CRC rescues brothers from Bo streets

The Child Reintegration Centre has launched its initiative to rescue street children, collaborating with local organization Street Child UK, which estimates there are as many as 6,500 children living on the streets of Bo.  These children may have escaped violence in the home, or they may have been abandoned by parents who are too poor to provide for them.  They are in desperate need of shelter, food,  education, and a family to love them.  This is the case with Momodu and Momoh, brothers identified by Street Child and rescued by the CRC.

Momodu, 14 and Momoh, 12, are from a family of 10 children, of whom four died.  The family, originally from a village near Bo, began to fall apart when their mother fled the abuse of her alcoholic husband.  She took her daughter, but left the five boys to fend for themselves.  Momodu soon ran away, landing on the streets of Bo. He survived by begging for empty cartons from shop owners, which he sold to market women for a few cents.  Sometimes he sold metal scraps that he gathered from garages. 

Eventually Momodu tired of the rough street life and returned to his village, but the home situation had not changed.  His father gave him and his brother Momoh a little money to travel to their auntie's home in Bo, where two of their brothers had gone to escape the turmoil of their home.  Sadly, their aunt also turned them away because she had no room for them.  
 
Alone and abandoned, Momodu and Momoh had nowhere to turn but the street.  They washed dishes for a woman who sold food at night.  In payment, she gave them a little food and money.  They slept in market stalls, where they were discovered by Street Child UK, who referred them to the CRC.  

The CRC staff brought the brothers into the interim home, took them to Mercy Hospital for testing, and began counseling.  The CRC is tracing their family to identify a safe home for them. They want to go back to school, but for the time being, they are so happy to be at the CRC.

---