One girl’s journey back to a loving family
Ho Srey’s story shows how UNICEF and partners work together to return vulnerable children to their families
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“When I found out that my daughter had left my granddaughter alone in the hospital when she was just a little girl, I was very sad,” says Loch Chan, visibly emotional.
Chan is a mother of five children and only learnt about her granddaughter’s situation when social workers came to her to tell her that she had been left at the Angkor Hospital for Children in Siem Reap while she was there for a medical checkup. The mother couldn’t be contacted but is understood to have migrated to Thailand in search of higher earnings.
Kaliyan Mith, an organisation UNICEF supports in Siem Reap, was one of the first to learn of Ho Srey’s situation. Kaliyan Mith offers a range of social reintegration services, including family reintegration for vulnerable children such as Ho Srey. Although its staff knew they wanted to reunite Ho Srey with her family, they didn’t have contact details to reach them immediately. They didn’t want Ho Srey to go into residential care, which extensive research has shown it’s not ideal for a child’s wellbeing, and so worked to find her a foster care placement while they conducted family tracing with the support of the local Commune Committee for Women and Children (CCWC) and the Ministry of Social Affairs Veterans and Youth Rehabilitation (MoSVY).
“We immediately started to search for appropriate foster care conditions as she needed specific care that can’t be provided by everyone,” says Chhoun Sreymom, a social worker at Kaliyan Mith.
Sreymom says it was crucial to find a foster carer who had gone through rigorous training, and had some experience in taking care of a child with a disability.
Initially Kaliyan Mith was able to find Ho Srey a suitable temporary foster home and then stepped-up efforts to find close relatives of Ho Srey. Staff from the CCWC, MoSVY and Kaliyan Mith worked together to create a case file and began trying to find Ho Srey’s closest relatives. When efforts to locate the mother or father failed, they managed to reach her grandmother. “Immediately after we found the grandmother of Ho Srey we started conducting a situation assessment to understand the living conditions of the family,” says Chhoun Sreymon. “The situation was very challenging.”
When she was first contacted, Loch Chon was concerned she couldn’t take care of Ho Srey properly because of her poor economic situation and her fear that she couldn’t care properly for a disabled granddaughter. “I was already looking after a daughter with a disability,” says Chan, speaking of her 32-year-old daughter who lives with physical and intellectual disabilities, including limited mobility. “When I realized my granddaughter was on her own it was a very difficult situation for me to manage.” Chan was already facing multiple challenges in her life and need to sell her land to survive and feed the family. For these reasons, Chan needed additional support if she was to provide her with the nurturing care she needs.
The partners began working together to ensure that all the family members received the material and emotional support they needed to make Ho Srey’s reunion with her family successful in the short term and the long term. This was crucial because studies have shown that children who grow up in a stable, safe and caring family-based setting experience improvements in their health, cognitive abilities, emotional well-being and social skills, compared to those who grow up in residential care settings.
As part of this preparation, Chan was given advice on Ho Srey’s health needs and the move only went ahead when Chan felt fully confident, she could care for Ho Srey. The Cambodian Government also agreed to provide support towards Chan’s rent, food and other essentials. She is a member of the IDPoor scheme, which entitles her to essential social support.
"The collaborative intersectoral approach to reintegrating Ho Srey into her family is a demonstration of the effectiveness of the partnership UNICEF established in 2019 with MOSVY and Friends International, called the Partnership Programme for the Protection of Children, which is financially supported by USAID. The goal of this partnership is to create a national child protection system that supports all children, including the most vulnerable, like those living with disabilities and those living in residential care institutions. We want all children to benefit from living in family-based care and not to experience institutionalization,” says Marianna Garofalo, UNICEF Cambodia’s Chief of Child Protection.
A core reason for the success of this partnership is the capacity building support that UNICEF and MoSVY provide to social workers. Both Chhoun Sreymon and her colleague Pheat Thab received specialized training on how to effectively handle cases of family reintegration for children who are separated from their families. “Thanks to that training, we know exactly how to support families with children with disabilities,” says Thab.
“One of the greatest satisfactions in my life is to be able to help a vulnerable and neglected child to experience the beauty of life when they are safe in the love and care of their relatives.”
“We hope that the health condition of Ho Srey will get better, and we are ready to provide our support continuously. Together with social workers, we are monitoring the medical improvement of Ho Srey and are ready to further help her by providing a wheelchair or any other assistive technology she will need,” says Moem Sokum, chief of the child welfare office of the department of social affairs at the branch of MoSVY in Siem Reap.
Today, Loch Chan’s family and herself look happy together. “I am so thankful to everyone who supports our family in these uncertain times.” says Loch Chan, holding her granddaughter. The visible affection for each other is just one illustration of the benefits of family-based care.
