Ndèye Diodio Calloga describes four years of progress in retaining talibé children in their home villages
Young talibé children roam the streets of Saint Louis all day long, reaching out their begging pails or engaging in activities that can compromise their education, health, safety, and morals. We began the European Union project in 2016 with a complete census of these begging street children, hoping to have a major positive impact on this problem. And we did! Two parts of the project contributed to this: finding and reintegrating children living on the streets, the subject of our last report; and awareness campaigns in the towns and villages that the children come from.
Awareness campaigns in the home communities of the talibé children have proven to have enormous impact. They provide an opportunity to meet the children’s families and to better understand their living conditions and the reasons why they send their children to Saint-Louis.
We organized a total of eleven awareness campaigns throughout Senegal, with 41 sessions in some twenty areas. The choice of locations was no accident – they were the major home communities of Saint-Louis talibés including the regions of Louga, Kaolack, Kaffrine, Kolda, Matam, Podor, Tamba, Diourbel, Bambey and Saint Louis. Thousands of families continue to send their young children to Saint Louis to learn the Koran, usually in total ignorance of the fate that awaits them there. To make any progress at all in the struggle to end child begging, we must make these families aware of the lives to which they are condemning their children.
The awareness campaigns have had a huge impact. They allowed us to meet the families of the children and to better understand their living conditions and the reasons why their families send them to Saint Louis.
Our first and most striking observation was the rudimentary living conditions in the places where families live. The home visits and the many discussions and exchanges revealed that parents send their children to big cities so that they can have better living conditions, in addition to receiving Koranic teaching. We were able to better understand the real reasons for the flow of boys to large cities, and also why children returned to their homes find it difficult to stay and reintegrate. There are seldom any educational, leisure or professional activities for them other than heavy farm work, which can be very demanding.
The awareness campaigns have also contributed greatly to the work of our night rounds team in Saint Louis. It was often difficult to locate the families of talibé children found living on the street, because of the resistance and often the refusal of their marabouts to cooperate and to the vague memories of the children. The campaigns made it possible for us to establish partnership relationships with AEMOs (local offices of the Ministry of Justice) and with grassroots community organizations in all corners of Senegal. And, we established monitoring committees in several areas. These relationships now provide enormous support with family tracing, returns of children to their families, and above all in taking charge of and monitoring children after their return home.
But, how can we measure whether any real change has resulted from these efforts? Are there less begging talibé children in Saint-Louis? This was the purpose of the censuses that we carried out in early 2016 and again in December 2019.
In the first census, we catalogued all the daaras in the commune of Saint Louis. The work was carried out by a team of ten field investigators supported by five marabout-facilitators and five supervisors. Over 95% of the marabouts responsible for the daaras collaborated in providing census information. A total of 14,779 begging talibé children were identified living in 197 daaras.
We worked closely with officials from each of the 33 neighborhoods in Saint Louis for the second census of talibé children in December 2019. They were involved both in initial information campaigns and in the actual census. Our objective was to not only to obtain the data that we needed, but also to help the officials to identify and establish relationships with the daaras in their areas so that they can exercise some oversight over them. Accompanied by these officials, our field investigators visited a total of 147 daaras and were able to identify a total of 4,973 begging talibés.
The sharp reduction in both the number of daaras and the number of begging talibés is a sure sign of progress. With your help, we will never give up the struggle to end begging and abuse of talibé children.
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This is the final of three reports presenting the dramatic advances for the begging talibé street children that were made possible by a four-year grant from the European Union, from 2016 to 2019. We are grateful for this invaluable support.
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Diodio describes four years of progress in finding and safely reintegrating boys found living on the streets
The four years of our grant from the European Union made possible a substantial improvement in the living conditions of the begging street children of Saint Louis, through our educational, healthcare, art, sports, and other programs. Our last report celebrated this progress.
