The following article
appeared in the Vancouver Sun a few days ago. I have some questions for Scott,
which I have interspersed throughout the article.
The Apostle Paul’s epiphany came in a blinding
flash on the road to Damascus. Scott Neeson — the former president of 20th
Century Fox International — had his while standing on a garbage dump outside
Phnom Penh.
QUESTION: Were you ever
president of 20th Century Fox International?
How drastic?
When Neeson first surveyed the horror of that
garbage dump, with children living and dying on its 11-hectares of waste and
filth, he couldn’t have known he would soon be living on the edge of the dump
himself — Hollywood and one of the great glamour jobs in the world left behind.
Neeson had been travelling in Asia in 2003 after
leaving 20th Century Fox, where he had made more than 200 films in 10 years,
including Titanic and Braveheart.
In what sense did you ‘make’
200 films?
“I took a break before joining Sony Pictures so I could
cleanse my soul of Hollywood and someone took me to this garbage dump outside
Phnom Penh,” Neeson said Tuesday in Vancouver.
“It was horrendous. The epiphany — when I knew I
was going to be doing this forever — happened when I took a 10-year-old girl
and her mother out of the dump that day and, through a translator, found them a
rental house, a way to deliver rice, a stipend. And all for less than $45 a
month. It just seemed so easy.”
This was someone who was making a million dollars a
year but didn’t believe in giving to charity.
A year later he had waved goodbye to Hollywood,
sold his home, his cars and his boat, and moved to Cambodia.
Out of his own pocket he set up the Cambodian
Children’s Fund to care for some 2,000 children living or working near that
rubbish dump in Steung Meanchey district.
Were
you, in 2004, taking care of 2,000 kids, paid for out of your own pocket?
It’s probably only a matter of time before someone
makes a movie about it, but Neeson — born in Scotland, raised in Australia and
proud of working-class roots — isn’t sentimental, nor does he see himself in
the Mother Teresa mould.
“Honestly, I try an avoid that kind of stuff
because it all goes downhill from there if you don’t.”
On Tuesday night he was in the sales office of
Vancouver House on Howe Street to thank the 380 purchasers of units in the
luxury 59-storey highrise that will be completed in 2018.
For every unit sold, a new 130-square-foot home
worth $2,500 will be built in Steung Meanchey to house families who eke out a
living on the garbage dump.
How much does it cost to make
one 130-square meter home?
How much do you charge World
Housing per home?
How much rent do you charge
the poor families who live in these homes?
It is the result of a relationship between Neeson
and Vancouver-based World Housing, which promotes the one-for-one real estate
gifting based on TOMS Shoes model, where TOMS gives away a pair of shoes to a
child in need for every pair purchased by a customer.
The project was backed by Ian Gillespie, president
of Westbank Projects Corp., which is building Vancouver House, after he met
with World Housing founder Peter Dupuis.
Neeson said the 380 homes will house over 2,000
people and will be located in a gated community. Each house will have
electricity and there will be shared washrooms and bathrooms for every six
families.
Why will the community be
‘gated’?
Parents who want the homes have to agree to keep
their children in school — not working in the dump, must be free from drug or
alcohol abuse and not involved in domestic violence.
What contractual arrangements
does the Cambodian Children’s Fund enter into with parents of children being
cared for by CCF?
Are parents given an
opportunity to obtain advice of any kind from another source before signing a
contract with CCF?
Are parents allowed to retain
a copy of the contract they have entered into with CCF?
Will you release copies of
such contracts to human rights organizations and journalists?
Neeson found the social problems at the garbage
dump overwhelming.
Babies and children are routinely abandoned among
the rubbish; children whose parents are victims of usury sell their children
into prostitution to pay off loans they can never hope to meet; while the
routine level of violence against women and children was numbing.
Of the 2000 children in CCF’s
care, how many were ‘abandoned among the rubbish’?
He carries pictures of some of the children on his
phone.
Here’s one of a year-old baby abandoned on the dump
with tetanus — “didn’t know he’d survive, only 50-50 chance, but now he’s in
our nursery.”
Next is one of two girls, perhaps five years old.
“Raped by guys who tried to kill them. This child
was beaten until she was unconscious and raped and wasn’t expected to live.
This child, the guy thought he’d drowned her. These girls can’t stay at home
now so they stay at our facility,” he said.
This one “stepped on a landmine and lost both her
legs and she was brought to us.”
“Just look at that picture. (She’s lying in bed
surrounded by toys.) She doesn’t even want to look at me. All she wants is to
die. But now she’s the princess of our residential centre.”
Neeson says he knows the names of each of the 2,000
children his organization helps.
Graham Brewster, managing director of World Housing
who was recently with Neeson in Cambodia, swears it’s true.
“I was blown away by him doing that. He knew the
name of every child he met,” Brewster said.
The Cambodian Children’s Fund operates on a budget
of about $8 million a year without government support and has 540 staff.
