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Congo Child Soldiers Rebuild
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Many countries are dealing with the issue of child soldiers and how best to help these young people reintegrate into society. One United Methodist congregation in the Democratic Republic of Congo gathered its scarce resources to give skills and support to those who suffered a grave injustice. Jan Snider reports. |
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SCRIPT:
(Locator: Lubumbashi, DRC)In a classroom riddled with bullet holes from wartime past, these students in the Democratic Republic of Congo forget about former conflicts and move ahead with their studies.
But just a few miles away, on the grounds of Mount Sinai United Methodist Church, there are other students whose education took a tragic turn. As young boys, they were seized from school and forced to be child soldiers. Today, they are rebuilding their lives one brick at a time.
Kyungu Mpelembe (via translator): “It was not easy because they forced me. I didn’t want to. I was going to school. They take me from the school and I went. It was not easy.”
Sixteen-year-old Kyungu Mpelembe escaped his bondage by hiding in the bush, riding atop an electric train perilously huddled next to its power line. Once in the city, he moved from place to place until the church offered him shelter and training.
Kyungu Mpelembe (via translator): “I was lucky to meet one of the teachers and managed to discover the program.”
Eager to put that life behind him, Kyungu works daily from an open classroom made of poles and tarps. He and his classmates are learning masonry and carpentry skills. Most here are survivors of the Congolese civil war—others have lived on the streets most of their lives. An instructor says the church simply could not ignore the underground society.
Jules Ilunga Mayani, Professor of Carpentry (via translator): “After discovering that they were just moving around without doing anything, we came up with this program so that we can teach them something. When we started, we managed to get 140 students.”
Students learn more than technical skills. They learn to fit back into society.
Jules Ilunga Mayani (via translator): “The tools they are learning are helping them to think, to analyze, to observe, also to behave. And it’s helping to change their behaviors.”
It’s a two year program with scarce resources—tearing down what they build to re-do the work…over and over again. But with each pass of the trowel, lives are empowered.
Jules Ilunga Mayani (via translator): “We don’t have tools. We don’t have equipment. We have the children. They are here.”
Kyungu Mpelembe (via translator): “What I want is to learn, to get skills so that I will be able to do something in my life. I want to get a job. I want to learn.”
TAG:
Every year, The United Methodist Church honors “Peace with Justice Sunday”—a special initiative which supports programs that bring about social change.
You can learn more about supporting vocational schools like this at the Advance site.
Also, see: Congo church builds up abused youth
Posted: May 28, 2010