Kali­fa Clyne

A new home for boys was opened on Nel­son Street yes­ter­day, eight years af­ter the home's first build­ing was de­stroyed by fire in 2007.The Cre­do Drop-In and Res­i­den­tial De­vel­op­ment Cen­tre of­fi­cial­ly opened yes­ter­day. It has been in op­er­a­tion since March.It of­fers shel­ter to home­less boys, a home­work cen­tre for the com­mu­ni­ty and has re­cent­ly start­ed its first adult pro­gramme, a hair­dress­ing course for women.

Ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor of Cre­do, Sr Rober­ta O'Fla­her­ty, said she felt re­build­ing the cen­tre, which cost $8 mil­lion, was nec­es­sary for the coun­try and the com­mu­ni­ty.She re­called an eight-year-old boy from the com­mu­ni­ty who knocked on the door of the pre­vi­ous build­ing one day and asked if he could live there.O'Fla­her­ty said over the years nu­mer­ous chil­dren who had found them­selves on the streets through dif­fi­cult cir­cum­stances had come to the home where they had re­ceived help.

"These so­cial­ly dis­placed boys and girls are re­al­ly very good chil­dren but they go to the streets be­cause of their cir­cum­stances," she added.She said the home of­fered aca­d­e­m­ic, tech­ni­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal de­vel­op­ment for the chil­dren."The aim is to get young peo­ple away from drugs, gangs and crime on the streets," O'Fla­her­ty said.The home was built with funds ac­cessed from the gov­ern­ment as well as pri­vate cor­po­rate part­ners.

"This is not an easy era for chil­dren. The odds seem stacked against them," she said.Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Gen­der and Youth De­vel­op­ment Razi­ah Ahmed said Gov­ern­ment would ex­haust all re­sources to en­sure young peo­ple were tak­en care of and their rights were up­held.

Suc­cess sto­ry

One of the boys, Bran­don (not his re­al name), at the home de­scribed the cen­tre as a safe place for young chil­dren.He said he had been in or­phan­ages for as long as he re­mem­bered and had nev­er known his par­ents.He said he had dropped out of two schools and end­ed up at the Youth Train­ing Cen­tre (YTC) where he was giv­en an op­tion of serv­ing time or go­ing to Cre­do Cen­tre.

Bram­don added: "I chose Cre­do Cen­tre and saw two ladies with big smiles and I won­dered why they were smil­ing."I have been in Cre­do Cen­tre for eight months and I feel sta­ble for the first time in my life. I am in Ser­vol where I am do­ing three trades and I will be do­ing CXC next year."Bran­don was one of a group of young peo­ple who ex­pressed grat­i­tude to the cen­tre.