The Korea Herald

Ill= icit orphanages to exploit outdated laws

2006.02.15

This is the secon= d of two articles looking at conditions in welfare homes. -- Ed. <= /i>

By Susan Tran

With marriages on the decline and the birth rate at record lows, finding a wife is becoming increasingly difficult for most Korean men.

But among those wish= ing to buck the trend are residents from the Angels' Haven Disabled Home. For the = past five years the Seoul-based welfare agency that cares for disabled orphans, = has been offering a diamond ring to the first woman who marries a disabled man.=

The Home's director,= Cho Kyu-hwan, says many o= f his boys desperately want a wife. "Some boys are almost 40 and they want to marry. It is very difficult to find girls who have parents who want them to marry orphaned boys.

"I announced ma= ny times that the first woman to marry a disabled orphan from Angels' Haven can get a diamond ring, but nobody is willing," Cho lamented.

Despite attempts to = change cultural attitudes, the stigma of being an orphaned child remains in Korea. = There is an unwillingness to adopt orphans because of a need to maintain the "p= urity" of a family's bloodline.

Park Young-sook, who founded the foster care movement in Korea, = says Koreans traditionally believe abandoned children "have to be isolated = from society" because they are making up for sins committed by previous generations.

"Children who l= ose a home or parent are paying a debt for their ancestors' [wrongdoing], so they deserve to be in bad situations- that is the tradition," said Park, who does not share these views.

Placing abandoned or= abused children in institutions has been standard practice since the end of the Ko= rean War in 1953. Hundreds of orphanages were built to accommodate children who = lost parents in the conflict.

However, many privat= ely-run institutions reliant on community donations for survival have suffered a la= ck of adequate funds and chronic staff shortages. This has led to children com= ing out of orphanages unskilled and overly dependent on welfare.

"In institution= s, they're isolated. They come out to society when they are 19 years old and do not know how to ride buses, they don't know anything. They tend to expect something from the government, they tend to become reliant on welfare during their lives," Park said.

But Cho says at registered institutions such as Angels' Haven, rehabilitation facil= ities and professional counselors are available to ensure that children are prope= rly integrated into society. Many former residents from the able-bodied section= of Angels' Haven have moved on to become "active members of society"= as lawyers, doctors and public servants.

Cho admits, however, that the vast majority of privately-run orphanages are poorly resourced. "If you visit there, th= ey are very poor. There's no food, no clothes, no heating. They need money.

"[Angels' Haven= ] gives special education and we do all kinds of therapy, but non-licensed agencies= do nothing. There are no teachers, no therapy. There's nobody there," Cho said.

Despite their lack of resources, most orphanages continue to operate out of a genuine desire to h= elp the disadvantaged. But Cho says that "some places" misappropriate donated money and mistreat children.

Last year, police cl= osed down the Soogyung Temple in Seoul after SBS Television revealed acts of child abuse committed by Buddhist monks. The footage showed monks recycling disposable diapers and neglecting children w= ho had sustained burns.

To address the probl= ems endemic in institutional care, the Ministry of Health and Welfare in 2002 drafted a plan of action to license all orphanages. By July last year, 70% = of the 1288 places found to be unlicensed became registered or were destroyed.= The remainder are either undergoing construction or in the process of being destroyed.

Cho says the number of unlicensed places remaining= is probably closer to one thousand. Without adequate funds, most are unable to meet the standards required for registration, making it "very difficul= t to get a license".

Given the vast netwo= rk of private organizations, shutting down places that do not meet the standards required is no small task.

Professor Nho Choong Rei, from the department of social welfare at Ehwa W= omen's University, says it is unfeasible to stop all unlicensed places from operat= ing. "The government has let private organizations do stuff for a long time= , so there are too many individuals and organizations who are providing services without licensing.

"Now the govern= ment says [the organizations] can't do that anymore, that they've got to meet th= ese standards. Why hasn't the government done that from the beginning?" Nho said.

Compounding the prob= lem is the lack of governmental support to help unregistered places set up the necessary resources.

"Private organi= zations have done such welfare work and now, at this point, the government tries to introduce licensing in order to standardize services and programs. But they lack leverage because they haven't done their part.

"The government= must come up with some kind of alternative. If private organizations and individ= uals need qualifications, what are the government's options to help them?" = Nho said.

Meanwhile, at Angels= ' Haven, the diamond ring is still up on offer. Although no one has come close to claiming it in five years, prospects for giving it away are brightening.

After June this year= , the agency will open a new home for disabled girls.

"I want to bring disabled girls here and marry the boys here. Our boys, they want a girlfriend," Cho said.