By Ude Thaddeus Njikem
Every child has a right to education, best attainable standards of health, and protection from abuse, torture and labour which interfere with the child’s physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.
However, Covid-19 has had an adverse effect on the rights and welfare of children in Africa, particularly on the right to education. Despite measures to use digital platforms to deliver lessons, many children still cannot access these and the lack of access further aggravates vulnerable children across the continent.
The pandemic has forced school closures in 191 countries, affecting at least 1.5 billion learners and 63 million primary and secondary teachers.
According to Unesco, half of all learners currently out of the classroom – or nearly 830 million globally – do not have access to a computer.
Additionally, more than 40% have no internet access at home. For those children who have access to digital platforms for learning, imminent risks of child pornography, online sexual exploitation and cyber-attackers wait for an opportunity to strike.
Without access to comprehensive sexuality education, which is mostly delivered in schools, children should not be left to themselves, as staying at home puts them at more risk of attacks by abusers and predators.
In Africa, comprehensive sexuality education is predominantly school based in both primary and secondary schools and equips children with knowledge, skills, attitudes and values that empower them to realise their health, well-being and dignity. .
Child-friendly justice requires that young people be provided with the skills and competencies to make informed decisions, and this includes information to access the internet as they go online for studies safely. The Covid-19 pandemic also further provides us with an opportunity to find alternative ways to promote justice and improve and facilitate access for those children who do not have the means to get onto digital platforms to gain information about their sexuality.
Marriage is one of those issues where there has been no justice for children across the continent for many years. For one, when girls are sent off into marriages at the age of 10, for example, they are often deprived of the right to education.
Child marriages jeopardise the rights of girls in Africa to education, healthy and productive lives. Girls living in rural areas of the developing world are twice as likely to be married off before the age of 18 as their urban counterparts, and girls with no education are over three times more likely to fall into this trap than those with secondary or higher education.
Access to education is an empowering tool for children across the continent. When children, especially girls, have access to quality education, it provides them with the skills, knowledge and confidence to make an informed decision – and to their best interests . Global pandemics such as Ebola and Covid-19 remind us of the need to protect and promote the rights of children on the continent.
The International Day of the African Child reminds us to look not just at access to child-friendly justice from the legal framework, but for states to look at the underlying areas where injustices have continued to prevail.
Ensuring all children have access to education and are protected from harmful traditional practices and online harmful exposure is crucial at this time .
Ude Thaddeus Njikem is a co-ordinator of the Men Engage Africa Youth Alliance.
The Star