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Heritage Hotel, Pasay City
17 November 2009
delivered by
LEILA M. DE LIMA
Chairperson
KEYNOTE SPEECH
Good morning to all of you.
First of all, allow me to thankBahay Tuluyan, for inviting me to be here with you, today. The launch of this study, produced in cooperation with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), is a significant event in the life of a significant institution.
Bahay Tuluyan is a significant organization, because for more than two decades, since its inception in 1987, it has been at the forefront of the effort to ensure, that the human rights of all children in the Philippines , are respected, protected and fulfilled. Through all these years, Bahay Tuluyan has been a refuge and a safe haven for kids, a place where they can get some rest or take a bath, have a meal or play with other children, free from fear, and sheltered from the peril of a life lived out on the streets.
More than rest and food and shelter, Bahay Tuluyan has also given street children a face and a voice. Far too often, the children who live out on the street are seen, considered or treated as eyesores to be removed, as something less than human. To far too many persons, street children are the disembodied knocks on tinted car windows, or mere shadows or clumps of shadows, which congregate along avenues and public spaces. They are the vague forms right at the edge of one’s peripheral vision, that is, if they are even seen at all.
It is precisely organizations like Bahay Tuluyan, which bring street children, their concerns, the problems they confront, and the abuses to which they are subjected, into clear focus and into the public consciousness. Bahay Tuluyan rightly refuses to consign street children, to the margins of Philippine society, and instead draws public attention to their plight, and puts their situation front and center.
This organization helps the public at large to have a better understanding of the lives of street children. To far too many people, street children are an amorphous group, of undetermined number, presumably scattered throughout the country, whose common characteristics and traits are unknown. Bahay Tuluyan and other like-minded organizations are helping to change that.
They have been and continue to gather information, leading to a better understanding of the phenomenon of children, living or spending much of their time out on the street. It is only by having a better grasp of the breadth and scope of this particular challenge, and only by gaining a better understanding of who street children are as a whole, that we can begin to credibly assert, that we are doing all we can for these kids.
Only last year, in January of 2008, a study was carried out in cooperation with Bahay Tuluyan, on the indiscriminate rescue of street children, then being carried out in Manila . Certain numbers from that study are striking. For instance, of 110 children surveyed, 58 claimed to have been chased by their rescuers, thereby putting them in harm’s way and in contravention of relevant guidelines and procedures. 16 said that they had been subjected to name-calling, and 18 stated that they were hurt during the process. In addition, that study noted that 80% of the children surveyed said that they did not want to be rescued in the first place.
When what is claimed to be a rescue, ends up subjecting the street children to the immediate risk of physical harm, or when the rescuers themselves are at times directly inflicting injuries on these kids, then something clearly needs to be changed. When it becomes clear that many of the alleged beneficiaries of rescues did not want to be rescued in the first place, or when 78 of 109 children surveyed said that rescue operations make them afraid, then there is something wrong with the status quo.
These numbers culled from the research of institutions, such as Bahay Tuluyan, help to give a bird’s eye view of the challenge that we face. In addition, this information helps to ensure that discussions which have implications for street children, and oversight pertaining to relevant government programs and policies, are based on the reality on the ground, and on what children are actually experiencing, when indiscriminate rescues are carried out.
In addition to this information gathering at the macro level, Bahay Tuluyan and other organizations like it, are also doing important work, because they are emphasizing, through the information they disseminate, that street children are in fact individual human beings, with unique identities, and with an inherent human dignity which must be recognized and respected.
The report I mentioned earlier noted that, in a sense, street children and their families were being made pawns by some government offices. Instead of being viewed as persons, they became mere numbers, who needed to be processed in order to meet quotas. And for some individuals, these quotas became the be all and end all, so that targets had to be met no matter the consequences to the children involved or their families. In certain cases, beautification was considered and prioritized over what should have been a core or primary concern, namely the best interests of the child.
Far too often, the humanity and human dignity of these children were ignored. Bahay Tuluyan and organizations like it continue to work in order to change that.
Some of the most striking passages from the 2008 research paper involved the words of the street children themselves. In particular, a case study was presented on page 18, where a rescue operation was observed and described.
A rescuer was noted as saying, “We give you food, shelter, free soap and at Christmas we give presents – so why won’t you just come with us.” To that, one of the girls replied, “We don’t want to come with you because you are hurting us.”
“Pinagpapalo kami”
That girl knew that the treatment to which she was being subjected was wrong. She understood that she and her friends and loved ones, deserved to be treated better, that being forcibly loaded onto a vehicle like that was improper. And she, of course, was right.
She was right, and the governmental intervention, while well-meaning, was regrettably off the mark for several reasons.
The “rescue” of children must always begin with the identification of those who do and do not enjoy the care of their parents. To jump to the conclusion that street children do not have parents to whom they return to overlooks the parental rights and authority exercised by these parents. While allowing their children to roam the streets smacks of being remiss in their parental responsibilities, we have to be reminded that where parents are present or nearby, they must make the choice for the child, and generally, this choice must be respected. Save for very exceptional reasons, the forced or insidious separation of children from their parents is not in keeping with promoting the integrity of families.
