Public urged to report immediately any child abuse case

ILOILO CITY – Special Envoy of the President to the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) Monica Louise Teodoro on Monday underscored the importance of reporting to authorities incidents of child abuse.

“Please do your part and try to prevent anything from getting worse and help the government and social workers and NGOs (nongovernment organizations) that are helpful and in reporting immediately to the right authorities because it is very, very lucrative to traffic children and abuse children,” she said in a media interview at the sidelines of her courtesy visit to the office of Iloilo Governor Arthur Defensor Jr.

Teodoro made the appeal as she noted online sexual abuse is increasing, although she could not provide specific figures.

“It’s so lucrative that it’s going up instead of going down, it’s just going up because of easy money. And the perpetrators are family members,” she added.

Teodoro was in Iloilo to visit the Cameleon Center, an international association dedicated to helping abused and neglected children.

Currently, it has in its care some 180 abused young girls, a lot were incestuous cases, in Barangay Sablogon in Passi City.

The child advocate, joined by Cameleon foundress and directress Laurence Ligier, brought to the attention of Defensor the condition of the center, about 50 meters away from the jail.

The girls sometimes chanced to see the perpetrators or their mothers visiting their husbands, and this upset them even more.

“I was asking help from the governor. Cameleon is really here to help the girls recover from the trauma of sexual abuse they have been experiencing for so many years,” Ligier said, adding that the youngest child under their care was five years old.

Teodoro said the incident is repeated in their minds each time the children see their perpetrators.

In response, Defensor said he would talk to Passi City Mayor Stephen Palmares about the possibility of an alternative location to transfer the jail, and the provincial government will build the building.

“We really want to help Cameleon because they are a great help to us. They take care of our sexually abused girls. They are doing a great part of the job of the government,” he said.

Defensor added he would like the provincial government to do more collaboration with UNICEF in line with the advocacy of the Cameleon because in the past, it already had collaboration through the Provincial Health Office. (PNA)