Salamata

When appropriate facilities and services are put in place to receive and care for children who have experienced traumatic events in humanitarian crisis contexts, this enables them to recover their mental equilibrium, regain self-confidence and take an active part in the life of their community.

In her life story, Salamata, a girl from the host community who has dropped out of school and is a beneficiary of the JF-CPiE project describes how the activities in her club and the life skills programme have had a major impact on her life, making her a leader in her community.

Can you introduce yourself and tell us what you were doing before taking part in the project?

My name is Salamata, I’m 15 years old and I come from a village just outside Kaya. There are 6 children in our family and I’m the third sibling. I dropped out of school in 2022 when I failed my Certificat d’Etudes Primaire exam. I was so shocked by my failure, especially as all my classmates had passed.  My parents encouraged me and gave me advice, but I didn’t want to go back to school. So I opted to sell peanuts at the police checkpoint by the tarmac. But the heightened security crisis forced the authorities to close the only main road through the town of Kaya. I had to give up my business because this decision led to a drastic fall in sales. This had a severe impact on my income-generating activity, and consequently on my self-esteem and morale. Since then, I’ve withdrawn into myself at home.

How did you hear about the project and what has changed in your life as a result? What have you achieved as a teenager thanks to the project?

My father took part in a meeting that project staff organised in our village with parents and community leaders at the beginning of 2023. Back home, he told me about the meeting and that the project wanted to set up a children’s club in our village. I didn’t know what that meant. On the day the club was set up, my father told me about it and I took part.

The project officers explained to us what a children’s club was and what its purpose was. I was immediately taken with the idea and volunteered to be a member.  

I was so happy when I went home that I told my father everything that had happened first and then my mother after dinner, because my relationship with my mother was not at all good because I refused to go back to school. When I started taking part in the activities of the club and the project in general, I felt I had found what I needed in my environment as a teenager, because my life has changed completely for the better. It enabled me to meet up with my old classmates again, to rediscover joy and to strengthen my personal skills through the life skills sessions, talks and training I took part in on children’s rights and children’s participation in issues that concern them in the family and in the community. What I really liked and what also helped me was the life skills session on child abuse and violence against children. Through this session, I saw that I was exposed to violence when selling peanuts on the tarmac, sometimes late at night. All the sessions I attended met a practical need in everyday life and they helped me to understand a lot of things, to re-establish relationships with both my parents, especially my mother, who sometimes refused to let me talk to her about intimate matters because I refused to go back to school. These days, my mother and I are confidants and I’ve re-enrolled in school to sit the CEP exam.

In our club, I’ve been elected information officer and I take the lead in programming and organising educational talks on menstrual management and sexual and reproductive health for my peers in our neighbourhood, with the technical support of a godmother who is a community health worker. In view of my leadership of the children’s club and my commitment to the cause of the local children, I’ve been nicknamed the village MP.

What are your most important prospects for your future and that of your community? How do you see your future and that of your family/community after the project?

I’m happy, my mum, my dad, my family and some of my neighbours are very proud of me and my behaviour. Thanks to this project, I’ve regained my self-confidence and I’m protecting myself and my peers against violence. I would like to thank the CN/AEJTB, the NGO Terre des Hommes Suisse and its donor who, thanks to the project’s activities, has enabled me to strengthen my skills and go back to school to continue my studies. I am confident that I will succeed and I dream of becoming a French teacher and teaching pupils. I will also continue to mobilise girls not only at school but also in our village to raise awareness about menstrual management and the consequences of early pregnancy and child/forced marriage.