KUALA LUMPUR – Women, Family and Community Development (KPWKM) former deputy minister Hannah Yeoh insists the ministry’s existing workforce is insufficient to support approximately nine million children in the country.
She also highlighted in a call with The Vibes earlier that the Welfare Department (JKM) is unable to properly focus on protecting children, which makes up 30% of the population, against all forms of violence due to the broad range of issues and portfolios that it handles at present.
In addressing issues related to the setting-up of specific agencies to tackle the children rights’ issues, Yeoh claimed that during her tenure under the Pakatan Harapan administration, the ministry had focused heavily on child issues.
“As long as you continue to neglect issues related to children (and their rights), the country will pay for the repercussions later.
“However, under Minister Rina Harun, (the ministry) was more focused on women because between children and women, who are the voters?” she said.
“In this country, anyone with no voting power will get their welfare ignored.
“As a politician, I will tell you this because every effort that you focus on is geared towards being popular with the people.
"For instance, the three areas where you see constant neglect – ie children, foreign workers and animal rights – all do not contribute to voting,” she added.
While admitting that the ministry had several agencies, Yeoh however, pointed out that the issues involving children are confined to a section under JKM (looking after the guidelines and regulations for kindergarten, babysitters, and protectors) instead of a specific agency.
“When children’s affairs are merely being looked after by a section in JKM, obviously there will be not enough resources and emphasis for them,” she said.
"Based on the last data I received back in 2019 on the matter of protectors, we only have about 208 of them (JKM staff) in total and the ratio of protector to child abuse cases assigned under them is 1:80.
“If one protector needs to look after 80 cases, they are certainly not able to do meaningful check-ups or follow-ups regularly,” she added.
On how her suggestion fares against complaints about ministries already being bloated, “JKOM and Rela members are more than the total amount of JKM staff assigned specifically on children’s affairs – and again we are talking about kids here,” stressed Yeoh.
“Children who are at risk or suffer from abuse carry that weight for the rest of their lives.”
“You can’t sweep it with the same argument where ministries are bloated, therefore establishing a ministry dedicated to children is not necessary.
“It does not need to have 10,000 staff to be established or even be mega-sized. It’s just a matter of having that structure and growing from there.
“We must look at priority and needs because today, children’s issues are more than just underage smoking, it has grown into sexual grooming because our kids are exposed to the vulnerabilities of today’s sophisticated crimes.
“Our challenge now is that there are no spokesmen or champions of children in the last cabinet bringing up pertinent issues on the table. As a result, you see a lot of it never making it to the mainstream,” she said.
“A simple example is on SOPs. Over the last year, a lot of announcements were made without considering child care centres or kindergarten requirements.
“On the MoE level, they also mostly talk about the operations of schools, but when it comes to children – there is the wellbeing aspect when it comes to the development,” added Yeoh, noting that she speaks on behalf of children's NGOs and as a parent herself. – The Vibes, August 25, 2021
