Building Community Safety Nets for vulnerable children in Albania

The participation of partners was extraordinary and most of the actors officially committed to become part of the network,” said Irena Shtraza, World Vision’s National Coordinator of the ‘Building Community Safety Nets for Vulnerable Children’ project.

Why do we need different classes for the Roma children here in Lezha, when they can do the lessons together with usThe child protection safety net will be a network of authorities, professionals and locally based actors, supported by central and regional level actors tasked to prevent child abuse and the violation of children’s rights in the locality, as well as identify, refer, coordinate, treat, manage and help alleviate existing child rights’ violation incidents.

During the roundtable various successful models of child protection nets were presented to the group, together with analysis of the child protection situation in Lezha, success cases of Child Protection Units (CPUs) in Lezha, and also next steps and commitment for the future.

“Why do we need different classes for the Roma children here in Lezha, when they can do the lessons together with us, because they are like us and have the same rights,” said 13-year-old Denis Bardha, in front of his teacher and other representatives in the meeting.

"All the children from all different communities and all different colours must be the most precious thing for you because all of us are your future”, he added.

Participants also highlighted other problems related to children, including child labour, children living and working in the street, school dropout, trafficking of children, absence of a psychologist in schools, communes and municipality, and domestic abuse of children, etc. From this one teacher referred a child abuse case to one of the CPUs in Lezha commune.

All the children from all different communities and all different colours must be the most precious thing for you because all of us are your futureIn the past two years alone, the three CPUs in Lezha commune have identified more than 45 cases of child abuse. Physical and psychological abuse, neglect, no health care, school dropout, abandonment, discrimination, child labour and other complex issues are only some of the challenges reported by these cases. These problems affect not only Lezha’s children, but also children across Albania, primarily in rural areas, which are not only the poorest and most disadvantaged, but also lack the structures to address these problems.

Participants drafted an action plan for the coming months on capacity building, establishing multi-disciplinary groups and plans for advocacy on child protection issues. World Vision will walk alongside them to support and empower its partners step by step.

“Once the child safety net model is created in World Vision’s Lezha and Vlora ADPs, we will promote and advocate for the national adoption of this model with government,” concluded Mrs. Shtraza.

The Community Safety Net is a pilot project in Albania, initiated by World Vision’s Deinstitutionalisation (DI) Network in the Middle East, Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

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