Africanews
Street children population is exploding in Kenya, also due to the many children orphaned by AIDS. New initiatives are confronting the problem, assisting the children to reintegrate in what is left of their family. Pandpieri Children Rehabilitation Centre in Kisumu is one of them. |
"If I had not gotten the opportunity to stay in this place, I wonder where I would be now," ponders Michael Anaemba. Anaemba was born 14 years ago in Vihiga District, Western Province of Kenya. He walked a distance of about 23 kilometres to Kisumu town to seek refuge from the ravages of life.
Only a week after his arrival in Kisumu he got refuge at Pandpieri Catholic Centre and he is now taking part in a non-formal education programme.
He however will not be able to go back home. Only his grandfather stays at home. He says: "We are not in very good terms, so I can't stay with him. I was taken home for Christmas in 1995 by the centre's administrator, and my grandfather told me never to return there again," adds Anaemba.
He says of his broken family: "My father chased my mother away and then remarried. I stayed with my father and step-mother for sometime and when the going got tough I left for my grandfather's house. There, I received constant beating for little faults, so I decided to try my luck in the streets of Kisumu."
One beautiful morning in May 1994, he set out on foot for Kisumu town and after about 17 hours reached his destination. On arrival in Kisumu it was necessary to survive, so he collected papers, plastics and scrap metal and sold them to buy food and at night he would look for a quiet, protected corner to sleep. Anaemba admits that since being admitted at the centre, almost two years ago, he had not heard from his parents.
Anaemba is one of the 28 street children and 34 community children (who are mainly from poor families and considered potential street children) undergoing non-formal education at Pandpieri Catholic Centre.
The coordinator of the programme, Mr. Alphonse Lumumba Omollo says that since the programme was set up it has dealt with 1,300 street children and that last year 75 per cent of the children were reunited with their family, at least with some relatives.
Mr. Omollo says their basic approach is to build companionship and trust with the children. "We work on the streets daily, sometimes in the evening, and in this way we make contact with our main target group, the children who live in the streets".
Every week on Thursday, the centre members carry out home visiting, taking two to four children and at the same time making a follow-up of up to 10 children to find out how well they have been integrated back home.
In the research which was carried out last year and which involved 66 street children it was also found that 19 percent had been living with their grandparents before going to the streets while 26 per cent of them had been living with their parents. Many of the parents had succumbed to Aid. About 78 per cent of the street children were from rural areas and these children went to the streets because of feelings of rejection, boredom, lack of food and beatings, and peer group pressure.
Mr. Omollo believes that children go to the streets due to lack of proper communication between the child, parent and teacher.
The Assistant programme coordinator, Mr. Timothy J.L. Malcomson, a lay missionary from England says that at any one time, about 130-150 children are found in the streets of Kisumu. He says that the rehabilitation work is so successful because the children are in the street against their own will, and when offered assistance their reaction is very positive. He adds that new efforts and new laws are needed to safeguard the rights and property of children orphaned by Aids.
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