A visit to Maison de la Gare’s center can be inspiring … seeing children playing like normal children, washing their clothes and brushing their teeth, and learning in their classrooms. However, one element of our work is consistently painful to accept and difficult to understand … finding boys sleeping on the streets at night alone or with one or two others. The European Union grant made it possible for us to greatly expand our efforts to find and take care of these boys, with a team of eight to ten making night rounds on the streets several times a week.
The results were more than alarming! During the four years, 984 boys were taken in from the streets including 473 minors returned to their daaras, 437 returned to their families, 55 referred to other centers and 19 who ran away from our emergency shelter.
While almost a quarter of these children were younger than 10 and a similar proportion older than 13, over half were between 10 and 13 years of age. This can probably be explained by the fact that, at this age, children can adopt a rebellious attitude. This is also the age when they begin to assert their personalities and values. They need to be listened to and understood and, if this need is not satisfied, it often leads to the talibé children running away from their daaras.
One of the unexpected challenges is the care of children who are addicted to illicit substances. We have increasingly realized the extent of the risks that street children run because they are often exploited and used by traffickers for the sale of their goods and this exposes them to use. Maison de la Gare is thus increasingly seeing delinquent children referred by the police, the courts or quite frequently by families. These children often have great difficulty in their teenage years and, without assistance and guidance, they can embark on a dangerous path and be lost forever.
When children are brought into our emergency shelter by the night rounds team, they are registered by the night staff and bedded down comfortably. In the morning, our social workers interview the children and open files for them. The children are always afraid, and it takes a great deal of wisdom and compassion to obtain their true stories. Each case is different, and often involves investigation with their marabouts and contact with their families. We work with the local office of the Ministry of Justice responsible for street children (“AEMO”) and, when appropriate, the children’s court. In many instances we are authorized to return the child concerned to their daara, or to their family which is usually in a distant corner of Senegal or, at times, in a neighboring country.
In past years, we almost never made a night round without finding several children asleep in hidden corners. Recently, however, the night-rounds team occasionally finds no children at all in the places where they usually sleep. This could well reflect an improvement in the children’s living conditions in their daaras. Ndaraw Diop, our leader of this activity taking charge of children living in the streets, identifies this with the impact of marabouts repeatedly having to deal with returned talibé children, often being brought before the court. Ndaraw quotes an expression from traditional African wisdom: “Shame kills more surely than the iron of a lance”.
With the end of the European Union grant in 2019, we are trying hard to sustain this critical activity. We are deeply grateful for your support, which is making this possible.
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Diodio shares Maison de la Gare’s remarkable story as a beacon of hope for the talibé children over the past four years
A little over four years ago, we reported on “A New Chapter for the Talibé Children”, a four year grant from the European Union which made it possible to strongly reinforce our educational, health and hygiene, sports and arts programs for the begging talibé street children, to dramatically expand our efforts to take charge of children found living on the street, and to raise awareness in the children’s communities of origin of the dehumanizing conditions that they are subjected to when they are entrusted to marabouts in distant cities.
This grant ended in December 2019. This report is the first of a series of three that will look back at what has been achieved over the four years and highlight the challenges ahead.
Talibé children come to Maison de la Gare’s welcome center to benefit from the health and hygiene programs, educational, social and sports activities, and much more. Over the four years from 2016 to 2019, an average of 855 different children visited the center each month, a total of 3,165 visits per month. Most of these children (60%) were between 10 and 17 years of age, while 27% were younger, as young as 4 years old, and 13% were older. 64% of the children are from different regions of Senegal, the rest having been trafficked from neighboring countries - Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, and Mali.
Medical Assistance - Maison de la Gare offers care and medical assistance to talibé children participating in its programs, as well as to talibé children in their daaras. On average, 427 children per month were treated in the infirmary and in daaras over the four years. The main pathologies include acute respiratory infections (cough, cold), abdominal pain (constipation, diarrhea, parasites), dental diseases, conjunctivitis and other eye conditions, and skin conditions such as scabies. Also, cuts, abscesses, headaches, infections, and burns are common.
