In the past couple of weeks local newspapers in Sabah were awash with articles about the story of an 11-year-old boy named Donni.

Many, from politicians, government leaders, NGOs, and ordinary people are giving their two cents worth as to why this tragedy happened.

There's the usual finger pointing and passing of the buck, there's the usual pictures of politicians visiting the victim's family, and the usual knee-jerk reactions.

It is without a doubt that the story of this 11-year-old is so heart wrenching. Many shed tears, and in schools it seems that the teachers were talking to the students about the incident in the Moral class, English class, even in Maths class.

Taxi drivers, domestic helpers, illegal immigrants, professionals, mothers, fathers, the young and old are all talking about it.

The boy named Donni was the third of six siblings whose ages range from 5- to 17-years old.

Their father, who is in his 30s is in jail until 2016 due to his involvement in drugs. His mother works as a rubber-tapper in the village. She suffers from a heart disorder as well as thalassaemia (a blood disorder).

The family receives an allowance of RM70 per month from the State Welfare Department.The family moved from another village previously as they were ostracised by the villagers.

The villagers' tongue-wagging drove Donni's family away from the village. Donni's mother used to prepare rice porridge for her children to bring to school as they could not afford anything else.

The rice porridge was cooked with kangkung, a green leafy plant commonly found in wet areas such as drains.

Donni's classmate teased him about the rice porridge saying that it looked like dog vomit. Donni used to wear torn school shoes and old uniform to school. This probably made him even more vulnerable to ridicule by his peers.

Found hanged

The mother recalled how Donni had been very depressed that his mother cannot even afford to buy a 20 sen ice cream for him.

It seemed that Donni had previously attempted suicide but stopped by his mother. He had told his mother then that the reason he wanted to die was because he wanted his mother to have his heart, besides having one less mouth to feed.

Donni was found hanged from the ceiling of their home in Kinarut (just outside of Kota Kinabalu city) on March 20, 2007.

Recent articles showed how donations poured in for the family since Donni's death. The family now live in another district; the effectiveness of the Hardcore Poor Scheme by the government is being questioned; the effectiveness of the Welfare System is also being questioned; the attitude of society where have our compassionate gone, the sharing and caring mentality that we are so proud of in the past?

The fact that this family is a non-Muslim indigenous people is also highlighted could this be the reason why they did not receive assistance from the government?

There's also the call to demolish the six Filipino Refugee Settlements and other foreign migrant squatters colonies these places it seems are the drug haven in Sabah which causes the multitude of socio-economic problems Sabah State is facing.

These are some of the issues raised. The state government on the other hand is saying that various forms of assistance are being provided by the government for the poor, including education, food for the poor in schools, financial assistance, textbooks and tuition voucher to students from poor households.

Also, every student receives a school uniform complete with shoes, exercise books, and pencils.

Primary school students are also given free milk in schools chocolate, plain, and honeydew flavoured.

A representative of UPKO, a component party of Barisan Nasional, claim that the government's hardcore poor policies are good but the implementation is suspect.

The frontpage headlines of a local newspaper on Monday April 9, 2007 were "Suicide by lad must not be in vain". If however history repeats itself, what often happened here in the past were that the cries of concern and fury only lasted for a couple of months.

The story will be forgotten as people return to their daily grind of chasing the ringgit.

Failed action plans

Malaysia was represented at the World Summit of Children at the United Nations in New York in 1990 and became a signatory to the World Declaration on the Survival, Protection and Development of Children.

Malaysia then formulated The National Plan of Action for Child Survival, Protection and Development of Children in the 1990s to implement the Declaration.

This plan themed Caring for the Children of Malaysia was endorsed by the Cabinet in 1994. Malaysia reaffirmed its commitment to children through its participation at the UN General Assembly Special Session on Children in 2002 and the various Ministerial Conferences.

Malaysia has ratified the United Nation Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). Malaysia is now on its second National Plan of Action for Children, for the period 2001 2020.

However, all the good that is written in the Plans of Action do not seem to reach the actual target group.

I'm sure many, including the community leaders, are not even aware of the existence of this National Plan of Action so how can it reach the community.

For example, here in Sabah, what has become of the Child Protection Teams which are a requirement under the Child Protection Act? As far as I am aware of, funding for children activity centres are available but the Child Protection Teams that are supposed to implement it are not moving.

These activity centres are supposed to provide educational and recreational facilities to benefit children who are potentially exposed to unhealthy and "high-risk" social environment, which I assume include those living in poverty.

What about the Vision 2020 of becoming a developed country by the year 2020? Never a speech presented here in Malaysia that do not mention the Vision 2020. Everyone in Malaysia has heard of it.

It is ingrained in every citizen in Malaysia that the aims of Vision 2020 include creating a caring society while inculcating the sense of independence and self-reliance among its citizens, but we seem to hear but we don't seem to understand.

Maybe we are emulating our role-models, the leaders of our country? We are only 13 year away from the year 2020, and yet we are becoming less and less caring towards each other.

Different rules for the rich

People are treated based on their appearance, their wealth, what brands of car and material things they own. Special privileges are given to those with material wealth such as special parking space at the hotels, airports, - in fact, those who drive expensive, fuel guzzlers can run you off the road or park anywhere and get away with it.

Even shop assistants will give you the head-to-toe look before deciding whether to assist you or not.

Donni and his family didn't stand a chance at all in this present society of ours.

With regard to 'family institutions', Malaysia in its hurry to become a 'developed' country by year 2020 seem to have forgotten to monitor and manage the impact of rapid development to its citizens.

As a result, there's unequal distribution of wealth between the rural and the urban population; there's the widening gap between the rich and the poor, and the ensuing poverty, unemployment, and deprivation both in terms of access and opportunity among the poor to productively participate in the mainstream development.

Statistics supplied by the government show that the percentage of people in Malaysia living below the poverty line has reduced tremendously in the last thirty years to below 10 percent.

However, I believe any statistics pertaining to Sabah are inaccurate. How can it be accurate when no one knows for certain the actual population of Sabah if taking into account the illegal immigrants and undocumented people.

Without the statistics, how can the state government formulate effective policies to tackle poverty, health, unemployment, education, housing, infrastructure, crime prevention, community building, welfare, environment and other issues?

It is equivalent to preparing food for a family of five when there are actually 10 to feed. Everyone suffers in the end as a consequence.

So please, let us not allow Donni's death be in vain.

SUSAN BANSIN is a facilitator for community development using theatre as a tool for both development and to provide voices to the marginalised. She believes in grassroots level participation to find solutions as well as to contribute to the development of the country and its people .