Do you really have 540 paid
members of staff?
How much do you pay your 540
staff per month?
It provides schooling, food, medical care, child
care and housing, will undertake to pay off crippling debts allowing families
to pay back loans at normal interest rates, and has resulted in Neeson being
showered with awards for his humanity.
If CCF undertakes to ‘pay off
crippling debts’, why do you evict families from homes rented from CCF for
being $12.50 in debt to CCF?
However, when he gets down to it, Neeson admits he
really doesn’t like living in Phnom Penh.
“But
I’ve got all these relationships with all these kids I’m raising. These are
kids who’ve never been picked up or held. And for me to just know their names
means the world to them.”
How
many of the children at CCF have never been ‘picked up or held’?
***
The
Vancouver Sun article about Scott Neeson can be found at:
Other
questions asked of Scott Neeson over the past few years can be found at the
following addresses:
# 1 Is Scott Neeson the knight in shining armour he presents himself
to the world to be?
# 2 Is Scott Neeson a saint? A bully? A liar? Or perhaps all
these?
# 3 Scott Neeson lies about buying land for rubbish dump family
# 4 Scott Neeson reveals his true colours
# 5 Scott Neeson's refusal to answer questions raises serious
doubts about his honesty and integrity
# 6 "You are a voyeur" Scott Neeson tells filmmaker
who asks too many questions!
# 7 Scott Neeson's responses to legitimate media questions
raises a Pandora's box of other questions
# 8 Scott Neeson exposed as a liar
# 9 email to Scott Neeson, 22nd Feb 2014
# 10 A few questions for Scott Neeson and the Cambodian
Children's Fund, dated 2nd June 2014
# 11 Some questions that Heather Graham should ask Scott Neeson
# 12 Response from Scott Neeson to my letter to Heather Graham
# 13 A note to Chuan and Ka regarding my promise to the family -
to be passed on, or not, by Scott Neeson?
# 14 My response to Scott Neeson's online Cambodia 440 response
to my letter to Heather Graham
# 15 More questions for Scott Neeson
# 16 Scott Neeson's wage per month - $10,000. A CCF teacher's
wage per month - $120
# 17 CCF Child Protection Unit's involvement in public arrest of
Long Ven
# 18 to Heather Graham and her publicist, Lindsay Galin re CCF's
Child Protection Unit
# 19 Questions for Scott Neeson proliferate. Scott's refuses to
answer them.
# 20 for Bob Alexander, Chief Operating Officer, CCF
# 21 Is Scott Neeson Cambodia's next Somaly Mam-style scam
scandal?
# 22 Three to four kids in each bed, Scott? And many more
sleeping on the floor!
# 23 Were you a participant, Scott, in Peter Hogan's plot to see
David Fletcher jailed regardless of overwhelming evidence in support of him his
innocence of the crime of rape?
# 24 Scott Neeson complicit in 'Stolen Generation' of Cambodian
children?
http://cambodianchildrensfund.blogspot.com/2014/10/24-scott-neeson-complicit-in-stolen.html
http://cambodianchildrensfund.blogspot.com/2014/10/were-you-participant-scott-in-peter.html
Does Scott look like a pedophile in that photo? OMG!
ReplyDeleteSorry, but what does a pedophile look like? Earlier today someone said, on another blog entry, that I looked like a pedophile. Others have been convinced that David Fletcher must be a pedophile because there is a photo of him holding hands with a young girl. Sorry, but there is no 'pedophile look'
DeleteAu contraire Mr. Ricketson. Body language conveys 80% of communication and from Scott Neeson’s expression and body language, many opinions can be assessed. Just look at that mug! His beady eyes, his pursed lips, the angles and expression of the lines on his face, his squeezing grasp on the opposite shoulder of the pictured young lady, and obvious unease, of Scott Neeson! This picture creates a feeling of distrust, awkwardness, gawkiness, undesirability. Traits that one might associate with some who is, or could be, a pedophile or rapist.
ReplyDeleteIn sharp contrast, the picture most seen of David Fletcher. He appears at ease, smiling, friendly, jovial, straightforward. I might conclude from his photo, a humanitarian, helping these children, and loved by them.
Yes, 'Anonymous', I agree with you about the 'squeezing grasp' of the young woman in the photo. She looks to me to be about 35 years younger than Scott. I would guess that she is in her late teens and, whilst this age gap is of some concern, the fact is that the streets of Phnom Penh are filled with men of Scott's age (and older) who are here in Phnom Penh primarily for the purposes of having sex with late teen and early 20s Cambodian women. It is impossible to walk down streets 136 and 51 and not see this. I guess my overall response is that we need to be careful reading too much into one photo.
DeleteWell Mr. Ricketson, If you were going to cast the role of Santa Clause into a film of yours, would it more likely be Scott Neeson or David Fletcher?
ReplyDeleteYes, me too!
Deletehttps://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=12748
ReplyDelete