This blog was written by Chris Nicholson, Regional Program Manager for our work in East Africa.
1,000 children making music in Goma in 3 months!
Since completing their training in June 2022, the new team of Community Music Leaders in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, have run music workshops with over 1,000 children in orphanages and Internally Displaced People camps. The workshops offer connection, joy and opportunities for creativity in the most deprived of environments.
Since completing their training in June 2022, the new team of Community Music Leaders in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, have run music workshops with over 1,000 children in orphanages and Internally Displaced People camps. The workshops offer connection, joy and opportunities for creativity in the most deprived of environments.
Earlier in 2022, the Rwanda Youth Music team trained the new Kivu Youth Music team of 25 young Community Music Leaders with the skills to run music workshops with children and youth who are directly affected by conflict. The project aims to build communities that are prepared to act creatively and peacefully for their future. The new team of Community Music Leaders are trained to facilitate groups in collaborative and expressive creativity. The cross-border approach, wherein Rwandan and Congolese youth are the activists for social change, embodies the notion of peaceful co-existence in a context where cooperation is vital.
Why are we working in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo?
In just the first 6 months of 2022, over 200,000 people were displaced by violence in the area surrounding Goma, in the Northern Kivu region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Young people are particularly vulnerable. Children and youth are abducted into armed forces, and others join willingly against their backdrop of hopelessness and violence. Orphanages are full. Thousands of children are displaced by conflict, away from schools, friends and often their families.
