Protecting vulnerable children
The ENDA Jeunesse Action (ENDA JA) association was created in 2011. However, its beginnings date back to 1985 as an ENDA Tiers Monde entity with an international office and a national one. ENDA JA works to protect vulnerable children, in particular children and young people out of school, children in family rupture situations, indoctrinated children, children and young workers, unaccompanied migrant children, children who have been victims of abuse, children who have been victims of marriage, and children who have been victims of traditional practices (FGM, forced marriage, child marriage).
To reach these groups of children and young people, ENDA JA acts according to four strategic pillars:
- Protecting children through education
- Tackling the early migration of children
- Sexual and reproductive rights of adolescents and young people
- The economic integration of young people
Approach
ENDA JA’s strategy is based on three main pillars:
- Direct actions intended to meet the immediate needs of children (education support, citizenship registration, setting up a framework which takes care of girls’ problems in school so as to ensure their access to education and their empowerment in terms of sexual rights and reproductive health, providing access to health care structures, hosting children in day-care centers, reintegrating children from broken families or unaccompanied migrants, etc.);
- Advocacy actions with the authorities to better take into account the needs of vulnerable children in terms of protection, education and training;
- Community mobilization (grassroots community organizations, children’s organizations, customary and religious authorities) for lasting social change.
Finally, in addition to being a founding member of the ENDA Third World International Network, ENDA JA is active in several settings:
- COSAED (Collectif des Structures d’Appui aux Enfants en Difficulté), a network of structures intervening for the respect and protection of the rights of street children;
- CONAFE (Coalition Nationale des Association et ONG en faveur de l’Enfance), which brings together from throughout the national territory all those involved in child protection. ENDA Jeunesse Action is a founding member.
- COMAME (Coalition des Organisations de la Société Civile pour l’Abandon du mariage des enfants au Sénégal), which has the objective that by 2022, the government, territorial administrations and civil society organizations provide integrated multi sectoral responses, an adequate legislative framework and a budgeted action plan to help reduce the rate of child marriage from 28.8% to 24.7%. ENDA Jeunesse Action is a member of the secretariat.
- RAO (Réseau Afrique de l’Ouest pour la protection des enfants), a regional mechanism covering the 15 ECOWAS countries and the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. Its main mission is to develop transnational cooperation in the context of the reintegration of unaccompanied migrant children for quality care of unaccompanied migrant children.
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