National and international human rights law contain a catalogue of rights which this type of treatment violates. From the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, international law contains prohibitions on this type of conduct.
That girl may not have communicated her sentiment in the language of human rights statute, but in her own way, she completely understood that as human beings, all of us, no matter who we are, deserve recognition of our inherent dignity and respect for our humanity.
These stories are striking, and they need to get out there, whether they take place in the context of indiscriminate rescues, or whether they relate to the other threats that street children face out there on our roads. Their stories need to be told, and need to reach even wider audiences.
It is these stories which put a more human face on the phrase, street children. It is hoped that as the public learns of these children’s experiences, of fear and separation, of hurt and abuse and degradation, they will come to understand that the children who live and play, work and suffer, out on the street are just like any other child.
A street kid has the same human rights as any other kid. A street child possesses the same human dignity that every child possesses, and that every other human being has. They cannot be treated as mere pawns or props, mere numbers or nameless statistics. They are so much more than that. They are human beings.
We have seen sobering reminders of what happens when individuals or groups of individuals, are considered to be less than human, or less deserving of protection than other people. For instance, over these last several months, the Commission on Human Rights has been carrying out investigations and public inquiries, on alleged death squads operating in several major cities in the Philippines .
These death squads are alleged to have summarily executed individuals, including children, simply because as persons who were living out on the street, they were considered eyesores. Or because as persons who had resorted to drug use, and had thus broken the law, they could now be discarded or treated as if they were disposable, and subjected to extrajudicial killing.
It is vital that no one sector or group of people in our society, is considered as somehow less than human. This is unacceptable and cannot be allowed. Thanks to the work of organizations such as Bahay Tuluyan, there remains continued and strong resistance against the dehumanization of any particular sector of our society, especially that of street children.
One other striking observation from the 2008 paper is that the detention of street children in particular, can be quite a dehumanizing experience. Issues of lack of clean water and adequate nutrition, limited or no access to clean comfort rooms, the inflicting of corporal punishment and even worse forms of abuse, and more, lead to a situation of detention tantamount to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.
There is a parallel here with the situation of adult detainees. Adult detainees are also often subjected to conditions which are unacceptable, under international human rights law. For a long time, they could simply be ignored by government leaders because detainees could not vote, and could not therefore apply meaningful public pressure on officials in government.
Thankfully, some progress is taking place in that regard, and it is hoped that in 2010, detainees will be allowed to meaningfully exercise their right to suffrage, thereby opening the door toward improvements in the conditions to which they are subjected.
Like adult detainees, street children currently tend to be ignored by government leaders. They cannot vote, after all, so government officials need not necessarily worry about what these children think or experience or suffer through. There is no direct way for these kids to create the kind of public pressure which politicians must listen to.
Again, that is where organizations like Bahay Tuluyan come in. By disseminating information on street children, by telling their stories, by allowing them to speak to the public at large in their own words, these kids are provided an avenue through which they can reach out to the hearts and minds of the other members of our society.
And in this way, the public at large will eventually better understand, that street children have human rights, as do all of us, and that these rights must be respected, protected and fulfilled.
The work carried out by Bahay Tuluyan and other organizations like it, is crucial. You are helping to make ours a better society, more in keeping with our true values, and truly respectful of the human rights of all individuals. The Commission on Human Rights thanks you and honors you for the work that you do.
I am certain that this research study being launched today, which takes a close look at the practice of indiscriminate rescues carried out in 4 cities in Metro Manila, will further help to increase our understanding of the challenge at hand, will further help people to understand what is really happening and what needs to change, and will provide further guidance in order to help the many men and women in government, who truly desire to do what’s best for street children, in keeping with the need to protect the best interests of the child.
We usually hear leaders say that our young people are the future of our nation, and that our children are our greatest treasure. It is time to ensure that this way of thinking, this attitude toward our youth, becomes the norm for all our young people, especially those who live as members of marginalized groups, and especially those who are most vulnerable and most at risk. All these programs gear for and aimed at the youth should not only feature children clad in their crisp and clean school uniforms, neatly combed hair; those who enjoy the company of classmates, have educational opportunities and the typical characterizations in television ads. Caring for the children and their future must include absolutely all children. Children from indigenous communities, children in rural locales, children among a displaced population, fleeing calamity and war, and children lost in the urban landscape, who scrape the bottom of the can to eke out a very fragile existence. All children have to be a part of governmental rhetoric and ultimately, deliberate and effective action.
In the end, what must be made clear is that all our children are precious, no matter where they may live, no matter where they may play, no matter the mistakes or the wrong choices they or their parents may have made.
All our children are precious. I thank you for working so hard to advocate for their rights, to keep them safe, and to safeguard their present and their future.
Thank you very much.