Senators told: Don’t allow minors’ return to orphanage

MANILA, Philippines —  Authorities yesterday appealed to senators not to allow the return of 127 rescued minors to orphanage Gentle Hands Inc. (GHI) amid allegations of neglecting children under its care.

During the Senate women, family relations and gender equality committee hearing yesterday, officials of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) and the National Authority for Child Care (NAAC) scored GHI for its failure to maintain its facility and to ensure that the children are adopted by loving families.

“If we’re going to speak about trauma, there were a lot of stories,” NAAC Assistant Secretary Madeline Arezu Jam said, turning emotional. “If you listen to their stories, it’s horrible. It’s not supposed to be happening to them.”

“We hope that by the end of this hearing, we can find a way to help these children. Please, do not bring them back to Gentle Hands,” she added, wiping away tears.

Without giving details, the NAAC official said there was one case of a “disrupted adoption,” wherein a child was separated from his or her siblings adopted abroad because the adoptive parent no longer wanted to keep that one child.

The child exhibited behavior that indicated trauma after being housed in GHI, Jam said, citing “evidence of sexual and physical abuse.”

Department of Justice Undersecretary Nicholas Felix Ty, who is officer-in-charge of the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking, said prosecutors are looking into kidnapping and human trafficking charges against GHI.

During the hearing, DSWD Secretary Rex Gatchalian said GHI’s facility in Quezon City is a “fire trap,” with its derelict condition a “recipe for disaster.” He also scored GHI for refusing to turn over the rescued minors’ case folders.

Gatchalian invited two mothers who were prevented by GHI executive director Charity Heppner-Graff from taking back their children kept in the orphanage.

Monina Roxas said she was prevented by the orphanage from regaining custody of her three children, who were among the 127 children rescued by the DSWD.

Roxas said Heppner-Graff berated her for being a “useless mother.”

Melanie Marzan, who filed a case against the orphanage, said she was prevented from taking back her son even though she had only left him at the GHI for a temporary stay as she made arrangements to file for leave from work.

GHI legal counsel Tina Balajadia denied that Heppner-Graff is capable of berating Filipino mothers, adding that the facility has a strict process to verify the parents’ capability to care for their children when returned.

The facility also could not make renovations such as making repairs on its fire exits because the building is set to be demolished to give way to the construction of a subway, she added.

Speaking virtually from abroad, Heppner-Graff denied Gatchalian’s allegation that she berated not just the mothers, but also the Filipino social workers who visited the facility.

Committee chair Sen. Risa Hontiveros said there is a need to look into the circumstances of the rescue amid criticisms that the children were traumatized again when they were loaded into DSWD buses under heavy media coverage.