Background
CECYDAR is a non-profit organization founded in 1992 through an inspiration of the couple Cyprien and Daphrose Rugamba. This couple, out of the ordinary, let themselves be touched by the miserable living conditions of the children of the street as well as by their lively side and leader toward off the challenge that the world poses to charity : see the young children who live with drugs, trash, and who are not in school ! It was then the birth of an initiative rooted in a clear and profound vision : "Uwari Umuterashozi ashobora guhinduka Umuterashema" to say that "street children can become the pride of Rwandan society".
This couple was murdered in 1994 and since then, the Emmanuel Community of Rwanda, from which they are founders, took over. CECYDAR is a center located in Remera, GASABO district, Kigali city created to accommodate street children especially those living in urban areas.
In doing so, CECYDAR is fully integrated into the process of deinstitutionalization initiated in Rwanda for several years : it does not seek to become a new alternative home for children, but simply a transition in their lives, a buoy that should allow them to resurface and get off to a good start, before returning to a home and school environment. Its intervention areas comply with :
• The Rwandan government vision 2050 through its Economic Development Plan for Poverty Reduction Strategy (PDESRP) ;
• The Ministry of Gender and Family planning Strategic Plan (MIGEPROF 2005) ; with the child rights protection policy put in place by the Rwandan government (National Integrated Child Rights Policy, Policy and Strategies, §2 Family and Alternative Care- MIGEPROF 2011) ;
• And more broadly in the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
From 2007 to 2012, UNICEF was the main funding partner of CECYDAR through its supports aiming at offering the Rwandan government a reintegration model that works and can be replicated throughout Rwanda.
Successive project agreements between UNICEF and CECYDAR have successfully developed and tested a methodology for the rehabilitation and reintegration of street children into Rwandan society. Over the years, CECYDAR has acquired recognized expertise and has become a specialist organization in the sector.
At he beginning of 2018, a new approach was tried. As the problem of street children grows, it was necessary to dig and attack the cause by the roots by making a particular focus on the family. In reference to the major causes of child runaways, the family plays an important role. Working with families has made rehabilitation and reintegration easy and fast.
