Who are the Kings and Queens of Kibera?
Who we are
We are a small non-profit organization based in the USA. At the beginning of 2011 we decided to take a leap of faith and build a home in the heart of Kibera. Built in the traditional fashion with the help of the Kings, construction took several months. In 2019 this house was renovated into a two story construction. Today the Kings and Queens of Kibera is an environment for growth, with an all-purpose classroom, a bedroom for their bunk-beds, for the boys and a separate wing for the girls, a kitchen, and even a bathroom with showers. It is a home for Kings and Queens. In front of the house we have a courtyard, an office where our caretakers stay, and a garden on the side for the Kings to learn where their food comes from. Everyday, like any home they have their chores, cleaning the house, doing laundry and most importantly making sure their homework is finished and they have studied for the day to come. This is our “3rd Generation” of children, and in the beginning of 2020 we accepted four new street girls into the program and have since transitioned from The Kings of Kibera to The Kings and Queens of Kibera!
EDUCATION
Education is the key to success. Since many of these kids have been on the street for years they require greater attention, we have organized many educational outreach programs. Our commitment goes beyond school hours as we work daily with them on their homework, and hire teachers during school breaks to provide the extra attention that is needed. Our end goal is always to give these children the best chances in life that they have. Out of our “2nd Generation” students we have three now attending university.
COMMUNITY
Kibera is truly a place where neighbors and friends have to rely on one another to cooperate to get things done. Without the community supporting the Kings and Queens of Kibera, these former street kids would not be where they are today. Within the community everyone knows these kids and they proudly encourage them to challenge the status quo take the opportunity to educate themselves to lead a better life.
Street kids are a global issue
It was estimated in 2007 that there were 250,000- 300,000 children living and working on the streets across Kenya with, with more than 60,000 of them in Nairobi. This is a serious issue, and when you have to pay for education it only compounds the problem.
Unemployment among parents of the street children is quite high. Almost a quarter of the children claim that their mothers do not work whereas less than a tenth say their fathers do not. Studies of the parental occupations suggests that these are menial, poorly paying and often highly labor intensive jobs. The implications of this may be many including inability to meet basic family obligations leading to broken homes, high incidences of child neglect and abandonment, absentee parenthood and a tendency to encourage children to obtain employment by any means in order to supplement the family income. This view is supported by the findings that indicate that children are sent out to the streets to earn a living for themselves and even to support other members of the family.
Many of the children claim that their parents are either deceased or have abandoned them. Abandonment by or death of fathers is found to be more common than abandonment by or death of mothers. The implication is that there are more single mothers than there are fathers. The death of either or both parent and abandonment in turn increases the likelihood of children turning or being turned out to the streets because of limited or no resources for their sustenance within the extended family setting. Children either orphaned or abandoned are found to be among those who have found permanent residence on the streets (approximately 14% of the total sample). Among the children ‘of’ the streets, over 65 percent are male. Girls generally tend to be invisible in most studies on street children.