Palma police and the town hall's planning department are to launch an inspection of kindergartens in the city. This follows the furore caused by a video released on social media which shows a child being shaken by a person believed to be the proprietor of a school in the Son Gotleu area.
David Quesada, the father of the twenty-two-month-old girl, says that when he realised it was his daughter in the video he went to the kindergarten and would have kicked the door down if had not been for the presence of police. The girl's mother, Estefanía Martinez, says that she suffered a panic attack.
The couple have formally denounced what occurred to the National Police's family and women's unit. Estefanía Martinez adds that the girl has bruises on her legs.
The video was taken by a neighbour. It shows the woman pushing the child brusquely to the ground and shouting at her to not pull the hair of other children. The woman has said that the girl did not suffer any injuries and that the girl had been fighting with other children and needed to be separated from them.
The town hall's responsibility for kindergartens only covers the correct activity licence - in this instance, an educational activity - safety and signage. Otherwise, it is a matter for the regional government. The councillor for education, Susana Moll, says that kindergartens have needed regulation "for a long time" and that the incident shown in the video "is not the first case".
The social services minister, Fina Santiago, said yesterday that it is worrying that "we don't know who is caring for our children". She explained that the government wanted to regulate kindergartens and that a decree had been drawn up. However, the Balearic parliament decided that this had to be withdrawn because regulation had to come via the Council of Majorca and the other island councils.
It is understood that the kindergarten in question is to close at the end of this week.
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The woman’s defence statement is pathetic. Any good teacher knows how to calm down fighting toddlers without resorting to this violence. You don’t respond in kind. You respond with calm and reason. Second time in a matter of months the guardarias have been in the news for this, so I welcome inspections. Thankfully my kids have never been subjected to this kind of thing, but I know that other readers have had their kids bullied at school. Keep very aware, everyone...shame that a few people (it seems NOT Mallorquins) treat the kids the same way animals are treated in this country...