Africa 24 Media Photography

According to the UN Children’s Fund’s annual State of the World’s Children report, Sierra Leone is the worst place in the world for a child to be born. Of every 1,000 children born in the West African nation each year, 262 will die before age five, and 2,100 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births are recorded. Life in the country, which emerged from a decade of civil war in 2002, is underlined by daily struggles under intricate circumstances.

During the ten-year civil war, tens of thousands of Sierra Leoneans were killed and over one-third of the population displaced. But seven years since the civil war ended, Sierra Leonean children are still suffering. Poverty and diseases are a part of their lives, while traumatic experiences of the civil conflict are still deeply rooted in the minds of many. A scene of children sweating in the diamond-fields, a trend which began at the height of the conflict, is still common in the country. Children between the ages of 5-14 are engaged in long and hazardous hours of digging, sifting and shifting of diamond in the fields. Under very abysmal conditions, the children, who engage in either paid or unpaid work, are at the risk of accidents and diseases and are often highly exposed to collapsing mine pits, sometimes due to overcrowding. School attendance is low, while the worst forms of child labour such as prostitution, domestic work and begging are common. In life, a diamond is a symbol of wealth and love. But to a Sierra Leonean child, it is a symbol of abuse, desperation, utter suffering, abject poverty and sometimes, death.

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