RWANDA:As Rwanda this week mourns the genocide of 1994, the children who survived then continue to struggle today, writes MARY CUNNINGHAMin Kigali.
JACQUES IS 23 and lives in a two-room cottage with five other youths who he refers to as his children. Three are his biological siblings: Chantal, Jean Paul and Claudine; two he has "adopted": Prince and Sixt. He has been head of the household for eight years.
Jacques and his family live in the Gasabo district of Kigali, Rwanda, in a village of 47 other child-headed households. He is currently working towards a deadline to finish his dissertation for his degree at Kigali's university, where he is being sponsored by a Rwandan minister to study business administration.
Every day Jacques travels from the Gasabo district, where his house has no running water, sanitation or electricity, to the centre of Kigali. He says it is difficult caring for his children and completing his degree at the same time.
Rwanda will today begin an official seven-day mourning period for those who were killed in its genocide of 1994. Jacques will mourn for his parents, three siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and many friends.
Jacques, like so many Rwandans, has been handed a bad deal in life.
On April 7th, 1994, the day after Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana's aircraft was shot down, Jacques' family's neighbour (his father's godson) came to their house and murdered his mother and three siblings with a machete.
His father was not in the house to witness his godson murdering his family. Jacques, aged eight, was told he could watch.
That night Jacques fled with his younger sister to his aunt, who hid them with an old Hutu lady.
Their infant brother, who had survived the attack strapped to his mother's back when she was killed, was brought to them by their grandfather the next day.
After three days, in fear of her own life, the Hutu lady told them they had to leave. Jacques, carrying his toddler sister in his arms and infant brother in a basket, fled to a Catholic church, where their father found them.
After two weeks, the bishop of the church asked them, and the hundreds of others hiding there, to leave. No blood was to be shed on sacred ground.
The group fled to a nearby stadium where crowds of Tutsis and moderate Hutus sheltered. The Interahamwe (unofficial Hutu militia) came to the gates with lists of those they wished to kill, stating that if they did not receive those people, they would kill everyone. Jacques's father was on one of the lists and was murdered on April 25th.
Jacques, his little brother and sister narrowly survived the 100 days of the genocide and were then placed in an orphanage.
When asked why he thought he and his little siblings survived, Jacques replied that he thinks it was because it was a difficult task to kill so many people, and they simply didn't get round to them.
Through the Red Cross and Save the Children, they found their older sister, Chantal.
Aged just 10 in 1994, she had been beaten severely across the head and buried alive near their home, where she was found by dogs three days later.
Today she does not communicate and needs to take daily medication for her ongoing physical pain.
The siblings spent the next few years in orphanages and foster homes, which Jacques would secure by begging his classmates for help. It was a hard task to keep the family of four together, so Jacques began to approach non-governmental organisations (NGOs) he heard were working with genocide survivors. In 2005 he and his siblings were given a house, surrounded by other child-headed households, which they live in today.
There are approximately eight youths per household in each of these cottages, claiming an average monthly income of less than $10 (€6.40). The village relies on daily food handouts to survive. In 2005 three youths died due to poor living conditions.
Jacques is obviously smart. Like many Rwandans and Africans, he speaks several languages fluently: Rwandan, French, English and Swahili.
His most remarkable characteristics, however, are his hope and determination for this village of child-headed households and his relentless kindness in the shadow of his horrific past.
In 2006, aged 20, Jacques established a representative association for the village, called Nsanga (meaning "come to me"), knowing that, through a registered charity, he could gain more for the orphans.
In Jacques's house, youths wander in and out of the main room. John comes in and Jacques motions to him to sit down. When he sits, Jacques gives him a smile and the thumbs up.
John is deaf and doesn't speak. This, Jacques says, is because of the traumas he experienced in the genocide. He was beaten repeatedly on the back of the head with a baton and watched his father being murdered with firewood.
We walk through the village and meet members of other households. There is Alice, aged 24 but referred to as "Old Lady" throughout the village due to her much older appearance. She has severe diabetes and needs daily medication, but often doesn't have the means to get any.
The village is a mix: some youths are educated to a high standard; some, due to untreated medical conditions, do not have the strength to walk to the city centre, about an hour away.
HIV and Aids is a problem, heightened by some turning to prostitution. Income is generally non-existent.
The majority of youths in this village have experienced unimaginable atrocities, but they are proud of their village and want it to succeed. They need employment and direct income to address the poor living conditions.
With local NGO Yes Rwanda (Youth Employment Summit), Jacques and other Nsanga committee members have come up with the idea of establishing a survivors' centre in their village, to which people visiting Rwanda could come and learn their stories.
The aim of Nsanga survivors' centre will be to attract Rwanda's growing tourist market. It will sell photographs taken by village members and a book on their lives to date. It will be run by Nsanga members, creating income for the village and addressing immediate needs such as sustained food and medical supplies.
But help is needed to set it up.