GANG WARFARE....CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA

On Thursday this week, our social media featured pictures and comment about a gang related shooting of a Mannenburg mother in the Cape Flats. From what I could gather, it was a drive-by revenge shooting for the loss of a gang's member. Celeste left two young boys, 3 and 5 years old. 

Gang rivalry (warfare) is no excuse for this. ( Fancy boys vs Hard Living). People live in fear of violence, guns and being caught innocently in crossfire. The call is to bring in the police "gang squad". The parents of gang members came in for flack. "It's not your children if you support them in their wrongdoing or are proud of their actions."Some comment said, "It's a disaster". "It's the end times!" The community expresses it's outrage in protest, road closures, tyre burning and blame. "Enough is enough - the police are failing us....our children die in the crossfire, ( and they do!) , We live in fear.

The Minister of Police responds. Large numbers of riot squad police and visual policing moved into the area. 

My experience - -  group violence can and frequently does, escalate when there is a police presence. There seems to be certain satisfaction among gang-like groups of youth if they experience themselves as having the power as a few, to mobilise uniformed forces. There are some social media stories circulating that some police persons are fearful of confronting gang members and some, it is said, are bought out with threats of violence against their families 

It's doubtful whether either the protest or the police strategies are the solution. They may be pouring petrol on the fire. We have to find a way of addressing the disease and not the symptoms.

What attempts are made to do this, and by whom?

 Some church groups. There was a  national TV news item which featured a church group giving full "rock styled" sets of musical instruments and sound equipment to a school in the flats.
The banners read. "Join Bands, Not Gangs". It was intended as preventative and life changing. I wondered if this endeavour in a school was preaching to the converted, a cheque book exercise, without getting hands dirty..... and getting high profile media exposure as a pay-off.

Dr Shernaaz Carelse at the Western Cape mini Conference this month, spoke of having come from "one of our projects in the Cape Flats". It must be assumed then, that the Social Work Department of the University of the Western Cape is undertaking "on the  ground" work in gang areas. Social workers are involved in the mess of gangs and gang membership, or with the parents and community. No publicity, just quietly getting on with it. No high public profiling ..... typical of Social Service professional practice. 

Dr Carelse immediately then said that child and youth care workers belong in the work with gangs. Dr Carelse and I are in sync. Child and youth care workers belong in gang work.

Brian Gannon told me that in 1989, Dr Barnado's Homes, a type of young person's residential consortium, closed the doors of all it's residential facilities. It was part of a UK national move to de-institionalise child and youth care by closing residential facilities. Brian Gannon quoted figures saying that Barnado's was reaching about 400 young people. They moved their programmes into the streets. .....there they reached about 4000 young people. Success was measured by an annual count of the percentage of the young people entering the Criminal justice system through the district courts. I seem to remember him saying that in one East of London districts, the number dropped from +40% of all cases to 17%.

I cannot but help thinking of Amy Biehl. In the South African apartheid era, at the age of 25 while delivering bread to families in Guguletto, she was brutally murdered by two youth. Her body was dumped into a culvert. Her parents came from the USA for her funeral. In the midst of pain and loss and distress the Biehls recognised a need among township youth, which, if it could be met in a constructive way, would contribute to the reduction of violence and crime. They had built and resourced Youth Centres in Guguletto and other townships. The main off the street attraction was, among other programmes, the boxing clubs. They opened Bakeries to provide employment and easily accessed bread... Biehls Bakeries. Disasters are signs of social need, and so, social  service.
Like Barnado"s and the Biehl's.

Gang warfare is a sign of need. A sign of a need for intervention and Social Services We say as child and youth care workers that we work in the lifespace of young people . We say we have a unique approach. This is where we are needed. We must take our programmes into the streets. We must apply what we know, apply our skills and self where the need is now calling for us... in the streets where there are young people in the grip of gangs. It's not for me to spell out tasks, our professionality and our track record in South Africa speaks for itself. Enough to say that child and youth care workers will approach the roots of the need for young people to join gangs. Irirangi Make is a restorative justice worker among indigenous people. In social media she says, "We are not dealing with just the individual, the incident that brings a person here ( the justice system) we look at it from whanau. Whanau is a multi-layered, flexible physical, social, family, extended family and spiritual  perspective. This is EXACTLY where child and youth care workers in South Africa have considerable experience and knowledge in practice. An integrated case management, multi-disciplinary team approach is indicated. In this setting, child and youth care workers will contribute invaluably and practically to the reclaiming of young people in gangs.  Barnado's  and the Biehls did it. Child and youth care workers know how to reframe and redirect a-social and anti-social behaviours toward the more appropriate , pro-social, less damaging,   

Child and youth care workers know the adrenaline rush in young people...the "Let's make a movie "stuff....They know adventure seeking and risk taking as a developmental need, they know connection and belonging, the insignia, the regalia, fear, power, oppression, issues of self esteem, control , manipulation, poverty, parenting, issues of skin colour, identity and support in the management of anger and change.

It's time.   Child and youth care work has to put it's money where its mouth is. We have to do outreach work. We have to take our programmes into the streets.