Temp shelters: Schooling street kids as a means of getting them off Sabah’s streets

Wanita MCA Sabah lauds the announcement by Chief Minister Datuk Seri Hajiji Noor, represented by Assistant Minister Abidin Madingkir in the Sabah State Legislative Assembly that the Sabah state Government is embarking on a pilot project to establish temporary shelters in various districts to resolve the issue of street children or child beggars.

The protective centres which target children from the Bajau Laut or Palau community in the city, Tawau, Sandakan, Lahad Datu and Pulau Gaya serve to safeguard them. Usually undocumented, these minors could easily be exploited to be child labourers, be availed for child marriage as a method to alleviate the family’s poverty, and at a worst-case scenario, they are susceptible to sexual offences and abuse by adults.

It is hoped that this proactive move, much awaited, will enhance the literacy rate among impoverished and stateless children whilst imparting them with living skills. For the long-term, it is also hoped that their parents and guardians will recognise the importance of sending these children to schools to be imbued with education as a means to escape the vicious poverty cycle.

Wanita MCA Sabah also implores on these shelters to register these pre-teenagers with the National Registration Department and the State Welfare Department as well as identify the necessary assistance that can be rendered to their families e.g. financial aid, meals baskets, transport arrangements to and fro schools and others.  

Expressing confidence with the personnel at the temporary shelters in discharging their roles professionally and with tender care to these vulnerable children, Wanita MCA Sabah also appeals that they exercise extra patience and refrain from any form of patronising conduct. The duties and couselling they undertake are noble and priceless as they will be rescuing the lives of deprived children from any form of exploitation by individuals who do not always wield altruistic values.

These temporary shelters are also in line with the Child Act 2001, UN Convention on the Rights of the Child as well as the 1989 Geneva Convention.

-MCA online-