In June this year, we shared with you a new Street Kids Rescue Project starting in Goma, D.R. Congo in our blog post which you can find here. We are excited to share with you an update on the project and how they are getting on. We were privileged to meet these children in person on the trip in the summer, and were overwhelmed by both the severity of the difficult circumstances they have found themselves in, and also their incredible happiness and joy when they welcomed us to the Village of Hope in July. It’s been wonderful to read of the changes that have taken place in their lives since joining the project.
The Street Kids Rescue project launched in Goma where poverty, hunger, violence and loss of parents (36% of children on the project have lost both parents in North Kivu’s ongoing conflicts and militia violence), displacement and abuse have created a growing crisis of street children. Compared with our projects in Rwanda, Burundi and South Sudan, the children tend to be slightly older (average 12 yrs and 8 months with a wide range) and much more likely to engage in violent assaults and aggressive robbery on the streets. That has made the project so special in being able to provide a context for older children to develop transformed lives of peace and protect the younger children from entering a life of violence and crime. There is also a high proportion of girls (40%) on the project. All of the children, apart from one who slept in someone’s outside ‘kitchen’ hut, were sleeping on the streets.
100% of the children were experiencing abuse or violence in the months leading up to their admission to the project but during the project evaluation after six months every child was free from violence or abuse. For most this is because they are in Christian host families but for some the support for the child has wrought a change of heart in their home situation which had driven them to the streets. Dusabimana (all names changed), a 12 year old girl said ‘since I’m in the SKR I’m not experiencing any violence or abuse because my mother has changed and she showed me how much she is proud of me,’ and Mugabo, a 14 yr old boy answered, ‘I no longer have violence because my father has begun changing his bad behaviour and he is happy because of what Comfort has done in coming in help to me.’
Street Life inevitably curtails education and not one of the children had attended school in the six months previous to joining the project. However, since then every one of the children has had at least 90% attendance at school.
Buzima (shown right) is one of the children on the project. He was ‘surrounded by happiness and love’ at his home in Kibumba, 15 miles north of Goma, where his father sold cabbages and carrots. In July 2021 tribal violence broke out and his area was overrun, his parents killed, and Buzima left an orphan at 11 years old. He fled to the city of Goma where he lived on the streets for eight months stealing and begging for food. When he joined the street kids rescue project he was integrated into a church host family, taken to school, and became part of the children’s choir at Bethlehem Church in Goma. Within 6 months he was obtaining the second best marks in his class at 76%.
The Street Kids Rescue Project has made a significant impact in the lives of young people in the are who are at risk of homelessness, abuse, violence and disaster. Providing community, schooling, feeding and most importantly love and emotional support for these people has made a profound difference to their prospects and their self worth. If you’d like to find out about sponsoring a child on any of the Street Kids Rescue projects, please get in touch with us at [email protected] or visit our website.
