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| Sunday, 22 February 2004 |
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Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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Tourists and child sex: Everything's not in black and white by Padma Edirisinghe Recently the writer was given access to some reports compiled by the Police Department (specifically the Women's and Children's bureau of Borella) that led to some startling and unhappy revelations. For example according to these reports Sri Lanka comes only second to Philippines for cheap child sex. (a research study done in 1980).
A further study done in 1990 by UNICEF had revealed that the number of commercially exploited boys that had been 2000 in 1980 has increased to around 30,000. Most of them are in the age group 7 to 19 years. The report goes on to state, "In the past prostitution for boys was unheard of in Sri Lanka. But the advent of the open economy in 1977 and the establishment of hotels and resorts for tourists mostly along the Western coast gave rise to prostitution by boys". Soon spread Sri Lanka's fame as a paedophile's paradise where sex acts with boys were video - casetted and exhibited in their countries. "This encouraged people with paedophilic persuasions in these countries to visit Sri Lanka in large numbers" goes on the report. So out of the evil of Child prostitution was engendered the evil of child pornography of which both boys and girls have become victims, reveals the police report. "This was never heard of in the past. It has taken firm root in Sri Lanka after the advent of the open economy in 1977 and due to the aim of successive governments to maximize the earnings from the tourist industry".
Statistics relating to child pornography have not been available in the past because this was an unknown aspect of crime, but after it has now burgeoned into a lucrative industry though vile and evil, statistics are being maintained. This kind of information though revealing and useful for preventive action makes us view almost every white-skinned tourist with a jaundiced eye. But it should be borne in mind that not all tourists who come from the West are after lust at the expense of blossoming lives and yearn for cheap sex. There are many who travel here for the love of travel alone and then get motivated for sublime activity. The DE Jonge couple I met at Sunil Beach Hotel at Naarigama fall into this category. With the support of the hotel management the couple have become benefactors to many a social venture. Tragedy changed Annie De Jonge's life after her sister became handicapped. Today while the sister languishes in a Home for Handicapped in Holland, Annie globe trots with her husband and helps many a House for handicapped and also hospitals. She has been visiting Sri Lanka annually since 1979, she says and the beautiful island with smiling faces and hospitable ways, she says, is almost her second home now. She was here at the era of the height of terrorist activities, playing Good Samaritan to many a distraught human around the South. "Many tourists fled from the island. But we stayed here right in the hotel going out to help whoever we could. We are used to worse situations in some countries we have visited. The world does not seem to get any better anywhere "But despite this dismal information the Jonges are determined to shed some beam of light wherever they go especially to make lives of the sick and unfortunate better and happier. The Sambodhi Home for Handicapped children in Galle and Aachchikande hospital at Hikkaduwa have earned their patronage. The donation of an ECG Machine to this hospital is in the Jonge's 2005 agenda. The cargo of the Jonges is not the usual cargo of the affluent tourist of the West with its premium on material comforts. Open our bags, Annie says and they are full of Oxygen cans, blood pressure meters and Peak flow meters and such like medical paraphenelia needed for hospitals. And of course bags and bags of toys for the handicapped children at Sambodhi. Besides their Good Samaritan activities the couple own academic interests too. Egbert has been thrilled to discover the family name among the initial architects of the Dutch Fort while Annie has a ready ear for linguistic similarities in the many countries she visits. She has picked up quite a number of Sinhala words and collects Dutch words that are used here. "Kussi and Kakkussi are our words" she says laughing. I nearly fell off the chair in that beautiful garden facing the Indian ocean when she asked me, "When you toast you say "Savdiya Puronawa" Don't you?" "Yes "I answered much surprised." Well at festive tables in Portugal they say, Now let us begin Sawdi Poro". It was not so much the Ferenghi origin of the term that astonished me but her cleverness in spotting the similarity. More surprises were in store for me. By the fence that cordoned off the sea from the hotel premises boys had begun clustering. They were carrying flowers and shouting "Mummy "Mummy'. News that she had come had spread and this was how the children were showing their gratitude for the gamut of social activities she had been doing in the area since 1979. It is only a certain segment of tourists who smell bad. Tourists like the Jonges exude a fragrance, the fragrance of human goodness that we, the more fortunate, should try to emulate. More fortunate? Yes. Touch wood. Still we are not confined to beds and can roam about freely and still we are not handicapped or maimed. So, what better investment of time can we find than giving a helping hand to those who need it? |
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