Maithem - Supporting his Family

Maithem is 13 years old. He dropped out of school when he was in the third grade of his primary class. Since then, he has had to work on the streets to support all eight members of his family.

Maithem’s daily routine was long and punishing:

"Each day I wake up early in the morning, in fact, most of times before the first light of the morning I leave my house in order to find a cart to work on it before it's taken by the other children who might be earlier. There were many children who are working in the market, and each day we witness a fight among the children who came late and couldn't find any cart to work on it. I was doing my best to avoid such situations and to ensure that I will come back to my home at the evening with food to feed my family and money to support them.”

Each morning Maithem makes a wish “I hope that always there is a summer, so I can go to the market daily and early, because in winter the weather becomes very cold and my body started shaking and most times I cannot feel my ears due to the coldness. I have no ability to buy heavy clothes for myself because all the money I got I gave it to my family." He also worries each day that he will return home with nothing “what would happen if I got nothing today? How I can feed my family if I couldn't find a cart to work on today? And if I found one if there is any body will hire me.”

Since the war started, two million children have had to leave their homes and one and a half million children have been orphaned. The continuing conflict in Iraq has led to widespread poverty and an steep increase in young children living and working on the streets. War Child is currently the only children’s charity still working in the south of Iraq and Maithem is one of the many children our work aims to protect.

Our work with street children in Iraq has meant that Maithem attends one of our funded drop in centres and has learnt valuable vocational skills. Maithem spent more than two months learning to sew at the drop-in centre. After he successfully completed the sewing course, a member of staff at the centre helped Maithem to find a job in a dress-maker’s shop in Nassiriyah. He calls it his, "new respected job."

War Child has visited Maithem at his new workplace and there, we found a much happier young boy. "He is very willing to learn more and he is skilled dress maker in fact" said the shop-owner. When War Child’s team asked Maithem if he has anything else to say, he said this, "Now I have respected job, much better than dragging carts in the market, and the people respect me now and I can support my family in better way and I will get back to my study I can make balance between work and my study”

Maithem is one of our success stories but there are still thousands of children we need to reach who are living and working on the streets of Iraq, one of the most dangerous war zones on earth.