Georgia: Military Shuts Orphanage, Staining Childcare Reform

While the small group home in Telavi is a successful example of the reforms the Georgian government is trying to implement, the former Dighomi Children's Home shows how the authorities can act rashly. The institution, now abandoned and slated to be a military cadet training school, was abruptly closed to the surprise of international donors, who are working with the Ministry of Health to resettle minors with their biological families, in foster care or in group homes. (Photo: Molly Corso)

An ambitious Georgian government program to move children out of state care and into the community has earned praise by local and international children’s rights advocates. But the unexpected decision to close a state children’s home to make way for a new military training center has sparked fears that – despite the progressive reforms – politics still triumph over children’s rights.

Nearly 60 children were resettled from a home in Dighomi, a Tbilisi suburb, in June as part of an agreement between the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Defense. The move caught children’s rights organizations by surprise, feeding concerns that the children and their families were not properly prepared for the closure.

Health Minister Andria Urushadze denies that the Dighomi closure was mishandled, although he notes that there is “frustration” from some local and international organizations involved in the reforms.

Ending state institutional care for children has become a mission for Urushadze, who sees state-run homes as a troubling relic of Georgia’s communist past. That legacy places children, who often have parents, in a system that obliterates their rights and roles in the community, he says.

Urushadze has worked with international and local children’s rights groups to create a progressive system of alternative housing options for children in state care. The reforms – which enjoy broad support from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), international charities like EveryChild and Save the Children, and local partners – include financial aid so parents can afford to raise their children, plus foster care and special group homes for children who cannot go back to their families.

Those new programs have enabled the ministry to close 22 state-run institutions, slashing the number of minors in state care from 5,000 to just under 900 since 2005. Today just 23 institutions remain open, according to the State Care Agency, the government body that oversees them.

The closures and reforms, Urushadze stressed in an interview with EurasiaNet.org, are “driven by our values and our understanding and respect for child rights.”

But advocacy groups argue the sudden decision to close the children’s home in Dighomi violated young residents’ rights because it shortcut procedures. The 57 children living there were sent home to their biological families, placed in foster care or relocated to a state facility several hundred kilometers away without proper psychological preparation.

The closure was “traumatic” for children – and underscored the limits of advocacy groups’ ability to protect them – notes Natia Partskhaladze, a family and child wellbeing specialist at UNICEF. “Unfortunately what happened was not well prepared and none of the key stakeholders were informed or involved in this move,” she said.

Procedures put in place to prepare children for relocation, including individual assessments and outreach programs for biological families, were not completed prior to the closure, according to some officials and children’s rights organizations.

The lack of preparation made the move unnecessarily stressful for children, said Jaba Nachkebia, the director of Children of Georgia, a non-governmental organization that monitors children’s rights.

The protocol for closures calls for an intensive process between social workers, the children and their biological families to ensure they are properly placed in alternative housing.

“We knew that Dighomi was also to be closed [eventually] but suddenly we heard that the children from Dighomi were transferred to another institution in one day,” Nachkebia said.

Giorgi Kakachia, deputy director of the department that oversees the institutions at the Health Ministry, denied the closure was rushed or improperly executed, although he admitted the government was under a deadline to close the facility by the end of the summer so the Defense Ministry could start repairs.

The decision to close Dighomi was made in April, according to Kakachia. Non-government organizations working with the reforms say they were not informed about the agreement between the ministries or the rational for Dighomi’s rapid closure.

The building still is occupied partially by families displaced during Georgia’s 1992-1993 war over Abkhazia; there are no signs of construction. The Defense Ministry did not respond to questions about the building.

Health Minister Urushadze contends that the closure was properly executed over a period of “weeks.” Anything short of closing down institutions “means nothing” to children who “spend all day locked in their rooms” at state children’s homes, Urushadze stressed.

But closing an institution without insuring children are protected could “spoil” the good work the government has done, argued Andro Dadiani, the Georgia country director for EveryChild.

“[The reform drive is] very progressive, and they [the government] are proud of it and they should be proud of it. That is why we are so frustrated when suddenly things like Dighomi happen,” Dadiani said. “Why, why do you spoil this good progress with such total disregard for the best interest of children?”