Girl hid in house for 12 years

In Enala Chisambi’s wisdom, disability means inability as she hid her 13-year-old disabled daughter in a home for 12 years.

Enala who is from Khwalala Village, T/A Chikulamayembe in Rumphi, managed to hide ‘the little one’ (that’s how she will be referred to because of her innocence) to the extent that her distant neighbours and the principal group village head Kanjululu never knew the existence of such a child.

Enala’s uncle, Mseka Chisambi, said Enala moved to the village in 2001 when the little one was a year old.

“We thought the baby was like any ordinary person. But as she was growing up, we noticed that she could neither sit nor crawl,” said Mseka.

“Later, we also noticed that she could not talk, walk or eat. We visited various hospitals, including Malawi Against Physical Disabilities (MAP) where she was given various treatments but there was no change,” said the uncle, a herbalist.

He said not even his traditional herbs could improve her condition.

As a baby, the little one was usually on the mother’s back. But when it was discovered that she could not sit, walk and talk, the mother got tired of carrying her on the back.

“There was nothing we could do because the mother was expected to do house chores,” he said.

The little one’s cousin, Elube Chisambi, 18, said every day, as she was going to school, she would leave her relative in the house and could find her in the same position when returning from school.

A teacher at Bera Primary School in the area, Oswell Mhango, said he never knew that Elube had a cousin who was hid in that home for all those years. He said he came to know about it when Mzuzu Diocese’s Education Commission rescued her.

When Nation on Sunday visited Enala’s home on Wednesday, we were greeted with groaning utterances from the little one. She was on her wheelchair, driven by Elube outside the house. This was an opportunity she was denied for 12 years.

The mother was reported to have gone to a funeral in the neighbourhood when we visited them. Her phone could not be reached until we went to press.

Last year in October, Diocese of Mzuzu Education Commission (Domec) through its School Access and Governance Improvement Project were tipped off of the little one’s situation.

Domec project officer Edgar Bayani said his organisation was carrying out research in the area to find out the needs of the village to be addressed by their project.

“The time we rescued her, she was pale in complexion, could not move her legs and hands, could not sit upright and was generally weak,” said Bayani.

She was then taken to MAP for screening and they recommended that she should be referred to 500 Miles Clinic at Mzuzu Central Hospital. She spent one week at the clinic to undergo intensive physiotherapy.

According to a medical report Nation on Sunday has seen, the little one was born on August 30 2000. Her condition is called cerebral palsy caused by trauma encountered during delivery.

A physiotherapist at MAP in Rumphi said the little one had been receiving treatment at their clinic for close to five years, then stopped.

“We resumed treating her after Domec brought her to us. We have given her the wheelchair to help her sit. We are also treating her to stimulate her stiff joints so that they should soften up,” she said.

The physiotherapist further said if the little one had continued with the treatment in her earlier years, her condition would have improved by now.

Currently, the little one is undergoing speech drilling therapy administered by St. Dennis Resource Centre in the district so that she can go to school.

Bayani said plans are underway to enrol her at Magdalene Centre for the Disabled Children if she successfully completes the therapy.

One of the persons with disabilities at the Federation of Disability Organisations in Malawi (Fedoma), Virginia Nyalo, advised parents with disabled children not to take disability as a burden.

“The most important thing is to be proactive in such situations by educating them so that they may be independent in future,” Nyalo said.

She can now turn her neck, eat, sit upright, move her legs and arms.