Stolen childhood

By Leonard Ibrahimi

Today, almost two centuries after Dickens promoted the changes, through portraits of child labor in David Copperfield novel, the twin evils of poverty and institutional carelessness perpetuate the destructive practice of abusive child labor. Shockingly, in Kosovo these days might be seen the rebirth of “Copperfieldian Era”.

Artan is fourteen years old, a good looking young man with a disturbed life. His happy childhood ended at age ten, when he left the school and started to work in order to support his family.

Artan’s family lives on the periphery of Peja, not so far from the new market. Their living place looks like everything else except a normal living environment. In fact, they have no house; they live in the tin – plate receptacle, placed on what has remained from the foundations of old house, which was burned during the war.

Artan’s background is full of troubles. His life seems to be a set of unfortunate happenings. However, he hopes that in the predictable future the luck will come back to him since the chance to have a life of a normal human being is all he wishes. “I just want to have an opportunity to get education”, he says, “I always dreamed to be a doctor”.

A fat youngster with a dark face lives in a family of four members and two of them are handicapped. His father, Jonuz, had an accident on the job, ten years ago and he can not work anymore. Artan’s only sister, Arbnesha, who is ten years old suffers from child paralysis for more than seven years.

On the other hand, Artan’s mother Hava, who was the only bread – winner of the family since her husband became a handicapped, was diagnosed as a diabetic and high blood pressure person, five years ago.

All these unlucky happenings will in a way determine Artan’s destiny. Surrounded by an extreme poverty, lack of the elementary needs, and careless of the institutions, Artan, four years ago, at age ten, decides to leave the school in order to feed his family.

As a consequence, Artan becomes a part of the street communities and, the toughness and the cruelty of the streets becomes a part of his everyday life. Since then, the life of a young innocent boy becomes, in essence, a life of a person who deals with difficulties of all natures.

After a while, street atmosphere will influence him. Very soon, Artan will move away from his first aim, taking care of the family. His attitude, as a working child, towards the people around him, including the members of his family, becomes one of extreme suspicion and mistrust. So, while time passes he does not help them anymore; on the contrary, he makes their life even harder.

Inability of the government to implement the law on compulsory primary education, and the law according to which, children under age of 15 are not allowed to work, has given the space for different kinds of children exploitations.

The presence of working children on the streets is a growing phenomenon in today’s Kosovo. Because of the institutions’ failure to understand the seriousness of the problem, working children are continuously used as exploitation means. In the near past, Albanian family had some norms. It was impossible to find a single child laborer. At the present, Albanian families are facing a lot of changes. Everybody, including children, is seen as a potential worker.

Experts say that this is a consequence of economic problems. The accumulation of economic disadvantages can really place the children, at a very high risk for reliance on their families. What is more, children are considered as a mean of profit. “Children, in Albanian society, used to be seen as security for the retirement of their parents, since they were ignored by the regimes of the past”, says Labinot Lekaj, an expert of economy, who is familiarized with the problem of working children. “Today, children are no longer seen as future security but as present – day laborers to bring home food and money for their parents”.

The 220 working children of the region of Peja are just a small part of a much bigger and upsetting picture. According to a local NGO Ta Mbrojmë të Ardhmen (Let’s Defend the Future) which is doing an investigation about the working children in Kosovo, the figures are really shocking.

Estimates are that the number of working children might be some where between 1300 and 1500. And, among them, about eight percent are girls. Most of the working children combine school and work in spite of the difficulties they face. Leaving the school in order to dedicate the time entirely to the work represents an unusual case; only few cases are known. However, the officials of NGO say that, their number is on the rise.

The NGO’s investigative results suggest that most of these children are under age fifteen and according to the ILO convention 138, which is valid in Kosovo, the children under age of 15 are not allowed to work. Actually, Ta Mbrojmë të Ardhmen suggests that more than 80% of the working children belong to the 11–14 age group.

This NGO, at least till now, has no information that any of these children have started to work before age 10. Nevertheless, it does not exclude possibility that such cases might exist.

The officials of NGO say that the phenomenon of working children is increasing very fast. Their information suggests that only for the first three months of this year, at least 70 children have joined the army of working children.

According to Anife Kelmendi, an official of NGO, the situation of the working children is terrible. “If you see a child who sells cigarettes, believe me, you are seeing a very lucky child”, she says, “We have seen the child of age thirteen lifting the bag of cement which is heavy 50 kilograms”.

