adminperpetuate the transmission of the body of knowledge, and hence development, from generation to generation. They are our most enduring legacy, guarantors of our civilisation, past and present, and need to be nurtured with meticulous care and accorded all the support necessary so that they can reach their full potential and contribute meaningfully towards the realisation of a world fit for all.
Of late, however, there has been a disturbing upsurge in reports in the press of children with disabilities being abandoned by their parents soon after birth. While in other cases of abandonment, care has been taken to find the culprits and bring them to book, in the case of children with disabilities, however, abandonment reaches its lowest point.
Here, we are confronted with a situation where, after the mother has given birth to a child with disability, the father summarily abandons the family without any feeling of compassion, openly declaring that there is no way that he can give birth to a child with disability.
Worse still accusing the wife of infidelity and dabbling in witchcraft. The father is allowed to abandon his legal, moral, financial and emotional obligations with impunity by an indifferent society that conveniently chooses to look the other way.
On February 4, 2011, H-Metro reported the case of a mother who gave birth to a child with teeth. The father rushed to distance himself from paternity of the child, saying there was no way the child could have been his, and that the mother must have strayed from the marital bed. As is the norm in such cases, the mother will be left holding the baby as it were – she will be the one to care single-handedly for the child till it grows up, thus creating a number of psychological problems for the child from which he or she seldom recovers.
There was not the slightest response from the authorities, or a whimper from human rights organisations, and not even a concerned groan from child protection societies. Zimbabwean child help societies remained sublimely supine in the face of this first form of violence on the rights of the child, choosing, as usual, to play the role of the innocent bystander. The church, though preaching that children a gift from God have also choose to remain mum on the matter.
On Thursday, February 10, 2011, Newsday also ran a story of an 18-year-old Mutoko woman who, facing problems with her husband who was failing to come to terms with having sired a child with a physical disability, subsequently drowned her child in order to make peace with her husband. Even when not abandoned at birth, the child with disability is faced with violence, stigma and discrimination at every turn, perpetrated, paradoxically, by the very people who have the responsibility of bringing up the child in a loving and nurturing environment – the child’s parents.
The Herald of 20 January 2010 gave a report of a prominent Mabvuku businessman and church elder who had been keeping his 26-year-old mentally challenged son in a cabin that resembled a tool shed at the back of the house for three years. Again, a deafening silence as society became afflicted with a sudden deafness – the deafness of indifference.
Studies by UNICEF have shown that mothers predominantly bear the burden of care for children with disabilities, the fathers having abandoned the children at birth. This brings into sharp focus the need for introduction of anti-abandonment legislation to curb abandonment of children with disabilities. Abandonment is the first form of violence against children, who are entitled to a family and to familial care and supports.
Anti-abandonment legislation needs to be bolstered by anti-abandonment activities like, putting an end to outmoded practices where children are separated from their mother at birth, registering children at birth, ensuring that there are social workers in maternity hospitals and wards, – introducing appropriate welfare services to provide support for mother and child, giving mothers financial aid, and providing advice and special assistance and making sure that parents are more closely involved in cases where a child is born with a disability among others.
Research has shown that a child’s early experience of being nurtured and developing a bond with a caring adult affects all aspects of behaviour and development. When parents and children have strong, warm feelings for one another, children develop trust that their parents will provide what they need to thrive, including love, acceptance, positive guidance, and protection.
It is this positive behaviour and development that the adoption of anti-abandonment legislation seeks to inculcate among parents, caregivers and the society at large. Risks associated with abandoned children as they grow up include truancy in school, low school performance, a distorted view of themselves, a high incidence of drug and alcohol abuse and aggressive behaviour. The teen may also withdraw from all relationships, including those with friends, family, and classmates, and become extremely dependent on the remaining parent. Teens may also react by becoming sexually promiscuous at an early age, sometimes to the point of addiction. Aggression, deep anger and resentment, feelings of betrayal, difficulty concentrating, chronic fatigue, and problems with friends or at school are not uncommon. According to a UN study on violence against children in care and justice institutions, the most common reasons for placement of children in care systems are disability, family disintegration, violence in the home, lack of social support systems, and poor social and economic conditions, including poverty.
While for the rest of the children so affected, placement is usually due to one or two of the above factors, children with disabilities are affected by the whole gamut of factors – their disability often results in family disintegration, with the father commonly abandoning the wife for having committed an abomination.
These accusations usually result in violence and spousal abuse. The violence is sometimes transferred to the child with disability; and the documented high incidences of poverty among people with disabilities, and the concomitant social exclusion, manifest themselves commonly in lack of social support systems and poor social and economic conditions.
An anti abandonment law should also be supported by national efforts to ensure children with disabilities get social protection and things that they need in life such as wheel chairs, hearing and walking sticks. This will help reduce stigma among the by communities and acceptability people. Stigmatisation by society and inability by parents who lack money and support services to cope with the child’s disabilities puts additional pressure on the parents to dump these children in institutional care.
In most of the institutions the violence sparked off by abandonment, often continues unabated. As a result of lack of resources being invested in these institutions, there are typical overcrowding and squalid conditions in disability care institutions, thus heightening the possibility of ill treatment and outright negligence of the children. Children with disabilities in care institutions need special treatment, including basic toiletry and living skills, and very often, staff in these institutions have not received special needs training that enable them to adequately understand and care for these children.
The writer is Information and Communications Officer with the National Association of Societies for the Care of the Handicapped an umbrella body of organisations of and for people with disabilities in Zimbabwe.
Online Reporter