Caring for children left behind

Time and again the news hits the headlines of rejected infants abandoned in various sites, such as temple and church premises, dustbins, sanitary pits, even rivers. The older children who are too young, immature and naive to realize the rejection and maltreatment of the Carers suffer untold misery physically, psychologically and sexually as they are too dependent and innocent to even think of running away from home.

Whose children are these?

These are the children of very poor families who have become single parent or Carer due to various situations such as death of a spouse due to natural causes, or war, marital disharmony, divorce or migration of mother to the Middle East for employment.

My focus today is on the latter group, where the mother has migrated for foreign employment leaving the brood behind in temporary care.

Who are the Carers?

In some cases it is the husband, grandparent or an older sibling. If the husband is irresponsible, or alcoholic or if the grandparent is old or feeble and if the older sibling is "too fit and able", very soon the care arrangements break down and the dependent children begin to suffer silently in miserable situations. In Sri Lanka this "mother migration" has gone on for over thirty years.

We are told that these mothers bring in the highest Foreign Exchange to Sri Lanka over and above Tea, Rubber and Coconuts or Garments.

No government has taken steps to ban this migration as the income fattens our coffers and Sri Lanka is now very dependent on this foreign Exchange.

In spite of the breach in the family unit and social and moral fabric this migration t4rend seems to go on.

But is this morally right?

If these poor women are contributing so much to the bank balance of Sri Lanka should it not have a role to play in making sure these children, the wealth of our nation are well cared for, during this period of maternal absence.

What has the Government done?

It is heartening to note that the Government has established a foreign employment Bureau to register all migrant workers. They also give them a months' training in the relevant fields of employment, use of equipment and appliances, and knowledge of the host country language, for the purpose.

What more can the Government or foreign employment bureau do?

The categories of temporary carers are people who have never played this role of full time Career before the mother having taken most, if not all the responsibility of loving and caring, including feeding, sheltering clothing, schooling and healthcare.

* The Foreign Employment Bureau should, at registration, get the details of children to be left behind and question the mother as to the care arrangements made and have it recorded.

* The importance of conducting a "training and counselling course" of at least two weeks, to prepare the carers and instill into them the importance and responsibility of the new role they will be burdened with during the mother's absence.

* Further the Bureau of foreign employment should set up multi disciplinary Committee at district level, to monitor the care arrangements of the children, and to step in when needed to rescue the children at risk, before irreparable damage is done.

Grama Niladaris, Provincial Councils, Department of Probation and Child protection, and Department of Social Services should be members of the Multi Disciplinary Committee.

* Education departments, for the involvement of the principals and staff of schools attended by these children.

* Health Department, has field officers such as Mid-wives and Public Health Inspectors and Medical Officers of Health who have been playing the same unchanged role in the community for so many decades. Let them now get involved with this new project.

l Representatives at the M D C who could meet regularly. Elected officers could pay rostered visits to the home of migrant mothers to make sure the child care is progressing well.

* The Cares should be given details of the hotline of the Foreign Exchange Bureau, and M D C representative to contact in case of need for assistance.

* In Sri Lanka the neighbours too could give very valuable information on details of the day to day situation of the target family. They too could have access to the hotline.

We are only a small island and we have a reasonably good infrastructure so there is no excuse for not having a protective umbrellas in any nook or corner of the country to monitor the caring arrangements of the children of these migrant mothers.

The writer is a family doctor - from Mt Lavinia