We are increasingly convinced that prevention is key to health care. Many of the children use the hygiene facilities in our center to shower, wash their clothes and brush their teeth. We established a major program for the prevention and treatment of scabies in partnership with the Saint-Louis health district and the Red Cross. And we have completely treated and renovated certain daaras where the children’s living conditions were particularly unhealthy.
Education - Our educational programs, through literacy training, math and life lessons, arouse the children's interest in learning, even if their integration into formal schooling has proven to be difficult due to the resistance of the marabouts. The teachers explore with the children the rules that govern society through practical exercises, simulations, exchanges, and discussions. An average of about 30 children have attended classes regularly each month, while a total of just 17 have been successfully registered in formal schooling.
For the older youth for whom formal education is not an option, our apprenticeship programs have become increasingly important. 55 youth graduated from our agricultural apprenticeship program in Bango during the four years, learning all the elements of establishing a successful market gardening plantation. We added a poultry farming apprenticeship program in 2017. 30 apprentices have completed a training program including several production cycles of 125 chickens each, mastering preparation, feeding, hygiene and security, butchering, and marketing. Several of these youth have successfully established their independent operations, most recently with the support of our new microfinance program. Since 2018, our new tailoring apprenticeship program is providing another possibility for youth working to become self-sufficient.
Based on our experience over these four years, we are thoroughly rethinking the educational programs, to make them more in line with the talibés' most pressing needs. Integration into formal schooling will be deemphasized. We will focus on providing the children with practical language and computational skills as a bridge to successful participation in our apprenticeship programs and other routes to becoming financially self-supporting.
Sports and Arts - The sports program not only promotes good health; it allows children to express themselves through leisure activity that provides a rare release from their hard lives on the streets. The children love competing in soccer tournaments which bring them together through their shared passion. 74 inter-daara tournaments were held during the four years, in addition to hundreds of unofficial matches involving huge numbers of talibé children.
Also, many children and youth continue to benefit from our karate program. 46 of them are now enrolled at our center and at a local dojo, and are making enormous progress. In 2019, one of the talibé youth successfully earned his black belt!
Art and music are powerful tools for communication and self-expression, providing children with an important means of psychological development. They are a key element of our activities, animated by our teachers, volunteers and other staff.
We are grateful to the European Union for the reinforcement of our programs for the talibé children that their grant has made possible. The children have benefited enormously, and our staff members have renewed their commitment and effectiveness.
Although it is difficult to limit or reduce the number of daaras in the Saint-Louis area, learning conditions for the begging street children have improved considerably over the four years. The marabouts who control their lives are now more cooperative and Maison de la Gare has reached a threshold of knowledge and visibility that facilitates the children's access to its services.
Now that the European Union grant has ended, we are more dependent than ever on you, our precious supporters, to sustain our life-giving programs.
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The stories of three talibés who refused to give up on their dreams
Maison de la Gare is a haven for the talibé street boys of Saint Louis. The organization’s center and its caring staff offer hope through education, and an oasis from the daily grind of hours upon hours of forced begging and from having to figure out a way to survive on the streets.
The hope, through education, is real. This report will provide an update on three exceptional boys who, despite years of forced begging and facing unimaginable obstacles, chose to persevere in pursuit of education.
The street boys of Saint Louis are rarely from the local region. With no parental support and no money, and subject to daily begging quotas of the marabouts who control them, formal education is barred to them. In most cases, the children lack the documentation that could otherwise entitle them to register for schools and write exams.
Arouna was Maison de la Gare’s first great success in formal education. Passionate about the possibility of becoming educated, Arouna did have Senegalese national identification (he is from the distant region of Kolda), and Issa Kouyaté, the founder and director of Maison de la Gare, negotiated with Arouna’s marabout to reduce his begging quota on certain days and allow him to be registered in school. Maison de la Gare fed him, so he would not have to spend time begging to eat, allowing more time for study. Issa and the staff teachers helped Arouna with homework, paid his registration fees and purchased his school supplies. Arouna’s journey through the formal education system was long and challenging. He faced countless incidents of discrimination and overcame multiple attempts by authorities and his marabout to derail his education.
