A divided house

From Scholastica Onyeka, Makurdi

Twelve-year-old girl, Sewuese, is a regular face at a major fuel station, North Bank area of Makurdi, Benue State. She resumes as early as 7:30 am and retires after dark.

Daily, she roams the premises of the fuel station and beyond. She must sell off her tray of bananas before heading home through a lonely path.

On this Monday, she sat by her tray, worried, tired and pale. She was scared of home and the coming darkness. Why? It’s taboo to return home without selling off the bananas in her tray.

She said in distress: “If I go home, my aunt will beat me. She warned me not to return home without selling off the bananas. I cannot go home.”

The sad story of Sewuese, who was brought to the city from Guma Local Government by her father’s sister, is similar to that of several children in the state. They are hurried to the city by cold relatives and made to work as street hawkers or house helps.

Peter Yecho, runs an NGO against violation of the rights of children.

He testified to a similar background. He alleged he suffered violations as a child in the hands of his stepmother.

He told Daily Sun: “Following the death of my biological mother, I was left at the mercy of my stepmother. Right before the eyes of my father, I reduced him to a slave-child some years ago.”

Investigations showed that abuse of the rights of children is a common practice. The violations range from child labour, trafficking, sexual abuse, killings, displacement and hunger to early child marriages.

Others are lack of education, maltreatment in schools and bullying among schoolmates.

Some of the victims of these abuses (names withheld) described their experiences as harsh, wicked and hateful. They revealed that they were maltreated both at home and in schools.

They listed their experiences to include inability of their guardians to enrol them in schools, failure to pay their school fees, forced to hawk in streets, maltreatment by relatives at home, unnecessary beatings, hunger and inadequate feeding.

Advocates of the Child Rights Act are worried that not much has been achieved despite the domestication of the policy and constant advocacy. Rather than abate, they feared that the situation has become worse.

To mitigate the situation, Benue State Child’s Rights Implementation Committee (SCRIC), said they would embark on state-wide sensitisation programme to schools with a view to familiarise them with the Act and rally their support.

The decision was reached at a meeting organised by the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development. It was in collaboration with a non-governmental organisation, Sexual Offences Awareness and Response, (SOAR) Initiative, other ministries and parastatals.

The meeting regretted that in some schools, teachers put up certain practices that violate the rights of children like sending them out of the school premises to buy things for them: “Most times, teachers allow the senior ones to ‘discipline’ the junior ones. That way, they take advantage to bully them.”

It also frowned at the indiscriminate operation of schools in unacceptable places and environments; garages, uncompleted buildings, not conducive for learning. It vowed to collaborate with the appropriate authorities to clampdown on such schools.

Chairman, SOAR, Eje Mary, noted: “In some communities, you see children moving about in torn clothes, sleeping in uncompleted buildings where they are molested and abused. No care, no food, no school.

“So, as we go into the New Year, all stakeholders must do their bits, especially government, to take care of the welfare of our children.

They are suffering.”

President, Federation of Muslim Women Associations in Nigeria (FOMWAN), state chapter, Dr Mariam Yakubu, affirmed that her association was in support and has been advocating for children’s rights: “For us Muslims, our rights are enshrined in the Quran.

Children have rights; rights to good health, to education and others.”

However, not everybody shares the feelings and passion for unconditional rights for children. While agreeing to the general principle that children should be treated decently, many held that the policy must be screened to select those aspects that agree with the culture of the people. A number of respondents rather recommended a system of moderated rights for the child.

Professor of History, Benue State University, (BSU) Makurdi, Gabriel Nyityo, argued: “Talking about child’s rights from an African perspective, you must also look at what is good for the child and what is not good for the child.

“What the white or the western world considers as violations of rights may simply means safeguarding the child’s rights in our own circumstances.

“For instance, freedom of expression. In our context, as a child, people choose for you when to talk. You don’t talk anyhow.

That is why you see some of the people here appear timid when they grow up. We do not allow all the freedom of speech because you do not want to expose a child to unnecessary talks that are way beyond his or her capacity.”

On early marriages: “If not for the health challenges arising from early marriages recently, VVF, the truth of the matter is that early marriages are ways of curbing immortality. Look at what is happening in the society today, you will appreciate the wisdom of early marriage

“For societies that want to procreate for purposes of agricultural production and for perpetuity of the lineage, they believe that these children should be married out young enough so they can have enough children.

“Most time, they don’t want matured women as new wives because their level of procreation may have dropped at that stage. They want them married out young.

“It has to do with procreation potential, the need to curb immortality among others. Of course, that does not end immortality. Some people will still not procreate at that tender age. You need to allow them to develop.”

Speaking to Daily Sun, the

The Ad’Ohimini, Idoma Traditional Area Council, John Ochayi, told Daily Sun: “In the African context, a child doesn’t have rights over whatever decisions the parents make or take for them. That is a very blunt summary of how it looks like.

“Like the Bible says, children should be obedient to their parents.

The African culture sees this obedience to be 100 per cent and in every aspect of their lives.

“In the African context, a child is supposed to obey the parents. No matter what, the parents’ views are supposed to be the ultimate.

“This goes to affect the choice of his educational life, which schools to attend. The child has no right to choose a school for himself. The quality of education is at the mercy of the parents. When to marry, who to marry or from which area to marry, all those are things the parents think they should know better than the child.

“The choice of a partner is decided by the parents almost 100 per cent in all African cultures. Parents should have rights over their children but should not abuse these rights.”

Samuel Baaki said: “For us Africans, our child rights are limited. In Benue societies, a poor father who has land to farm on does not care about the child’s right. The day he is going to the farm, he takes everyone including the young ones.

“He doesn’t care about school for that day. All he is thinking is what they will eat. And here, children are supposed to listen to their parents because no parent wishes their child evil.

Every parent looks at their choices they make for their children as the best for them for several reasons. But in everything you do, ifyou overload the child beyond his capacity, you are violating the child’s rights.”