Conflict in the CAR Turns Lives of Mothers and Children Upside-Down

Plan International is working to bring relief to refugees in Cameroon.

 

A young refugee mother from the Central African Republic (CAR) is now depending on the support of Plan International USA to get through a time of uncertainty, turmoil, and heartache.

Kadidja, 15, is one of tens of thousands of refugees who fled to Cameroon to escape the bloody violence in CAR. Along with her 2-year-old daughter, Mariama, she trekked for four months to escape the fighting, completing the arduous journey of more than 600 kilometers amid violence, starvation, and a real threat of death.
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Grandmothers fighting malnutrition, one child at a time

Mother knows best, right? Well if that’s the case, it’s safe to call grandmothers the wisest members of the family. In Benin, Africa, that’s definitely the case.
“It’s often the grandmother that passes on the traditions, knowledge and values to children,” explained Paul Sabi Boum, a Plan staff member from Benin. “She is a respected member of the household and the community, and she is uniquely placed to influence others because of her experience.”

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A Journey to School: A Mother and Daughter Perspective

Yié and her mother Natoume live in Mayos, a community of Baka pygmies in eastern Cameroon, West Africa. Both strongly believe in the importance of an education and serve as roles for their community. Yié is the only Baka girl out of 800 of her peers to attend school, while her mother currently campaigns for the education of the Baka children who live within their community. These are their stories...

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Keeping mothers and their newborns alive

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 800 women die every day due to complications during pregnancy and childbirth. Only 1% of these deaths occur in high-income countries.

That means that 99% of all maternal deaths occur in developing countries. But the majority of these deaths are preventable through simple, cost-effective interventions.

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It’s Tough Without Any Friends

I argued with my mother again today. We haven’t been able to see eye-to-eye recently. She is cross, perhaps understandably so. She is desperately trying to convince me or even to force me to go back to school. I haven’t been attending school recently. I left school fuming 10 days ago and I haven’t been back since. She is trying to play down the episode which made me leave school nearly two weeks ago. That Monday, I was not allowed to enter the school yard and to attend school because I was not wearing the school uniform. The school uniform is compulsory here. In Kidal, I would never have been excluded from school because of a uniform issue–we were a wealthy family. My parents had good jobs. They had the means to support us. Here however, it is a struggle. It is a constant struggle for everything.


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Mother at 14...in a Refugee Camp

It is 9 o’clock in the morning. A tall, lean figure is making her way through the dusty wind in the Mental B refugee camp, in northern Burkina Faso. It’s 15-year-old Fadimata. She seems weary, tired, and stressed.

Fadimata was only 14 years old when she got married. The conflict in Timbuktu broke out just two months into her marriage, forcing her and husband Abdul to flee to neighboring Burkina Faso. For a year now, they have been living in exile in a Plan-funded refugee camp. It is in this strange place that Fadimata had her first experiences of married life and of motherhood.


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