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Prevalence, Abuse & Exploitation of Street Children In the early years
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CAUTION: The following links
and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the
situation in ***
FEATURED ARTICLES *** One way street – to despair: life for
Zimbabwe's street kids Sokwanele, December 10th,
2007 www.sokwanele.com/articles/zimbabwesstreetkids_10122007 [accessed 18 August 2011] Mandla sleeps under a
cardboard box and survives by scavenging for food from the city’s many overflowing
and evil-smelling rubbish bins. He has only been on the streets for a few
weeks but has learnt quickly, as needs must in this dangerous and
disease-ridden environment. There is no one else to turn to for help. His few
surviving relatives do not even know where he is. On the streets the law of
the jungle operates - literally the survival of the fittest. Frequently it is
only rapid reflexes and a swift pair of feet that keep the inhabitants of
this shadowy world out of really serious trouble. Mandla
Mpofu (*) is one of Uphold Children's Dignity Philani Nyatsanza,
The Herald, allafrica.com/stories/200904080118.html [partially accessed 18 August 2011 - access
restricted] It has become
common parlance, so much that we have ignored the consequences of such labels
as "street children" and "Aids orphans". In simple terms, this is not just naming,
but naming and shaming in the same breathe. The power of life and death is in
the tongue (Proverbs 18:21). Why
should a child be made to pay the price of something over which they had
neither power, say, like losing a parent to an HIV-related illness? The tragedy is that such shaming has a
very high price because, whether we see it or not, it will always haunt the
child, looming over them like some spectre of evil. Every time you call
them "street children" or "Aids orphans" you are
prophesying into their lives (words are carriers of spiritual power) and at
the end of the day, they act and behave in a manner consistent with what you
have labelled them. So, instead of getting answers to the
problem of children making a "home" in the streets, we exacerbate this
socio-economic ill by condemnation through labelling. "Street
children" seems to have become almost like a trade name, because it is
drawn directly from the disadvantaged children's characteristically grimy
lifestyles in the streets. But
whether they live and work in streets, in families and communities, they are
just children. ***
ARCHIVES *** UNICEF
– www.unicef.org/infobycountry/zimbabwe.html [accessed 18 August 2011] The Department of Labor’s 2004 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/tda2004/zimbabwe.htm [accessed 17 January 2011] INCIDENCE
AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - Parliamentary investigation into the situation at
camps found that conditions were poor, trainees were subjected to political
indoctrination, and no real vocational training was being provided. Over the past few years, the number of
children living on the streets has continued to rise and there are reports of
children involved in commercial sexual exploitation. Since the beginning
of 2004, many schools have been forced to increase fees to cover the growing
cost of materials and salaries due to inflation. The fee increases reportedly
have led to a rise in dropout rates, affecting girls disproportionately CURRENT
GOVERNMENT POLICIES AND PROGRAMS TO ELIMINATE THE WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOR - The government’s
“Children in Difficult Circumstances” program is intended to assist street
children. The Program and the Basic
Education Assistance Module provide school fees, uniforms and books for children
who cannot afford to attend school.
