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The Master's Touching Hand, Inc

The problem of Street children in Africa

Why are they living,... and dying on the streets ?

We contend that not enough is being done to address the problem and that indeed the problem of street
children remains an ignored tragedy that is set to have a devastating impact on the development of
African countries. The problem has at best been muted and remains ignored or sidelined. Those key
players who are supposed to play a leading role in finding a solution to the problem have in fact become
the major source of the problem.

Parents are sending their children into the streets to beg or engage in small trade, children are leaving
their homes to escape domestic violence or because of the breaking up of family structures. Schools are
turning into centers of violence and crime and creating an environment to puts more children on the
streets. This problem of children living in and on the streets requires urgent attention as it threatens the
very fabric of society. A starting point would be to get an understanding of who these children are and the
factors that turn them into street children.

By definition, street children are those under the age of eighteen who spend most of their life on the
streets. There are those who live permanently on the streets called "children of the street”. These live and
earn their 'living' on the streets. There are also those who earn their living on the street but do not
necessarily live on the streets. These spend most of their time on the street but usually return to some
form of a 'family.

An estimated 10 million children in Africa live without families, mostly in towns as 'street
children' (UNICEF, 1984:39) It would be adventurous to come up with accurate statistics about how many
children live at the moment on the streets of Africa. But without any doubts, there are tens of millions of
children living on the streets of Africa. There are ignored, invisible and excluded; the shameful tragedy of
the African continent today.

Street children face untold hardship and danger on the streets. The lack of food, clean water and adequate
health care. Living and 'working' on the streets exacts aterrible toll on street children. They are often
exposed to every physical and moral danger and as they grow older they often become a danger to others.
After such precarious childhoods, most of them are condemned to spend their lives excluded from
mainstream society.

UNICEF (1985) correctly observes that Yesterday, street children were no more than a footnote. Today,
street children are a major issue. Tomorrow, if present trends continue, they could be a blight on urban
civilization. For Africa, tomorrow is already here. Street children are not only a blight on urban civilization;
they pose a serious obstacle to overall socio-economic development in Africa. Poverty is a major cause
of street children. Africa is today a continent characterized by extreme poverty. It is poverty that is
resulting in children being forced to work on the streets to support themselves and their families. It is
poverty that is also causing many families to break up with parents being unable to support their children.
It is rural poverty that is making rural populations including children to move to urban areas with the hope
of a better future. Poverty causes malnutrition and poor health and reduces a family's ability to work thus
creating conditions for children to move to the streets. Clic to read more...
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Reaching for hands, Touching the hearts

With an estimated 45,000 children living
on the streets of Kinshasa, 30,000 in
Lubumbashi and thousands more in major
cities of the country the size of the entire
east of the United States, the hellish living
condition of these kids needs more than
just simple compassion. It needs action to
find durable solutions. Click here to read
more about this tragedy. There is a move
in the making by the authorities in
Lubumbashi to get rid of all street children
called" shegue". We are trying to gather
all information concerning this new
development. We will get you posted very
soon.

© MTH Our Regional Director David Meji, tryingto grasp, first
Hand, the heart-wrenching situation ofchildren Living, Sleeping
and Dying on the streets of Africa.

This is not Africa’s problem, it’s everyone’s.
Why would you stand and watch? It’s time to get
involved. These children in central and southern
Africa should not keep on living--- sleeping---
and dying--- on the streets. "These children sleep
on the street even when it rains. After a heavy
rain, gutters overflow, Sometimes street children
are drown in the filthy sewage water, explains a
reporter in Congo

The twenty-first century Presents a
hostile and unwelcoming face to many
millions of children in many African
countries today. An increasing number of
children are being forced to be on the
streets because of poverty, abuse, rape
abandonment or orphaned by AIDS.
Human rights violations against children
in the 80s, 90s to date, have become a
common, horrible and disturbing reality in
many African countries. These children
are denied the basic human and legal
rights to life, liberty and security.
Unfortunately, this denial of human rights
to children has become a feature of the
African socio-economic landscape,

©MTH