- The people who care for Sujit Kumar call him a boy, even
though he is 32. The Fijian has never learned to speak and is only just
learning to behave like a human. The reason, they claim, is that he spent
his childhood locked in a chicken coop. Psychologists and a team of
American
behavioural scientists have been examining Kumar and his bizarre background
which, if true, is one of the most tragic cases of child abuse in
Fiji.
-
- One of those looking after Kumar is Elizabeth Clayton,
widow of New Zealand mountain climber Roger Buick, who died on Everest
in 1998. She says that when she first met Kumar he pecked at his food and
would crouch down as if roosting. His fingers turn inward from scratching
around in the dirt, he communicates by making a rapid clicking noise with
his tongue and he seems detached from much that goes on around him.
-
- Clayton found Kumar in an old people's home in the Fijian
capital Suva. He had been tied to his bed for 20 years after being found
in the middle of the road one night and taken to the home by welfare
officers.
She has been piecing together his past and says that when his mother
committed
suicide and then his father was murdered, Kumar fell into the care of his
grandfather in rural Nausori outside Suva. The grandfather locked the
six-year-old
in a chicken coop, where he lived for years.
-
- When he arrived at the Samabula Old People's Home he
was aggressive and the staff tied him to his bed. There he remained until
Clayton heard of his plight. He still lives in the old people's home but
is no longer tied up. He has a 'caretaker' - a Fijian man named Drauna
Matavesi - and goes to school daily in a room in a factory in suburban
Suva. 'For 30 years he hasn't been doing anything. He didn't know how to
stand or walk,' said Matavesi.
-
- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004 http://www.guardian.co.uk/fiji/article/0,2763,1258590,00.html
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