BVES
Bureau pour le Volontariat au Service de l'Enfance et de la Santé (Voluntary Force at the Service of Childhood and Health)
From the founding of BVES in 1992 until november 2021:
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412 875 vulnerable children (131 142 girls) have been helped, including street children, servant girls, war orphans and victims of sexual exploitation.
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53 964 child soldiers (3 320 girls) have been helped :
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17 948 demobilized child soldiers or children released from armed forces and groups (1 976 girls) were welcomed in the BVES CTOs
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35 354 children escaped or abandoned from armed forces and groups (1 344 girls) were identified in the villages and protected in their communities
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11 635 unaccompanied children, refugees or children separated from their families because of armed conflicts (5 257 girls) have been taking care of in the BVES Transit Centers.
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325 928 children who have dropped out of school or never attended school (80 428 girls) have been reintegrated into school (formal and non-formal) through BVES CRS (Centers for School Upgrading or Day Centers).
Personal stories
F. S.
17 years old, from Mukuija/Kalehe – ESFGA (Child Withdrawn from the Armed
Forces) and resident at BVES’ Transit and Orientation Centre since April 2010
 « To
everyone who has a good heart:
Help us, we the child soldiers who are in the process of leaving the army and
also, help the whole population. We pray that peace will come! Because if peace
is not brought about, we are always at risk of going back into the army, and yet
in the army there is nothing for us.
Now that we have been able to leave the army, we would like to study! We hope
that people don’t forget us and that visitors sometimes come to see how we live
and what goes on here in our country.
We hope you send visitors like you sent Nadège (Belgian BVES volunteer), because
that helps us to bring about peace here and these visitors can pass our messages
on to people in your country.
We want peace because we have suffered greatly. Help us so that we can forget
all the suffering we experienced in the army and so that we can build a better
life. »
M. K.
17 years old - from the Island of Idjwi - ESFGA and resident at BVES’ Transit
and Orientation Centre since April 2010
« I went into the second
year of secondary school, and up until then I was doing a lot of silly things
and didn’t listen to my teachers or parents. I was an unruly child!
At 13, I went to Goma, in the North Kivu region, to visit my older brother. I
went for a walk to see how crops were grown there and it was then that I was
captured by the CNDP (the National Congress for the People’s Defence). A
military car stopped me and asked me for my identity card but I didn’t have it.
So they tied me up, put me in the car and took me to Kichanga, their military
camp. There, they threw me in a hole where they left me for two months. Then,
they took me out for questioning: I had to choose between dying and working for
them! They left me two hours to think about it (with water and food). I said to
myself that if I refused, I was going to die because there was no one to help me
or warn my family. If I worked for them, I would one day manage to find a
solution.
So I accepted and worked with the courage necessary to accept this difficult
life. I was taught how to handle a weapon, how to salute the soldiers... And I
was appointed escort of Major K. I started smoking cannabis because my friends
in the camp told me that it would help me to not think too much about my family…
I was the Major’s escort in 2007 and 2008. In 2009, the Major was appointed
Colonel and I continued to work as his escort. Also in 2009, the CNDP and the
FARDC (the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo) signed the
Kimia 2 contract (the President wanted peace) and I was working at the time for
the FARDC in South Kivu, still for the same colonel in the third group of the OS
zone. The Colonel then became Commandant of the OS zone, the one in charge of
operations in South Kivu, and kept me as his escort.
On 6th April 2010, MONUC (the UN Stabilisation Mission in the Congo) took me out
of the army and took me to BVES’ CTO (Transit and Orientation Centre). I saw
that as grace from God.
I stopped smoking cannabis and drinking alcohol to live in God’s grace, to
always be free in my life and able to carefully reflect.
For the two months since my arrival at the CTO, I’ve been rebuilding my life,
starting from scratch so that I can be a better person and be in a position to
help my family.
If I have the opportunity, I would like to study law at university in order to
help end the suffering of my country and its population because there’s a lot of
unrest here.
I would like to thank:
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Papa director Murhabazi who gave me good advice, especially on how to rebuild my
life and make plans, and who explained to me how to leave behind ignorance and
move towards knowledge.
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Nadège (Belgian volunteer), who has always comforted me, showed me how to change
my character and also explained to me why smoking is bad for me. She helped me
to feel better and look towards the future, instead of to the past.
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The BVES charity who helped me with my schooling, with re-starting my studies
and with learning how to take photographs (in Nadège’s lessons), all of which
may allow me to help my family who are poor and to educate my little brothers. »
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