By Robert Andre Emmanuel
Top officials within the country’s social services departments have linked challenges with juvenile delinquency to a lack of familial support, along with weakening of community engagement and the lack of civic education for children.
A National Crime Forum, hosted by state media, brought together Director of Family and Social Services, Feona Charles-Richards, the Department’s Probation Unit Supervisor Alvin Jarvis, and Social Services Director at the Sir Lester Bird Medical Centre (SLBMC) Sequoyah Survia to discuss crime and youth.
Charles-Richards alluded to declining parental interest in their children, explaining, “Our statistics have changed over the years, we have a lot of children who now have both mental health illnesses at the early age, and we also have an increase in neurodevelopmental issues, which is autism, dyslexia, ADHD.
“When I did teacher training, those numbers were one in 100 or one in 200, now they’re one in 50, one in 30, and so we have a different type of community in terms of the type of makeup of our children in itself, and when there isn’t early intervention for children because of a lack of interest from the home then, of course, we see them acting out in class.
“Criminals know a lot about law, but they also know psychology. They know exactly what our children need, they know that our children aren’t getting any attention, they know that they probably didn’t eat any food this morning…and they work on their self-esteem because families haven’t built their self-esteem, haven’t shown love,” the Director of Family and Social Services argued.
Survia noted that since she began work at SLBMC, she has seen girls as young as 10 and 12 becoming pregnant and having to give birth.
“A lot of children are being left unattended, they roam the streets at all hours of the day, some of them not even going to school because I can tell you in the community where I’m from, when I’m driving to work, I see children in their uniform and they’re smoking on their way to school…they don’t have money to buy breakfast and they’re not eating proper meals.
“They end up going to the man on the corner that hail them every morning while they’re going to school, say ‘come here, here is some of a little lunch money for you’ and then they start to reel them in…they become their little foot soldiers on the road, and then they start selling substances at school, on the road, in town, wherever, and the cycle just continues,” Survia stated.
The healthcare professional expressed frustration with the lack of parental involvement in their children’s care, citing that some parents refuse to engage with her office, and when they do show up, they appear to be very young themselves, struggling with multiple jobs and single parenthood.
Survia argued that sexual education needs to become a part of the regular curriculum at schools to reduce teenage pregnancies along with sexual abuse and statutory rape of minors.
“I think that sex education needs to be a main subject area within the curriculum… the highest percentage of STDs right now is amongst teenagers, and they are unaware of it until they end up feeling like they have a stomach pain and do some lab tests,” she said.
Meanwhile, Supervisor Jarvis added to the discussion of a holistic approach to criminal behaviour among youth, looking directly at the role – or the lack – of father figures.
“Even though it might not be a single parent household, the limited role, or lack of involvement of fathers, plays a pivotal role in how the children are socialised so we must engage the whole system,” he noted.
Jarvis estimated that from January 2024 there were at least 50 juveniles under a probation arrangement with his department.
