Kidsave Sierra Leone: Reuniting Orphan with Family

When he was 12, Bockarie lost both parents to the Ebola crisis. He languished in an orphanage for almost two years; during that time no one reached out to help him. Over the past few months, Kidsave searched for Bockarie’s grandmother and recently reunited them. Bockarie has now moved in with his grandmother permanently.

Kidsave in Sierra Leone is rescuing children, including Bockarie, who have been languishing in orphanages since the Ebola crisis, and many happy reunions are occurring in Puejehun and Bo as a result of this work.

Kidsave’s focus in Sierra Leone is twofold -- searching for biological or extended families for children who have lost one or both parents to Ebola, and if a child cannot be reunified with family members who knew and loved them, then finding a good local host family to advocate for the child, get him or her out of the orphanage and on the path to a permanent loving family.

A total of 22 children were reunited with their families in December and January. Many tears of joy were shed as children saw their aunts, uncles and grandmothers for the first time in two years during the reunification process.  The Christmas holidays were also an opportunity for the children who could not be reunified with their biological families to meet families in the community interested in helping them. At the beginning of March five families had signed up to be foster parents for these children.

Kidsave Sierra Leone needs support. We have a group of 65 children in our control group whom the government is asking to participate in the reunification program, as our efforts have proven successful.  We need $30,000 in funding to help these 65 children.

 $25 will help provide food for a community gathering to meet the children
 $115 will pay for one child’s bed kit – a mattress, sheets, pillow and toiletries.
 $325 will help one child move into a family.
 $1,000 will help ten children find their biological relatives and reunite.