CCN wants end to child trafficking, violence against children

GOVERNMENT at all levels have been charged to take urgent steps to nip in the bud the menace of child trafficking and violence against children.

President of the Christian Council of Nigeria (CCN), Rev Benbo Fubara-Manuel, made the call in Calabar on Monday during a press brief to commence the one-week sensitisation on ending all forms of violence against children.

This is even as he called on parents, traditional and religious leaders, civil societies organisation and the media to take action to end all forms violence against children.

Fubara-Manuel’s address, which was read by Rev Ubong Eyo, Secretary of CNN in Cross River, said that the call became necessary because children cannot speak for themselves, hence the need to protect them.

He said that CCN is embarking on the week sensitisation in collaboration with the United Nations International Emergency Fund and with the financial support of the United State Agency for International Development.

According to him, the plight of children is a reality that is often relegated to the backgrounds of the list of priorities of government and religious communities, partly because children cannot speak for themselves.

“We regret this as Christians and affirm the care for children is no more addition to our creeds, but is an essential dimension to our being and calling as the people of God.

“We are, therefore, not satisfied only with providing Sunday School spaces for our children and giving teachers to them; but we are committed in promoting practices and establishing institutions that will allow them flourish in all ways.

“We commit together to end violence against children in all form. By this, we reject child neglection, child exploitation, child abuse, child trafficking and all shades and colours of violence against children.

“We name violence against children as a real evil confronting all communities in our country today. It is not an evil that happens far away from us but right under our very noses as parents, family members, religious people, and traditional and political leaders,” he said.

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We seek to draw attention to the systems that perpetuate injustice in the society today by ways of enlightening them.

“We are at a period in the history of our country where some extremists, in the name of religion, have shown no value for children’s lives.”

“What a shame that people send out young boys and girls on suicide missions; they pull them out of their homes and proper schools keep them in their camps and ghettoes, to use some as sex machines, to rape some and forced marriage.

“We also live in a world in which many people of religious communities traffic our children and expose them to both national and international danger simply for the love of money,” he said.