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Young people taking part in ChildFund Myanmar’s youth empowerment project are playing a critical role in helping to keep their communities safe during the COVID-19 pandemic. Here, we share stories of how three young people are applying the leadership skills they have learnt in ChildFund’s project to make a difference in their villages.

Every second night 19-year-old Htay Lwin stands watch at the edge of his village in Tanintharyi, south of Myanmar, keeping an eye out for people looking to pass through the gates.

Htay Lwin is on watch from 9pm to 4am, the curfew hours enforced by the Government of Myanmar to restrict people from unnecessary travel during the COVID-19 pandemic. If Htay Lwin sees someone at the gates during these hours, he stops them and takes their temperature to check for a fever and make sure they do not have the virus.

He is happy to be able to help keep his village safe.

“I didn’t know that helping my community could please me so much,” he says.

Htay Lwin says the hours he keeps watch at the gates is a rare period in his day where he can relax and feel respite from everything that is going on because of the pandemic.

Htay Lwin is one of dozens of young people taking part in ChildFund Myanmar’s youth empowerment project who have put up their hand over the past several months to help stop COVID-19 from infecting and spreading in their communities. “Before joining ChildFund’s youth empowerment project, I was very shy,” Htay Lwin says. “Now, I have the confidence to participate anywhere my community needs me.”

When the day dawns, 13-year-old Bote Son is the first in her family to awake. She is up and about, getting ready for school.

Education has always been important to her, Bote Son (pictured above) says. “My greatest desire is to learn and to be educated,” she says.

The teen, who has a disability that makes it difficult for her to walk and use her hands, gets to school in a wheelchair. She started school for the first time two years ago when ChildFund Myanmar began running non-formal education classes for children from disadvantaged backgrounds in Yangon,

This program is supported by the Australian Government through
the Australian NGO Cooperation Program (ANCP). It is also supported by ChildFund Deutschland and Myanmar-Kinderhilfe Stiftung.

Over the past couple of years, Bote Son has learnt to read and write for the first time in her life. She is also learning maths, Burmese and English.

She is an enthusiastic student, says her teacher Thida. “Bote Son tries hard. She is the most active student in my class and she has never missed a day of school.”

Bote Son’s mother Kyi says she has always wanted her daughter to go to school, but the limited opportunities for children with disability in government-run schools in Myanmar has meant it has been impossible to enrol Bote Son into the formal education system.

Private schools have been out of the question because she and her husband cannot afford to pay the fees. Kyi makes and sells brooms, while her husband is a taxi driver; their income is irregular and unreliable.

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