Swiss Review 5/2018

Swiss Review / September 2018 / No.5 17 Society MARC LETTAU In the sitting room of the soon to be 80-year-old Rita Soltermann of Nied- erönz (BE) there are flowers every- where – and 350 porcelain piglets. It is a sight that draws a smile. But the lit- tle pigs are a souvenir of a childhood that was anything but rosy. At the age of six, Rita Soltermannwas contracted to a childless mountain farming fam- ily in the Emmental. Rita was the 14 th contract child in a row to slave away there on the steep hillsides of the small farm – as an unpaid worker. At six o’clock in themorning it was time to get up and feed first the chick- ens and then the pigs. The farmyard smell clung to her when later, un- washed, she hurried off to school. Rita Soltermann puts it bluntly, “We stank.” After school, it was time to change clothes and get back to work. There was no time for homework on a work- day. As a result, her limited schooling did not prepare her well for the future. She was not able to learn a trade, was always dealt a bad hand. “When you start out that way, you will just be ‘a helper’ for the rest of your life. You re- main trapped in the bottom drawer”, she says. The piggyback rider Feeding the pigswas also the highlight inRita Soltermann’s everyday life as a child. She liked the pigs. They became her companions and even gave her moments of happiness. “Sometimes I rode out of the sty on the back of a mother sow.” At school “Söirittere” – Piggyback Rider Rita – became her nickname. Money cannot heal all the wounds of the past Rita Soltermann was a contract child on a farm in the Emmental. From then on she remained “trapped in the bottom drawer”. She appreciates the federal government’s moves to offer reparation for the suffering inflicted during that period. But the scars remain. Rita Soltermann, former contract child, in her sea of flowers today: “To have felt no love is the most painful thing.” Photos: Danielle Liniger Rita Soltermann is one of many thou- sands of victims of compulsory social measures. Her fate is typical of those children robbed of their childhood by the authorities supposedly for their own “welfare”. Children from low- er-income families were contracted; others were moved to institutions or givenup for adoption. Jenisch children were taken away from their families to guarantee them a “decent” future. Other victims even came under the knife andwere sterilised at the behest of the state. For years nowSwitzerland has been debating about reparation for this dark chapter in Swiss history that lasted until 1981. The federal government hasmade an important contribution towards dealing with the past. In an intensive dialoguewith those affected, the issue of reappraisal was tackled. The vic-