Manila social workers and policemen have rescued a six-year-old girl who was allegedly chained and abandoned by her mother and teenage brother inside their house and left to tend to her eight-month-old baby sister.
Staff of the local social welfare department and operatives of the Manila Police District (MPD) Jose Abad Santos police station 7 immediately went on Thursday to a house at 734 Fajardo Street, Barangay 58 Zone 5, in Tondo, after receiving information from a concerned citizen on the inhumane treatment of the children.
MSWD head Jay de la Fuente told the Inquirer that when the child was found by social workers and policemen, a chain was looped around her ankle and secured to the bedpost with two padlocks while her baby sibling was lying on the bed.
There was no adult around, he said, and the two young girls had apparently been left to their own resources inside their house. The kids were taken by the MSWD personnel to their office for proper care and protective custody.
De la Fuente told the Inquirer that officials in the barangay confirmed that they have previously gotten wind of the children’s maltreatment last May but when they interceded and talked to the children’s mother, she had promised never to chain up her daughter again.
Information
“Our district I chief Lala Clemente received information from a concerned citizen about the abuse and immediately decided to rescue the children,” the MSWD chief pointed out.
Apparently, he told the Inquirer, the children’s mother and teenage brother chained up the six-year-old girl in the morning when they would leave the house and would only release her when they got back.
Grown accustomed
“The girl has seemingly grown accustomed to the routine and that kind of treatment,” De la Fuente remarked, adding that they have yet to identify the children’s mother as well as the girls’ 14-year-old sibling.
The children’s father, Jun Battara, was invited on Friday afternoon for questioning by MPD station 7 investigators but Battara denied knowledge of the maltreatment.
Jose Abad Santos police station commander Supt. Ernesto Barlam told the Inquirer that based on Battara’s claim, he and the children’s mother have long been separated and that he had not lived under the same roof since 2004.
“He (Battara) told us that he only gives the children financial support but did not know that they were being treated that way,” he said.
Charges
Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim, who was informed of the case, ordered De la Fuente to file appropriate criminal charges before the city prosecutor’s office against Battara and the children’s mother.
Among the cases that could be filed against the children’s parents is the violation of a city ordinance which penalizes any person who abandons or exposes a minor or allows a minor to be abandoned or exposed to a perilous situation that endangers human life, health or well-being.
Lim directed the MSWD to ensure that the parents would be held liable for subjecting their children to such treatment.