Local Youth Corner (LOYOC) says its Salaam School project has helped 20 displaced students return to school in Mora, Cameroon.

The aim of the project, which was launched in 2019, is to return displaced children between the ages of three and 18 to school.

According to the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), more than 100,000 children have been chased away from classrooms in the Far North Region as a result of insurgency in the area.

It is understood that many children have lost their parents and have suffered severe trauma.

‘They [do not] have a place to sleep at night. Even here, there [are not] enough bedrooms’, Africannews quoted a Salaam School teacher, Mamma Kellou, as saying.

‘And they [do not] have enough to eat. They go and beg, eat a bit of the food they have and keep the rest for tomorrow’.

LOYOC says it has provided mats for displaced children to sleep on at night.

‘We have noticed that some of them are being recruited by violent groups to be used as suicide bombers’, the organisation’s Coordinator, Christian Achaleke, said.

‘So it was important to have a psycho-social response, and we have seen a lot of change’.

Achaleke also said, ‘We also work towards their reintegration in formal schools because our programme is not formal.

‘But we make sure that they learn the basics of language, maths, and other things’.

The non-governmental organisation (NGO) focuses on promoting the empowerment of young people, as well as campaigning against violent extremism.

Source: Africannews

Photo source: Local Youth Corner