First Lady Linda Ramkalawan visits President’s Village |30 December 2020

‘The country lacks a dedicated school for children with behaviour problems’

The young residents of the President’s Village at Port Glaud, yesterday morning welcomed First Lady Linda Ramkalawan on her first visit to the state-run residence and she expressed that the country lacks a dedicated school for children with behaviour problems.

Mrs Ramkalawan was accompanied on her visit by the chief executive of the National Council for Children’s (NCC) Yasmin Umarji and the village’s manager Brigitte Balette.

The First Lady started off her visit at the boys’ living quarters where she visited their sitting room and dormitories, and interacted with them.

This was followed by a tour of the girls’ quarters and day-care facility.

Mrs Ramkalawan’s last stop was in the dining hall where she was treated to a Christmas Carol and a message of thanks from a 16-year-old resident. Some minutes later, the First Lady also engaged in a private discussion with the more senior girls on the village who wanted a more discreet conversation with her.

Her visit at the village was an opportunity to learn more about life on the President’s Village for the children and staff, programmes and activities being conducted for the benefit of the children such as therapy sessions.

The President’s Village presently shelters 44 children, a mix of boys and girls, between the ages of two and 16. These children are placed at the village by social services due to various reasons such as the loss of their parents or social ills in their homes.

Ms Balette, the President’s Village manager, however explained that the village is also taking in children with behavioural problems which their parents or guardians can no longer handle.

She expressed the need for additional support to the First Lady, in order for the village to better cater to the children who are put in its care.

“At the moment, the President’s Village is the only state institution that can take in kids with bad behaviour, and on our side we have to do our utmost to change their behaviour. It is not easy but we are here to help them alongside social services and other partners,” said Ms Balette.

“Social services work with the parents to ensure that the child can go back and re-integrate with their family. The parents need a lot of help before the child can return home so the work is vast and does not only concentrate on the village,” she added.

She further noted that the re-introduction of a youth rehabilitation programme should be a topic that is strongly discussed nationally.

Ms Balette continued to add that “one of our greatest challenges is that we are in need of more personnel.”

“There is a new standard in place stating that we should have 1 personnel for every five children but at the moment we have 42 children and we are not meeting the required standards. If we get the number of staff needed to align with the standard, it will be a great help because we can better deal with smaller groups of children than larger ones.”

On her part, Mrs Ramkalawan said her visit has shown her that the President’s Village is a difficult place to manage, faced with a myriad of challenges.

“There are a lot of damages done to property which is a shame because I had yet to encounter this situation in my visits to other orphanages. This makes me think that the country is lacking a dedicated school for children with behaviour problems,” noted the First Lady.

“They are more suited to a facility that can better deal with delinquents […] I believe that the President’s Village was not created to deal with such issues but rather for orphans and children with social difficulties but now we are seeing these kids being put together with those whose parents can no longer handle them, which makes the management’s job doubly hard.

Mrs Ramkalawan also made note of the lack of maintenance work at the residence that needs to be addressed.

The accompanying photos show some highlights of the First Lady’s visit at the President’s Village.

Elsie Pointe

Photos: Louis Toussaint