<i>Making them vocal about rights from childhood</i>
A boy at work: Will the wheel of fortune ever swing back?Photo: STAR
Children of all ages gathered at Ramna Park last Thursday to launch Child Protection Movement, a national platform run exclusively by children, aiming to ensure their rights in Bangladesh.
The movement, first of its kind, is a joint move by 40 children's club of Dhaka run by 20 NGOs associated with Save The Children, Sweden-Denmark. The member of the movement now stands at 90.
One of the campaigners Nazrul Islam, a 15-year-old school dropout, said, “Before joining these clubs I had no idea that there are some things called child rights. I had seen things and thought this is how it is and never questioned the adults.”
“This movement is about giving voice to the children to tell the adults about their needs. It is about raising questions and pointing out the child rights issues from children's point of view,” said Ibrahim Khalid Mamun, a class IX student of Mohammadpur Preparatory High School.
“Sometimes children know best about what they are going through. If the adults listen to their points of view attentively they will discover many unspoken issues,” he added.
Primary agenda of the movement is to ensure basic securities like food and shelter, education, health services, recreational opportunity to all children, giving special focus on working children, the physically and mentally challenged, displaced street children and children from the indigenous community.
The movement will work to prevent child trafficking and sexual abuse, provide advocacy to children in distress, create awareness among the adults giving them a children's point of view, and help working children being vocal about their rights. The activists will also work as observers of the general status of child rights in Bangladesh.
Another teen activist Jahanara Afreen, a student of Agrani School and College said, “These are the most pressing issues that demand urgent attention right now. Once these issues are addressed child rights can be ensured to some extent.”
Campaigners explained that anyone bellow the age of 18, interested in working on child rights issues can be a part of the movement.
The movement has three committees -- the guideline committee will prepare work plans and organise activities, the advocacy committee will answer to the call of the children in distress and the reporting team will stay in touch with the media to convey the messages to all.
The movement will function with supervision from the adults of the associated NGOs.
The movement also has an agenda to send two annual reports to the government and one report in five years to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child about the status of the child rights in Bangladesh.
Earlier in February this year a forum of these young club members prepared and sent the first-ever alternative child rights status report to the UN committee.
Sheuli Islam, a student of Agrani School and College, said, “During our brief work period to prepare the report we discovered that the general status of child rights in Bangladesh is appalling. Children are being abused in many ways, especially the working and street children. This is when we felt the need for a movement of all children.”
Comments