The Caleb Project is a registered CBO (Community Based Organization) working with Street children in Eldoret, Kenya.

Our Mission: To improve the welfare of street children and others less-fortunate children in our community.

Our Vision: Every child enabled to play a significant role and realize his/her potential in the community.

Our Objectives:

• Reaching out-meeting the chldren and providing for their immediate needs,
• Relationship bulding-Spending time listening to the children and nderstandng their background and future hopes,
• Rehabilitation- preparing the chldren to make the transition from the street and back to their community,
• Reintegration-enabling the child to return to their families or to find alternative ways to the community.

Rationale and context

A street child could be regarded as one such child who lacks a home and barely has to rely on the street life is , however too harsh and inhuman for any child. Children run to he streets for all kinds of reasons – family breakdown, violence, abuse , poverty , illness and more common reason today is the loss of relatives to HIV/AIDS and other diseases large number of children have hence flown to urban centres to seek ways of surviving and fending for their siblings.

Street children occurrence is a phenomenon that has puzzled modern social structure and institutions. It poses threat to National security; as well as personal development of the child concerned .It is a real threat that undermines human dignity.

The re-emergence of child labour as an important social issue has its roots in the causes of flight to the urban centres by these children. The capitalist economies structure have catapulted these problems, thus making many children rely fully on weak means of earning a living. They have continually become vulnerable to abuse, violence and poverty-which are threats to human dignity. They scavenge on garbage for leftover food.

Eldoret town is a home to over 2000 street children .The number having risen from 90 in 1992 to he present level, representing an increase of 95.5% .Eldoret is an agricultural town in the Northern part of Rift valley with a population of 112,343 as per the 1989 census. The growth rate is 15.6% this the population is projected to be close to 200,000 at the moment.

Observations carried out on Eldoret streets children reveal that 98% are poorly clothed, have poor health evidenced by skin diseases and are generally underfed. 71% of them reveal that they are older that what they physical appearance potent. They lack moral values- they can rob, mug, steal, and rape and often use vulgar language. These children have to develop tough survival skills in order to withstand the harsh realities of the street .In order to do this, they resort to taking drugs, e.g. bhang and rely heavily on alcohol, sniffing gums is common among them. They say they do this in order to get their hunger pangs down. The more mature ones have developed trade skills –They collect waste papers and plastics for instance, and either sell them, or exchange them for food , clothes or drugs and alcohol. They  spend the night in the streets and mostly around garbage bins.

They do not have national identity cards, and therefore cannot be accessible to formal meaningful employment if any, neither have they basic education – all of them dropped out of primary school or never being  to school at all.

The society on the other hand views them as a threat and has negated them as “ chokoras” (the Swahili word for scavengers from their habit of collecting leftover food from garbage bins). This majority of them get no attention from the public, especially when it comes to illness and disease.

The negative connotation attributed to street children is far removed from the aspirations of these children. Being asked what kind of assistance they desire from the society, one of them responded that if they could be assisted to get education and train for skills, he could be able to get employed, earn a living and assist his siblings. Another talked of complications in getting national identity card, which makes it hard for them to get employed even as security guards, This is a clear indication that these children, though they are under harsh conditions, have strong spirits with great expectations in life.

The United Nations’ Declaration on the Rights of the Child assets the rights of the child as the right to:-

1)      Affection, love and understanding

2)      Adequate nutrition and medical care

3)      Free education

4)      Full opportunity to play and recreation

5)      A name and nationality

6)      A special care if handicapped

7)      Be the first to receive relief in times of disaster

8)      Learn to be a useful member of the society and to develop individual abilities

9)      Be brought up in the spirit of peace and universal brotherhood.

10)  Enjoy these rights regardless of race, colour, sex, and region, national or social origin.

The United Nation Declaration on the Rights of the Child –which the Government of Kenya has ratified, contains some of God’s essential intentions for his created order. Every child should be accorded a meaningful, living, irrespective of their socio-economic shortcomings and a chance to establish a relationship with God the creator .It pains to witness a child struggling under inhuman conditions in the eye of the government, community, the church and even able organizations and people.

Government’s resources  towards this effect seem inadequate or inefficient , thus the need for the community and other organizations and even individuals to fill up the vacuum. This is why Caleb Project has initiated these programmes .The programmes is expected to provide free quality education and training , adequate nutrition and medical care , shelter, social and recreational programmes .Entrepreneurship programme will come handy in providing employment to these street children as a way of getting them permanently out of the streets and be useful to themselves and the society .The continued increase and presence of street children in  Eldoret town is an indication that nothing significant or comprehensive is been done about them. While these  programmes become fully operational, they will comprehensively cater for the needs of the children in a tri-kind approach: relational holistic and reintegration .This approach will ensure that no former street child gets back to old habit of the street and experience in similar programmes .