(ANS – Freetown)  - In an interview in the newspaper "Awoko", Brother Lothar Wagner SDB, director of the Salesian work in Freetown and of the NGO "Don Bosco Fambul", provided an update on the work of the Salesians in support of the people, especially young people, struggling with Ebola.

In the face of the Ebola pandemic, what is the situation of children and young people?

The children and young people are very anxious and unsettled. Schools are closed and the football fields are empty. More than 2.000 children have lost their parents through the virus. Many contracted the disease themselves and have died, particularly in the rural areas where there is little or no medical assistance available. A huge number of children who have been cured continue to be outcast by their extended families and the village communities.

How does this trauma manifest itself?

Children have a deep longing for encounter and relationship. This was abruptly unsettled by their parents’ deaths and their own stigmatisation. They need a new beginning under different conditions. The traumatised children who come to our centre are introverted and do very little, staring and waiting the whole day.

What does Don Bosco do for these children?

What is important for these children now is holistic care. Food and a mattress do not suffice anymore. Trauma-healing, stress-therapeutic activities, group games, individual and group counselling, family care and leisure-time activities are all very important. What is most important, however, is to be there for these children in this difficult situation. For this reason, we have built a centre which was finished in September where we are able to take sixty children.

Some organisations deplore the rise of sexual abuse against girls since the beginning of the Ebola crisis. Can you confirm that?

It is unfortunately true and we have taken in an increased number of girls in the recent past who fell victim to severe sexual abuse. This is why there is need for more direct help for these young people. There is need for more NGOs that care directly for the young people instead of just reporting the problem. This does not help the girls who have been raped.

Don Bosco Fambul is also present at the Pademba Prison. Does the pandemic make itself felt there?

Yes, we meet the Ebola-pandemic there too. With more than 2,000 prisoners the prison is hopelessly overcrowded. Every day Don Bosco Fambul cares for more than a hundred young prisoners who are ill. Apart from food and legal assistance, we provide them with medical care. We have just handed over another ten table-tennis tables and fifty board games. This is part of the rehabilitation and reintegration programme.

Don Bosco Fambul is actually well-known for its social workers caring for street children in Freetown...

Yes, that’s right. And from the 1st of December we are going to be on the road increasingly at nights as we have the first ebola orphans on the streets. 20 social workers are going in the night to the "periphery", as Pope Francis wishes us to do. "We have to wake up and to shake the society as religious".

Published 09/12/2014