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On 31 December, 2023, we celebrated graduation awards ceremony to 15 university scholarship survivors who successfully graduated bachelor and mater degrees. In the occasion, we are also honored the awards to our boards, outstanding staffs and girls.
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Samdach Akka Moha Sena Padei Techo Hun Sen, the Prime Minister of the Royal Government of Cambodia and the First Lady of Cambodia Samdach Kittipritbandit Bun Rany Hun Sen had officially inaugurated the Tom Dy center buildings, he donated.
Early 2019, Samdach Hun Sen, made his first visit to the Tom Dy center just after the First Lady did it. On his first visit, he donated 2 buildings to replace the very old buildings, in which one of them is a dormitory consists of 40 rooms and another is an office consists of 4 rooms, monthly rice ration of 1,200kg, monthly food of 20,000,000.00Riels (increased from 10 million to 20 million Riels in January 2023), monthly pocket money for the 119 girls, 1 mini-bus of 12 seats and 27 staffs to be government officials under the department of social affairs, veterans and youth rehabilitation of Phnom Penh municipality. This is the first recognition of the Royal Government of Cambodia on what we are doing to assist the victim children, that we waited for over 2 decades.
The construction of the new building started in 2019 and completed in quarter 1 of 2021. We moved in after the completion. Samdach Hun Sen and the First Lady officially inaugurated the Tom Dy center building on January 1st, 2023. The donation of these new buildings is a sign of great support from the government to recognize our work to assist the girls, whom had been victims or at risk of being victim of sexual violence, trafficking, abuse or indentured slavery and or exploitation.
The building of the office helps us to save money on renting office in town and it is in the same compound with the dormitory that contributes to the quality of project management because we moved in all the programs to the center beside saving money it improves the daily work management, especially we have more time to work with and care for the girls than we rented an office in town.
The new building provides more quality of services provision in term of spaces for bedrooms, bunk beds, health consultation and exams, OPD, classrooms for English and computer, libraries, counseling room, art therapy room, meditation room, anger-expression room, leisure room, garden, playing yard where we can set up playground for the girls to play, kitchen and dining area. In short, we can say that the new building contributes to the protective environment, building friendship and connection, stress free from study hard at schools, the physical and mental development of the girls we work with.
In the inauguration occasion, he provided 2 new brand tuk-tuks for transporting the girls to and forth schools; higher degree scholarship (school fee) for 16 university students, increase monthly food support from 10 million to 20 million Riels and annual donation of 50k for general operation where there is gap.
Over 20 years in operation of AFESIP-Cambodia, especially during these few years after the visits of Samdach Hun Sen and the First Lady we noticed that there are more and more local people at large and corporates turn eye on recognizing and supporting our work in a positive way financially and spiritually. They start to aware of the problem, sharing and caring such as private companies, banks, politicians, law enforcement and public at large.
Better judicial procedure is a key solution to a better child protection
Our work is to build a good future for the girls whom we work with and to bring them justice before law by supporting them legal assistance throughout judicial procedure. One of our biggest challenges in bringing them justice is to have victimized children of rape testified in front of their rapists in the hearing process at courts.
Our Funder and President Somaly Mam said “it takes 5 minutes to rescue a girl but it takes years to recovery her from the traumatization and injure she had gone through”. Hence, you may know major victims of sex trafficking, rape and sexual abuse had suffered with disastrous crisis to the global development, carried scars and stigma deeply, that contributed to the damage of their physical and mental development. Our lessons learnt showed that most girls severely re-traumatized after they were testified during the investigative process and attended the hearings at courts because they were in the room with the perpetrators in courts, interrogated on what happened to them at police post, primary hearing and trial at court. All these processes made the girls recalled (refreshed) all the events she had gone through that contributed to the negative impact of their mental health severely.
Based on the proof above, our founder and President Somaly Mam requested the Prime Minister Samdach Akka Moha Sena Padei Techo Hun Sen to not allowing the victim children who are under 5 years old of age to present in court against their perpetrators, on the occasion of his 2nd visit to inaugurate the buildings of Tom Dy center, in January 2023, where he donated when he made the 1st visit in quarter 1 of 2019. He accepted the request and 3 days later, on 4 January the Minister of Ministry of Justice announced the instruction of the procedure enforcing with minor victim who are under 10 years old of age at least, in criminal case should not present in court during testifying procedure if it is not necessary. This is a great success we lobbied for over 2 decades to care for the psychological circumstance of the victim children during the judicial procedure. Our purpose of the request is to care for the mental health and the wellbeing of the victim children, whom we work with as well as for the children in general, to reduce their re-traumatization in the healing process.
This granted procedure is a great benefit for all victim children, who involve with legal process in criminal case in Cambodia, as well as significant encouragement and motivation for us to continue our work towards. The procedure was developed and the next step is to follow up on how it enforces in practice.
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An 11-years old girl, from Kandal province, is a survivor of rape. She is an older daughter of 3 siblings, whose 1 brother and 2 sisters, in a family of 5 members. The mother is a household and father is a worker at Phnom Penh.
She had repeatedly been raped by an old neighbor 3 times, in April 2016. A 65-years old alleged offender was arrested in May 2016 by local policemen of her community.
Read more: A 65 years old man convicted of rape an 11-years old girl to imprisonment
