An initiative demanding financial compensation for thousands of former Swiss children who were once forcibly adopted and exploited as free labor in rural households, without any rights, has received enough support to call a referendum on one of the darkest issues in Swiss history. , world agencies reported.
Switzerland took a long time to respond to the painful practice by which, from the middle of the 19th century until almost the end of the 20th century, orphans, as well as children from poor families, often single parents, were forcibly separated from their family environment and placed in institutions or assigned to foster parents. , usually well-to-do peasants, who then, usually without compensation, exploited them in the most difficult jobs until they came of age or otherwise managed their lives in accordance with their own wishes.
Many persons, who were once part of that group which in Switzerland is called "child hirers", were forcibly separated from their loved ones by the authorities under the auspices of "social assistance" and placed in foster families, where many, by their own admissions, were psychologically, and some were sexually abused.
"Compensation package" collected 110.000 signatures
About 200 victims of this practice came to the Swiss capital Bern today to officially hand over 110 signatures collected in support of the initiative called "Compensation package for child laborers and victims of coercive social service measures", collected in the past eight months.
The Swiss system of direct democracy provides that any person with the right to vote can request a referendum on an issue if they collect 100.000 signatures within a period of 1,5 years.
The initiators of the referendum estimate that around 20.000 children were involved in these and other coercive procedures over several dozen years, and they demand the establishment of a solidarity fund in the amount of 500 million Swiss francs, from which compensation would be paid to around 10 to 20.000 victims, as many as, according to estimates, still between lives. Each individual hearing would be reviewed by a special commission, which will be established exclusively for that purpose, which would decide on the amount of compensation. It is also required to officially acknowledge that such a practice was actually carried out and to organize a public debate on the issue.
Last year, the government apologized to the "children"
The Swiss government, on whose behalf Justice Minister Simoneta Somaruga apologized to the victims last year, but without mentioning compensation, will determine the date of the referendum after checking the validity of the collected signatures.
"Before I turned 10, I had to start working on the farm, from 4 in the morning until dusk. I didn't go to school, and I was beaten every day by that farmer who didn't consider me his family," says Charles Probst (85), who due to the poverty of his real parents, when he was 8 years old, the authorities of the canton of Bern placed him on a farm in Lisak, where he grew up.
Horror stories of foster children
In addition to forced labor on farms, children who were separated from their parents experienced other horrors in foster families, so girls were forcibly sterilized, and some children were forced to be guinea pigs in laboratories that tested new treatment methods or drugs.
"I was 18 years old when I got pregnant, and then 'it' happened", today 60-year-old Bernadette Getcher told her sad story in which her foster family forced her to have an abortion and sterilization at a clinic in Vila.
The horrifying practice of exploiting underage poor children in Switzerland began to decrease with the advancement of technology in agriculture, when machines increasingly began to replace human labor, and it almost completely disappeared in the 80s.
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