saying that only stigmatizes them further and makes it harder to find real solutions.

Bureau Report