Thursday, May 10, 2007

Child labour at the Liberian refugee camp

As I mentioned in an earlier post, once a week I go to the Liberian refugee camp outside Accra to work with reporters that publish a paper called The Vision. I recently had the privilege of helping a man named Abednego David publish his first-ever newspaper story. He was a quick study, researching and writing a draft of a story a week after our first meeting. It was on child labour at the Buduburam refugee camp and printed in the April edition of the paper. I've re-printed the story here for you to read. I hope to post some of the pictures in the next week. - Mark

"Children push wheelbarrows to survive in Buduburam"
By Abednego David

Samuel David, 14, a refugee child at Buduburam, doesn't go to school with other children. He goes to the Buduburam market at 6 am with a wheelbarrow, which was bought for him by his sister Mamie David.

David’s routine includes transporting heavy loads of vegetables and other goods to and from the market. He also makes deliveries to people’s homes in the camp.

He starts work very early in the morning and finishes at 6 pm. He said he can’t afford to go to school.

“I am not attending school because there’s no money for fees,” he said. “I give the money that I earn to my sister for food,” he said.

David is one of many boys who push wheelbarrows at Buduburam camp. Most of them do this work to survive and do not go to school. Many of them are also homeless or living with other children and no adults.

Aruna R. Kamara, 41, a Sierra Leonian refugee and Chairman of the United Wheelbarrow Association (UWBA), said his association has a membership of 50 persons. He said they pay 20,000 cedis (Ghanaian currency) to be part of the association.

He said 25 of them are children aged between 12 and 16 years. They are mostly Liberian and Sierra Leonian refugees, but there are also some Nigerians and Ghanaians.

Most children don’t have their own wheelbarrow, and rent on a daily basis for 12,000 cedis from business people on the camp.

“The children come to appeal to work for themselves,” said Kamara. “I cannot deny them, because they have to hustle for their living.”

Kamara said they have two types of child wheelbarrow pushers - the “regular and after-school pushers.”

The regulars are those children who work from 6am - 6pm daily. The after-school pushers report to work at the end of the school day.

Alhassan Adam, a 13-year-old Ghanaian who lives with his grandparents at Buduburam Village next to the refugee camp, said after the death of his biological parents, he needed to do something to survive.

“I started pushing wheelbarrow for the past five months, just to support my grandparents and myself,” said Adam.

Liberian refugee Jonathan Taryouway, 15, also said he does this work to survive. “I have to rent a wheelbarrow to eat, wash and pay my school fees,” he said.

Madam Jenneh Sandra Blay, Coordinator for Women’s and Children’s Affairs at the Liberia Refugee Welfare Council (LRWC), isn’t just concerned about the youth pushing wheelbarrows. She said they are doing other types of jobs as well.

She plans to meet with the children very soon, but she isn’t sure what can be done for them.

“For now the LRWC do not have any funds [to help] the children pushing wheelbarrows, washing pots and dishes for owners [of small restaurants] on the camp,” she said.

Blay said they have tried to help in the past by giving the children tickets for food at the UNHCR monthly food distribution centers.

She also said that many of the children don’t have families and that many of them live on the streets. She said it’s often difficult to integrate them into a new family.

“I believe they feel more comfortable on the street,” she said. “I have learned that some of them are going to Accra and other big cities begging for money.”

Madam Dorothy Kumah, a Social Welfare officer at the camp, said they have had some success, though. She said they rescued about 700 street children, and reintegrated them into a home where they enjoy parental care.

She said they’re conducting a study to find out how many children are still living on their own and in the streets at the camp.

20 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow.
That's a very powerful story, Mark. Having had the privilege to spend the day judging 15-17 year old Canadian kids' projects at the Canada-wide science fair, for the Canadian Commission for UNESCO prize for science for peace and development, my head is now filled with such a stark picture. A picture of two very different worlds, for two 17 year-olds, worlds apart, on the same planet.
Thanks for sharing.
Paul Black

Anonymous said...

Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your older articles are not as good as newer ones you have a lot more creativity and originality now keep it up!

Anonymous said...

[B]NZBsRus.com[/B]
Escape Sluggish Downloads Using NZB Files You Can Easily Find High Quality Movies, PC Games, Music, Applications & Download Them at Dashing Rates

[URL=http://www.nzbsrus.com][B]NZB Search[/B][/URL]

Anonymous said...

After getting more than 10000 visitors/day to my website I thought your jmghana.blogspot.com website also need unstoppable flow of traffic...

Use this BRAND NEW software and get all the traffic for your website you will ever need ...

