In the world today, the most assaulted victims of conflicts are children. In the entire world, there is a clear indication that most natural and man-made disasters are greatly affecting children everywhere. Can you imagine children as well babies are amputated in most African wars like Sierra Leone where one of the high rates of mutilation has ever takes place. Some years ago there was a report of an earthquake in central Africa where majority of the victims were children. Through these atrocities, children are expected to die, and mostly some are separated from their parents. Children can be defenseless when their parents are not around, some time they become unaccompanied.
In a clear human perspective, there is a saying that “Children are the future leaders of tomorrow". I believe there is no strong fact about this saying because if the children are polluted at this stage with the negative effect of wars and partly natural disaster, definitely we don't expect any good leadership from our children in the future. That is why in the African continent today it is difficult to find young people in most ministerial or legislative positions. That is also the reason you will find lot of African leaders taken 20 to 30 years in power, failing to know that power is not meant for one individual but that it should be rotational.
In the past years of terror in Sierra Leone, there was a clear testimony that children were the major victims of all atrocities. When you think of mutilation, sexual abuses, killing, forcing them on drugs and also using them as killers, children have been greatly misused. With the above, I believe we will now have a clue that children are really open to lots of chaotic crises like war and natural disasters.
Let us have a look at some of these crises that affect children from becoming our future leaders.
TERRIFIED: In most war affected countries in the world like Congo, Sudan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Burma, Liberia and Sierra Leone, children have been used to fight on their behalf. If I can give you a sight testimony, I will like to take Sierra Leone as a case study.
In the past civil and terror war in Sierra Leone, children were fighting for both the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), and the Pro-government local militia, the Kamajors. It was difficult to know among the two groups which one had the large number of children because in the east and south of Sierra Leone, children were always initiated to become kamajors as well as rebels. When ever towns or villages were attacked, children were taken to train as fighters. Often after the RUF abducted the surviving children, many of whom have seen their parents been slaughtered were then taking to a special training camp where they were injected with different types of drugs. Those children who escaped often joined the Kamajors in order to retaliate against the rebels. In the past conflict in Burma about 50 years ago; this conflict was between the government and rebel ethnic minorities. During this conflict, there was a 15 year-old Zaw Tun who fought in the Burmese army. These are instances that child abuse is mostly committed in war affected countries.
If we can also take a case study of Burundi, we will realize that all the atrocities committed against children are the same with other war affected countries like Sierra Leone and Liberia. Let us take a case of about two brothers who fled from Burundi to Tanzania. Isidor the elder one was 8 years while Melchior was 6 years. These two children's parents were killed in front of them and unfortunately Isidor the elder brother had one leg. According to one UNICEF report, Isidor refused to speak to anyone who attempted to talk to him. I believe the reason was because they were traumatized. Can you imagine kids watching the death of their parents, which might lead to an acute trauma.
I will again emphasize here that, such stories of children in crisis are common in Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Liberia to name a few. It is also pathetic to know that all the atrocities are alike.
Irrespective of countries affected by war, there are also countries that are not at war but yet still you find children in crises, which have humanitarian problems, and who suffer from stress. So children are open to all out crisis no matter the condition or situation of the country.
ORPHANS: The Rwanda genocide which left an estimated 400,000 orphans. Odetta is one of them. She was 12 years old at the time and saw her parents and sister butchered in front of her. She herself was kidnapped and was attacked with a machete. Deeply traumatized, today she is cared for in an orphanage run by the sister of Calcutta.
Even though there is a blow of poverty in Rwanda, there are still families who are ready to foster children who were orphaned in the genocide.
ABDUCTION: In some of the cases of abduction, Sierra Leone can also be taking as a case study. Sometime in 2000, 72 children were confirmed abducted by the RUF rebels in Makeni, where there were 164 children in an interim care centre. Because of the rebel presence in the township, there was a cut off, because of this, 72 of the children were abducted while 88 were able to escape from the township because of the insecurity. The 88 children who were able to manipulate their way to Freetown were assisted by UNICEF under the protection officer of Roisin De Burga, who explained the plight of the children that their journey to Freetown was a hectic one. They went through lots of ordeal, and almost walked part of their journey on foot. As it was not an easy trip because Makeni to Freetown is about 110 miles.
The cases of abduction of children in most war affected countries are very common because the faction forces are using children to do series of operations and if they refuse or attempt to escape, they are tortured, mutilated or killed.
