Street Child World Cup

More about Street Child World Cup

Unicef estimate there are over 100 million children living on the streets throughout the world. They are the most marginalized, socially excluded and vulnerable people on our planet. They live with injustice and exclusion every minute of everyday. They have no access to education or healthcare. They are routinely abused. Where they are not completely invisible they are treated as rubbish and dirt. Andille, one of the street children in South Africa, said “When they see me on the streets, they say I am a street boy, but when they see me playing football they say I am a person. I am a person, like you.”

Football is a universal language, and the FIFA World Cup attracts huge media attention. We use football to change people’s perceptions of street children. To make the invisible, visible. We were astounded by the international media attention at the last SCWC. The national profiles of the NGOs involved have been strengthened due to their involvement in the SCWC, and they attracted increased media coverage of the issues faced by street children in these countries. They won hearts and minds, and finally the people in their countries were on the side of “their” street children.