Adults have a responsibility to prevent child vulnerability, says lawyer
NAN-H-78
Children
By Moji Eniola and Grace Alegba
Lagos, May 18, 2017 (NAN) Mr Taiwo Akinlami, a lawyer and child rights activist, on Thursday said that adults have huge responsibility to ensure that children in their care are not vulnerable.
Akinlami, made this assertion in a speech on ‘Child Abuse, Child Trafficking and Child Rights’ at a seminar organised by the Human Rights Committee of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Ikeja Branch.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the theme of the one-day seminar is “Protecting the Rights of Vulnerable Citizens in Our Society.’’’
“Children are not vulnerable, what we call child vulnerability is actually adult irresponsibility.
“There are four ways in which a child can be abused, it can be physical, emotional, sexual or through neglect.
“In 2006, a United Nations report titled “Report on Violence Against Children 2006’’ states that abuse occurred in countries all over the world but is more rampant in developing countries.
“The UN noted in the report that nearly all national and international laws created to protect the rights of children have flatly failed.
“Though the report did not state why the laws flatly failed but the cause is a lack of enforcement of these laws,’’ Akinlami said.
`According to him, the number one enforcer of the law is the human conscience which is awoken by enlightenment and enlightenment will address issues in our culture.
“We focus a lot on physical discipline in Africa while neglecting to show discipline via example to the child,” he said.
Another speaker, Mrs Ifeyinwa Awagu, Acting Director, Institute of Humanities, Pan Atlantic University, addressed issues of gender equality in her speech titled: “Domestic Violence and Female Rights’’.
Awagu said that teaching children self-mastery would help curb sexual promiscuity.
“In Africa, we live communal lives; the lifestyle of individualism was gotten from the west.
“For sexual promiscuity to be curbed in children, especially the male ones, they need to teach our children self-mastery.
“If we don’t teach our children self-mastery, monogamy will become an issue and sexual abuse will be rife,” she said.
Earlier, in her address of welcome, Mrs Caroline Ibharuneafe, the Chairman of Human Rights Committee of the NBA, spoke about the efforts the committee had made in protecting the rights of the vulnerable.
She said that the aims and objectives of the Human Right Committee of the NBA is the offer of free legal services to the indigent of our society.
“With the cooperation of the Deputy Comptroller of the Ikoyi Prisons, we have visited Ikoyi prisons, interviewed some of the inmates and presently offering free legal services to these indigent ones.
“This is so because there are sections in the society who by virtue of birth, status and occupation are naturally vulnerable to abuses by the privileged in the society,” she said. (NAN)
MAE/GA/ENN/WOJ
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(Edited by Edwin Nwachukwu / Wale Ojetimi)