How
streets children played hide and seek games with KCCA law enforcers
Majority
hide to avoid relocation
AL-MAHDI
SSENKABIRWA
August
18 started as a normal day for Janet Okolo, 9 but it turned black when Police
officers and city law enforcers rounded her up in the ongoing crackdown of
street children.
The
law enforcers supposedly mistook Okolo for a street kid despite her pleas that
she is she a pupil of Tara Primary School, Kisugu, a city suburb.
This
unlikely little girl had accompanied her mother who vends food at
Diamond Trust building veranda.
“Being
a holiday I was assisting my mother and I explained this to the police officers
but they couldn't listen. They also arrested my mum other too and I don’t know
where she is now,” Okolo sobbed as she narrated her ordeal.
Interestingly,
majority of the real street children avoided being rounded up as they engaged
in a hide and seek game with law enforcers.
Mr
Daniel Mujjukizi, the Kampala Capital City (KCCA) director gender, community
service blames this on what he describes as ‘disgraceful Karimojong’ mothers
who reportedly alerted the children to vacate their known hideouts in central
Kampala and relocated to city suburbs.
“Some
Karimajong mothers and their leaders in Kisenyi are using the kids for their own
benefits. When they knew that we are going to round them up, they alerted them
and they disappeared from their known hideouts to unknown places,” Ms Mujjukiza
said over the weekend.
He
said Karimojong mothers in Kampala had a racket which was trafficking children
from Karamoja to the city.
“We
have so far prosecuted four Karimojong mothers for aiding kids to stay on the
streets and more are going to be hunted.” Mujjukizi added
But
Ssemanda Ntanda, 13 wondered why he was rounded up yet he doesn’t hail from
Karamoja.
“They
have been saying they want only Karimajong .I am not one but I was arrested,”
says Ssemanda who disappeared from his home in May after his father, Benjamin
Ntanda reportedly chased him.
Most
of the street kids sleep in the cloud on building verandas and a
few who save some coins through begging pay between Shs300 and Shs 500per night
to get accommodation in makeshift lodges in Kisenyi and Katwe suburbs . The art
of begging has of recent changed, with babies being used by their mothers and
siblings to beg on their behalf, well aware that they will attract more
sympathy from the public.
In
the first operation carried out by Police and KCCA law enforcement officers ,
only 70 out of the estimated 5000 street kids were rounded up. First Lady Janet
Museveni who also doubles as minister in charge of Karamoja is spearheading the
campaign to remove all street kids off the streets.
The
first lot of 70 kids including Okolo who were rounded up last Thursday night
have already arrived at Masulita Children’s Village (MCV) run by Uganda Women’s
Efforts to Save Ophans (Uweso) and will serve as a transit centre for the
children .
Ms Naomi Watiti,
the chief executive officer Uweso says the kids will be screened and those from
Karamoja will be relocated to Koblem Reception Centre .Those from other regions
will be reunited with their families.
“Those
from Karamoja will be resettled back home while those from the central and
their parents cannot be traced will be enrolled in schools,” said Ms Watiti
during the official launch of the launch of the street children project t
in Masulita recently .
“We
are going to bring smiles on the faces of these kids and for the time we shall
be with them we shall treat them as our own children.” She said
Ms Museveni who
presided as chief guest at the Masulita event reaffirmed her commitment to seek
a lasting solution to the street children menace. “These are seeds of Uganda which we must nurture to become useful in future,” she said
Ms Museveni said under the new arrangement, street kids will get all the assistance needed to grow up as good citizens.
“We have been taking these children to Kampiringisa Rehabilitation Centre which is more of a prison than a home. This new place (MCV) is good I am optimistic that they will enjoy their stay here,” she said
During
their three-month stay at Masuulita, the kids according to Ms Watiti , the
executive director Uweso the kids will receive psycho-social support, simply
literacy, treatment, involve them in games and educative films.
“We
hope that after three months they could have changed their attitude and start
seeing themselves as useful children,” she said during
Previously, the
street children were forcefully bundled onto KCCA trucks and dumped at
Kampiringisa Rehabilitation Centre in Mpigi District where they could escape in
days due to deplorable conditions at the centre . It is believed that begging
on the streets is big business as begging children can easily earn more than
employed individuals and 80 percent of them, according to KCCA hail from the
hunger and violence-prone Karamoja sub-region.Last week, KCCA began removing lunatics from the streets and hundreds of them are currently receiving psychiatric assistance at Butabika referral hospital and Kampiringisa Rehabilitation Centre in Mpigi district.
According to Dr Livingstone Makanga, KCCA director of medical services, over 100 lunatic people have been removed from the streets in the last couple of weeks .This followed complains from hotel owners and shop operators that lunatic people were scaring away their customers. A good number of lunatic people on the streets escape from Butabika Hospital while still on medication.
There are also reports that some lunatic men rape women at night. Street vendors who have for long been blocking walkways and pavements in down town Kampala are soon facing a similar fate following a presidential directive to relocate them to nearby permanent markets .This brings hope that the city will de-congested and become clean
Monitor Publications
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