Jamburr: Teaching "Never Again" through storytelling

On 12 April 2025, Fantanka held a storytelling activity in Jamburr with 20 out-of-school children, built around Fantanka's TRRC child-friendly report. The intention was not to "teach" children transitional justice in an abstract way, but to make the national story legible and personal, and to do it through a format children already recognise as authoritative: community storytelling.

Fantanka invited Mr Abdoulie Bojang, a victim, to narrate the TRRC's findings and recommendations in a traditional storytelling format. Mandinka was used throughout — not as a token gesture, but because language is part of access. If justice is only explained in official English, it quietly excludes the very children who are most likely to live with the consequences of silence and stigma.

The activity ran in two sessions of 10 children each. The storytelling approach proved immediately engaging because it created a bridge between national processes and everyday life. Mr Bojang narrated key TRRC elements while weaving in relatable illustrations and parts of his own experience, allowing children to connect moral judgement, accountability, and community memory in one continuous narrative.

One child asked a question that captured the core purpose of the whole exercise: "Didn't the Junglers go to school?" It was not simply curiosity. It was disappointment, and a moral demand for explanation. That question is exactly why Fantanka produces child-friendly justice materials: because children can ask the questions adults avoid, and those questions force society to think seriously about the kind of education and values that prevent recurrence.

Some of the children present were themselves victims of state abuse, including children affected by the former regime's witch-hunt exercise. When they spoke, they did not speak like passive recipients of sympathy. They spoke as young people making sense of wrong, naming it, and locating themselves inside the national promise of "Never Again."

One child said: "The way Mr. Bojang told the story made it easy to understand. It felt like he was talking about our own lives… now I understand why we need to make sure such violations do not happen again."

Fantanka's lesson from Jamburr is clear. If the country wants non-repetition, it has to invest in justice learning that is culturally grounded, psychologically safe, and accessible to children outside formal systems. Storytelling is not decoration. It is civic education, and it can be a form of healing.