Kelmendi says that children very often are badly treated; what is more, even their payment is too low. “Can you imagine: you might find a child of age twelve while carrying a full wheelbarrow of goods in a distance of two kilometers for only a euro”, she says, “This is not a job; this is beyond exploitation”. According to her, virtually everyone is guilty of participating in this abusive practice: institutions that allow this by not implementing their own laws and people who employ these children to work for them.

Children work for a variety of reasons. Local experts recognize that the roots of child labor, in our country, lie in family poverty; however, they do not exclude the exploitation and abuse motives.

For instance, Besian, a skinny youngster, who is fourteen years old, works because of the poverty. His family lives in a rented house on Peja periphery for more than seven years. Their house was destroyed during the war and no one gave them any assistance to rebuild it.

He says that his parents have not forced him to work; in fact they do not expect from him to work. His family numbers eight members, and the only bread – winner is his father “I decided to work because my father can not feed us”, Besian says, “Just for rented house we need to pay 80 euros per month”.

Labinot Lekaj, considers that if poverty rates go up, and institutions do not fulfill the family’s elementary needs, predictions are that, the number of children laborers will get higher every day.

Relating to the needs, the latest data of the Statistical Office of Kosovo, show even more hopeless data concerning the resolution of this problem in the predictable future. According to these data, a family of six members which gets less than two hundred euros monthly, lives in extreme poverty. Therefore, even if the Office of Social Assistance gives two hundred euros per family with special needs, which is absolutely impossible for now, these families would still live in extreme poverty.

The poverty is recognized as the main source of child labor, but there are cases when children get forced by their parents to work. Some children are forced to bring home their daily earnings from selling cigarettes, matches and candies on the streets, because their parents want to spend that money on alcoholic beverages. Shockingly, at the same time as children are enslaved in various forms of profitable exploitation, some of their parents are enjoying the fruits of their labor by expending their children’s money for their own needs.

Beni, a teenager with blue eyes, who is fifteen years old, works and, he does it against his will. His father is alcoholic man and he sends him every morning to work. “I have to bring him every evening some money otherwise he will not let me in the house”, Beni says. “I remember, three or four months ago, I couldn’t earn any money and he didn’t let me inside; so, I had to spend the night at my friend’s house”.

These cases show in the best possible way that children are considered as a mean of profit by some parents and the care institutions are doing nothing to stop this. Children’s welfare, since the end of the war, has never been prioritized by the legislative or executive branches of the country. This is so because the institutions are concerned all the time about “bigger concerns”, such as “national cause” and the “issue of final status”.

The irony is that state authorities keep on attributing the problem of child labor to extreme poverty, which on the other hand, according to them, is result of the lack of the competencies. “We can not take loans from any international financial institution, including World Bank”, says Faton Merovci, an official in Ministry of Economy. “As a result, we can not make capital investments, to decrease unemployment and accordingly the poverty”.

Authorities recognize that when parents are not capable to support their families, then it becomes the duty of the State, as a parent of its population, to care about them; however, they did not allocate, at least till now, any budget to provide more programs for poor families.

Helping poor families and reinforcing the implementation of certain laws, is widely seen, by officials, as the only way to stop children labor or to prevent them from abuse and exploitation. They agree that, it was never and it should never be the duty of children to take care of their families; yet, they do nothing to alleviate the problem.

The case of Flaka Gashi, a blond girl fourteen years old, shows that sometimes even citizens do not have understanding toward working children. She works to help her mother to sustain her family; but, she studies very hard too. She wants to improve the economic state of her family, and she is not shame nor worried about that. It is the behavior of citizens what is concerning her.

Sometimes, when she does not sell anything on the street, she goes to restaurants, in order to sell cigarettes or chewing gums; in there she faces the brutality of the people. “They know to be very cruel sometimes”, she says, “Once, an owner of a restaurant told me with ignorance: hey, child without childhood, get the hell out of my property”.

The gap between law and reality for children workers in Kosovo can be explained only by the post – war poverty and the negligence of the institutions to deal with serious problems, say experts. Incapability to implement the laws which are valid might be seen as one of the causers.

Kosovo’s laws provide protection for the country’s children. Kosovo is administered by United Nations, and that means that ILO convention 138 is valuable. So, children under age of fifteen are not allowed to work.

On the other hand, the Kosovo’s Constitutional Framework identifies the provision of education as a principal responsibility of the state. Valid laws establish free compulsory primary education for children ages six to fourteen and mandate that secondary education, including vocational education, must be “available and accessible to every child”. All what will be needed is their implementation.

