“The idea is that the child from Villa Sol leaves the environment in which he is”

During the inauguration of the House for Children and Youth in the municipality of Galapa, the national director of the Colombian Institute for Family Welfare (ICBF), Astrid Cáceres, referred to recent events involving minors from the Atlantic Ocean and, unfortunately, one of these lost his to live.

Initially, the director of the institute referred to the case in which a minor physically assaulted a woman with a sharp object, in the Villa Sol district of the municipality of Soledad.

“We act immediately. The Ombudsman Group has restored the rights of the child. The idea is that the child gets out of the context of the home a little bit, to enter a context where he’s more protective. The administrative authorities act in the best interests of the child and the situation and we are working on that, but in reality behind that we see the life history of neglect, which leads to these cases of violence,” said Cáceres.

Similarly, the official added that “if a child wants to get to that situation, there has to be a very strong social context that we have to go in to protect him from that, get him out of that situation and understand what happened, how it happened.” happened and, of course, immediately contain it, but also contain the emotionality of the child and look at what were the factors that led to this ”.

Then he told about the fact that a child under three years old died of burns with boiling water, in a house in the Barlovento district.

“We are talking about a crime coming in through the Public Prosecution Service, I understand that the Public Prosecution Service has taken action. What we do is verify if the family had other children, to find out if they are at risk, because the situation of negligence and carelessness are also violations of rights and we are starting to act to that extent to protect other children who may be with are connected to each other by families,” the official said.

The director stated that this case “should not have happened. Families from that angle will always have that weight and that pain, but these mistakes are, so to speak, fatal accidents that hurt. They must be preventable and avoidable.”

“We’re establishing what are the campaigns and strategies that we need to run in the country to prevent things like this, and as a result of preventable accidents like these landlords, you wouldn’t expect to have to campaign, you would hope that the communities would already have those warnings, but there will certainly be areas and regions where we need to focus on prevention,” added Cáceres.

Home for children and adolescents

On the morning of this Wednesday, May 3, the inauguration of the House for Children and Adolescents took place, with which it aims to work on conflict resolution and support the dreams of the country’s children.

“The idea is to have many points in the country from where children can access arts, sciences and psychosocial care that the ICBF would provide to guide their educational journey. We will also get a little piece of the ‘Atrapasueños’ strategy, maybe not with all the intensity, but a part where we can get early warnings,” the official said.

‘Atrapasueños’ is a strategy that brings together the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Sports, the Ministry of Education and the ICBF to provide a comprehensive and preventive response to children.