Handling menace of child labour in Africa

By: Charles Ikedikwa Soeze

Child labour entails a process where children are forced to work for social or economic reasons. In other words, it simply means those under aged children pushed into the labour market and subjected to all forms of work at their tender ages. Such children can be found on different streets, plantations, factories, hotels as prostitutes and also as house helps doing some kinds of jobs that are above their capabilities or strength

Consequently, it is therefore appropriate to say that child labour occurs because it is the best response people can find in intolerable circumstances. Permit me to say that poverty and child labour are mutually reinforcing based on the fact that their parents are poor, as a result, children must work and not attend school and then grow up poorer than their parents. Another is that of lack of parental care or the care of their guardian. Again, child delinquency can equally lead to child labour and the resultant abuse.

According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), 215 million children are in hazardous work and that Africa is worst hit. The ILO celebrated the World Day against Child Labour 2010 events with a clear message to member-nations on the negative impact of child labour and the danger inherent in the slow pace of efforts by nations of the World to end the phenomenon. It was revealed by the ILO that the events were held in more than sixty (60) countries. It included governments, employers and workers, other United Nations organizations and non-governmental organizations and high level panels, who organized media events, awareness raising campaigns, cultural performances and other public events.

In Geneva, Switzerland where the global event, International Labour Conference took place, hundreds of local school were joined by the Mayor of Geneva, Ms Sandrine Salerno; the Conseiller d’Etat, Mr. Charles Beer, ILO officials and visiting conference delegates, who participated on a “Children’s solidarity event” at the Place des Nations (United Nations House).

Furthermore, the ILO Director General, Mr. Juan Somavia, used the occasion to paint the pathetic picture of hazardous conditions of many children around the World who were involved in child labour. In Africa, it was a pathetic story as Somavia stated that the situation was a worrisome in Africa where the worst form of child labour takes place and more children were working in hazardous conditions. Somavia added that the World Day Against Child Labour (WDACL) came at a critical juncture in the global campaign ending its worst forms by 2016.

At the WDACL, it was stated that what is needed is access to quality education for all children, at least, until the minimum age of employment; extending social protection that provides a buffer for families and enable them to keep all children, girls and boys in school; and productive employment for adults. In other words, with an integrated decent work approach and a decent work route out of poverty, children can realize their potential; families and communities can enjoy better standards of living and greater stability.

In Nigeria, little efforts are being made by both government and organizations to reduce or eliminate the worst form of child abuse because we are deeply routed in poverty and cultural attitudes of the people. However, these efforts, in most cases are not backed by appropriate data to enable national authorities and the international communities to measure the nature and perhaps the extent of child labour in the country and identify areas where action is required to tackle it.

It is flabbergasting to say that in Nigeria like many other African countries, ILO policies are often violated, despite the fact that many countries of the World have developed statistical monitoring and information systems on child labour, often with the support of ILO’s Statistical Information and Monitoring Programme on Child Labour (SIMPOC).

Nigeria as a member-state signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the ILO in 2000 for cooperation in implementing the International Protocol for Elimination of Child Labour and a national programme on the elimination of child labour was therefore created. A monitoring system, the Statistical Information and Monitoring Programme on Child Labour eventually constituted to gather data on child labour practices in Nigeria. It is being managed by the Federal Office of Statistics (FOS). In Nigeria, there is no legal minimum age for starting work, while ILO recommends that children should be in school until the age of 14.

Astonishingly, the FOS in 2003 reported that more than 15 million Nigerian children under the age of 14 were working, mostly to help pay their school fees and help parents for daily upkeep. The survey, conducted with support from the ILO, showed that over eight million of the country’s working children were also attending school. These children said they were forced to work part time in order to pay for their school fees and books. In 1995, statistical data for child labour was 12 million.

Furthermore, the United Nations International Children Funds (UNICEF), in its 2006 report on child labour in Nigeria, reveals that a staggering 15 million children under the age of 14 were working across Nigeria and that many were exposed to long hours of work in dangerous and unhealthy environments. These children, according to the report, carried too much responsibility for their age. The report further revealed “Generally, working children have no time, money or energy to go to school. About six million working children in Nigeria equally split between boys and girls, do not attend school at all, while one million children are forced to drop out due to poverty or because of parents’ or guardians’ demand to contribute to the family income”. Over eight million children manage, at least partly, to stay in school and work in their spare time to pay education fees. Due to high demands at work, these children often skip classes. Missing out on education makes it impossible to break the cycle of poverty and exploitation and prevents children from having a better life and safer future.

In the area of legislation, the Labour Act of 1974 prohibits the employment of children under the age of 15 in commerce and industry and restricts labour performed by children to home-based agricultural or domestic work. It stipulates that children may not be employed in agricultural or domestic work for more than eight hours per day, while children under the age of 12 can not be required to lift or carry loads that are harmful to their physical development. The Labour Act also prohibits forced labour.

For example in Nigeria, the Inspectorate Department of the Ministry of Labour and Productivity is responsible for enforcing legal provisions relating to conditions of work and protection of workers. Surprisingly, there are very few inspectors for the entire country thus making it difficult for them to fulfil their tasks.

