Background

• Situated in West Africa and covering an area of 112,622 km², the Republic of Benin is home to 6,769,914 people, 1,711,000 of whom are children under eight years of age.
• Benin has an average life expectancy of 53 years, although 15.4% of children born never live to see their 5th birthday.
• Benin suffers from deficiencies in its education system: 40% of eligible children do not attend school in Benin, and gender disparity in school participation is evident as 66.7% of eligible boys but only 52.1% of eligible girls attended primary school classes on a regular basis.
• As a consequence of this gap, girls and other marginalised groups often do not have the opportunity to acquire the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values that will enable them to assume an equal place within society.

What We Do

Benin hosts refugees fleeing conflict from various African countries. Right To Play has worked since 2001 in Kpomasse Refugee Camp in the southern Benin. It is a relatively small camp, with approximately 1000 refugees from Togo, Nigeria and Congo (and a small minority from Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Burundi, Ethiopia and Chad), but with very little presence of either the UNHCR or international or national organisations in the camp, conditions were not very good. We use sport to educate and provide exercise for the children in the camp and instil indispensable life skills such as leadership, discipline, fair play, and conflict resolution which will lead to increased child self-esteem and resilience. Through our involvement refugees have learned to become self-sufficient through income-generating activities and even small business endeavours.

So Far

15,000 children and youth receive regular activities from 660 trained Coaches in 61 preschool centers, 75 Schools and Community Centres, and 25 Vocational centres. In addition we have 5 Athlete ambassadors and work in connection with 3 government ministries.