They too are Children of the Country

KOMPAS/KORNELIS KEWA AMA

Refugee children in Oebelo village, Kupang regency, East Nusa Tenggara, do not attend early childhood education and basic education because the school is too far from their homes, and their parents do not have the means to pay for transportation.

Twenty years is not a short time, especially if the two decades are spent in uncertainty about the future of one’s family.

A lack of certainty and struggling with poverty is the harsh reality faced by no fewer than 358 ex-East Timorese families who choose to remain Indonesian citizens. They number about a thousand people who, according to a Kompas report from last week, still live in the Tuapukan Camp in East Kupang district, Kupang regency, East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) (Kompas, 24-26/2/2020).