A safe haven restoring hope for boys exiting prison life
Lifesong Kenya, the shelter located in Ngong pictured on April 9, 2024.
What you need to know:
- James Ouma was motivated by his own difficult childhood to start a safe house called Halfway House.
- It provides shelter, counselling and job training for boys and men exiting prison or escaping abusive situations.
- Halfway House also takes in boys neglected, abused or made homeless, giving them a supportive environment.
Somewhere in the green hills of Ngong’, Kajiado County, hope fills the air. And there is one special group of people breathing this upbeat breeze.
Here lies a safe house for boys and men who have exited prison and faced various forms of violence, including sexual violence and neglect. Those who have suddenly become homeless due to loss of income or hopelessness, or those in need of fatherly love, care, and guidance, find this place the best home - free from fear of stigma, shame, rejection, and isolation.
We visit the Halfway House on a calm Tuesday morning. On the terrace are three boys playing chess. They timidly glance at us before responding to our greetings.
"This is part of therapy," James Ouma, who runs the safe house, informs us.
Seven years ago, a sad reality hit him hard. For years, he had produced several children's episodes for a television show at a local broadcast station where he worked as a producer. During that time, he met boys in prisons who needed the love, care, and guidance that he had yearned for while growing up.
"I grew up around lack. I didn't have a father. My father died when I was 13 years old," he shares.
Until he turned 27, all he focused on was what he never had: a father figure and money to fund his college education. Meeting the boys helped him turn over a new leaf. It was time to treasure what he had and find hope in the things he was passionate about - becoming a television producer and journalist.
With no training and an email ending with the signature "life is a song," James decided to pursue his hope by applying for the television job to produce a children's show.
Lifesong Kenya Founder James Ouma speaks to nation.africa at the shelter in Ngong' on April 9, 2024.
"The television program manager asked me during the interview, 'Why have you applied for this job when you know you're not qualified?' I told her, 'To show that I'm qualified is a piece of paper, but if I don't turn up to work tomorrow, this piece of paper won't work on my behalf. Then I told her that I'm willing to learn.' I got the job and started learning on the job," he says.
The job gave him the opportunity to get into the hopeless lives of boys in juvenile prison.
"Through the show, I met children who just focused on what they lacked. I remember most of them saying, 'I want to be on the show so I can ask for help from sponsors.' But I'd tell them, 'You'd rather focus on the treasures you have than on what you lack,'" he remembers.
He wanted them to sing a different song – a song of hope. So, in 2010, he started a book club for the boys called Lifesong. His intention was to cheer them up and infuse them with expectancy for a better life.
But then, he realized the boys were not interested in the books. All they wanted was to get out and be reconciled with their parents. With that, he converted Lifesong into an entity of hope.
In 2013, he officially registered it as a community organization with a heartbeat in helping imprisoned boys find a new life post-captivity.
"For me, Lifesong is that whatever you focus on, especially the things you lack, becomes like a broken record or a bad song. But when you focus on what you have, like treasures, you have a cheerful song," he explains.
Through Lifesong came the Halfway House, which James says implies "halfway home," as the boys stay here for up to three months while undergoing counseling and learning how to make money through repairing bicycles, delivering goods via bicycles, and recycling glass bottles.
Minimise exposure
It opened its doors in 2021. But the journey to having this facility was heavy on him. From 2018 to 2020, he held cycling races to raise funds to rent a place.
Until now, he holds annual cycling races to keep the house going and finance other supporting activities, such as giving the boys' mothers capital to start businesses. James says, through the income, they would support their sons once reintegrated, and this way, they would minimize exposure to circumstances that could send them back to prison.
To protect all those under or who have passed through his care, we will conceal details of the exact location and the number of boys and men at the safe house.
Although the safe house initially focused on the ex-imprisoned boys, during his interactions with the boys' mothers and surrounding community, he realized there was a need to review and redesign his intervention.
Samson Ouma, a beneficiary, repairs a bicycle at Lifesong Kenya Organization in Ngong on April 9, 2024.
"We came to learn that there were a lot of boys we had locked out – the boys who had been abused at home, sexually abused, or those whose mothers remarried after escaping abusive marriages but are not accepted in the new home. Or boys who have been neglected or those just looking for a safe space," he says.
"So, from 2021 up to this year, we were just piloting with different ages – 14, 15, 19, 21, 33, and 35 – to find the right fit for us."
James says stigma is the greatest challenge of working with boys who have been in conflict with the law.
"People don't want to know whether you're innocent or not. They don't want to know if you have reformed. They just know you as a criminal. This is wrong. Very wrong," he emphasises.