UNICEF and other international organizations are assisting with the
government’s education efforts and have been particularly involved in school
feeding programs during the recent food crisis. UNICEF has also been supplying
school-in-a-box kits, which provide basic learning materials, to children
attending satellite schools. Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61600.htm [accessed 17 January 2011] CHILDREN
-
There was no compulsory education, and schooling was not free. School fees
increased dramatically during the year, and enrollment declined. According to
one company's inflation analysis, school costs for low-income families
increased nearly 900 percent from December 2004 through November. Many
families could not afford to send all of their children to school. According
to the 2002 census data and age‑specific population distributions,
roughly 72 percent of school‑age children attended school. In September
President Mugabe claimed that 97 percent of primary school-age children
attended school in 2004. The highest level achieved by most students was
primary level education. There were an
estimated 1.3 million HIV/AIDS orphans by year's end, and the number was
increasing. The number of AIDs orphans (including children who lost one as
well as both parents) was about 10 percent of the country's population. Many
grandparents were left to care for the young, and, in some cases, children or
adolescents headed families and were forced to work to survive. AIDS orphans
and foster children were at high risk for child abuse. Some children were
forced to turn to prostitution as a means of income. According to local
custom, other family members inherit before children, leaving many children
destitute. Many such children were unable to obtain birth certificates, which
then prevented them from obtaining social services. During Operation
Restore Order, the government detained many street children and took them to
transit camps or juvenile detention centers. At year's end NGOs were
uncertain how the operation affected the number of children living on the
streets, which in previous years had risen dramatically. Concluding Observations of the Committee on
the Rights of the Child (CRC) UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 7
June 1996 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/crc-Zimbabwe96.htm [accessed 17 January 2011] [17] The Committee
is concerned at the number of orphans and abandoned children as well as at
the increase in child-headed families, inter alia, as a result of the high
incidence of AIDS, at the inadequate measures taken to ensure the realization
of their fundamental rights and at the lack of alternatives to their
institutionalization. Zimbabwean girls seek opportunity in South
Africa Donna Bryson, The Associated Press AP, Musina South www.chicagodefender.com/article-4433-zimbabwean-girls-see.html [accessed 19 August 2011] Sofia Chimhangwa, a 14-year-old in a denim skirt, lies on the
concrete under a filthy blanket. Her 15-year-old friend sits next to her,
braiding a legless Barbie's hair. Musina is "not a
good place," Streetchildren Need Families Philani Nyatsanza,
The Herald, 22 April 2009 allafrica.com/stories/200904220293.html [partially accessed 19 August 2011 - access
restricted] Sometime back in
July 2006, Government -- exasperated by the number of people resorting to
eking out a living in the streets -- embarked on a programme
whereby they sought to clean up the city centre by rounding up all children
living in the streets. The action seemed
to be only a temporary reprieve, for the streets were soon flooded again,
showing that the concerned parties had applied the wrong method to addressing
this question of children living and working in the streets. This is typical of what always happens in
vicious cycle-fashion: whenever children are rounded up from the streets by
the police, it's only a temporary measure for they always come back because
the streets are probably the only "accommodating" places they
know. They would rather not go back
to empty homes: be they empty of parents, love or food. Uphold Children's Dignity Philani Nyatsanza,
The Herald, allafrica.com/stories/200904080118.html [partially accessed 18 August 2011 - access
restricted] It has become
common parlance, so much that we have ignored the consequences of such labels
as "street children" and "Aids orphans". In simple terms, this is not just naming,
but naming and shaming in the same breathe. The power of life and death is in
the tongue (Proverbs 18:21). Why
should a child be made to pay the price of something over which they had
neither power, say, like losing a parent to an HIV-related illness? The tragedy is that such shaming has a
very high price because, whether we see it or not, it will always haunt the
child, looming over them like some spectre of evil. Every time you call
them "street children" or "Aids orphans" you are
prophesying into their lives (words are carriers of spiritual power) and at
the end of the day, they act and behave in a manner consistent with what you
have labelled them. So, instead of getting answers to the
problem of children making a "home" in the streets, we exacerbate
this socio-economic ill by condemnation through labelling. "Street
children" seems to have become almost like a trade name, because it is
drawn directly from the disadvantaged children's characteristically grimy
lifestyles in the streets. But whether
they live and work in streets, in families and communities, they are just
children. Children flee Justine Gerardy, Agence France-Presse AFP, Musina South mg.co.za/article/2009-01-11-children-flee-zimbabwe-to-uncertain-future [accessed 19 August 2011] Prince Jelom has sold eggs, carried bags and pushed trolleys to
survive life as a 13-year-old on the run from Jelom is one of 100
Zimbabwean children sleeping in a crowded tin-roofed garage at a Musina church, set up as a shelter for scores of young
Zimbabwean boys found wandering the streets.
