Pastors
Brian Mulheran and Leigh Ramsey
322
Wecker Road
Carindale
QLD
4152
Directors
of the Global Development Group Board
Unit
6, 734 Underwood Road
Rochedale, QLD 4123
David
James Pearson
Geoffrey Winston Armstrong
Ofelia (fe) Luscombe
Alan Benson
David Robertson
12th
March 2014
Dear
Pastors Leigh Ramsay and Brian Mulheran (Citipointe church) Geoff Armstrong
(Global Development Group) and members of the GDG board.
Citipointe
church and the Global Development Group have decided, separately or in
conjunction with each other, not to provide Chanti, Chhork, myself or any other
interested party with a copy of the MOU that you have both claimed gave the
‘SHE Rescue Home’ the legal right to detain Rosa and Chita from 11th
August 2008 onwards. Given Rebecca Brewer’s email of 11th August
2008 email to me, this MOU would have to have been entered into before 11th
August 2008.
The
reason for your conjoint refusal to provide anyone with a copy of the MOU is abundantly
clear – namely that both Citipointe and GDG know (and have known for 5 years)
that the pre-11th August 2008 MOU with the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs did not give the ‘SHE Rescue Home’ the rights that both your NGOs have implemented
to remove Rosa and Chita from their family.
Threats
of legal action against me did deter me from acting on Chanti and Chhork’s
behalf as an advocate. Your scarcely veiled threats, Brian, to have me arrested
jailed etc, also did not deter me. I took this to be the bluff and bluster of a
Pentecostal bully who is used to be able to get his own way through
intimidation.
More
recently an attempt has been made through the Phnom Penh Municipal Court to
intimidate me. A document that has sat on file at the court since 30th
Oct 2012 was suddenly activated two days after you, Geoff, wrote your curt letter
to me in which you made reference to the yet-to-be-executed warrant. As my
mother used to say, “I did not come down in the last shower!”
Citipointe
and GDG can, of course, proceed down the path of intimidation if you so wish. Who
knows, you may even find a Judge prepared to put me in jail and so fulfill your
prophesy, Brian. This will only serve to draw maximum attention to Citipointe’s
illegal removal and detention of Rosa and Chita in 2008. In many way, though I
do not particularly wish to find myself in a Cambodian jail, my incarceration would, at least, make this story newsworthy
and you would all find yourself being asked a whole range of questions that you
would prefer not to answer by print and TV journalists.
An
alternative path to go down would be, in the most gracious way possible, with
whatever saving of face your respective spin doctors can conjure up, to admit
that you have, separately and in unison, broken Cambodian law by illegally
removing Rosa and Chita from their family and abrogated the human rights of
Chanti and Chhork’s entire family. You could acknowledge this and return Rosa
and Chita to their family and that would be the end of it. Chanti and Chhork
want nothing more than to get their daughters back.
Here
is how it could happen with a minimum of trauma for Rosa and Chita:
(1)
Rosa and Chita leave the ‘SHE Rescue Home’ and take up temporary residence in a
non-denominational NGO home of some kind that has no affiliation with
Citipointe.
(2)
A sensible re-integration program is formulated by professionals experience in
the complexities inherent in re-integration with the best interests of Rosa and
Chia in mind.
(3)
Over a period of a few months Rosa and Chita are (a) allowed visits to their
family in Prey Veng and (b) their bothers, sisters, mother and father are
allowed visits to them in the non-denominational
NGO in which they are now residing.
(4)
This process of gradual re-integration is monitored and adjusted to take into
account unforeseeable problems by professionals who know what they are doing.
(5)
As this gradual re-integration process is taking place a second dwelling is be
built on Chanti and Chhork’s property in Prey Veng. There is room for a second
house and I will pay for the construction of it so that Rosa and Chita can have
some of the personal privacy that I imagine they are accustomed to in the ‘SHE
Rescue Home’.
(6)
During this gradual re-integration process I will be looking into the various
options open to Rosa and Chita to guarantee that they get a high quality
education. This is a goal that I wish for all of Chanti and Chhork’s children.
Srey Ka, James and Kevin are, at present, attending a private school in Prey
Veng at my expense because the school in their village is not adequate to
provide them with a good education.
It
may well be that the only way that Rosa and Chita can get a high quality
education is by going to a school in Phnom Penh. If so, I am in a position to
pay their school fees and their boarding fees if necessary.
(7)
Only when the re-integration process has achieved the above-mentioned goals
should Rosa and Chita be returned to the full time care of their parents. This
is not because Chanti and Chhork are anything other than good parents. It is an
acknowledgment that the re-integration process will throw up problems,
challenges, that must be met with the best interests of Rosa and Chita at
heart.
Given
the heartache that Citipointe church and the Global Development Group have
caused Chanti, Chhork, Rosa and Chita, I think it appropriate that both NGOs
compensate the family. My suggestion is as follows:
(a)
A trust fund be set up by Citipointe and GDG to pay for the education of all of
Chanti and Chhork’s children.
(b)
This trust fund should be administered by a completely independent NGO with no
affiliation with GDG, with Citipointe or with myself. It’s sole aim would be to
pay legitimate school and university fees into the future. If, for whatever
reason, any of the 6 children drop out
of school, the family receives no compensation for their education.
(c)
If all 6 children go on to university their fees are paid for by GDG and
Citipointe.
I
stress, I will not and should not be involved in any way with the
administration of this trust fund. And nor should GDG or Citipointe. It is
imperative that the NGO controlling the funds is totally independent of all of
us.
The
fine tuning of the above suggestions will take some time but are achievable if
there is a will, on the part of all parties, for some variation of them to be
put into practice to see Rosa and Chita are re-integrated back into the family
in the most appropriate way; in a way that minimizes the traumatic impact of their being taken out
of the world that they have lived in for close to six years and returned to the
world of their family (nuclear and extended), the world of their community and
the world of their Buddhist culture and religion.
If
both Citipointe and the Global Development Group agree to the broad outlines of
what I am suggesting here, perhaps the Australian Council for International
Development (ACFID) could play the role of independent arbiter – with the
intention of guaranteeing the well-being of Rosa and Chita and with no regard
at all for the vested interests of Citipointe, of the Global Development Group
or myself.
I
await your response to this letter with interest!
best
wishes
James
Ricketson
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