Dear Naly and Helen
I am writing to you in the hope that you
might both add your voices to what I believe should be a chorus of voices to
Cambodia’s Ministry of Social Affairs recommending that Citipointe Church’s
‘She Rescue Home’ be closed down.
I am writing to you both not merely because
I believe that there are human rights issues here that should be of concern to both
LICADHO and Chab Dai but because Citipointe claimed at the outset, in mid 2008,
that its removal of Rosa and Chita from the care of their parents had the support
of both Chab Dai and LICADHO. Indeed, in the case of LICADHO, Chanti believes
to this day that the sham ‘contract’ she signed on 31st, July 2008
was with LICADHO.
My reasons for believing that the She
Rescue Home should be closed down will be clear if you have read even a small
part of my blog but I would like, here, to focus on some specific details.
One young woman who will appear in my film
(and whom I will refer to here as Srey Pec) was a resident at the She Rescue
Home from the age of 15 to age 19. I know her family very well. The family is
very poor. Srey Pec was not a victim or Human Trafficking and nor was she at
risk of becoming one. Both her mother and father had jobs but they also had a lot
of children and it was difficult to make ends meet. It was the family’s poverty
only that resulted in Srey Pec spending four years in the She Rescue Home.
During this time she had virtually no access to her family. At the age of 19
she was released by SHE, given a 20 pound bag of rice and sent on her way.
Other than learning quite good English, Srey Pec had been provided with no life
skills at all that would equip her back in the world she had come from. Today
she sells books to tourists on the streets of Phnom Penh to feed herself and
her children. One more than one occasion I have bought rice for Srey Pec when
she has not been able to feed herself and her children. From the day she left
the She Rescue Home she has received no assistance at all of any kind from
Citipointe church.
Yesterday, Chanti and Chhork went to the
Ministry of Social Affairs to speak with a woman about Rosa and Chita being
returned to their care. The woman was, Chanti tells me, very sympathetic to
hers and Chhork’s plea but she was very clear on a particular point. I am
paraphrasing what Chanti told me: “If you and your husband allow Rosa and Chita
to sell books on the streets of Phnom Penh you will be arrested and placed in
jail.”
This raises a whole host of interesting and
important questions that I will not delve into here. However, just as
Citipointe did nothing at all to prepare Srey Pec or her family for Srey Pecs
reintegration back into the family, nor has Citipointe done anything to prepare
for the reintegration of Rosa and Chita back into their family. And Citipoointe
has made it quite clear that in the event that Rosa and Chita are returned to
the family’s care, the church will provide no ongoing assistance to the girls
or their family. So, Rosa and Chita, accustomed to swimming in a clean
chlorinated swimming pool, playing games on computers, three meals a day,
pretty dresses and in many ways enjoying the material luxuries available to
their Western contemporaries, will be sent back into the poor family they came
from – one that does not have access to a chlorinated swimming pool or computer
games and will not be able to indulge Rosa and Chita’s materialistic desires.
To build up expectations in the minds and hearts of young girls that their
families and communities cannot fulfill when they are released is just plain
bad policy. And, of course, if Chanti’s family were to be confronted by another
financial crisis and Rosa and Chita did wind up selling books to tourists to
help feed the family, their parents would wind up in jail and the entire family
would be destroyed – all of the kids winding up in institutions of one kind or
another. A disaster. And if the family were to be confronted by a financial
disaster – say, Chhork falling ill and being unable to drive his tuk tuk –
would Citipointe help out? No, though Citipointe would probably be there to
‘rescue’ the girls and market them online as girls as risk of becoming victims
of Human Tradfficking!
It is my belief that it is irresponsible
for any NGO to simply pluck poor children from their family and community
context for a few years and then, at age 18 or 19, to send them back out into
the world with none (or few) of the skills they require to survive in what is a
very difficult world for the families of children that wind up in ‘orphanages’.
