CHILDREN LIVING ON THE EDGE: WHO IS ULTIMATELY RESPONSIBLE?
Grisha Balasanyan

2010/05/31 | 15:08

Feature Stories society

26% of Armenians Under the Age of 18 Live in Poverty

On the surface, it would appear that children in Armenia are
adequately cared for given the notion of the traditional Armenian
family and the attention it devotes to the raising of kids. However,
take a closer look at reality and you will see that the rights of
children in Armenia are being violated on a constant basis. Take,
for example, the case of a child in need of medical treatment but
the parents cannot afford the cost.

Under RoA law, all individuals who have not yet turned 18 are
considered to be juveniles. However, the state limits government-funded
medical treatment to children under the age of seven. After that,
the parents must pick up the tab.

Then there is the law that states that all children must be provided
decent and adequate living conditions. But what if a family cannot
afford to do so? The law stipulates that they must. 26.5% of Armenia’s
population are children.

UNICEF statistics reveal serious shortcomings

26% of these children live under the poverty line and 3% live in
what is termed “extreme poverty”. According to UNICEF standards,
individuals with a monthly income of less that 17,232 AMD in Armenia
are regarded as “extremely poor” and those with less than 25,188 AMD
per month are regarded as just “poor”.

According to UNICEF studies, child poverty rates in Shirak Marz are
the highest at 7%. Vayots Dzor ranks the lowest with a 1% extreme
poverty rate for children. In Yerevan, Armenia’s capital, a whopping
21% of children are living in poverty and 3% in extreme poverty.

The larger the family, the greater the chances of a child growing up
in poverty. Such a risk increases if the parents have a high school
education or less and if the child grows up in a one-parent family,
especially if the head of the household is the mother. It doesn’t help,
if none of the elders of the family are out of work.

In order to combat extreme child poverty and to soften the
consequences, UNICVEF has urged the government to seek new ways to
more effectively channel state funds aimed at providing a social net
for children.

For example, it has been suggested to the government that children be
allocated a monthly allowance of 5,000 AMD. This would cut the child
poverty rate from 26% down to 10%. According to UNICEF estimates,
allocating such assistance to juveniles between the ages of 0-4
would cost the government about $30 million; or about 1% of the 2010
national budget. The practice of granting child assistance has been
successfully employed in western Europe.

9 year-old Lilit: Can the government assist the truly needy?

In last week’s edition of Hetq, we covered the issues confronting Nina
Babakhanyan’s nine member family living in the Ararat Marz village
of Sipanik. Their house collapsed due to rising underground water
and the family now lives in a makeshift hut on wheels.

There are five juveniles in the family that just aren’t getting enough
to eat on certain days. When we visited the family, 9 year-old Lilit
walked up to us, tears in her eyes, and begged us to help get them a
house. The girl has come down with a chronic cough due to the damp
conditions.

The doctors have diagnosed her with chronic bronchitis but she has
never received proper medical attention. Some physicians suspect that
she might have contracted tuberculosis.

They have sent Lilit for further testing and luckily the TB suspicions
have been ruled out. However, all the necessary pre-requisites for
contracting the disease still remain – dampness, malnutrition, etc.

Lilit is now being treated at home with various medications. Ernest
Baloyan, who heads the out-patient clinic says that other than offering
certain prophylactic care, they can do no more for the girl.

So this is the extent of the government’s care of the child. Her
parent cannot afford adequate medical attention because she is out
of work. With the money the family receives in assistance from the
government , they can barely put food on the table for half the month.

Lilit dreams of living in Yerevan where she can at lest go down into
the yard and play with friends. In Sipanik, her village, there’s not
even any dry land left to walk on, let alone play. The underground
waters have totally engulfed the rural community.

Years ago, Lilit’s family resided in Yerevan but circumstances forced
them to sell their apartment. They would up in Sipanik. The girl
showed us the only three cuddly toys she owned and a bag in which
she kept her clothes.

All these were presents received from neighbors. It’s been several
years now that Lilit and her younger brother, Felix, haven’t gotten
any new clothes. The kids have made do with hand-me-downs from others.

Lilit couldn’t speak with us for long. She was always coughing and
crying. Felix has also suffered from the unhealthy living conditions,
contracting nephritis, an inflammation of the kidneys.

Do the bureaucrats actually care?

Gagik Poghosyan, Head of the Children’s Rights Protection Department
at the Ararat Regional Administration, told Hetq that most of the
cases of rights violations were socio-economic in nature and that
their number wasn’t all that large.

“The region is mainly an agriculture-based economy. People own plots
of land, so even if they have no steady work they can always raise
the kids on income derived from the land. Compared to residents of
the mountainous regions, those living in the Ararat valley are fairly
well off,” Mr. Poghosyan said.

He pointed out that during the past two years some 250 local kids from
needy families and or when one or both parents are missing, have been
sent to Tzaghkadzor or Hankavan free of chrage by the government for
their summer vacation.

“If the child has a medical issue, we get involved to see that proper
treatment is provided in order that the child fully recuperates,”
said Mr.Poghosyan.

When we told him about the plight of Lilit and Felix in the village
of Sipanik, Mr. Poghosyan said he was aware of the situation since
the mother had contacted him directly s few months ago. He directed
the children’s parent to the Health Department at the Regional
Administration.

“The mother came here so I directed her to the Health Department. I
didn’t see her again afterwards,” said Mr. Poghosyan. When we told him
that the little girl’s condition had only worsened after the visit,
he said that the Regional Governor was taking steps to solve the
family’s housing situation.

We asked Mr. Poghosyan if he wasn’t at all interested in the fact that
the children had serious medical problems. “They came here to see me,
but not with medical problems. I remember the encounter well. They had
come about a housing matter, that there was a great deal of water,”
he replied.

The fact is that the official who heads the Children’s Rights
Protection Department has never gone out to the home where these
needy children live. Neither does he understand the full scope of
their problem; nor does he display a desire to. The official seemed
to be tyrying to extricate himself from any responsibility over this
unfortunate situation. But he stumbled on his on words.

At first, he literally boasted to us that the children’s mother
had come to see him and that he directed her to the right office,
the Health Department. Later on, however, he insisted that she had
visited him with a housing matter.

Of course, the two issues, health and housing, are interrelated. But
Mr. Poghosyan would rather see one and not the other, and then only
when it’s convenient to do so.

From: A. Papazian