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At Home or At Children’s House?

August 16, 2007

bavshvta_saxlib.jpgWhat does deinstitutionalization process promise children lacking parental care?

“Georgian government will do its best to withdraw children lacking parental care from institutions and return them to their biological families or send to foster families. Thus the children will find the love they lacked for many previous years,” said Tamar Chanturia, the head of the program “Assistance of Orphan Children and Children Lacking Parental Care” within the Georgian Ministry of Education and Science.

Two Stories

Nika with large eyes is sitting on his mother’s knees and embarrassing her…

Nika was one year old when he got into Children’s House. Neighbors advised his mother to take to Children’s House and he spent seven months there. Now Nika is two years and four months old and lives with his mother again. Nika’s mother is expecting a baby in a month.

Galina, Nika’s mother: “My neighbor had left her child at the House for Infants and advised me to leave my son there too. We were very poor; I lived in a rented flat but did not work. I could not feed my child and finally left my baby at Children’s House. I visited him once a week or once in two weeks. I was glad because he was in better conditions. He even grew stouter. I missed him; I wanted him to be close to me. With the support of social workers Nika now lives with me. I am expecting second baby next month and I will keep him with me until I nurse him; then I will take the second child to the same asylum and I will start working. As for Nika I will send him to a nursery school. It is horrible when you cannot keep your children close to you. I hope I will survive all difficulties.”

Gio is four years old and he was abandoned in the House for Infants as soon as he was born. Grandmother visited him several times but soon she also disappeared and Gio remained at the asylum without any care. Two months ago a family fostered him.

Gio is sitting at a computer and knocking on the keyboard energetically. He cannot hold up on the chair.

Neli, Gio’s foster mother: “I have worked at the House for Infants for ten years. Now I am retired. I have children and grandchildren but I loved Gio so much that decided to foster him. Everybody supported my idea in my family. The child was too reserved, he could not contact with others. He has health problems and it was difficult to look after him. However, he has changed since I brought him to my family. He has learned a lot of rhymes and songs and the most important is that he found the family affection he had lacked before that.
 
Now Nika is growing up in his own family and Gio lives in foster family. With the support of Subprogram of “Prevention of Abandoning the Orphans and Children Lacking Parental Care and Deinstitutionalization” these children left asylum.

 Deinstitutionalization-simply difficult word or…

As representatives of the Ministry of Education claim the priority of their ministry is the process of deinstitutionalization in the field of orphans and children lacking parental care that aims to return children to their biological families or to foster families.

In order to carry out the process Georgian Ministry of Education and Science, under the Georgian Law on “Fostering the Orphans and Children Lacking Parental Care” started the subprogram of “Prevention of Abandoning Orphans and Children Lacking Parental Care and Deinstitutionalization” with the support of UNICEF and British Organization “Every Child.”
Nowadays, it is considered to be a state program.

Tamar Chanturia states that the subprogram is being implemented in 32 districts of 11 regions throughout Georgia.

“The above-mentioned subprogram is being implemented in three directions: returning the beneficiaries of Children’s Houses to their biological families and supporting of similar families (below mentioned as reintegration); prevention of children who are under risk of being left at asylums and supporting them to grow up in their families (below mentioned as prevention); and based on contract to place a child in fostering families for temporary inhabitance (below mentioned as fostering). Within the subprogram, social allowance for fostering a disabled child amounts to 250 lari a month and for healthy child allowance is 125 lari. As for prevention and reintegration, the allowance for disabled child will be 80 lari and 60 lari for healthy one,” said Chanturia.

Officials from the Ministry of Education, deinstitutionalization is too successful in Georgia. “Georgian families, because of Georgian mentality, consider that they are acting generously when involving the program and consequently, though it might sound incredible, there are plenty of fostering families in our country. I want to underline Telavi. There are a lot of foster families there. Unfortunately, under the law, fostered child can remain in the family until the age of 18. When s/he is of the full legal age the ministry cannot take responsibility on his/her life. However, there are occasions when fostered children remain in foster families for a long time,” said Chanturia.

According to statistics in I-II quarters of 2000-2007 the amount of children involved in deinstitutionalization program reached 1817. There are over three hundred registered foster families throughout Georgia.

Tamar Chanturia stated that the budget on 2008 is getting ready to be introduced to the Ministry of Finances. “We think that allowances for foster families must be increased and since deinstitutionalization is state program they will be eager to increase the budget.  The fact will support to withdraw more and more children from institutions,” said Chanturia, who added that the Ministry of Education does its best to return the children to their biological families. Corresponding service centers, like Daily Centers, were established on propose where mothers can leave their children during day-time and work. “There are similar centers in Tbilisi, Tianeti and soon it will be in Rustavi too. We are planning to extend the network in order to assist the parent to keep the child in biological family. Similar service can be provided at Mothers and Children’s Asylums, small family-type houses that aim to provide family environment for those children who cannot enjoy some other kind care at the moment.”

Directors of most similar institutions appreciate the program; however there are people who have different idea.

Angelina Berishvili is director of the Children’s House, “Satnoeba”, located in so-called Africa District in Tbilisi: “Don’t think that I am against the program because I am a director and do not want to lose beneficiaries. But I assess the program negatively. Parents of our beneficiaries are people who will waste the money received as an allowance from the budget in a day and their children will remain in the street again. As for foster families, I have not seen similar ones yet. Our house was opened ten years ago and during that time only one family applied to us to adopt a child and they wanted only an infant. We should also take into consideration that although the parents of our most children are either alcohol-addicts or prostitutes, they do not want their children to be adopted by other families. Some time ago, eight-member-group visited our asylum that carried out three-day-monitoring. We invited several parents according to our visitors’ suggestion and monitoring group members witnessed themselves that those parents categorically refused to let somebody adopt their children. We do our best to support our beneficiaries; they can get education and proper meal. So I think similar program is unreasonable to be implemented.”

Lali Alfaidze, director of Dighomi (district in Tbilisi) Children’s House has different opinion about deinstitutionalization. She said that it is necessary to implement similar project. “Family is essential environment for a child. Being in Children’s House is totally different from being in a family. A teacher who is in charge of fifteen children cannot deal with all of them properly. Attention is important for child’s development. We cannot replace a family environment here despite all our effort to create perfect conditions for them. Unfortunately we have not dealt with foster families so far. Parentless children are only few and we cannot let people adopt children who have parents because of parents are against it. Mothers left their children in asylums because of poverty, but they are against letting somebody adopt their children. The allowance they are supposed to receive from government if they take their children at home is not enough to look after a child.”

Irina Bekuridze, director of the JSC Tbilisi Infants’ House, has similar opinion regarding the program. She said that deinstitutionalization will provide children with welfare and family environment. “We support the activities in this direction and cooperate with the Ministry of Education.”

Manana Tsilosani, director of the Tskneti House for Children Lacking Parental Care was short in her comments on the situation, - she appreciates the deinstitutionalization program.
It must be pointed out that the Ministry of Education decided that in nearest future, the elections of directors for asylums will be held. ”Directors elected through polls will pay more attention to children’s welfare and interests. They will not focus on increasing the number of children in their asylums,” said Tamar Chanturia.

Nino Tarkhnishvili   

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