15 Oct 2014

Botswana’s respect for the rights of the child has been demonstrated through the accession and ratification of the United Nations Convention on the rights of children and African Charter on the rights and welfare of the child, says Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Mr Peter Siele.

Speaking at the Convention of the Rights of the Child Breakfast meeting in Gaborone on October 13, Mr Siele said the domestication of the said instruments were achieved through the enactment of the Children’s Act of 2009.

He said that his ministry had traversed the whole country creating awareness about the Children’s Act in particular the Children’s Bill of Rights which contained social, economic and cultural rights accorded to children.

“It also spells out the rights and obligation of the parents who are the primary duty bearers for the welfare of the children,” he said, adding that such provisions effectively domesticated the core principles under the convention that are based on the values of dignity, equality and respect for freedom and security of children.

Mr Siele noted that the law further entrenched the concept of dignified living for every child with the main objective of providing for the facilitation of the respect, promotion and the provision of the realisation of child rights in Botswana.

He told stakeholders that they are duty bearers bound under the current law to ensure that the contribution towards the survival, development and protection of all children is well articulated in the country’s laws, policy frameworks, programmes, as well as development interventions.

“We have to constantly remind ourselves that we should always place the best interest of the child at the apex of decisions that we make that have direct effect on children,” he said.

He said while a lot still has to be done, at least 320 village child protective committees have been established around the country to educate the community on child neglect, ill-treatment, exploitations and abuse as well as monitor the welfare of children in their respective communities.

Programmes Manager at BONELA Mr Felistas Motimedi said that it was alarming to learn that a nine-year-old girl became pregnant by a close relative and that the case was withdrawn.

She noted that cases of defilement were prevalent in Letlhakeng yet they always faded without any action being taken; in most cases, the police usually use the Penal Code instead of the Children’s Act and that children were tried in open courts.

She said that access to education remained a challenge and that the national care for people with disability was outdated. 

UNICEF country representative Ms Vidhya Ganesh said that children, just like adults, possessed inherent rights such as the rights to health, education protection and equal opportunity without discrimination on the basis of gender, economic and social status, ethnicity, religious belief, disability or geographical location. ENDS