Poverty, Abuse Force Davao’s Children to the Streets

By CARLOS H. CONDE
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism
(Part Two)

DAVAO CITY — In 2000 and 2001, Davao City was adjudged the country’s “Most Child-Friendly City” by the National Council for the Welfare of Children, a government body under the Office of the President.

This year, however, Davao failed to get the recognition because of what local officials here have dismissed as negative noises coming from child-rights groups.

The NGOs retort that they had found it ironic that a city that tolerates the killing of minors as part of a brutal campaign against crime would be considered “child-friendly” at all.

Moreover, says Mae Templa, a social worker who is also with Karapatan’s Task Force for Women and Children, public discussion of killings have also “glossed over the real story of the children, why they are in the streets in the first place.”

The Davao City Local Development Plan for Children (2003-2007) says that in 2000, Davao had 1,505 street children. This figure more than doubled the following year to 3,213. According to the child-rights group Tambayan, most of the city’s street children belong to gangs, of which there are now some 150.

These gangs have become the bane of the city, say the police, who blame such groups for the various crimes committed by juveniles. But the killings of juvenile offenders have not deterred more young people from engaging in crime. The city’s plan for children says that the number of minors in conflict with the law increased by 18 percent between 2000 and 2001.

The Women and Children Division of the Davao City Police also says that between January and September this year, 749 minors committed crimes, with theft topping the number of cases at 285. The police say the juvenile crimes constitute a majority of the crimes committed overall during that period.

Child-rights advocates like Templa, though, argue that in the case of these youths’ involvement in crime, they are as much the victims. “They are for example used as drug couriers and, in a way, the community is involved in that,” says Templa. She adds that oftentimes, violence is just the youth gang’s reaction to society’s neglect. “They are,” she says, “pushed to the periphery.”

Tambayan program officer Pilgrim Guasa agrees, saying, “Poverty pushed them to the streets, where they are vulnerable to criminal activities, like drug use. For sure, these children are not the ones running the drug business. For one thing, they don’t have the capital to do it. So they are in fact being used because they do not have options and the necessary skills to venture outside the streets.”

According to a study done in November 2000 jointly by Tambayan, Save the Children-UK, Caritas, the Stichting Kinderpostzegels Nederland and the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef), most gang members belong to urban-poor families, and 81 percent of them are out of school due to poverty.

The study showed that 90 percent of respondents who were minors in conflict with the law had experienced abuse at home. The children also said they joined gangs because this is where they find “happiness,” and their gangmates are more likely to listen to them and understand them.

“Joining gangs is a means of support,” confirms Templa. She explains that because the structures of mainstream society including youth groups like the Sangguniang Kabataan do not absorb these children, they form their own groups. Unfortunately, she says, in cities like Davao, they usually end up being called thugs and labeled as society’s problems. Says Templa: “They have become the scapegoat for the community’s troubles. That’s very unfortunate.”

Kabataan Consortium executive director Bernie Mondragon says these youths simply lack the opportunities in life. For example, he says, if they cannot find wholesome entertainment at home, they would naturally gravitate to the outside world.

“I tried my best to keep my children here, in this house,” says Clarita Alia, the 48-year-old mother of three teenage gang members who were casualties in Davao City’s war against crime. Nanay Clarita Alia lives in a tiny, cramped shack in the middle of Bankerohan, the largest public market here.

Since her husband Cornelio left the family in 1996, Nanay Clarita has been forced to work double time. For a fee, she hauls vegetables using a wooden cart she rents for P10 a day from the market’s tambakan to the stores that sell these. Her day often starts as early as 2 a.m.

Nanay Clarita had eight children, six by Cornelio, one by a previous lover and another one she adopted. Tending to the children in such a chaotic neighborhood proved to be a problem. And no matter what she did, the streets would beckon to the children. “I once bought a television set so they would not be tempted to go out to the streets,” she says. The tactic worked, but after money problems forced Nanay Clarita to pawn the TV, so the children went back to the streets.