Arouna was held back many times, in primary school and middle school, but he persevered. Eventually it came time for Arouna to write exams that would allow him to advance to high school. Alas, in an effort to continue to control him, his marabout refused to relinquish his national identity papers. During the years it took for Maison de la Gare and Arouna to obtain duplicates (nearly impossible given that his parents were both deceased and did not have death certificates, as Arouna was a child talibé at the time and unaware they had died until years later), Arouna took high school courses to prepare for what lay ahead, and refresher classes to help him prepare for the exams he hoped he would soon be able to write. All the while he lived in a daara with no access to electricity or running water, packed in with dozens of other talibé boys.
Arouna began high school in classes with much younger children, but with much hope in his heart. Again, he faced discrimination and was held back, extending his time in school. As he was beginning to repeat his final year of high school, disaster struck his family once more. His older sister died unexpectedly, and her young son became Arouna’s responsibility along with his two younger sisters. Not one to give in to despair, Arouna worked at Maison de la Gare between school hours to support his sisters and Issa Kouyate took in his young nephew, registering him in formal school to allow Arouna the relative freedom to continue his education.
This year Arouna was due to graduate. But, just months from exams schools in Senegal were closed due to Covid-19. Despite his familiarity with challenge, Arouna was devastated when it was announced he would need to repeat his final year of high school yet again. But, along with challenge comes hope. Arouna’s younger sister was married this summer, lessening his burden of support, and allowing him to double down on his studies. Today, in his early 20’s, Arouna has enrolled in his final year of high school (for the third time) and is committed to putting everything into his studies in order to give himself the best possible chance of advancing to post-secondary studies. Hope and perseverance define this fine young man.
Tijan is another talibé who continued to be driven by his passion to obtain an education. After leaving his home in Gambia to come to Saint Louis as a talibé, Tijan studied in Maison de la Gare’s literacy and math classes for years. He was finally able to return to Gambia, with Maison de la Gare’s support, to enroll in high school. A year ago, he graduated from high school, an extraordinary accomplishment for one who had spent many years as a talibé. He was very keen to apply to and begin university. But, despite sufficiently high marks he was not accepted. There were “irregularities” with his application; perhaps he had chosen the wrong program, or did not have the right prerequisites, we cannot really know the reason.
Determined not to give up on his education, Tijan spent the past year taking additional business courses that he felt would better prepare him once he was accepted to university. He applied again this spring and has recently received news that his application was successful this time. He is scheduled to begin studying management and business at the University of The Gambia in September!
A year ago, while waiting to receive news about his initial application to university, Tijan travelled back to Maison de la Gare to receive a computer that would help him continue with his higher education. While in Saint Louis, other talibés were astonished to learn he had actually graduated from high school. Tijan had become a superstar, a shining beacon of hope. Sulayman was one of those talibés whose eyes and heart were opened to the possibility of returning home to school thanks to Tijan’s example.
Sulayman had been a talibé for many years. Like Tijan, he was originally from Gambia and had national identity papers which entitled him to register in school in Gambia. But, as a talibé, the idea of education seemed impossibly remote. He did have an unspoken dream of becoming educated and had always worked to complete his begging responsibilities early to be able to attend Maison de la Gare’s classes. After years of forced begging, Sulayman left his daara due to intolerable conditions there. Even while continuing to beg and do odd jobs to survive, he continued to study in Maison de la Gare’s classes. When Sulayman encountered Tijan, his hope for an education was reignited.
