Poverty
Viji Jegarasasingam
Secretary, Ministry of Social Services and Social Welfare.
Telephone : +94 11 287-7124 |
Why is poverty not shrinking?
A good reason is that no one gives due consideration to persons
with disabilities and the elderly. Ten percent of the population
are elderly. Disabled is about 7-10%. Also another 20% are single
parent families, mostly women. 40% of the population needs service
and they're not directly being addressed. So how can we alleviate
poverty?
For a disabled person to contribute to the economy and live
with dignity they should have access to all the buildings, but
so far it's impossible. If we start now in ten years we can
have something possible. We need to social integrate these people
without leaving them as a burden to their families. Perhaps
they meet with an accident, but they have knowledge and potential.
However, our environment won't let them contribute to the economy.
Do people plan for retirement or disability?
Sometimes they're ignorant. Until you become old and are very
weak you don't look for support. People don't really plan for
their lives sometimes. When you are very old and you can't do
your labour work, then you look up to government to do everything
for you. Now we're encouraging people to contribute a little
bit out of their savings and receive a monthly pension at the
age of 60. However, farmers and all just work until their death.
For them there's no retirement at all.
What are you doing to target and reduce poverty?
The immediate task for us is to see that the vulnerable
groups do not end up on the street. For example, care of prisoners.
Their families are in a precarious position and we are trying
to strengthen those families.
We also concentrate on rehabilitation of street people. In Colombo
we did a survey and 1,523 people are sleeping on the streets
at night. We thought of rehabilitating these people to find
that no one gives any money. We managed to convince them to
go and find some houses and said that we will pay the rent.
We paid one year rent with NGO funds, not government funds.
Twenty-three families were socially rehabilitated. Then I offered
them some self-employment opportunities. I asked what jobs would
you like to do? They said buying and selling some apples, king
coconut, etc. I gave Rs. 5,000/= - 10,000/=, money to them each
and sent my photographer to take photos of them at work. They
all did, because they know if they behave well I will look for
permanent land and a house. Still, we couldn't work on it because
we need to go for a cabinet paper and get the ministers to do
something.
We also did some work in Kollonnawa area. You can't imagine
that people live there. People throw everything everywhere,
and toilets are coming up, not very healthy place. There are
local governments, and they are responsible for toilets, water
and sanitation in that area. They're not looking after it. All
these things nobody tells us to do, but we feel like we have
to look after these under-privileged people.
Where is poverty concentrated?
Estate sector is one, North and East is another. Some people
are living on the earnings of their dropped out child. The kids
go and pick some paper here and there and they live on that.
So those children don't get a chance to get to school. The people
in that area said there are a lot of vacancies in those schools,
the children are not coming. The parents have to be made aware
of how education is important. The problem is survival. The
parent is unable to survive without the support of the child.
Does your Ministry operate in the North and East?
Through the Government Agent there, yes. However, we can't supervise
and nobody goes there. So services aren't up to standards. Officers
can't have as much access. You think the Provincial Council
would take care of things, but things never go smooth.
What challenges do we face in reducing poverty?
Why we haven't succeeded is because we're not addressing the
people in need of our services. We don't really encourage the
government giving a package and saying you're being looked after
any more. We're now trying to see that people need to contribute
to their own development as well.
What I see from my 33 years experience is that we do not have
proper data about the target group who is in need of what. If
we had some sort of basic data, all the ministries would know
who the poorest of the poor are and be able to allocate co-ordinate.
Now Provincial Council, Local Government, Livelihood Development
Ministry, three Agricultural Ministries are all doing something.
Our attention to specific target groups that need special attention
is not good enough. |
