Abstract

The situation of orphans in Central Africa is terrible as compared to Europe. This situation causes millions of deaths in Central Africa. Orphans have been face by many challenges in their life. The challenges in most cases results to poor standard of living of orphans and ultimately leads of orphans’ death. This is due to failure to identify orphans’ needs and failure address the challenges facing orphans and orphanage centers.

This study presents psychosocial needs of orphans aged between 12 and 15 years old, challenges facing orphanage centers and alternative strategies that may be used to overcome the challenges in serving orphans in the Buea Municipality.

The objective of study was centered at identifying the psychosocial needs of orphans aged 12-15 years- old; examining challenges in the provision of psychosocial support of orphans aged 12-15 years-old and finding out alternative strategies to address the challenges of psychosocial well- being of orphans aged 12-15 years-old in the Buea municipality.

The study adopted cross sectional design quantitative in selected respondents, a purposive sampling technique and a simple random sampling was used. The major findings of the study are that; the psychological needs for orphans aged between 12 and 15 years old are counseling services, health services, education and food. In regard to challenges, lack of skilled workers to work with orphans, lack of staff, and lack of fund to run the centers were identified.

Based alternative strategy to overcome the challenges the study identified soliciting fund from donors, train staff in difference skill levels to enable the staff to take care the orphans. This study recommended that, orphanage should employ competent and skills workers.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background

In the face of the AIDS epidemic in Central Africa, there is widespread concern that responses to increasing numbers of orphans are resulting in a proliferation of orphanages across the region. This unease emanates from the view that care for children – orphaned or otherwise in a ‘home’ and ‘community’ environment is ideal. Institutions, on the other hand, are noted to impact negatively on children, to operate as for children growing up in poverty-stricken environments, and to be disproportionately costly.

Arguing that residential care violates the principles of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the International child Welfare sector is united in advocating its use as only a temporary ‘last resort’ for children. The position is shared by governments and other key players in the local child welfare sector, (subbarao et al 2001).

Addressing the needs of Vulnerable Children and mitigating negative outcomes of the growing vulnerable population worldwide is a high priority for national governments and international stakeholders that recognize this as an issue with social, economic, and human rights dimensions. Assembling the relevant available data on vulnerable children in one place, and acknowledging the gaps that still exist in our knowledge, will assist policy makers and program implementers to make evidence-based decisions about how best to direct funding and program activities and maximize positive outcomes for children and their caretakers (Boston, 2008).

There has recently been a resurgence of debate about ‘the child care question’, with assertions in the media that non-parental care of young children is detrimental to their development (‘Home truths absent in child care debate’, The Australian, 24 March 2000;) Child care may be distinct as care for young children, provided by adults who are not their parents. Informal child care by relatives, nannies, or home care providers typically takes place in a home setting (either the child’s home or the adult’s home), while formal care by trained and untrained caregivers takes place in school or care center settings(Mccartney 1993).

Approximately 35 percent of the children in substitute care are orphans eligible for or awaiting adoption. Most children enter substitute care due to abuse or neglect. Slightly less than 1/5 enter due to parental death, absence or termination of parental rights. In addition, over two million children have lost the care of a parent and are living in informal kinship care but have not entered a governmental system or agency (Cherlin and Furstenberg. 1994). The number of orphans from parental deaths of all causes is predicted to number a staggering 106 million. The future of these children is at stake, particularly as it involves their access to social amenities such as health and education services.

It has been observed in Haiti that children move in and out of various groups of vulnerability as their life circumstances change (Family Health International/IMPACT 2000). Orphan hood imposes a heavy burden on the children orphaned by AIDS themselves, but not all children orphaned by AIDS are needy or poor (Ainsworth and Filmer 2002). In developing countries like Cameroon there are many children who are not orphans but are equally needy or vulnerable Indigenous to Africa is the concept of absorbing vulnerable children into extended families and within the community. It well reflects the use of traditional communal living and the extended family system as the indigenous responses to the provision and protection for vulnerable children (Addison. 2007).

