A tale of one city and two children

The authorities should act to eradicate child poverty in low-cost flats throughout Kuala Lumpur.

COMMENT

Child poverty has a huge impact on many children in Kuala Lumpur.

This is the story of two girls who live in Kuala Lumpur, a stone’s throw away from each other. Anna lives with her family in a luxurious 23rd-floor penthouse while Anita, fondly known as Ani, lives with her mother and two siblings in a small, low-cost flat in the shadow of the skyscraper.

Anna, who attends an international school, is chauffered there every morning by a company driver. Ani, meanwhile, walks to school and is often drenched in heavy rain or half-baked in the hot sun.

Ani’s mother, who is a single parent, sells kuih to office workers in the morning, holds down a cleaning job in the evening and works weekends at a retail outlet whenever she needs to make up for a shortfall in the monthly finances.

Whenever the lifts in Ani’s tower block break down, she is forced to navigate the stairways which reek of urine and are littered with rubbish and spent syringes. Her mother, meanwhile, must carry her wares up seven flights of stairs. Their request for repairs often fall on deaf ears.

Anna’s school takes care of all her educational needs, with one-to-one tuition classes available for supplementary aid. She attends piano and dancing lessons once a week, and her end-year school holidays are always spent abroad with her family.

Ani, meanwhile, has never left Malaysia let alone flown in an airplane. Her only excursion outside of Kuala Lumpur was to attend her aunt’s funeral in a village in Ulu Selangor.

According to a study by the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) called “Children without: A study of urban child poverty and deprivation in low-cost flats in KL”, almost all children (99.7%) in such areas live in relative poverty while 7% live in absolute poverty. The study also found a high percentage of malnourished children.

The government, however, insists that its economic and anti-poverty policies are working. With the threshold limit for poverty set at RM970 per month, the inference is that only 7% of households in Kuala Lumpur’s public flats are considered poor – an indicator which many experts say is misleading.

These experts say a more realistic representation of poverty would be a measure of income relative to the minimum amount of money needed to maintain the average standard of living for these segments of society. This yardstick presents a dismal picture where 99.7% of children in low-cost flats live in poverty.

Asbah Razali, a senior lecturer in developmental psychology at Universiti Malaya, warns that these children are at risk of mental illness as they are often consumed by negative emotions such as sadness, stress, isolation and shame.

Such children also suffer physically. Anna and Ani are of similar age, but Ani appears much older than Anna, who is taller and looks healthier with a fresh complexion and glossy hair.

Ani, who is often listless, insists that she has enough to eat. However, she has been known to go without food so that she can save up for an end-of-term treat with her siblings at McDonald’s.

If Ani and her siblings were to be measured, they would probably be below the recommended weight and height for children of their age.

The federal territories ministry, which is in charge of public housing, criticised the Unicef report, saying the government had “provided the best services in every aspect”.

Kuala Lumpur mayor Mohd Amin Nordin Abd Aziz said, “We are a very caring government”, while the education minister dismissed the report as “untrue”.

The Dewan Rakyat speaker meanwhile rejected a motion to debate the report, citing a lack of urgency and public interest in the matter.

In the years following Merdeka, our lawmakers slowly reduced poverty and uplifted the lives of women and children. But more recently, low-cost city dwellers have been thrown into the trap of poverty.

Unicef’s deputy representative Dr Amjad Rabi is confident that Malaysia can eradicate child poverty. Will the government act on this advice?

Mariam Mokhtar is an FMT columnist.