Gang Intervention and Prevention Program

The need for a basic youth gang intervention program became evident when there was an explosion of violence between the different groupings active in the area. Streets became boundary lines; sections became strongholds and young people were dying or staring death in the face on a daily basis. By using a simple gang outline program and concepts like construction, deconstruction and reconstruction we started to build trust bridges that later became mentoring spaces.  The other key principle was ongoing collaboration with other role-players that could help facilitate change in the lives of these angry and violent individuals. It was a long and dangerous process, but at the end of the day about 60% of the young people turned around and made better choices and found a new positive direction in life. Some of them had learnt to dream again.