Spiralling child abuse in Guyana has prompted two local non-governmental organisations to join forces to help abused kids and root out the problem.
Help and Shelter and Every Child Guyana yesterday officially launched the Pickney Project – a programme specially implemented “to improve the lives of children experiencing violence and abuse by promoting the safety and protection of children“
This initiative, which is being funded by Every Child Guyana, was officially launched at the Pattensen Community Centre in Sophia. The programme focuses on communities and aims to involve as many members of the community as possible.
Sophia has been identified as the pilot community for the three-year project, which is expected to run until March 2011. And apart from Sophia, similar initiatives will be carried out in Good Hope and in different parts of Region 9.
Project Co-ordinator Michael Gillis identified the aims of the project as being five-fold. According to him, the main aim is to raise awareness with parents and other caregivers about child protection. He identified the secondary objectives as being to provide counselling and other psychosocial support to children, to collaborate with the Guyana Police Force to ensure an effective response to every report of child abuse, to work with teachers and health care providers on child protection mechanisms and also to develop a coalition of faith- based organisations, community groups and interested individuals who will network and share resources to promote child protection in the communities.
According to Project Officer Vidyaratha Kissoon, who is attached to Help and Shelter, Sophia was chosen because members of the community indicated an interest in having such a programme in the area. He said that results from a survey conducted also revealed that there was a high rate of abuse in that community. Kissoon stated that the programme is aiming to meet the needs of the children in the community and this includes bringing counselling closer to them. He also mentioned that the organisers of the project will be accountable to the community and to the general public and promised that there will be open forums where the successes and failures will be discussed.
Omattie Seaforth, the Country Director for Every Child Guyana, said that the success of the programme will be evaluated after one year. She explained that whatever the administrators of the project learn from working in Sophia will be used as the project is taken into other areas in Guyana. She said that it was important that members of the community got involved, since it took the proverbial village to raise a child. Seaforth also said that yesterday’s launch was held to coincide with the beginning of Child Protection Week under the theme “Every Citizen, A Child Protector”
Also speaking at yesterday’s launching was Colin Marks who is the Community Liaison Officer.
He said that a survey done in the community between March and April of this year revealed that there was widespread abuse of various forms present in the community. These included sexual, physical, verbal and emotional forms of abuse. He effectively used William Wallace’s poem “The Hand that Rocks the Cradle” in his encouragement to parents to stop hitting their children. Marks urged the parents “to start rocking the cradle again and stop knocking it”.
The organisers expressed the hope that after this initiative comes to a conclusion after three years, that other entities will come on board and engage in similar activities.
