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How harmful cultural practices affect children’s rights, health, wellbeing —Experts

Across regions, millions of children continue to suffer from various forms of harmful practices, including female genital mutilation, early and forced marriage, corporal punishment, violent initiation rites, child labour and child trafficking, and several types of sexual violence.

According to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), some 650 million girls and women have been married as children, and more than 200 million have undergone female genital mutilation. Every day, 33,000 girls under the age of 18 are married, often against their will, and 3.2 million are in danger of being subjected to genital mutilation every year.

Aware of these challenges and the plight of the African child, the Centre for Child and Adolescent Mental Health (CCAMH), College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, organised a stakeholders’ engagement meeting in commemoration of the 2022 Day of the African Child to highlight lessons learnt from research and policy engagement.

It was also an opportunity for the centre to disseminate findings by the Accelerating Achievement for Africa’s Adolescents (Accelerate hub) study on accelerating progress on the sustainable development goals (SDGs) for adolescents in Nigeria.

Director Centre for Child and Adolescent Mental Health, Dr Tolulope Bella-Awusah, said that “Many of these practices are abusive but they are usually seen as acceptable within our community. They are defended based on our tradition or that it is passed down through generations. Corporal punishment and female genital mutilation (FGM) are two issues that we have many pieces of evidence to back up.

“But it has been shown that these practices can cause physical or psychological damage and suffering. They also negatively affect the fundamental rights of children. For example, they affect their right to life, health, dignity, protection, physical Integrity, among others.”

Many people are aware that female genital mutilation is a harmful practice that can cause many complications, including death; but it is not quite clear that it can affect people psychologically.

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Dr Bella-Awusah declared, “In 2013, our study in a community in Ebonyi State, where circumcision is done as adolescents or young adults, found that a majority of the women, over 80 percent, felt happy, joyful, fulfilled and honoured as a result of this practice.

“In the study, which was to understand how this practice affects the women’s emotions, mind and psychological well-being across their lifespan, a few of the participants also mentioned negative emotional states that were linked to negative adverse effects.

“People said they were sad and regret going through the practice; some were ashamed; some described painful traumatic memories from going through the practice. Some also described a feeling of betrayal by their families and the community in general. A particular person said she starts to cry in class whenever she remembers her experience.

“Also, the top-five health-related effects they talked about include bleeding, death and difficulties in childbirth. Quite a number told us that there was no health benefit of the practice and some also mentioned pain.

“Quite a number described what we call post-traumatic stress disorder, where they will have flashbacks; they feel anxious, depressed and unable to sleep. A participant said anytime she sees a blade, she remembers her own experience and so she does not use blade anymore.”

She stated that despite all the policies and interventions to stop FGM, Nigeria has not been able to eradicate the practice because it is considered a rite of passage, and without it, women cannot attain status and respect within their communities.

Corporal punishment is something that many people assume will not have any negative effect; but she stated, “the negative effects of corporal punishment, mostly from the Western world, include increased risk of depression, anxiety and personality problems.”

A cross-sectional study revealed that about 49 percent of students said it made them dislike school; about 48 percent said that it made them hate their teachers and about 65 percent said that it made them angry a lot.

“We know that it is not all young people that are negatively affected. Some people manage to pull through without any negative effect, and that is why there is a need for more research.

“We will need to have research, especially in our context, looking at what differentiates those who experience negative effects from those who don’t,” Dr Bella-Awusah added.

Dr JIbril Abdulmalik, CEO of Asido Foundation, said policies on harmful practices against children in Nigeria are not implemented, and as such the country is not prioritising their well-being to ensure they thrive and fulfill their potential even though the nation’s population is predominantly a young one.

He said, “Now children are exposed to street hawking, they are raped, beaten and assaulted. Families and religious organisations need to promote the protection and support elimination of all harmful practices against children.”

Abdulmalik said the government’s school- feeding policy to ensure children at least have one meal a day and not be hungry in school is good but poorly implemented. He also urged the government to make education free.

Dr Ebunlomo Walker, executive director, Initiative for Integrated Community Welfare in Nigeria, represented by Mrs Omotayo Adebayo, stated that the incidence of harmful practices, including female genital mutilation, had increased with the COVID-19 pandemic.

She stated that oftentimes, interventions to tackle harmful practices focus more on girls, leaving aside boys.

Dr Walker said, although civil society organisations can help with the dissemination of information to discourage harmful practices experienced by children at the grassroots, the government will need to do more to ensure that policies to eliminate harmful practices against children are enforced.

Dr Rita Tamambang, CCAMH’s research associate, said adolescents are threatened by diverse adversities and the key message from the centre’s study on how best to accelerate progress on the sustainable development goals of adolescents in Nigeria is that adolescent boys would benefit more from policies and programmes centred on bullying in schools, mental health promotion and parental support.

She said adolescent girls particularly will benefit from programmes ensuring food security and living in small-sized families, to have optimum gains in realising SDG goals, ranging from poverty alleviation and optimal health to decent work and quality education.

The provost, College of Medicine, Professor Yinka Omigbodun, asked parents to be better parents to help children thrive better in Nigeria, government to introduce a rounded school health programme, with a mental health component, stop child labour as well as take children off the streets.

“The government needs to take a stand on that. Children must not be seen moving through traffic. You see them carrying satchet water and all sorts of things through the streets. They could be injured; they could be raped,” he said.

Sade Oguntola