Child abuse still goes on

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Editor GUILLERMO TEJIDA III Desk Editor NANETTE L. GUADALQUIVER Busines Editor ERIC T. LORETIZO Sports Editor (On Leave) RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

A case of child abuse has been filed against a public elementary school teacher who had punished a pupil by making her swallow pencil shavings that caused her to get sick and die a few days later.

As a classmate of the second grader narrated it, she and Maria Delmar Rodota had been in the classroom when their teacher saw pencil shavings scattered on the floor. Apparently thinking that the two girls were the ones who had done it, she berated them and, as a punishment, she crammed the shavings into their mouths. The classmate said she was able to spit out the stuff, but Maria had swallowed it.

Maria got sick after the incident and complained of pain in her throat, which was believed to be caused by tonsils. It was only after she got worse and died that the pencil shaving experience came out. The incident came to the attention of the media, and now several agencies are looking into it, and parents have become alarmed at what their children could also suffer from the hands of cruel and sadistic teachers. Investigations have been initiated, and autopsy on the dead child has been done.

The incident happened at the Silangan Elementary School in Taguig City, which is not very far from Manila, where, one would suppose, things like this are not likely to take place. The over-strict schoolmasters, who did their job on the principle of not sparing the rod in order not to spoil the child are supposed to be things of the very distant past. With this, however, people can only wonder worriedly, what about the distant sitios, the far-flung areas where such things can happen and nobody will find out?

The Department of Education in Manila has announced a hotline number that parents and students can call to report cases of drug abuse. Its provincial, city and town offices should do no less.*