Living rough, often eating from rubbish bins, the street children are
casualties of the worsening crisis at home where deadly cholera has come on
the back of chronic food shortages, mind-boggling inflation and the collapse
of hospitals and schools. One way street – to despair: life for Sokwanele, December 10th,
2007 www.sokwanele.com/articles/zimbabwesstreetkids_10122007 [accessed 18 August 2011] Mandla sleeps under a
cardboard box and survives by scavenging for food from the city’s many
overflowing and evil-smelling rubbish bins. He has only been on the streets
for a few weeks but has learnt quickly, as needs must in this dangerous and
disease-ridden environment. There is no one else to turn to for help. His few
surviving relatives do not even know where he is. On the streets the law of
the jungle operates - literally the survival of the fittest. Frequently it is
only rapid reflexes and a swift pair of feet that keep the inhabitants of
this shadowy world out of really serious trouble. Mandla
Mpofu (*) is one of The Herald, allafrica.com/stories/200712030563.html [partially accessed 19 August 2011 - access
restricted] Mrs Gambiza-Pasipanodya said the programme
involved urging residents, ratepayers and private organisations
to desist from offering money or material support to street children and
adults as this was a major factor in influencing their continued stay on the
streets. Jotham Dhemba,
The Herald, This article has been archived by World
Street Children News and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 August 2011] THE EXTENT OF THE
PROBLEM
- There is rapid growth in the number of orphaned children in The worsening
phenomenon of street children in urban areas is also symptomatic of a
worsening problem and a malfunctioning child welfare system. It should be
evident to all concerned about the problem of child welfare, that there are
many more "invisible" children who are not accounted for in
official statistics. Tracey C. Velt,
REALTOR® Magazine Online, September 19, 2007 www.realtor.org/RMODaily.nsf/pages/News2007091908?OpenDocument [accessed 19 August 2011] “When I got there,
I heard about this wonderful woman who would bring the street children tea
and bread every morning,” she says. “I expected this benevolent, shining
woman to step out of the shadows to feed the kids, but she was an old woman
living in an apartment that was about to be condemned, barely able to make
ends meet. The children would climb out of storm drains and ditches to get
food from her.” Voice of www.voazimbabwe.com/content/a-13-56-74-2007-09-12-voa39-68996237/1465393.html [accessed 15 October 2012] Police in the Zimbabweean capital of Food Experts: Time is Ripe to Grow More
Bananas in Voice of www.voanews.com/content/a-13-2007-07-30-voa54-66781617/565204.html [accessed 15 October 2012] Munya is a street child
who earns money by guarding cars in the capital. He says he regularly
buys bananas from Chiwkama, because he can afford
neither chicken nor chips. Street children's project still to fly Augustine Mukaro,
The allafrica.com/stories/200607210148.html [partially accessed 20 September 2011 -
access restricted] To date, there are
no indications of any developments relating to a children's home. However,
the farm is being fully utilised. R W Johnson, The Sunday Times, www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article1290268.ece [accessed 19 August 2011] Suffer the little
children is a phrase never far from your mind in today’s Under the weight of
the general economic meltdown — the economy has shrunk by 40% since 2000 and
is still contracting — the health system has collapsed and a populace now
weakened by five consecutive years of near-starvation dies of things which
would never have been fatal before. A staggering 42,000 women died in
childbirth last year, for example, compared with fewer than 1,000 a decade
ago. Children of the streets feel wrath of Mugabe David Blair, The Telegraph, [accessed 19 August 2011] President Robert
Mugabe began a new onslaught on Last year they
bulldozed thousands of "illegal structures" in the poorest townships,
leaving 700,000 people without homes or livelihoods. Police The Herald, This article has been archived by World
Street Children News and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 August 2011] Police in Asst Insp Pamire said people should
desist from giving the street kids and beggars money because they usually buy
intoxicating beverages, thereby inciting violence and eventually disturbing
peace as they harass the public. The number of
children living on the streets is increasing because of the money they get
from people. Street Kids Unite to Write Book This article has been archived by World
Street Children News and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 August 2011] The book, entitled The book asks
whether street children are badly behaved, despised and rejected. It also
