The government is committed to ensuring a safe, systematic and sustainable transition of children from institutional care to family- and community-based care under the government-led National Care Reform Strategy.
Under the reform strategy, the government through the Directorate of Children services has developed an action plan to end residential care of children in orphanages and childcare institutions to safely and systematically transition them to family and community-based care.
Nakuru County Director of Children Services, Pilot Khaemba, explained that the transition of orphans and vulnerable children under the National Care Reform Strategy for Children in Kenya seeks to phase out all children homes in a 10-year plan that runs from 2022-2032 and is aimed at strengthening family ties, promoting community development and reducing the burden on institutional care.
The strategy, he elaborated aims to ensure that all children live in safe and supportive family and community settings and focuses on preventing separation of children from their families by addressing poverty and lack of access to basic services and by strengthening family-based care options like kinship care, foster care, and adoption.
In Nakuru County, Khaemba said they were targeting more than 2816 orphans and vulnerable children (Ovcs) from the more than 81 Charitable Children institutions (CCIs) commonly known as children’s homes and orphanages to transition them from institutional care to family and community-based care.
The County Director said Board members of the Charitable Children Institutions (CCIs) in the County were currently being trained on how to embrace and implement the government’s directive on transitioning to child welfare programmes.
On the trainings, Khaemba said they were bringing on board all stakeholders in the children’s sector and were anticipating the complex transition from CCIs to child welfare programmes would be successfully done as envisioned in the Children Act 2022, which directs all children hosted by CCIs to be integrated and brought up in family-based care.
Khaemba said the government with support from the UK based Lumos foundation was piloting the National Care Reform Strategy in Nakuru County where they were overseeing the removal of 60 orphaned and vulnerable children from six children’s homes and orphanages and their subsequent transition to family and community-based care by the end of this year.
Lumos foundation is said to provide technical guidance, support, and training to facilitate the transition of the children from institutional care to family-based care with a focus on prevention of separation, family strengthening, and alternative care options.
The foundation whose approach incorporates elements such as policy and legislation, workforce development and community participation to ensure the strategy’s effective implementation is carrying out similar programmes on a pilot basis in Embu, Kajiado and Uasin Gishu Counties.
The County Director made the remarks after witnessing the signing of a commitment to safe, systematic and sustainable transitioning of children from institutional care to family and community-based care by board members of the six children charitable institutions including those from Holy family children home, Sanata children home, New life Africa International, Springs of Hope Children Home, Moses and Mary Children Home and Shalome Gate children home.
To holistically and sustainably transition the 2816 children to either biological families or alternative family options or supported independent living, Khaemba disclosed that it required about Sh87,614,000.00.
In addition, he said it will cost about Sh36,613,500.00 to carry out other care reform activities that are outside the case management process plan, according to the county roadmap.
The official said as they focus on transition, the financiers and supporters of CCIs should have a different structure for supporting the children while in family and community-based system care.
According to Khaemba, once the transition is complete, donors and the children charitable institutions are expected to share the cost by redirecting funds to welfare programmes that seek to support children from within their families and communities.
The County Children Services Director indicated that the child-care transition had been split into three phases, namely, learning and decision-making, preparing the CCIs for the transition and implementing the transition.
Phase one of the transition, Mr Khaemba noted, focuses on aligning the CCI leaders to fully comprehend the rationale and benefits behind transitioning their model of care from institutional care to family- and community-based care.
The care reform strategy which is being spearheaded by the National Council for Children’s Services (NCCS) emanates from the belief that all children belong in a family backed by overwhelming scientific evidence that children under institutional care suffer severe and sometimes irreversible developmental setbacks as opposed to those raised in families and communities.
It is estimated that countrywide there are 45,000 children living in over 845 private charitable children’s institutions and another 1,700 children living in government-run institutions including rehabilitation, remand, reception, and rescue centres.
Mr Khaemba named poverty, gender-based violence, and marriage breakage as some of the major factors which cause children to escape from their homes and live in the streets, thus finding themselves at children’s homes.
“This approach can ultimately lead to a more sustainable and effective system of care and protection for vulnerable children and families,” he added.
Nakuru West Sub-County Children Officer Ms Irene Changwony pointed out that the Care Reform Strategy is part of Kenya’s commitment to various global standards for the care of children such as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the UN Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children among others.
She clarified that no CCI was targeted for closure and instead the residential care shall be transitioned to family care with the resources that are supporting each individual being redirected in a systematic manner to support the child while within the family or community setting.
“Children without known or traceable families will be assisted to live in formal alternative families such as foster families and adoption families. Young adults shall be assisted, supported and guided to enjoy independent living within the community as they pursue careers and vocations,” Ms Changwony affirmed
She added the CCI Board members and staff will get appropriate retooling in skills to work with and for children in families and that the existing infrastructures shall be used for other child-centred services such as schools and vocational training centers but not for residential purposes.
“Evidence shows that children thrive when surrounded by consistent, nurturing, loving and protective care from parents and other caregivers. This provides the foundation necessary to develop essential, lifelong intellectual, social, and physical wellbeing,” stated Ms Changwony.
She pointed out that families, when supported, provide critically important connections for cultural learning, social integration, and economic opportunities as well as support through difficult times, adding that the Care Reform Strategy is designed to support this family- and community-based model.
The strategy Ms Changwony observed also aligns with the Constitution, which recognises the family as a fundamental unit of society and bestows the responsibility of childcare on the child’s biological family.
According to UNICEF, children living in institutions are regularly isolated from their families and local communities, are deprived of parental care and endure physical, psychological, emotional and social harm, with consequences that last a lifetime.
They also are more likely to experience violence, abuse, neglect, and exploitation. Institutionalised children are at a greater risk of missing development milestones and are more likely to be exposed to drug abuse, suicide and alienation from kin later in life.
According to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and other studies done globally, at least eight out of ten of these children have biological and extended families and, with appropriate support, their families could look after them.
About 50 percent of the homes in Nakuru are concentrated in Gilgil and Naivasha sub-counties which host 20 and 16 institutions respectively, with Nakuru-East coming third with 11, while Rongai and Molo have 9 each. Other CCIs in the devolved unit’s Sub-Counties are located in Nakuru West (7) and Nakuru North (2).
Subukia and Njoro Sub-Counties have one each while Kuresoi North and Kuresoi South host none.
