| Zeina Mobassaleh
meets groups that deal with abuse At
first, the children wrote anonymously, slipping
notes into the box when no one was looking.
Eventually, they realized they could trust their
secrets to grown-ups who cared.
“They spoke of what violence they were
exposed to, not just physical or sexual, but also
such things as discriminating between girls and
boys at home. With time, they got more
comfortable and included their names,” says
Mona Saad Kanafani.
She is general coordinator of the Maarouf Saad
Foundation which runs two schools and a health
clinic in Sidon. She started a complaints box in
1995 in the Sidon National School to help
children speak their minds and express their
concerns. It is part of weekly sessions on
children’s rights that is included in the
school’s curriculum.
One child wrote: “Mama wants me to sweep the
house. She says if I don’t she will hit
me.”
Kanafani and school officials read the comments
once or twice a week, discuss group topics in
class, and meet with individual children about
more private matters.
“If we find out that a child is being
beaten, we meet with his or her parents. A child
came in the other day covered in bruises. We met
the father and told him that a child should not
be hit because of poor school work,” she
says.
According to Nour Salman of the Organization for
the Care of the Lebanese Child, child abuse is
mainly due to poverty, frustration and ignorance.
“Violence against the child is symptomatic
of Lebanese society today because of the high
levels of frustration. An angry father will
target the weakest around him, often the child
who poses the least threat. “Tolerance,
patience and understanding are luxuries that not
everyone in this state of economic hardship can
afford,” says Salman.
She believes most parents are ill-prepared for
child care, another factor in abuse. “Anyone
can have a child, but rarely is anyone taught how
to raise that child. Parents do not know that the
child will always remember the slap he or she
gets at the age of two.”
Judge Ghassan Rabah, the president of the
Lebanese Association for the Protection of
Juvenile Delinquents, points out that the only
laws that provide the abused child with legal
protection are articles 554-559 of the penal code
which refer to assault. Assault is punishable by
fining or up to 10 years’ imprisonment,
depending on the physical state of the victim.
But no separate law addresses violence inflicted
upon children.
“I see cases where the father has broken his
son’s bones, but his answer is that
he’s preparing him for the future and that
it’s for his own good,” says Rabah.
Section one of Article 186 of the Penal Code
permits a parent or teacher to hit the child as a
form of discipline.
Other laws used in child abuse cases include
Article 19 that protects the child from all
“mistreatment” and Article 501 that
protects the child from abandonment.
The Medical Code of Ethics requires doctors to
report any sign of violence against a child to
the Higher Council for Children at the Social
Affairs Ministry, the public prosecutor, or the
juvenile court. In these cases, legal action may
be taken against the parents or other responsible
parties. According to Rabah, judges who
circumvent this deficiency in the legal
mechanisms and rule in favor of the abused child
may also resort to the articles of the Convention
on the Rights of the Child, which legally binds
Lebanon as a signatory. It state that children
must be protected from all forms of physical or
mental violence.
Mona Zoghbi of Libanbel has been largely
successful in defending abused children. “We
have helped over 300 abused children, and in
every case we’ve taken to court, the judge
has ruled in our favor.”
Zoghbi founded her non-governmental organization
in 1988 to protect children from harm. “The
child is not the property of his parents, or his
neighbors. He cannot defend his rights,
that’s our role.”
The public prosecutor’s office often calls
on her to handle abuse cases brought to its
attention by schools, neighbors or community
leaders. After being charged, the court case is
fought by Libanbel and an army of lawyers who
volunteer their services. Libanbel has helped
poor families save more than $200,000 in legal
bills. It has also taken children to hospital in
emergency cases and helped with the medical
bills.
Zoghbi is used to getting calls at all hours of
the night, from all over the country. A divorced
mother, for example, recently called her at 11pm
because her ex-husband had been beating their son
during his weekend stays with him. This time the
child was left with bad bruises and bloody welts
all over his body. The public prosecutor, after
seeing the doctor’s report, forced the
father to sign a contract that threatened
imprisonment if he did not refrain from hitting
his son.
In other cases, Libanbel has succeeded in taking
children away from abusive parents and placing
them with other family members or with orphanages
and boarding schools willing to take the
children.
Nine-year-old Edmund was caught in the middle of
a conflict between his parents. His mother was
imprisoned for three months for encouraging her
brother to shoot her husband seven years ago. She
then kidnapped Edmund and disappeared for a year.
His father, after taking six bullets in the
stomach, is now in a wheelchair.
“You saw me today. Now leave. I don’t
want to see you again!” yells Edmund at his
mother during one of their weekly sessions at
Libanbel. The organization originally placed the
child in his father’s care and has been
trying to reconcile him with his mother. “I
don’t love her,” says Edmund.
He gets so agitated when he sees his mother that
he is routinely sick afterwards. “You
can’t force a child to love after going
through that,” says Zoghbi.
Rabah is working closely with the Higher Council
for Children to enact a law against child abuse.
“We need a moderate solution where we are
implementing the Convention within the context of
Lebanon,” she says.
NGOs dealing with children’s rights are
lobbying to enact a law that would empower them
to take action against abusive parents without
the public prosecutor’s authorization.
“When parents are not behaving responsibly
toward their children, we want the right to
interfere legally.”
Libanbel’s number is 01-685362, or
03-289463
Copyright© 1999 The Daily Star. All
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