The choices facing children today in most war affected countries are to join the military, die or become street children. The impact of the conflict on children is devastating, depriving thousands of the young people anything approaching a normal childhood. As you know children hardly fight for themselves, except they are forced into the idea of fighting.
Let us see what the Convention on the Rights of the Child declared, whether the above treatments for children are right or not.
Article 37 states that " No child shall be subjected to torture, cruel treatment or punishment, unlawful arrest or deprivation of liberty. Both capital punishment and life imprisonment with possibility of release are prohibited for offences committed by persons below 18 years. Any child deprived of liberty shall be separated from adults unless it is considered in the child's best interest not to do so. A child who is detained shall have legal and other assistance as well as contact with the family".
However in most African countries today, the convention of the rights of the child are not regarded or recognized because we are still seeing rebel groups and faction forces continuing to abduct kids and join them into their fighting forces.
PROSTITUTION: Prostitution as it is, I believe is one of the easiest clubs or teams to be joined by female kids because they can be paid with hot money. In Guinea, in the region of Gueckedou where the high rate of refugees were settled, there were guest houses, hotels and clubs. I decided to take a stroll, where my first finding was that refugee kids were all over these places roaming over panting behind those that are with money who will take them for the night.
Most of these kids were extremely vulnerable to sexual predation once they reach puberty. In most war ravaged countries today, young girls are lead into prostitution, if they cannot find a home or are not taken in by a child welfare centre, they are almost certain to have to sell sex to survive. They may opt to join life with older prostitutes in their camps, where they are used as porters, or sex slaves.
In Congo there is also a story about a boy of 16 called Michael who disclosed to Refugee International that " My sister and I joined the army because our parents were dead, and we had no jobs.. I went to the front line many times, and my sister was sent to the enemy to be a spy. Girls were sent to be prostitutes and get information from the enemy. This is how my sister was used."
ENROLMENT: In Sierra Leone where majority of child combatant are found, their common and reasonable explanation is that, their enrolment was due to the poverty of their families, others was due to abduction, while others was because of the brutal killing of their parents or loved ones. It is believed that kids have no choice when it comes to what they can do with their lives.
In East Africa we can also see that there has been lots child abuse, in 1998 there was a camp called Dadaab camp in the Northeast Kenya where refugees were settled for safe haven but it was rather unfortunate that their camp was continuously being attacked by Somalia bandits. Women, more especially kids encountered rape and other sexual pervasion. The young mails were forced to join the rebel army or they were killed.
Dadaab is a camp that is regularly being attacked by Somalia bandits. Their main target was to rape assault and mostly abducts young girls when they left the camp to forage for fire wood. This act of the Somali bandits has caused a high rate of rape among the Somali young girls and women. Even in Kakuma camp near Kenya's border with southern Sudan, there was also used to be raiders or bandits attacks, whose target was to target young girls.
In Albania too, majority of the traumatized refugees are children, they remained to be worried about their safety others too were worried because of the brutal killing of their parents or loved ones.
Children have been the main victims of war. It is believed that their status can be risky because they are open to different types of danger. If we can also get some facts from Save the Children's report, it was clear that young girls in Refugee camps were sexually exploited in the West African Sub-region. UNICEF report is a basic fact because in most war ravaged countries today, prostitution is common no matter the age of the girls. Moreover young girls are using sex today as a quick way to get money.
Children are defenseless, in refugee camps, they are targeted by wealthy personnel or most likely some aid workers who are not tutored on their code of conduct. In the cities girls are not spared, some mothers because of hardship in the home, they might push their daughter on wealthy men on the street so that they can get something in the home.
Further factors that leads children on the street:
Humiliation and stress can cause teenagers to abscond from their parents and seek out for a free life which will later usher them into prostitution or become highway robbers.
Pornography can also misdirect the vision or good intention of children to prostitution or any other practice because what they have seen in magazine, books TV or the Internet, they too will put them to practice.
In a peaceful home where there is no parental care, there are all tendencies that some of the kids will become hookers, thieves or will join street gangs. The reason for this is because the parents fail to take their part in the home. I once told a father of 5 children that "a home without parents or caretaker, is dead", simply because there will be disorder.
In Article 9 in the convention on the right of the child, it states that:
1. States Parties shall ensure that a child shall not be separated from his or her parents against their will, except when competent authorities subject to judicial review determine, in accordance with applicable law and procedures, that such separation is necessary for the best interests of the child. Such determination may be necessary in a particular case such as one involving abuse or neglect of the child by the parents, or one where the parents are living separately and a decision must be made as to the child's place of residence.
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