As Skelton (2005:4) argues, the residential care system in Cameroon “runs two systems: the system dealing with children in need of care, and the system dealing with children accused and convicted of crimes’. This report considers only those facilities concerned with children ‘in need of care’ – those which would usually, in terms of the Cameroonian law, be called Children’s Homes.

Beyond poverty, specific to Africa and Cameroon is the effect of H1V/A1DS. With streetism being a relatively new’ phenomenon, the role of HIV/A1DS must be considered. For Instance, nearly 1 in 7 orphans in Africa a study carried out in various parts including Cairo and Alexandria in Egypt found that children are exposed to real or constant threats of violence ,hostile community members, or peers they are often malnourished and lack access to medical services.(UNICEF 2001).A study of 2004 in Brazil tied to describe the level of vulnerability of street children to have the similar characteristics to street children from other cities of Aracaju in north east Brazil (Gurgel et al.2004)

Most of the organizations providing vulnerable children services in Cameroon are non-governmental organizations (78%). The rest include governmental (9%), private-not for profit (4%), faith- based organizations (4%) and multilateral organization (4%). The Cameroonian government has responded by putting in place the National Plan of Action on which helps to strengthen the capacity of families to protect and care for vulnerable children, provide economic, psychosocial and other forms of social support, as well as mobilize and support community based responses to increase vulnerable children access to essential services such as food and nutrition, education, health care, housing, water and sanitation.

The Department of Children Services, within the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Development, in collaboration with the National Steering Committee on children developed the vulnerable children Policy, a key aspect of which is the provision of a direct predictable and regular cash subsidy per month to households caring for.

1.2 Problem Statement

The increase of vulnerable children calls for more care institutions to provide care services with the children’s rights. For the last couple of years, remarkable gains had increasingly been made in provision of treatment, care and support services to vulnerable children.

The availability of children homes and other government institution have made contribution. In Buea of the Mile 14 area there are 7 children homes including HOTPEC is providing care services to orphans and other vulnerable children in various capacities.

Institutionalized care is one option for abandoned children and those who require special attention as in the case of HIV/AIDS-infected orphans, handicapped children, and abused children.

A screening device should be used to ensure that institutionalized care is resorted to only when no better placement options are available (Verhoef 2000; Rajkumar 2000), and only as a temporary measure until a placement in a suitable family is arranged. The care provided by some institutions seems to be quite substantial and satisfactory especially by those institutions run by NGOs like Children’s Village. It is not surprising then that new creative and less institutional innovations are emerging in much of the Buea Municipality.

While they may provide some of the ‘nurture’, typical institutions do not provide the holistic care that children are entitled to for all round development. Research has shown that children in institutions lack basic and traditionally accepted social and cultural skills to function in their societies; they have lower levels of educational attainment; have problems adjusting to independence after leaving the orphanage, lack basic living skills; have more difficulties with relationships, lack parental skills and some of them often have a misplaced sense of entitlement without a parallel sense of responsibility (Powell 1999; Grainger et al. 2001; Williamson et al. 2001).

In the process of collecting and comparing these cases of selected children homes, the challenges and obstacles that stand between them and their goals to became clear. The goal is to ensure that all vulnerable children achieve their full potential through the creation of a supportive environment that upholds their right to survival, development, protection and participation.

Responses must be gender sensitive and systemic, and must have rigorous monitoring and evaluation mechanisms built in from the outset (Wright 1999). It is in these three areas or gaps that the range of initiatives needs to be undertaken. In moving forward, to addressing these three gaps makes it necessary to action this research.

1.3 Research questions

1. What are the activities played by children’s homes in relation to security provisions for the vulnerable children in Mile 14?
2. What are the perceptions shared by the children about the orphanage?
3. What are the difficulties faced by the children and the HOTPEC orphanage as well?

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