MANILA (AFP) - A girl aged 11 hanged herself in a Philippines shanty after leaving a letter and diary depicting a life in rampant poverty, newspapers here reported Thursday.

The case put a human face to poverty blighting the nation, where nearly 14 percent of the 87 million population live on less than a dollar a day even as the government says the economy is on a roll.

"I suspect she did it because of our situation," the girl's father, Isabelo Amper, was quoted in the Philippine Daily Inquirer as saying.

In a letter found under her pillow after Mariannet Amper's death, she said she only wished for a bicycle, bag, new shoes and jobs for her parents so she could finish primary school.

"I just want to finish studying and to buy a bicycle," she wrote in the letter, which was addressed to a television programme that grants wishes to viewers.

An accompanying diary revealed the girl, whose family live in a shanty that has no running water or electricity, felt she had been absent from school for more than a month.

In one entry, she wrote: "We weren't able to go to church because we didn't have any money for transport and my father had a fever so my mother and I had to wash clothes for money."

The night before she killed herself, according to reports, she asked her father for 100 pesos (about two dollars) for a school project, but he did not have any money.

Her father said he had been out of a job for several months while his wife works part-time at a noodle factory, earning less than a dollar a day.

The story was reported on the day President Gloria Arroyo told a business forum that her economic reforms were bearing fruit.

"The common people are now feeling the benefits of a growing economy," she said, releasing one billion pesos to boost "hunger mitigation programmes."

However, the respected Social Weather Stations (SWS) institute found in a recent survey about nine million Filipino families rate themselves poor, the majority of whom live in the southern Philippines.

Many of those also experienced "severe hunger" in the past three months, it said.

Anti-poverty coalition the Global Call for Action Against Poverty said its own studies showed the nation's economic growth was not trickling down to the ordinary people, and urged the government to do more.

http://asia.news.yahoo.com/071108/afp/071108080114asiapacificnews.html

thought it happened in naija.would have cried my eyes out .ironically though

This story has brought tears to my eyes, it also reminded me of one of my favourite Jimmy Cliff's song many years ago. He had sang:

"Too many people are suffering, too many people are sad; too little people got everything and too many people got nothing; remake the world"

WHO WILL REMAKE THIS WORLD!!!!

Just read this:

smile4kenn:

In a letter found under her pillow after Mariannet Amper's death, she said she only wished for a bicycle, bag, new shoes and jobs for her parents so she could finish primary school.

"I just want to finish studying and to buy a bicycle,"

"We weren't able to go to church because we didn't have any money for transport and my father had a fever so my mother and I had to wash clothes for money."

This

the story is so sad. I heard another story like that 2 weeks ago and it was about an 8 year old boy hanging himself because he was being bullied at school.

how would a girl of eleven gave up so early in a life? it's imaginable the kind level of poverty tha would have made her go that extent.

ARU!!!!!!!

So sad!!!!!

so painful

It is a common occurence in england,children are depressed,they are no longer children,they grow up so fast in terms of activities and mental responsiblities that by the time they are ten,eleven,they are as burdened as an average adult.

The fast pace of digital world we live is cutting accross all stages and there are two sides of it,the haves which are burdened  and the have not which are also burdened.

On the side of the have not,cooperations like world bank and imf are mostly responsible for their plights,with their draconian free trade policies and cut neck interest loans,couple with irresponsible indiginous goverments,while on the side of the haves is a case of misplaced priorities and emptiness,achoholism,drugs,television,computers,video games,telephone,fast and package foods is taking the place of what use to be reality,people are losing connections that use to bond families together.

Poverty.

really sad!

well life isn't fare.

we just have to make the most of it

her parents should have prepared her for life and its attendant dissappointments, even if she had all she wanted how about when she grows up?life is all about dissappointments but we cant give up, my dad's mum died when he was 8 yrs old and his dad died 2 years later and he had to take care of his junior sister but its really sad an 11 years old will think of committing suicide,hope that will wake some of their leaders up

Poor little girl.very sad indeed.hmmmn Poverty. . .may we not experience it,i say!.who wud heal the world

All because of poverty

ahhhhhh na wa ooo poverty no good ooo , i wan cry 4 d girl, aahhh