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SOMEWHERE, A CHILD SCREAMS FOR HELP
“B
ARROWSMITH2 VIA DREAMSTIME.COM
NEW DATA PORTAL REFLECTS THE KEY ISSUES THAT MAKE REDRESSING VIOLENCE AGAINST CHILDREN STILL A TOUGH CHALLENGE. By Cai U. Ordinario
ATA, laro tayo. Hindi pa ako napapalo.” Such was the comment of a young boy to a new-found playmate, heard by this reporter while on vacation years ago somewhere in southern Luzon. The comment made the reporter laugh, recognizing that all children always had to test the limits of their freedom.
Filipino parents are clear subscribers of the idea “spare the rod, spoil the child.” Young children recognize ordinary objects such as slippers, hangers, and belts or even food items such as mongo beans and salt [on which they must kneel] as “weapons of mass discipline.” There are parents and guardians who use these items and their bare hands to threaten children to control misbehavior, but there are those who act on these threats and some even resort to downright child abuse. Data collated by the United Nation Children’s Fund (Unicef) from official government data violence experienced by Filipino children has become one of the major reasons for their unhappiness. The newly launched data portal Situation of Children in the Philippines showed more than half or 58.8 percent of children aged 1 to 14 years old experienced at least one form of violent discipline. In a briefing on Monday, Unicef Philippines Chief of Planning, Monitoring, Evidence, & Data
Xavier Foulquier said the experience of violence against children is at its peak at age 10 years old. “By bringing all this data in one spot we can compare those different sources and we can confirm, triangulate the different sources and can confidently say that, like the highest violence tends to be at the age of 10 by peers, then by a parent and it’s going down as the age is going,” Foulquier said. “So early in the childhood, it’s like that’s when we need to address violence. And it has an implication. The thing is, that data will be fascinating to mind. Who are those children? What happens to those children that experience violence at 10? Will they have a different outcome later on in their life?” he added. The data portal also showed the prevalence of violent child discipline is the highest among 3 to 4 year olds at 63.3 percent and among 5 to 9 year olds at 62.3 percent. Children aged 3 to 4 years old, the data showed, suffered the most
“WHO are those children? What happens to those children that experience violence at 10? Will they have a different outcome later on in their life?”—Xavier Foulquier, Unicef Philippines Chief of Planning, Monitoring, Evidence, & Data, on the long-term impact of early childhood violence.
COUNCIL for the Welfare of Children Executive Director Angelo Tapales on data and policy-making: “In not so many words, data, statistics, trends, and issues inform our policies...policymakers, stakeholders, and even the public will not be blind anymore on what is really happening to the Filipino children.”
from physical punishment at 49.5 percent while children aged 5 to 9 years old faced psychological aggression at 51.5 percent and 10 to 14 years old at 50.5 percent. “Among the oldest children aged 10 to 14 years, 4.1 percent have been meted out severe forms of physical punishment,” the data portal stated. Based on the data on the platform, boys are more likely to experience any form of violent discipline than their girl counterparts and children in urban areas are more prone to receive violent discipline than those living in rural areas. According to the portal, the prevalence of children experiencing violent discipline is highest among those whose mothers have had no education or postsecondary education. Among regions, Regions IX and II have the highest prevalence
of children aged 1 to 14 years who experienced any violent means of discipline, physical or psychological, with 72.3 percent and 71.7 percent, respectively, in 2022. Region XI with 69.2 percent and Region III at 68.8 percent follow closely while BARMM has the lowest percentage of 28.3 percent. Violence against children, however, is not just about excessive discipline. The portal pointed out that forms of violence include physical, sexual and emotional (or psychological), or any combination thereof, and includes bullying, violent discipline, trafficking, and involvement in armed conflicts. Abuse, the portal said, may also involve neglect or deprivation of essential needs. “Violence against children occurs in any and different settings, such as the home, school, street, community, and increasingly, online platforms. Perpetrators of
violence against children comprise a wide range—children’s parents, siblings, other family members, peers, and neighbors—mostly people they trust, as well as strangers, other children, and intimate partners such as spouses, boyfriends, or girlfriends,” the portal stated. “Some violence inflicts physical harm that can lead to serious injury or even death, while some causes psychological damage that can hinder children’s growth and development,” it added. The level of violence experienced by children has prompted the Council for the Welfare of Children (CWC) to support the proposed Positive Parenting Bill, which seeks to ban corporal punishment. The Positive Parenting Bill or Senate Bill No. 2036, was filed by Senator Risa Hontiveros in March 2022. The bill seeks to promote positive parenting of children at home, in school, in institutions, in alternative care systems, in workplaces and in other settings. Positive parenting encourages “behavior change in adults and establishes the necessary structures and mechanisms and mobilize resources to make this possible.” The proposed legislation also seeks to defend and uphold the rights of children against “all forms of neglect, abuse, cruelty, exploitation and other conditions prejudicial to their development.” CWC Executive Director Angelo Tapales said apart from backing this proposed legislation, the government could also explore legal remedies for children under the Domestic Adversity Adoption Act, which aims to give “victim-survivor child a semblance of family” in a different home. Tapales said another policy di-
rection could be to consider foster care or even kinship care, where children are entrusted to relatives within the fourth degree of consanguinity and affinity to escape violence in their immediate family. “In not so many words, data, statistics, trends and issues inform our policies. And perhaps because of the establishment of the virtual platform, policymakers, stakeholders, and even the public will not be blind anymore on what is really happening to the Filipino children,” Tapales said. However, while data helps address violence against children, the new platform also pointed to problems of underreporting. The portal said that cases of violence against children are hidden because of the stigma it creates, as well as the fear of perpetrators that the law will catch up with them. The portal also noted there are issues regarding information of who or where to report these cases, especially when the victim is dead and there are no witnesses to the abuse except the perpetrators. “It is common assumption that many instances of violence against children remain invisible and undocumented which prevents help for victims and deprives children of their right to protection,” the platform lamented. It is unfortunate that violence against children is happening but there is no way to determine how much is occurring behind closed doors where these children cannot be reached. Somewhere there is a child screaming but it’s not out of the joy of playing with a new-found friend. Somewhere a child is calling out for help to get away from the pain brought by a familiar face.
PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 57.7980 n JAPAN 0.3807 n UK 75.0102 n HK 7.4385 n CHINA 8.1174 n SINGAPORE 43.8461 n AUSTRALIA 38.3779 n EU 62.5895 n KOREA 0.0420 n SAUDI ARABIA 15.3890 Source: BSP (October 25, 2024)