Zimbabwe Child Soldiers Speak Out
Click on the links above to hear their stories
The Zimbabwe Child Soldier Victim Foundation helps the children who have been through the Zimbabwe Youth Militia Training Camps and those who have been victimised by the Youth Militia.
Through our various contact organisations both within Zimbabwe and beyond its borders where many of these people have fled to, the ZCSVF has been able to accumulate a mass of information on the violence and breach of Human Rights, the militia camps, the torture camps, as well as interviewing many of the former child soldiers.
Zimbabwean refugees crossing the crocodile infested Limpopo River into South Africa. photo Themba Hadebe
According to the International Child Protection Policy, every interview has an attached consent form signed by each child. To further protect the identity of these children, the filmed interviews have been blurred in order to conceal the faces of these children who are still being sought by the Zimbabwe government. Unfortunately by doing so, one no longer sees the pain within these children’s eyes, nor their tears. However, each interview on the ZCSVF website, whether in written form or video, is authentic. Please do not forget that these children are unable to perform such interviews without feeling fear, humiliation, guilt and anguish. They are children who have lost their childhood and therewith all other normal capabilities.
Young woman and child crawling through the border from Zimbabwe into South Africa. photo Themba Hadebe
They are children who have been forced to perform unspeakable acts of cruelty, including beating and killing their own family members; they have survived the Youth Militia camps through the sheer strength of their own decent morale in escaping, knowing they would be hunted down, and if caught, killed; they have crossed over the border into another country by bribing the security forces with money or their bodies, climbing through barbed wire fences, wading or swimming through the crocodile infested rivers and then walking the thousands of kilometres to a major city with the hope that someone, somewhere may help them. They are children who have lost everything. These children need a bit of shelter, a little food, some clothing and a lot of kindness.
Zimbabweans fleeing across the border at Beitbridge Border Post in Musina, South Africa, Friday March 28, 2008. photo Themba Hadebe
They need to be counselled and reunited with their families; they need to be forgiven and reconciled in their home country once more, but cannot because of the cruel politics enforced by a Dictator. We ask no more of you than to read their stories, listen to their voices, and feel their pain. Help us give them a voice.
Zimbabwe Child Soldiers Speak Out