explores whether they are safe in the streets, they have dreams and hopes,
aspirations to succeed and above all if at all they choose to be in the
streets. The 60-page book chronicles their life and the story is told first
hand by the street children themselves. Plot to dump street kids in youth
training camps The Financial Gazette, November 25, 2004 This article has been archived by World
Street Children News and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 August 2011] The Harare City
Council is planning to dump more than 7 000 street kids at the controversial
national youth training centres in a sweep likely
to be replicated in other towns and cities. Plans are already
at an advanced stage to forcibly round up beggars and a hardened army of
street children, starting in the capital Street Children Vulnerable to AIDS The International Child and Youth Care
Network CYC-NET, 8 July 2004 www.cyc-net.org/features/ft-streetchildren.html [accessed 19 August 2011] Ten-year-old Molin considers the streets of Increase
In Street Children As Economy Worsens UN Integrated Regional Information Networks
IRIN, www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?reportid=50886 [accessed 19 August 2011] Results from an
assessment of children living and working on the streets in urban areas
around the capital, Bleak
Future For Valentine www.zimbabwesituation.com/jun20a_2004.html#link11 [accessed 19 August 2011] With the economic
crisis showing no signs of a respite, there was little to cheer, particularly
for street children who have to endure cold nights and starvation in the
country's major cities. Government Establishes Fund for
Street Children The Herald, allafrica.com/stories/200507051446.html [partially accessed 19 August 2011 - access
restricted] Government has
established the Children on the Streets Fund meant to protect and
rehabilitate children living or working on the streets and shall be applied
for the removal of children below the age of 18 from the streets for
reunification with their families or placement in institutions dealing with
street children. Zim Online (SA), www.zwnews.com/issuefull.cfm?ArticleID=12093 [accessed 19 August 2011] The Femi
Kuti Speaks Out For Zimbabwe’s 1.3 Million Orphans United Nations Children's Fund UNICEF, 09
May 2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 August 2011] Despite the world’s
fourth worst rate of HIV/AIDS, the highest rise in child mortality of any nation,
and the number of street children doubling in the past five years,
Zimbabweans receive just a fraction of donor funding compared to other
countries in their region. Information About Street Children - This report is taken from “A Civil Society
Forum for East and Southern Africa on Promoting and Protecting the Rights of
Street Children”, 11- 13 February 2002, At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 19 August 2011] Over 30,000
household headed are headed by children under 21 and another 3,000 are headed
by children under 15; 600,000 children under 15 are estimated to have lost
their mother; estimated 12,000 street children of whom about 5,000 are in
Harare; numbers increase during school holidays and weekends when children
are sent out by their parents to supplement the family income or to earn
their school fees and levies. Tanya: It’s Better to Die of AIDS Than
Hunger www.newint.org/features/2005/04/01/harare-zimbabwe/ [accessed 17 January 2011] ‘Soon after the
death of my father I was evicted from the house where my parents lodged in Mbare. I went to
stay with my grandmother who lives in Mabvuku. There were 10 of us children staying there
and we had all been left by deceased relatives. Life was difficult because, being an old woman, my grandmother had no means of sustaining herself
and all of us at the same time.’ CHILDREN: Those The Anti-AIDS Campaigners
Forget Isabella Matambanadzo,
Inter Press Service News Agency IPS, www.aegis.com/news/ips/1996/IP960601.html [accessed 19 August 2011] Generally, the boys
do odd jobs such as guarding parked cars, while the girls beg. But destitution transforms many children of
both sexes into easy prey for people who sexually exploit them in exchange
for a little money, warm clothes, a pair of old shoes or simply a hot meal. Firelight Foundation Firelight Foundation grants.firelightfoundation.org/ [accessed 19 August 2011] [scroll down] SCRIPTURE UNION /
CHIEDZA STREET CHILDREN’S PROGRAM, BULAWAYO 2003 – $5,800 - Scripture Union,
a nondenominational Christian group, has been working with children, youth,
and families in [scroll down] NEHEMIAH PROJECT,
BULAWAYO 2003 – $7,000 - The Nehemiah Project works with children
in Sauerstown, an extremely poor community outside
of All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this webpage as: Patt,
Prof. Martin, "Street Children - |
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