Situation of the illegal families in Kaiyuan

Report on the situation of ""black people and black families"" of Kaiyuan area in Yunnan province.

SITUATION OF THE ILLEGAL FAMILIES IN KAIYUAN (Yunnan)

We are members of SP EDIFY - Saint Paul School Fund for the creation of educational infrastructure in areas of ethnic minorities in Yunnan Province (China).

Since its creation in 2002, SP Edify has worked in ethnic minority areas in Yunnan in the area of educational activities as well as work for poverty reduction.Our main task is to build ""Schools of Hope"" in the poor mountainous areas inhabited by ethnic minorities in Yunnan province, providing them with water and that all children who live in these areas may have access to education and complete 12 years of schooling.

So far, we have helped over 200 orphans to supplement their primary and secondary education, we have built 3 ""Schools of Hope"", we have coordinated medical visits from both China and abroad to care for more than 900 people of the Miao ethnic minority (also known as HMONG). In all these years, we have always concentrated in poor areas inhabited by ethnic minorities and we have acquired great knowledge of both their life and work, so we have been able to win both their deep friendship and their trust, to the point where they trust us to make our leaders know about their living situation and see if they can get your care and support.

A Miao village elder told me before he died: ""I'm going to die and I do not even have an identity. I heard that in the cities, even the dogs have identity. I, however, have past my life working in the fields, but none of the three generations of members of my family have an identity. Please help us convey this wish to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China."" After hearing these words, I have no words to really express the sense of shame I felt in my heart.The vast majority of the inhabitants of the villages where we built our Daoming Schools have no ""hukou"" (legal residence permission, neccesary to have an identity), so this kind of people are known as ""black families, black people.""

The day of the opening of the new academic year at one of the Daoming Schools that we have built, all the villagers were present at the ceremony. As the five stars of our national flag were raised and the music of our national anthem was heard, we could see in their faces a sense of excitement and solemnity. However, failure have an identity means that they have absolutely nothing: no legal residency,no identity cards, utilities, roads, schools, health insurance, immunizations, voting rights, right to survive. They can not even dare to hope or to dream.

SP Edify plans to bring those students who have excelled during the school year to Beijing in an study trip. But, how can we carry out this plan if they do not have an identity card?.

Here we want to transmit to our leaders the following report:

1. Situation of the drinking water

Virtually all of the villages inhabited by illegal families rely on rainwater that can be stored in pits or receptacles to provide drinking water for both people and animals. If there is drought, they have to go 2 or 3 miles away with oxen carts to get drinking water. However, water quality is extremely poor, seriously endangering the health of villagers. We believe this is the main reason for their poverty.

2. Lack of electricity

In 2006, the government released the news that he had successfully completed operation ""Illumination."" According to this plan, electricity had reached all the villages. However, the vast majority of the illegal people still do not haveelectricity. The truth is that, even in the villages where they have electricity, it has have been the villagers who have installed it at the cost of selling their crops to cover expenses. Because one of our schools was just build on one of those villages lacking electricity, we made contact with several offices of the local government, and all of them gave us the same answer: ""the illegal villages do not fall within the plans. ""

Due to lack of electricity, we can not use in our school we can not use Daoming none of the modern educational tools, and in the winterdays in low light, we can not develop normally our school timetable. Moreover, there is another fact to consider, and that is that in the villages lacking electricity, families normally have 3 or 5 children. The population is increasing, but the land is increasingly scarce. We believe this is also one of the causes of their poverty.

3. Low educational level

In recent years, the government has developed several programs to promote compulsory education. However, the children of ""illegal families"" can not enjoy these rights. If they go to a public school, they are asked to pay ""admission fee"" or ""compensation fee"". While some schools are willing to accept these children, given the fact that most of them are living in remote and isolated mountainous areas, the distance that they would need to come back home these children is higher than 6 or 7 miles. In rainy weather or poor lighting, these children have to walk more than 4 hours on mountain trails in order to return to their homes. Moreover, many of these schools have no place to live, so that the problem of ""school dropout"" and no schooling is becoming more serious. In fact, in one of our Daoming schools, we had to open a first-year primary class for 12 years old students.

4. Lack of roads

In 2008, the local government carried out the road plan to make roads to all populations. However, ""illegal villages"" did not enter into the plan. Now there is a road next to every village, and those villages can be accessed by car. However, black people's villages are still with the oxen carts and mountain trails. Roads and oxen carts have become the dividing line.

5. Lack of medical resources

Although the country has implemented a rural health insurance scheme, only ""registered"" people are entitled to such insurance. However, people who lack the ""registration"" can not enjoy any basic health insurance.

On January 28 this year, a fire happened in Zhangpojiao village. Because of the fire, two brothers were severely burned, one at 35% of its body, putting the very lives in great danger. Given the seriousness of their burns, this girl should have been taken to the Special Unit for Burns in the city of Kunming, but because their parents do not have identity card, she was not accepted.

Over the past 30 years, none of the inhabitants of this population has had no access to immunization services.

6. No registration, no right to vote or be voted

For decades, none of the ""black people"" has enjoyed the right to vote or be voted in any kind of election. Many of these populations have faced forced relocation, causing displacement distress to these families that have been forced to seek new places to live in even more remote mountainous areas.

These are the real conditions of existence that we have been able to ascertain in our work. We hope that all levels of government can understand more deeply the reality of this situation and seek a rational and effective way to help solve their practical problems and difficulties, so that they can gradually leave the situation of extreme poverty in which they find themselves.

Macau, Colegio San Pablo - SP Edify

January 20, 2008

Note: the pictures included below are those of a Miao village with 17 families of those considered "black families, black people".

Documentation

Situation of the illegal families in Kaiyuan

SITUATION OF THE ILLEGAL FAMILIES IN KAIYUAN (Yunnan)