= = > > http://get-massive-autopilot-traffic.com

In testing phase it generated 867,981 visitors and $540,340.

Then another $86,299.13 in 90 days to be exact. That's $958.88 a
day!!

And all it took was 10 minutes to set up and run.

But how does it work??

You just configure the system, click the mouse button a few
times, activate the software, copy and paste a few links and
you're done!!

Click the link BELOW as you're about to witness a software that
could be a MAJOR turning point to your success.

= = > > http://get-massive-autopilot-traffic.com

Anonymous said...

top [url=http://www.001casino.com/]online casinos[/url] hinder the latest [url=http://www.casinolasvegass.com/]casino las vegas[/url] unshackled no consign bonus at the foremost [url=http://www.baywatchcasino.com/]casino gratuity
[/url].

Anonymous said...

[url=http://www.onlinecasinos.gd]online casino[/url], also known as agreed casinos or Internet casinos, are online versions of conventional ("buddy and mortar") casinos. Online casinos ok gamblers to describe the village red and wager on casino games painstakingly the Internet.
Online casinos superficially offer odds and payback percentages that are comparable to land-based casinos. Some online casinos signify on higher payback percentages as a countermeasure with a stance origin gismo games, and some repeal prominent payout speck audits on their websites. Assuming that the online casino is using an fittingly programmed indefinitely business generator, board games like blackjack clothed an established congress edge. The payout mend after these games are established at next to the rules of the game.
Uncountable online casinos sublease or mesmerize their software from companies like Microgaming, Realtime Gaming, Playtech, Supranational Imposture Technology and CryptoLogic Inc.

Anonymous said...

Thanks to my father who informed me regarding this website, this
webpage is in fact awesome.

my site; aimbot

Anonymous said...

you are actually a just right webmaster. The website loading pace is amazing.
It sort of feels that you are doing any distinctive trick.

Also, The contents are masterpiece. you've performed a magnificent task in this topic!

Feel free to surf to my webpage ... sex games

Anonymous said...

Fine way of telling, and nice paragraph to get information
regarding my presentation subject, which i am going to convey in academy.


Review my site: link clicker

Anonymous said...

You've made some good points there. I checked on the web to find out more about the issue and found most people will go along with your views on this website.

Here is my site pdf password remover

Anonymous said...

I think the admin of this website is in fact working hard for his website,
as here every information is quality based information.

Feel free to visit my blog: cheat in castle ville

Anonymous said...

I am truly thankful to the owner of this web site who has shared this impressive piece of writing
at here.

Feel free to visit my blog post: virtual currency

Anonymous said...

It is appropriate time to make some plans for the future and
it's time to be happy. I've read this post and if I could I desire to suggest you some
interesting things or suggestions. Maybe you can write
next articles referring to this article. I want to read more things about it!


Feel free to surf to my web site virtapay currency

Anonymous said...

I'm amazed, I have to admit. Seldom do I come across a blog that's both educative and engaging, and without a doubt, you've hit the nail on the head. The issue is something that too few men and women are speaking intelligently about. I'm very happy that I came across this in my hunt for something concerning this.


My homepage ... exchange virtapay

Anonymous said...

Remarkable! Its truly amazing paragraph, I have got much clear idea concerning
from this paragraph.

Here is my homepage :: free psn

Anonymous said...

Touche. Outstanding arguments. Keep up the great effort.

Take a look at my blog post youtube view bot

Anonymous said...

Hey! I know this is somewhat off-topic however I had to ask.

Does operating a well-established blog like yours take a large
amount of work? I am brand new to running a blog however I do write
in my journal on a daily basis. I'd like to start a blog so I can easily share my personal experience and views online. Please let me know if you have any kind of suggestions or tips for brand new aspiring bloggers. Appreciate it!

Here is my webpage ... 1.6 cheats

Anonymous said...

Pretty! This has been an extremely wonderful article.
Thanks for supplying this info.

Have a look at my web blog youtube video downloader

Anonymous said...

of course like your web-site however you need to test the
spelling on several of your posts. Several of them are rife with spelling problems and I
in finding it very troublesome to inform the reality then
again I will definitely come back again.

Look at my web blog ... get minecraft for free

Anonymous said...

Have you ever considered writing an ebook or guest authoring on other
blogs? I have a blog based upon on the same subjects you discuss and would love to have you share some stories/information.
I know my subscribers would appreciate your work.

If you are even remotely interested, feel free to shoot me an e-mail.


Also visit my webpage free psn codes 2013