THIS is yet another appeal for the child welfare authorities in Moruca and Georgetown to demonstrate some serious, no nonsense interest in the circumstances of the abused and severely raped 10-year-old girl at Moruca, Pomeroon River. Yesterday, I was told by residents living in Moruca, that the former teacher who raped and abused all his girlchildren and grandchildren was placed on $100,000 bail. I am wondering if it is customary for a rapist to be placed on station bail when he can leave the village unnoticed by the police.
Editor, rumours have it in Moruca that the grandmother is fully aware of these children being abused and raped without reporting it to the police, village captain, Ministry of Human Services and Social Security Welfare Department, or the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs.
Incest and rape are perhaps the cruellest, most baffling of human experiences. It is a betrayal of the most basic trust between child and parents and grandparents. It is emotionally devastating. The young victims are totally dependent on their aggresssors, so they have nowhere to run, no one to run to. Protectors become persecutors, and reality becomes a prison of dirty secrets. Incest and rape betray the very heart of childhood –it’s in nonce.
Essentially we have indigent parents and grandparents of questionable psychological wellness being allowed to “nurture” their children. Being economically- disadvantaged might evoke some sympathy, but these particular parents are demonstrably incapable of raising these girls with any modicum of dignity. They do not work; they commission their children to abuse; they endanger their young either by exposing them to unrespectable locations or trespassing; and they are unequipped to instill any positive values in their girl children.
Why then is the state ostensibly reluctant to intervene on behalf of these children? Is it that the welfare authorities are convinced of the efficacy of these grandparents and parents? Or could it be that child welfare subscribe to the flawed view that love and care are corollaries of the birthing process? Can no one in Moruca and Georgetown discern that these children are drowning in a toxic environment of poverty, neglect, psychological abuse and disempowerment? And if child welfare is aware of this, why is there no effort to provide an environment more amenable to the development of the well-being of these children?
While these authorities are in their state of suspended consciousness, these children are subjected to rape and abused by their own blood and flesh while everyone in the village remains silent. They do not know what it means to simply experience childhood as most average Guyanese children do, because unfortunately for them, they were born not just into abject poverty, but also into an environment of psychological maladjustment.
Will we really be justified in calling them illiterate, delinquent and criminal should such horrendous fates befall them?