Lanka's children, victims of vicious competition

Stiff competition in the primary and secondary-education spheres, coupled with sexual abuse are making the lot of the children of Sri Lanka, a highly unhappy one, head of the National Child Protection Authority, Professor Harendra de Silva said in an interview with the 'Daily News'. It is the responsibility of every citizen to protect children against such abuses, he said.

by Nadira Gunatilleke

The interview:

Question: How would you describe the present condition of Sri Lankan children?

Answer: Children are generally happy by nature. They laugh, play and they have fun. Those are their rights and it is what we expect. Children should be psychologically happy. But there are restrictions which put pressure on them. Year Five scholarship examination is one of the main problems.

The stiff competition in education which has been created due to the non growth of resources during the past 35 to 40 years, is another critical problem and it has generated a rat race. The words free education have lost their meaning. There is no free education. The stiff competition is the base for all the other problems which affect children.

Poor parents' children do not get good schools because they do not have a few lakhs to pay principals. The resources in the education field such as the number of schools and their sizes have not expanded parallel to population growth. Therefore the number of schools have not increased adequately and the sizes of schools are the same as in the past. Therefore International Schools are mushrooming to fill the void. You find an modern or good English name and start an International School which has no prestige. When the child goes into an International School the parents do not think how they could fund his/her higher education in a foreign university.

Another problem which affects childhood is the way we (adults) want them to be 'disciplined'. The parents and teachers punish children when they fail to reach the level they expect of them. The adults apply corporal punishment in the name of 'discipline' which is not effective and is a violation of child rights.

Then the violence comes up. Then all the other problems arise such as fear of going to school, tummy upsets and all that.

Question: What is the gravest problem faced by Sri Lankan children these days?

Answer: Sexual abuse is similar to an iceburg. This is a major problem. It is hidden in society and no one talks about it. But now the public is much aware of this and parents and teachers recognise it and oppose it. Now the people are more aware of sexual abuse of boys which is a major problem in our society.

About 20 per cent of boys and 10 percent of girls get abused but now information has been passed on to the children and they are aware of this. The number of court cases in connection with child abuse has increased because of the increase in reporting. After some time this number will decline.

The problem of street children is also there. But this problem is relatively small. One third of street children in Colombo are beggar children. The NCPA started centres in several areas including Pettah and Anuradhapura for the benefit of the street children. Beach children is another problem.

The NCPA commenced Beach Centres for the benefit of the children in places such as Uswetakeyyawa. They can visit these centres, play, watch television, have a snack and a bath. The tourists who seek child sex now go to Thailand and other destinations due to the stern action taken by the NCPA to combat the child sex industry in Sri Lanka.

Child soldiers is another problem. We have to look at this problem from a non political point of view. No one can take political advantages from this problem. We destroy whole child populations by recruiting them into an army.

Some people say that those child soldiers do not lose anything but it is similar to an iceburg. A large number of children are being recruited as child soldiers but it is not exposed. It is the responsibility of every citizen to protest against recruiting children as child soldiers.

Question: What should be done to ease the suffering of tsunami affected orphaned children?

Answer: If we had more professional training we could have managed Tsunami affected children's problem far better. We lack professionals. The NCPA has developed a complete data base on tsunami-affected children.

In the Southern Province the project was entirely handled by the NCPA itself and the other tsunami affected areas were covered with the assistance of UNICEF and other foreign funding agencies. We added pictures of the affected children into the data base. May be there are minor shortcomings such as duplicate entries and a few missing children.

There should be a standard when assisting tsunami-affected children. If not tsunami-affected children will be discriminated against. Therefore we have set a basic requirement of Rs. 2500 for each tsunami affected child. There are several donor agencies which expressed their willingness to sponsor tsunami-affected children. If there are extra funds available they will go into a fixed deposit which will later benefit the child. We do not need to promote dependency and breed beggars.

If we look the service of foreign professionals to counsel local tsunami victim children, when they do some work and leave the country the children get affected for the second time without the familiar person's company and further service. Therefore we looked into the matter of psycho-social rehabilitation of tsunami-affected children and commenced training of trainers to avoid this problem. The training is in progress now and it will be done from the grass roots level.

Question: What should be done to ensure the protection of those children?

Answer: The NCPA has made arrangements to recruit 50 graduates under the Government Graduate Employment Program to implement proper monitoring processes in order to ensure the safety and well-being of tsunami-affected children who are being looked after by legally authorised families. If the conduct of guardians is not satisfactory the monitors can detect it and take necessary action. Monitoring about 5,000 children is an enormous task which is very difficult.

Question:- What are the religious, social and political restrictions that limit the services of NCPA?

Answer:- A significant number of sexual abuse cases have been reported to the NCPA from some religious institutions belonging to all religions. Around 125 complaints in connection with sexually abused children have been reported to the NCPA from some institutions belonging to all religions.

Human beings have certain abusive tendencies due to various reasons and this happens in every religion not in one or two. This problem is not a new trend but a long standing problem and it was there for ages.

Children were scared to complain due to the power of religious dignitaries and the pressure put on children by parents, saying not to reveal but we have broken that barrier to a certain extent and are now getting more and more complaints. A bottom top initiative should be taken to eradicate this problem.

This cannot be solved using a solution introduced from the outside. Initiative should come from within religions.

General delays in court procedures and legal procedures are another problem. Corruption is another reason for such delays. Sri Lanka is a small country and one can influence another very easily. This affects decision making and is another problem.

Territorial interventions are another issue. When we work in an area another group comes and chases us away. Such groups never work and do not let others work.

Some of the foreign funding agencies want us to implement their policies here which is sometimes impossible. But they do not realise it. Sometimes they try to weaken us because of our dependence. What we need is a national policy to deal with similar incidents.