The issue of child labour should be seen as a great concern to Africans. In Nigeria we can see especially in Lagos and other capital cities and urban areas, social miscreants called ‘area boys’. We hear and see awful sights as they vandalize and disrupt the peace of our communities through their hooliganism. We watch helplessly as these future generations are wasting away with none to intervene. What more shall we say as, most of these children are subjected to street hawking, hewing wood, drawing water, conducting buses, engaging in prostitutions and all forms of promiscuities; all just to earn living. In some neighbouring countries in Africa, we hear of child soldier. All these children ought to be somewhere learning a trade or schooling preparing for a better future. Again, child beggars are not left out of child labour, which constitutes child abuse, and we should understand why it is better not to give money to these little ones. Giving them money is a clear signal that we are in support of this nefarious act of those peddling them in their so-called business.

Child begging on the streets in some cities in Nigeria and the World and the attendant adult gangs that exploit these children has become a serious eye sore and a menace to the societies across the globe. Child labour is represented as a homogeneous phenomenon that is inhuman and necessarily highly abusive. Child labourers are depicted as being held in slave-like conditions: powerless, voiceless, and without hope. This depiction is certainly true for some children, and in situations of slavery, bondage and forced labour, the only effective means of protecting children is to remove them from the environment. Mostly, it takes place in economically less developed countries (LDC), and much is hidden from the eyes of the masses. Slavery, bonded labour, prostitution, and the recruitment of child soldiers are all intolerable and illegal. Despite these, in Central and West Africa alone, an estimated 200,000 children are traded each year. Landlords and Landladies can bond a child worker for peanuts that is quantifying the values of their pay, and family debts are manipulated so that there is no hope of repayment. The commercial sexual exploitation of children is increasing, and organized networks can be found in Latin America, Asia, Africa, etc. The recruitment of children as combatant is an increasing problem, and the factors responsible for this are becoming clearer. It was reported that more than 10,000 boys and girls were forcibly recruited in the conflict of Sierra Leone as soldiers, cooks, porters, and sexual partners for male combatants.

It is true to say that most children who work do so as a means of survival, and working children have been shown to contribute up to almost 90% of the family income. In other words, poverty is central to the continuation of child labour as earlier mentioned.

Tackling child labour effectively demands action on many fronts. First is the provision of education that meets children’s developmental needs and prepare them for an adult working life is crucial. School curricula are too often rigid, uninspiring, and totally irrelevant. Education budgets have suffered at the hands of structural adjustment policies imposed by the World Bank or International Monetary Fund.

It is important that employers be tackled, and employment sectors must sign up to codes of conduct that are monitored and enforced. Examples of good practice can be seen around the globe. There is also a role for trade unions in monitoring agreements and ensuring compliance, and in exerting influence at a political level. Again, non-governmental organizations have an advocacy role and can work with communities to develop local leaders who can then prevent children from going into hazardous employment. Many non-governmental organizations also provide services for children who have been traumatized by child labour. There are many gaps in our knowledge about the effects of labour on the health of child workers, which are not conducive to randomized controlled trials. The day-to-day misery of many child workers remains hidden. Certain groups of child workers such as domestic servants have been almost ignored. What it implies here is that researchers need to work in close cooperation with national and local government and non-governmental organizations if they wish to reach children who are difficult to locate and change adverse working practices.

A critical look at our own domain reveals at a glance that the Nigerian child has become a serious victim of the society that ought to cater for its comfort; it is true to say that this society does not care its future. The Nigerian child has been subjected to all forms of inhuman treatments. In most streets of capital cities and urban areas, children are seen roaming endlessly without destination. According to UNICEF, the rate at which children especially in developing world like Nigeria are becoming street children is alarming.

According to experts in the field of child trafficking, Nigeria is the sixth country where child labour is growing at a very ugly trend. Of about ten (10) children in Nigeria, three (3) are homeless in Nigeria. UNICEF and non-governmental agencies or organizations are working tirelessly to correct the anomaly or ugly situation. The big question is what is the future of Nigerian child? Is he actually the leader of tomorrow? All these questions and more are begging for answers. The society owes it a duty to help ensure that street children are resettled because no society can function meaningfully without the supposed leaders of tomorrow. The government; federal, state and local government inclusive must therefore put hands together so as to reverse the status quo. This is absolutely necessary because any society that neglects these future leaders, are like a house built on a gully site. Let all of us act now because a stitch in time saves nine.

Whatever the case may be, let me commend the respected and articulate governor of Delta State, Dr. Emmanuel Eweta Uduaghan for lamenting recently the continued forms of children exploitation that still exist in the African continent and urged collaboration among stakeholders to plan and budget for the well being of the child.

The governor who was represented by his deputy, Professor Amos Utuama (SAN) at the Day of the African Child celebration in Asaba, the capital city of Delta State, noted with sadness that the goals set by the United Nations and the African Union on the implementation of the rights of the child were still far from being achieved. He lamented further that various forms of exploitation of children still exist through child abuse and neglect, which have given rise to the violation of the rights of the child.