Issa and other staff sat with both Tijan and Sulayman to offer advice and support in preparation for their return to Gambia. Sulayman was eligible to enroll in high school. Despite his age of 21, he was excited at the prospect of the next four years of study - in a real school! Planning to start school in January 2020, Sulayman and Tijan left Maison de la Gare together - headed toward a new future based on the educations they were about to pursue.
When Sulayman arrived home, he was welcomed by relations of his family who lived near the high school he hoped to attend. He was accepted into the school and enrolled in a math tutoring class to get up to speed as quickly as possible. Sulayman is now a high school student looking to the future!
The hope is real, indeed!
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Maison de la Gare has launched a microfinance program, an essential tool for talibé apprentices in achieving financial autonomy
During the darkest days of the Covid-19 crisis, while talibé children were confined to their daaras and Maison de la Gare’s center was closed to most children, a critical new program was born there.
The framework of the new microfinance program was finalized in early May. We extended an invitation to potential participants and presented the program to them during two sessions in Maison de la Gare’s center. Six men and five women decided to continue with classes introducing them to the elements of microfinance, related basic math, accounting for a small business, and basic marketing techniques. Most male borrowers will be older talibés, but we are including other men and women in order to develop a learning community of borrowers that will be mutually supportive, benefiting from each other’s experiences.
Following this training, each of these potential borrowers submitted a simple business plan in early June, and these were evaluated by an Approval Committee consisting of the program coordinator Baye Ndaraw Diop, president Issa Kouyaté, accountant Adama Diarra, and the coordinator of the poultry farming apprenticeship program Cheikh Abdoulaye Ndiaye. Eight projects were approved for initial financing, and three others were approved later in the month following required revisions.
We have set the maximum loan amount at 200,000 francs ($350 US or 305€), although initial loans averaged 110,000 francs ($190 US or 170€). All loans are interest-free. Reimbursement rates depend on the business but are typically monthly over 9 to 18 months. A formal contract is signed with each borrower. We are committed to intensive support and follow-up with each borrower to assure their success. The program coordinator is making regular visits to the borrowers to encourage them, verify their progress and collect the reimbursement payments. One month after the initial loans were made, all repayments are on-time.
This is a beginning, and we will learn as we go. Three of our initial borrowers, Doudou, Ibrahima N. and Pape Modou, are talibé graduates of our poultry farming apprenticeship program, and each of them has started their first production cycle with baby chicks. Another talibé, Ibrahima D., has started a business selling wood charcoal and palm oil. These talibés will no longer be alone, but will be part of a community of borrowers and small business entrepreneurs.
The story of each of these borrowers is different, but every one of them is very moving. We share one of these here:
“My name is Ibrahima. I am 18 years old and I live in Balacoss in Saint-Louis, Senegal.
Before, I didn't do anything after my Koranic studies. I lived in idleness. I was almost a street kid.
In 2018, I met Cheikh Abdoulaye Ndiaye, and I told him about my journey. He integrated me into the group of young people from Maison de la Gare who were apprenticing in poultry farming in Bango.
At first, I didn't take it seriously, but when we started training I began to feel a lot of motivation. I also saw all that Cheikh Ablaye had achieved through selling chickens. So, I said to myself that I could do like him.
Today, I am trained in the different techniques of poultry farming, from start-up to slaughter. Currently, I have taken basic accounting training at Maison de la Gare’s center and, thanks to this training, I received funding from a project dedicated to young talibés and vulnerable people.
I now have my own chicken coop with fifty chicks, and I intend to go as far as possible with this funding because I can see that it is possible for me to succeed. Now, it only depends on my perseverance and my will.
I thank Issa, Cheikh Abdaye, Uncle Ndaraw, the partners of Friends of Senegal and all the staff at Maison de la Gare.”
Ibrahima’s example and those of the other borrowers will be a beacon of hope for other talibés.
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We are grateful to Friends of Senegal of Ashland, Oregon, who have made possible this critically important initiative. Friends of Senegal has believed in the promise of microfinance for many years, and our new program benefits enormously from their expertise and financial support.
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