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Despite economic growth
in some quarters, extreme poverty is forcing
youngsters to pick through trash.
Every day before school, seven-year-old Mohammed
Fariq Rostam goes with his father on their donkeys
to scrounge through Sulaimaniyah's garbage dump.
Mohammed's eyes often burn from the smoke that rises
from the rubbish, and his forehead bears a scar from
when he slipped on trash and sliced it on a piece of
glass.
But he is proud when he helps his father find a
source of income for their five-member family. That
could be aluminium cans that they can resell in the
market, or a piece of electrical equipment that has
been thrown away but can be repaired. Shoes and
clothes, though torn or stained, are also prized.
"This isn't a place for him," said Mohammed’s father
Fariq, 31, who is illiterate and unemployed. "I want
him to have a better future."
The dump lies in an industrial area 11 kilometres
southwest of Sulaimaniyah city, near seven villages
that are home to more than 100 families. It has
become a source of income for many like the Rostams
who are out of work and looking for anything that
can be resold or reused.
Zereen Abdullah, 12, sloshes through garbage with a
pair of muddy boots - one of her many finds. She has
rashes all over her body from the trash that itches
her skin, but triumphantly announces, "I have found
three dolls, and whenever I go home I play with
them."
Mohammed and Zereen have missed out on the economic
prosperity enjoyed by Sulaimaniyah following the
fall of the Baathist regime and the end of crippling
economic sanctions.
New construction abounds and the Kurdish regional
government has dreams that oil-rich Iraqi Kurdistan
could one day resemble Dubai.
But while Sulaimaniyah is booming, its outskirts
remain poor and badly served by municipal services.
Parents in the area close to the dump criticise the
government for not providing basic services for
their children such as kindergartens, parks or a
playground. Their relatives don't visit, they say,
because of the stench of the rubbish heap, which
clings to their clothes even when they return.
For local children, though, the dump is an a big
attraction, so much so that some say they dream of
becoming garbage workers when they grow up - much to
the consternation of parents, who they want more for
their families.
"Our children have nowhere to go during vacations
except this garbage dump," said Parween Muhammed,
48.
Sulaimaniyah officials have tried to discourage the
scavengers, but as the dump is not barricaded, they
cannot prevent people from sifting through the
garbage.
"We started arresting them, but it didn't work,"
said Rizgar Ahmad, head of public services for the
municipality.
The scavengers use iron hooks to rip the trash bags,
which some municipal worker workers say have been
used to threaten them. "They threw stones at my
bulldozer, and when I got angry at them, they came
with their hooks," said Sardar Ibrahim. "They were
about to kill us."
Talar Midhat is a mental health researcher with the
Dutch non-governmental organisation ACORN in
Sulaimaniyah, which helps children with
disabilities. She said poverty drives the children
to the dump and called on NGOs and the government to
push for greater protection of children's rights and
ensure that they attend school.
She said the few services available for children are
in the centre of the city, but the agency providing
them, the ministry of social affairs, has a poor
record in this part of Sulaimaniyah. "So you can
imagine its (effectiveness) outside of the city,"
said Midhat.
Responding to questions about the rubbish-dump
children, Shno Shiekh Latif, Kurdish minister of
labour and social affairs in Sulaimaniyah, insisted
that poverty was declining daily in the region. "We
certainly have a wide-reaching project to help
families so they don't need to send their children
to work," he said.
NGOs, meanwhile, says there’s little they can do to
aid the garbage scavengers.
Bakhtyar Kakan Salih, who heads Kurdistan Save the
Children's Kaziway Sarshaqam Educational Centre,
said, “ We can only give them moral support."
Barham Omar is an IWPR trainee journalist in
Sulaimaniyah.
www.iwpr.net
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