Action for Advocacy and Development – Sierra Leone (AAD-SL) grows from the exit process of War Child Holland (an International Non-Governmental Organization from the Netherlands which has operated in Sierra Leone since 2001 till 2012). War Child Holland started its intervention in Sierra Leone after the decade civil war with creative workshops for children and teachers, implemented in primary Schools and relief centres for ex-child soldiers, sexually abused girls, war wounded, orphans, street children and IDPs.
This was followed with a unique methodology and approach in supporting communities to address issues affecting children and youths through Community Based Programming (CBP) which entails Psychosocial, Child Protection, functional livelihoods and Education. Advocacy, capacity building and direct service delivery formed part of its intervention. While in Sierra Leone, WCH invested on capacity building of its staff to ensure that they are well capacitated to carry out the work thereby creating impact in the lives of not only the target population, but on those implementing.
As an organization, War Child Holland WCH has contributed invaluably over its period of operations in ensuring children and youth’s rights are protected and promoted. In the exit process of War Child Holland, the local/national staff desired
to sustain some of WCH footprints in Sierra Leone and initiated a nationalisation process to localise its efforts into a local NGO called “Action for Advocacy and Development- Sierra Leone (AAD-SL)” in September 2011.
Our operations cover three districts: Bombali, Karene and Port Loko districts. The prime focus of our interventions has been women, youths and children. Targeting these invariably means addressing the needs of men also. For greater impact of our work at all levels, AAD-SL is committed to working with partners, coalitions, networks at local, national, regional and global levels with whom we share similar goals and objectives based on mutual respect, accountability and responsibility to influence policy formulation and change.