Building a safe, prosperous future

The Universal Children’s Day is not simply a day to celebrate children for who they are.

It is meant to bring succour to children around the globe who have been subjected to violence, abuses, exploitation and discrimination.

Children are used as labourers in some countries, immersed in armed conflict; living on the streets, and suffering on account of religion, minority issues, or disabilities. Children feeling the effects of war can be displaced because of the armed conflict and/or suffer physical and psychological trauma.

The following violations, according to the United Nations, are covered by the term, children and armed conflict: recruitment and child soldiers, killing/maiming of children, abduction of children, attacks on schools/hospitals and not allowing humanitarian access to children.

Nigerians, on Saturday celebrated what we called our own Children’s Day, in the face of overwhelming child abuse, child trafficking and the child abandonment that has become the order of the day in the country. Hardly can you flip the pages of the dailies without numerous headlines pointing and lamenting the sexual assault faced by the helpless Nigerian children from the so- called elders and spiritual leaders.

Still in the mood of celebration, let me bring it to your notice that Nigeria has made history with half of the world’s out-of-school children in Nigeria.

A report by the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) on January 11, 2017 entitled: “An overview of Out-of-School Children Syndrome in Ni­geria,” revealed that: “13.2 million children are out of school in Nigeria,” repre­senting between 52.5 per cent and 60 per cent, or more than half of all the out-of-school chil­dren worldwide.

Over 2.7 million children are in need of protection, including more than 20,000 children separated from their parents or guardians.

• Bamidele Williams

Lagos