Mandaue victim’s kin, DSWD disagree on bill
A bill recently approved in the House of Representatives makes it illegal for parents, teachers or guardians to inflict corporal punishment on children for actions like striking, pulling hair or piercing skin.
But for some old-timers, such strictness is not cruelty, but part of old-fashioned Filipino family discipline.
Even if her 5-year-old grandchild died allegedly due to physical abuse by a stepmother, Myrna Flores of Mandaue City told Cebu Daily News she is not in favor of the bill.
Flores, the 58-year-old grandmother of Kate Arianne Chu Flores, said the bill doesn’t answer one underlying cause of child abuse—poverty.
She said parents get angry because they have no food on the table.
“They (authorities) should resolve hunger first because parents get angry when they can’t feed their children so they beat them up because the kids also become rebellious,” Myrna said in an interview.
Kate died after a two-week confinement at a government hospital.
Police are set to file charges against the child’s 18-year-old pregnant stepmother, Abigail Catindijan, who has disappeared.
Congress approved last Wednesday a bill criminalizing forms of corporal punishment on children.
House Bill 4455, which promotes positive forms of discipline on children, was authored by Bagong Henerasyon party-list Rep. Bernadette Herrera-Dy and Tarlac Rep. Susan Yap.
Yap said the measure will minimize incidents of child domestic violence in the country.
The bill seeks to ban such actions as pulling hair, piercing skin, striking, tying up and imprisonment.
The bill also encourages parents and guardians to instead use positive and nonviolent approaches such as praises, reprimand and responsibility building.
The bill also mandates the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) to create a comprehensive program to promote non-violent discipline of children in the country.
A similar bill authored by Sen. Jinggoy Estrada is pending before the Senate committee on youth, women and family relations.
Grandmother Flores said she raised her children with discipline, which included corporal punishment.
She said it is part of Filipino culture and it strengthens rather than weakens family ties.
“We only hit the feet. It’s part of our Filipino culture to punish children who do wrong and it’s what keeps the family close,” Flores said in Cebuano.
She said she even once tied up her 31-year-old son Arthur, Kate’s father, with a chain so he can’t go out with friends after he stopped schooling.
Her son Arthur holds a different opinion.
He said the law should be approved to prevent parents from abusing their children.
“The parents should talk to their children instead of beating them up because the children would eventually be immune to the beatings done on them,” Arthur said in Cebuano.
While saying that he disciplines his children, Arthur said he only pinches his kids whenever they disobey him.
He confirmed that his mother got mad at him when he stopped schooling to wash cars at seven years old.
A 12-year-old boy recently accused his teacher of beating him with a stick in Argao town, south Cebu.
The boy stopped schooling while the teacher denied beating him severely.
Mylah Ramos, a 33-year-old teacher of Bagong Lipunan school in barangay Mabolo, Cebu City, said she is against corporal punishment on students.
She said it discourages and develops feelings of hostility and resentment in them towards authority figures.
She cited her own parenting experience as basis. “Based on experience, you will only inflict pain and fear to the children. They won’t understand their faults if you just spank them,” the teacher told Cebu Daily News.
The DSWD Central Visayas office said it supports the bill against corporal punishment that was passed by the Lower House last week.
Jaybee Binghay, DSWD-7 spokesperson, said corporal punishment is different from discipline because it leads to abuse
“It is never effective. You can discipline a child without inflicting harm. Child abuse is a cycle and is never effective,” Binghay said.
She said using physical punishment to discipline the children is ineffective and would instead cause long-term psychological damage on a child such as alienation, low self-image, self-destructive tendencies and aggression.
Under the bill, police can file a case against violators in court.
Violators face one month of imprisonment or suspension of their parental authority over the children, depending on the penalties provided by existing laws to protect children.
The court can order the offender to attend seminars on children’s rights, positive and nonviolent discipline, and anger management. /Jucell Marie P. Cuyos,Candeze R. Mongaya and Rhea Ruth V. Rosell
