Officials from the Bali provincial government have confirmed that the number of children who are begging on the streets has surged since the Covid-19 pandemic started.
Bali Vice Governor, Tjokorda Oka Artha Ardhana Sukawati (Cok Ace) stated that the current economic crisis in Bali has caused huge numbers of families to lose their jobs and started to lose their ability to be financially stable and provide basic necessities. This situation has also affected children, as many of them have been forced by their parents to start working in order to help their family survive.
“According to our data, the unemployment rate in Bali has increased from previously 1.2% to 5.6% as of December 2020.” Cok Ace said on Thursday (28/10) in Denpasar. He also believes that the number has potentially surged in 2021 as the tourism sector hasn’t recovered from the current pandemic. He was concerned that many of those children have stopped learning at school as they usually spend an entire day on the streets begging for food and money.
“Most of these kids are supposed to be in elementary school, I’m confused why their parents don’t send them to the public school even though it’s free.” Cok Ace added. However, he admitted that this problem began even before the Covid-19 struck, so he has urged related institutions to begin an investigation to prevent an exploitation practice. “Someone must have forced them to beg on the streets, so we need to solve this problem and find who is responsible for those children.” Cok Ace concluded.
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Paul Morris
Saturday 30th of October 2021
Minister Cok Ace not sure where you get the figure of 5.6% it’s more like 70-80% unemployed but then I guess you are only taking into account the number of businesses that are properly registered with the government not the 1000’s who are not meaning that your figures are absolutely useless to give a true and accurate account of the poverty level in Bali.
J West
Friday 29th of October 2021
If the family is starving the child is starving…therefore can’t go to school. This is so simple that I’m thinking about running for a ministry seat to solve the mystery mathematics of poverty evading Mr Ace.
Mr Ace, please, you can’t seriously think that hungry children are on the street for any other reason than starvation. Go ahead, find those evil-doer parents, but be careful , they’ll likely assault the visiting officials, because at least the kids will be fed in an orphanage and they themselves will receive prison food.
Starvation is no joke. The root cause of starvation is a lack of compassion by government officials. “ Get those children into the free school” is equivalent to Queen Marie Antoinettes famous remark “ Let them eat cake” when she questioned why the poor were rioting over a lack of bread to eat.
Covid economic recession is not unique to Bali, in Bangkok the high numbers of beggars laying in the sidewalks are the nations shame. What can governments have done? Perhaps to have built rapid training colleges and housed the poor and trained thousands in new skills ?
Why aren’t Balinese children writing Python and working as remote digital nomads…for example. Anyone can tell you that coding is not a high level skill. It can be taught quickly…to anyone.
C’mon Mr Ace, you’re no dummy. You know you can do better.
Wayan Bo
Friday 29th of October 2021
What’s up with governments welfare program!?
Ganivet
Monday 1st of November 2021
@Wayan Bo, only applies to balinese, java and people from other indonesian islands can eat air
Steven
Friday 29th of October 2021
Very sad, a 5.6% unemployment rate seems very optimistic. It is probably way higher, seeing these kids at the traffic lights at so many places is so sad. I hope they force the parents to send them back to school. At least the parents can beg if need be, not good for the kids welfare to be forced to beg.
Paul Morris
Wednesday 3rd of November 2021
@Steven, Your dead right about the unemployment numbers, my son lives in Denpasar and he says that the unemployment rate is between 70-80% never mind the bs number given by the government 5.6% haha what a joke.
Steven
Monday 1st of November 2021
@Wayan Bo, The figures in europe are accurate due to the welfare system that records everyone whos unemployed or at least everyone whos claiming welfare. Here in bali there is no welfare system so how are they calculating tgese numbers. With the amount of restaurants, bars, shops and tourist related servuces currently closed. It appears there is mass unemployment at least more than the 5.6% quoted.
Wayan Bo
Sunday 31st of October 2021
@Steven, it’s exactly the same official unemployment rate as in Germany for example.
Mike A
Friday 29th of October 2021
Bali Vice Governor, Tjokorda Oka Artha Ardhana Sukawati (Cok Ace) What do you expect when you keep these draconian mandates and quarantines in place. Remove them all and quality visitors will return.