Education experts are concerned about the phenomenon of the working children and they suggest to the officials to deal with this problem otherwise the consequences will be incalculable. If not treated well, and in time, this problem might cause enormous problems for the children, their families and accordingly for the society.

Teachers and social workers in specialized social rehabilitation institutions believe that the circumstances these children face in the streets might result changes in their behavior. The sociologist, Vlora Kastrati has made some studies concerning the social consequences of children who work. Kastrati’s research, much of which is done in collaboration with a group of sociologists, examines the position of working children. “We should recognize the problem and, as a result, promote social advocacy, which has a crucial long–term role in raising awareness about child labor”, she says, “Otherwise, our society will face plenty of problems with these children”.

According to Kastrati, these children, in most of the cases, are unable to conform to social norms. “Even if they do the work in order to support their families, their system of moral values after a while will be jeopardized”, she says. Their moral conscience and their notions of good and evil, very soon, will be distorted: they often will have only basic needs and primitive interests”.

Kastrati says that this is because of the street environment; the street atmosphere which has replaced their normal youth life, for many of them has its own laws. “Adolescents may forget what friendship is, something that is important for any child”, Kastrati says. “The street communities place more value on qualities such as physical strength, wit, social rebellion, ability to improvise, power over others and so on”.

Artan’s mother, Hava confirms the hypothesis of Kastrati, by saying that her son had a very difficult period of life after he started to work. “He started to lie. More over, once he did a robbery”, Hava says, “When we were a normal family Artan never did these things”.

Child labor can not be viewed in isolation, since this is a cause and consequence of the country’s socio – economic and political reality. The social changes, which can be considered as a result of economic problems, might increase the number of young Albanians who are likely to alter their status from a pupil to a worker. Kastrati hopes that our society will be better prepared in the future to prevent this happening.

There are no conditions to end the child labor quickly; so, the immediate challenge is to educate the public about the dangers that working children face. “Of course, in order to solve the serious social problem of working children”, Kastrati says ”efforts of both governmental and non–governmental organizations should be coordinated”.

From psychological point of view, the case of children who work is very threatening. According to Fatmir Ramaj, a psychologist from Prishtina, children need more than any thing else the enjoyments of childhood and youth.

“Children need a period of time to grow up and to understand the world. Every kind of interference in this period might cause different psychological problems on them”, Ramaj says. “The lack of the childhood’s gladness which is result of the hard work, even if children go on with education, might jeopardize their future”. Ramaj thinks that, in most cases of early labor, there are various psychological and behavioral consequences for children, more or less serious, depending on the labor conditions: distress, psychosomatic problems, inhibition, delayed intellectual development, low self – esteem, and so on.

On the other hand, according to Ramaj, continuous job provokes many well–known problems in children; the physical consequences are numerous: muscle and bone deformation, growth problems, exhaustion.

In general, Ramaj says that, early labor prevents a child from growing up in full physical and moral health. “Working street children rarely have access to normal education and are consequently disadvantaged as adults”, he says, “Children laborers, even on their maturity stages, will have problems with the demons of their past”.

Ironically, while working children problem is threatening our society, the government is doing almost nothing to stop this. The officials of the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare recognize that there are systemic flaws, which lead to children labor. In particular, these systemic flaws have an effect on children who come from families with special needs.

They blame some parts of the legislation of social assistance. Law, according to them, has to be more specific – it must predict special cases such as Berbati family. “It is unserious if you allocate the same amount of money both to a family of four members without any handicapped person and to a family with two handicapped persons”, says Bardhyl Mehmetaj, from this ministry. “These details are very important; they can not be neglected just like that”. However, privately, the officials of this ministry admit that they didn’t initiate any changes to these flaws, but they plan to do so in the near future.

On the other hand, the Ministry of Education, its officials say that they don’t have any information that any child has left the school in order to work and support his family. “Compulsory primary education is valid in this country”, says, Agim Podvorica, from this ministry, “and, as far as I know, everyone is respecting this”. Nevertheless, Podvorica, recognizes that he sees everyday children who work, and most of them are under age of 15. “Well, it is the duty of social services to identify these children and to help their families survive crises”, he says ironically.

Meanwhile, the children laborers continue working to support their families. Some officials say it is not their job to find solutions for this problem; the others say that they have identified the systemic flaws and very soon will initiate their repairing.

The initiatives and proposals are welcomed by educational experts and people of good will; however, much more will be needed, in order to help, unfortunate children such as Artan to get education and to realize their dreams.