Providing Safe Spaces for Homeless Children

In our experience, empowering a child as well as making them aware of the support network is very important in order to promote safeguarding and child protection. Belinda* was 12 years when we started working with her. Although she had a family, her younger siblings were all in the streets while her parents were separated. She was still in contact with her mother although the mother was exposing her to more risks. 

Belinda would sometimes come and stay with her mother in the community and sometimes she would go back to the street. 

Her comfort and safety was split between being with the mother and being in the streets. While in the streets she had suffered a lot of sexual violence, verbal and physical beatings from her peers. Her big day of making her decisions came along while she was seriously beaten by her friends in the streets over a boyfriend. 

As she came from the streets, she went straight to the classroom but her heart was crying with anger and bitterness. She wanted solace and not to be judged for what she was going through. “I get hurt all the time I go back to the streets”. Belinda was put through sessions which empowered her to understand that she did not deserve the maltreatment. 

While Belinda prefered to live with her mother, her  mother was very abusive, who needed some special support separately. Through this, Belinda was most of the time beaten by her mother, called names, blamed and also overworked. She was fighting for the interest to go back to school as well as living with her mother and siblings. . 

The process of working with her and find her a safer space,took a lot of time because, it was hard for her to leave her mother and siblings although the abuses were evident. 
Now, Belinda is in formal school and living with a foster family. She is now championing for younger children to be placed in a foster care where they can be safe and develop. “Madam, if you speak to my mother, am sure she can take Salim the little boy. You know I have two mothers”, she said. 

Greetings from Glad's House, 

While situation in the streets of Mombasa continue to be complex, service providers are being challenged in their interventions of addressing some of these challenges. In the month of February, at Glad's House we rolled out our e- librrary and pysical library. This is to give each child an opportunity to build on their knowledge, a chance to learn basic skills in computer and establish a reading culture. 

"My life in the streets was less than 2 motnhs before i met Glad's House staff and gave me a chance to go back to school. The truth is, sometimes in the streets i used to get some good food from different places and sometimes we would miss if we were many of us. But after you get all these, what happends to your dreams? Everyone has a dream that God granted us with. We need to work on our dreams", said Beka. 

Beka expericend difficultis back home and these pushed him to the streets. Now he is able to access text books, read story books and go to school. Our library gives Beka and his peers a safe space to express themselves and tell their stories. 

With your continued support, we would like to extend these inteventions many more children like Beka both fromt he streets and those form the community before they end up in the strets. 

Thank you very much for contributing a change in Beka's life.