Not only should NGOs make a commitment to helping entire families in a
culturally appropriate way, this help should extend beyond the age of 18. I am
not suggesting here the creation of families dependent on NGO aid forever but
of ongoing support that may not be of a monetary nature at all. Let me
illustrate what I mean with an example.
Chanti has had 6 babies. For the first five
she had no real difficulty breast-feeding them. With baby #6, however, Chanti
does not have enough breast milk. Yesterday, when I arrived at Chanti’s home
with a visiting nutritionist friend, we were shocked to find that Chanti was
feeding her less than two week old daughter (English names, Poppy) cow’s milk
from cardboard cartons – transferred to a baby bottle. We explained to Chanti
that not only was cow’s milk bad for a two week old baby but that it could kill
her baby. Having relied on breast milk for all of her other children there is
no reason why Chanti should know about the danger of cow’s milk for babies.
However, if it had not been for my nutritionist friend’s and my arrival in the
nick of time, Chanti may well have continued to feed her baby cow’s milk, with
possible fatal consequences. (Where was Citipointe? Why was Citipointe not
there to offer advice to Chanti regarding the feeding of a baby by a mother
whose breasts are not producing enough milk?)
In a discussion with other mothers in the
community in which Chanti lives we learnt that in villages throughout Cambodia
it is common for mothers to feed new born babies with ‘milk’ made from rice.
Not only is this a very bad idea from a nutritional point of view but if the
water used to make the ‘milk’ is not boiled there is a very real possibility of
the baby getting very sick or dying as a result of drinking contaminated water.
So, my nutritionist friend and I took Chanti to the markets to buy some proper
baby formula. The woman in the shop produced a large can of powdered baby milk.
Chanti nodded and asked me to pay the $11 needed to buy it. Needless to say $11
is much more than many poor mothers such as Chanti can afford if they happen
not to be producing sufficient breast milk. Before I paid for it, however, we
looked at the writing on the side of the can (which Chanti could not read
because it was written in English) and discovered that this baby formula was
for babies older than six months. We replaced the can and bought one that was
for babies up to six months old. Again,
even if Chanti had had $11,s he could very easily have bought the wrong baby
formula.
Back at her home we explained to Chanti
that she must only use boiled water in the preparation of the milk for her baby
and that she must test the temperature of it on the inside of her wrist before
feeding her baby.
This whole
exercize cost $11 and a couple of hours of time on the part of myself
and my nutritionist friend. Why was it not Citipointe offering Chanti this kimd
of help and advice? Citipointe was not only quite prepared to risk the life of
Chanti’s baby when she was pregnant and had pneumonia but has shown no interest
at all in the health of either mother or child since baby Poppy was born. It
has been left to me, a male from another culture, to raise with Chanti questions
about her own reproductive system and what she can (or must) do to prevent
herself from having baby # 7. Why does this task fall to me when Citipointe has
had close to five years to counsel Chanti about birth control? In 2008
Citipointe promised to do so but, as with every one of the promises the church
made then, it has not done so.
I use this as an example of how an NGO can
play a significant role in the well-being of a family in a way that does not
cost a lot of money but which does require a good deal of time and a
preparedness to teach poor people such as Chanti about matters such as the
mixing of baby powder to make milk in a way that is not damaging to their child.
I believe that any NGO that is not prepared to make this kind of commitment to the
whole family has no right to be extracting two members of it, teaching them to
swim in a chlorinated pool, to play computer games and then, at age 18 or 19,
ejecting them back into the world their families live in with no of limited
real-life skills.
After four years with Citipointe, Srey Pec
is on the streets of Phnom Penh selling books to tourists. Will this be the
fate of Rosa and Chita if they remain with Citipointe until they are 18?
I believe that Citipointe’s short term help
of young girls, regardless of how well-meaning the church’s intentions might
be, does more damage than good in the long run – breaking up families, in
particular – and that short of a radical change to the church’s approach to
helping families, the She Rescue Home should be closed down and the task of
helping the girls in Citipointe’s care be handed over to competent NGOs who are
committed to helping entire families become self-sufficient.
best wishes
James Ricketson
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