15 Year Old Girl Rediscovering Her Lost Dream.

Scovia Awuor is from a polygamous family. Her father, James Ngore, was born in 1956. Mr. Ngore has two wives Caroline Ngore 48 and Rose Ngore 33 years. The family is blessed with 6 siblings including Scovia who is the second born and is 15 years old.

After sitting her primary school examinations in 2014, Scoviah was unable to transit to secondary school because of a family separation. This meant that she could no longer pursue her dream of becoming a designer. The separation resulted from her father who neglected their family after marrying the second wife Rose with whom they migrated to another town in Kisii County. This saw scovias mother and siblings experience immense trauma, desperation, neglect as well as hate from the fathers relatives.

Caroline Ngore Scovias Mother and her one year old baby

 

Scovias dilemma was referred to RAPADO by one of the Child Labour Committee Representatives Mr Kitenge as well as the area chief. Efforts by RAPADO and the local partnerships to secure her school fee support through the decentralized funds were unsuccessful. Scovia unfortunately got an early pregnancy and in July 2016, she gave birth to a baby girl. .

 

She then decided to engage in petty trade to be able to take care of her baby, herself and her mother. Scovia’s hard work was boosted by the continuous counselling efforts from RAPADOs social worker. The whole family were counselled and the mother tested positive to HIV. She was consequently referred for treatment therapy. RAPADO conducted a rapid assessment and matched her interest in dressmaking and design with the market survey recommendations.

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Scoviah is now undertaking her Vocational course for dress making at Jaimbos Tailor & Fashion designers Courtesy of the CCSCCL project. Her mother is fairly well now and is engaged in vegetable vending. She stays with her granddaughter who is now a year old. “I did not know that at some point, I would be able to forget my problems at home, but look at me now, being in this course has kept me busy, I promise to do my best so that I will be able to assist my family, especially my siblings in future.” This was her statement when she was visited by the Social Worker at the vocational training. Scoviah has only taken six (6) months since she joined the training, she even amazes her instructor because she is ever willing to learn how to make different types of dress fashions. Scovia comments that she is in the right track to fill up for her lack of transition to secondary school. We wish her the best!

2. Former Teacher in the frontline in Child labour prevention and response in Masara Village.
Madam Janet Obiero was elected as a member of the Community Child Labor Committee in Masara Village, Migori County in 2016. She has a very rare leadership role in a largely male-dominated community, and has been in the forefront of the child labor elimination efforts.
Janet is a farmer and former teacher in Masara Village, and has two acres of land she uses to cultivate maize and cassava to provide income to support her child’s education at Masara Secondary School. She was divorced by her husband and left to raise their four children on her own.
Janet is the elected vice Chairperson of the Community Child Labor Committee (CCLC) and has been leading efforts to eradicate child labor through awareness raising and monitoring activities in her community more especially at the gold mining sites. She also initiated the creation of Rafiki Self Help Group, which adopted Savings and Internal Lending Community’s model at inception. At the time of formation in 2016, Rafiki self-help SILC group had eight members, but it has since grown to a dedicated team of 17 members in one group and 13 members in a splinter group. The success of Rafiki SILC group has been a source of inspiration in Masara Vilage, and there are now five more SILC groups in the village.
Madam Janet is usually in the frontline of the Community Child labour inspections at the gold mining sites as well as in the local farms and households. ‘Individually, I have rescued over 17 children in this village in 2017 alone. As a SILC group and as a child labour committee together our efforts have surpassed hundreds of children who are now back in regular school, most of the here in the community. Our role as a SILC group and as a child labour committee is not only limited to monitoring, identification and referral of children in child labour but also linking the families to counselling, spiritual or even bursary services and opportunities’ Says madam Janet.
When discussing the SILC activities, Janet said that RAPADO capacity building initiatives had provided hope and opportunity for many of her fellow-community members, and she intended to continue her efforts to ensure that more people, especially women, joined SILC formations. Of the CCLC she says, “Since I joined the committee and have interacted with RAPADO and the Children’s department, I have learned a lot. I feel more responsible to work on removing children from labor because I would love to see other children go to school and ultimately join secondary school just like my child. Every year many children in our community fail to pass their standard eight examinations because of child labor.”
Janet’s leadership and capacity to mobilize and influence the community is demonstrated not only through the growth of the SILC program, but also through her continuous and tireless efforts to engage and promote the reduction and prevention of child labor in Masara village.