November 2005. The Congregation of the Christian Brothers (CCB) is in partnership with Winrock International to raise public awareness on the hazards of using children in street begging, as well as provide educational opportunities for 100 child street beggars. Through the CIRCLE project, CCB has embarked on ongoing radio sensitization as a valuable means of educating adult street beggars, who predominantly use children in the practice.

In October 2005, CCB organized a major radio discussion program, which drew panelist from line ministries and NGOs in Child Protection from three of the four provinces of Sierra Leone. The UNCRC and the ILO Convention on the Worst Forms of Child Labor were discussed by the panelists, and followed by a live phone-in program by the public. This was broadcasted live across the nation, and is repeated once a week to sensitize the public.

This weekly radio program is now complementing efforts by CCB staff to advocate for the withdrawal of children from street begging, especially in Grafton and Waterloo communities in Freetown, which have a high concentration of child street beggars. CCB is innovative in targeting the children of blind adult beggars who need their children to help them beg so they never end up going to school. This group is difficult to work with since putting their children in school ends their only viable option for earning income, which is begging.

In one of the Community Child Welfare Committee (CCWC) meetings in Waterloo, the Chairman of the CCWC, Sorrie Kamara, testified thus "my blindness is not a reason to use my children in begging along the streets of Freetown". He vowed that all his three (3) children would be enrolled in school, and indeed, all three children, Wara, Mohamed and Isatu currently attend school. Sorrie Kamara now intends to seek the assistance of adults in street begging. Other adult beggars in Waterloo have decided to drastically reduce their frequency of street begging from daily to only Fridays and Saturdays, to ensure that their children attend school regularly. The majority of such children attend Muslims schools, which do not open on Fridays. The project now supports a total of 22 child street beggars in school in Waterloo.

Funding provided by the United States Department of Labor under cooperative agreements E-9-K-2-0048 and E-9-K-4-0005.
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