OUR HISTORY
Our history was not born from a desk, nor from the comfort of an office. It was born walking alongside the forgotten. It emerged from direct contact with those who have been stripped of their land, their homeland, their identity. It arose from the urgent need to respond where institutions do not reach, where political promises lie buried beneath years of neglect and exclusion.
This is how the journey of Jorge Aurelio Riffo begins — a Latin American social activist and developer of social and community programs, with more than 30 years of experience in Latin America, the United States, and Europe. In Tijuana, one of the busiest and most unequal borders in the world, marked by rampant violence, kidnappings, drug trafficking, and institutional abandonment, he founded the National Consortium ConSalud, a pioneering organization that provided free, comprehensive care in health, psychology, social prevention, and educational workshops for students, teachers, and the community at large.
Where authorities fled out of fear or disinterest, ConSalud was present. Where political campaigns promised health and education only to win votes, we offered real action and human accompaniment. ConSalud was recognized by local, educational, and community authorities for its high social impact and its inclusive, preventive model of work.
Its educational workshops on preventive health, ethics, and civic formation were officially approved by the State Education System through its corresponding State Commission, allowing implementation in various public schools. In addition, a collaboration agreement was established with the SNTE (National Union of Education Workers), strengthening work with teachers on issues such as mental health, ADHD, and comprehensive pedagogical tools.
Simultaneously, free public health campaigns were conducted, including general medicine, pediatrics, psychology, gynecology, preventive screenings, and emotional guidance — providing fundamental services to people in extreme vulnerability.
The project had a strong collaboration with the DIF (National System for the Integral Development of the Family), supporting emotionally and psychologically vulnerable children, and formed strategic alliances with CANACINTRA Tijuana (National Chamber of the Transformation Industry), promoting private sector participation in rebuilding the social fabric.
In this context, ConSalud also opened its doors to migrants deported from the United States — many of them with broken dreams, empty backpacks, stateless and identityless, thrown into border territory without documentation, family networks, or access to basic services — entirely forgotten by institutions.
These individuals were provided with psychological support, social and human guidance, and technical training workshops to assist in their labor reintegration, recognizing their dignity and potential and giving them a new opportunity to rebuild their lives with respect and empathy.
After more than 35 years of walking along borders and forgotten communities, I have been a direct witness to a painful and persistent truth: political promises vanish as soon as the campaign lights fade. Health, education, safety, and well-being are offered as slogans, but dissolve into thin air the moment power is attained.
I’ve seen entire towns consumed by institutional abandonment, migrants expelled without homeland or future, women made invisible, children without access to mental health, elders discarded by systems that no longer listen — all in the name of public policies that never arrived.
In the face of this systemic indifference, our response was not a speech or a slogan. It was concrete action, consistent presence, human accompaniment, and grassroots transformation. We didn’t settle into the comfort of offices. We walked alongside the displaced — those left out of the statistics.
Where politics failed, our conviction flourished. Because social justice cannot wait. And walking with dignity beside the forgotten is not charity — it is an ethical, collective, and non-negotiable responsibility.