Caregiver pleads for help

Deonarine said that successive governments have failed her although she held audiences with them. Ironically, among those living at the Ezekiel Home for Abandoned Children — which Deonarine has been running for the past 30 years — at her home in Sesame Street, Preysal are children sent by the State.

The Spiritual Baptist elder said she recently received a call from the Office of the Prime Minister and yet another promise to help her was made.

Deonarine told Newsday she grows her own food and rears animals. How does she purchase school books and uniform for the children? “I does throw a sou sou.” “I recently got two more children and have enrolled them in school. I have to buy books for Standard Three and First Year.

The children need chairs to sit by the table, we are also in need of fans, pots, pans, bowls, non-perishable food items, school books and reading material for a library.” Two years ago, she said, a Couva company stepped in and purchased school books while a Non Governmental Organisation (NGO) which donated generously in the past, has been forced to stop since the NGO itself has not gotten subventions due to the downturn in the economy.

“God gave me this work to do and I will do it,” said the grandmother of ten and great-grandmother of three. Nine boys and eight girls, ranging in ages between two to 18, live permanently at the Home. One woman, now 30, came in as a child but never left.

“She had nowhere to go although her relatives are all alive,” Deonarine explained. “I have one message for young people, if you know you are not ready (to raise a family), please do not get pregnant because it is the children who suffer.” Saying it pains her to see that parents continue to abandon their responsibilities by giving up their children to others to take care of, Deonarine lamented further that children are not being trained.

She continued: “It is so sad that when these children come to you, it makes me wonder. They have no training at all and it is not their fault. They don’t even know prayers, they don’t even know ‘Gentle Jesus’, they don’t know The Lord’s Prayer. The older ones can’t read or write.” She said 30 years ago, she received a vision from God and decided to make her life all about service. Deonarine said she took in the first set of homeless children when she was also raising her seven biological children.

“I have been doing this ever since.” She said that most of her children have gone on to lead fruitful lives, but always remember their roots with her and return to help out or donate. “But I am asking the State to help me out because is me alone and I am not young anymore. I won’t ever turn away a homeless child but I can’t do this on my own. I need all the help I can get...not for me but for the children.” Anyone — State or private — willing to help Deonarine can contact her at 787-3587.