In a first, 2 longtime searchers for missing relatives — mother and daughter — earn official certification

After years of searching for missing loved ones, Ceci Flores and her daughter have obtained government certification recognizing their skills, a first for relatives confronting Mexico’s disappearance crisis.

Flores announced last week that she and her daughter, Milagros de Jesús Valenzuela Flores, had received the credentials, issued by Mexico’s National Council for Standardization and Certification of Labor Competencies, an agency affiliated with the Education Ministry.

The certification recognizes expertise developed by families who search for missing relatives while pressing authorities to investigate their disappearances.

Flores, 53, has become a leading voice for Mexico’s searching families since her son Alejandro disappeared in 2015. She later founded Madres Buscadoras de Sonora (Searching Mothers of Sonora) and was named to the BBC’s list of 100 inspiring and influential women in 2022.

Alejandro remains missing, but in March, searchers recovered the remains of another son, Marco Antonio, who disappeared in 2019. DNA testing confirmed his identity earlier this year.

Flores’ daughter, Milagros, leads Jóvenes Buscadores de Sonora, a youth search collective she helped establish with about 15 other young people. She is in her mid-20s.

Mexico had 130,381 people still missing or unlocated as of Oct. 12, according to National Registry of Missing and Unlocated Persons figures reported this week by Conexión Migrante. The total excludes people already located alive or dead by that date.

The credentials fall under Competency Standard EC1542, which evaluates information gathering, preparation of case files, interviews, field and remote searches, and reporting.

Flores credited Guanajuato’s State Training Institute and the forensic and legal consulting firm Forensic and Legal with supporting the training, evaluation and certification, El País reported.

“We want to have more tools to do what no mother should have to learn to do: search for her children,” Flores wrote in an Oct. 7 post on X.

Eight women searching in Guanajuato will also receive certification after meeting the same standard, UnoTV reported last week. The women, who will receive their certificates within two months, UnoTV said, completed nine five-hour training sessions, with state scholarships covering certification costs.

In her post, Flores stressed that certification does not transfer the authorities’ search responsibilities to families or search collectives.

Mexico has about 200 such groups — who look for missing relatives while pressing authorities to investigate their disappearances — according to an Amnesty International estimate cited by ADN40 in March.

Meanwhile, Mexico City’s Cuauhtémoc borough has named its council chamber Madres Buscadoras, or Searching Mothers, according to an agreement published Tuesday in the Official Gazette.

The designation honors mothers and other searching relatives without endorsing any specific organization or political position.

With reports from El País, Aristegui Noticias, Vanguardia and Excélsior