– ministry counselling alcoholic dad
The four Mahaicony Creek children, who had been rescued from dire circumstances in January, have been placed in the care of a great uncle who lives in the area, along with their father, according to Child Protection Coordinator, Ann Greene.
In January, the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security had removed ten-year-old Anita Pooranmal and her siblings, nine-year-old Sanjay called Radesh; eight-year-old Ritesha and seven-year-old Avinash from the Mahaicony Creek home they shared with their father after this newspaper highlighted their plight and staff from the ministry visited and saw their living conditions.
According to Greene, over the past few months the ministry has worked with the children’s great uncle and with their father. At the end of the last school term, the children were released into the uncle’s care.
She explained that the children are in the foster care of the great uncle and another great uncle is assisting. While their father Gupta Pooranmal resides in the same home, he does not have primary responsibility for the children, and cannot remove them from the home without permission, Greene said.
After the children were removed from the house they shared with their father, which was in a dilapidated condition, they remained in the care of the ministry and had been enrolled in school. This was because a preliminary meeting held with relatives found that none of the relatives who were present at the meeting were capable of taking care of the children.
Greene said counsellors from the ministry had been working with the children’s father, providing the psychosocial support he needed and he had remained sober.
She pointed out that because of the attitude of the father his relatives were not keen on intervening, though concerned about the children’s well-being. However, after the ministry worked with the relatives they realised that the well-being of the children came first.
“When we worked with them their whole attitude changed,” Greene said. She added that work was also done with the children’s 22-year-old mother Ann Rosita Boodhoo, but it was found that she is in no condition to accommodate the children.
Greene said the ministry’s officials would be making regular checks on the children to ensure that they are well taken care of. The children are now attending school in the Mahaicony Creek. Greene said that at the end of the last term they had done well at the city school they attended for the short period of time.
She said that while the children had been happy in the ministry’s care; family life was better for them.
“The idea is to work with the parents to provide the support,” she said. “The children are in the foster care of the uncle and it is not a case that the father can get upset and remove them from the home as he may have done in the past as all they have to do is contact us and that father could be locked up because the children are in the uncle’s care.”
The ministry’s primary concern is that at no time should the children be made to suffer.
The ministry had contemplated building a house for the mother so she could take care of her children but that plan did not materialise after it was revealed that her current partner was not in favour of it. He had indicated that the house they are living in is his. However, they are living in an extended family arrangement and there is no hope of the children being accommodated there at present.
This newspaper had reported in January that Anita Pooranmal had to tend to her siblings after their mother left them one year ago to escape from her alcoholic and abusive husband.
The mother, of Canal Number One Polder, had eloped with Gupta at the age of 12. She had told this newspaper that she had suffered hardship and abuse from the day she moved with him to the Mahaicony Creek.
The day she walked out “for good” was the third day that she and her children had been without food. She said she begged the children to go with her but only Sanjay agreed.
The father subsequently took the children to stay with her but later returned for them.