VINCENT NUWAGABA
The African continent celebrates the day of the African child every 16th of June. This year’s theme was “Accelerated Child survival and Development; creating a safe environment for Children”. We need reflect on the day of the African child and the theme by looking at the plight of the African child. As the saying goes charity begins at home, I will concentrate on the plight of the Ugandan child not because I am insensitive and indifferent to other children on the African continent but because it is the Ugandan child whose plight I am fully aware of for I have witnessed with my naked eye stark child abuse and neglect and I am fully involved in human rights research including research on juvenile justice.
Majority of Ugandan children are the wretched of the earth if I can borrow Franz Fanon’s parlance. Uganda is a country with extreme wealth alongside extreme poverty. The poverty-stricken parents as a matter of fact have their children facing the full brunt of poverty. Uganda is bedeviled by vices of child labour, child prostitution, defilement, child trafficking, and child sacrifice among others. It is also vital to note that besides children-specific troubles, they are not spared the other problems that have bedeviled our society.
Given the nature of Africans where social responsibility is very crucial, whether or not one has a child, he/she must necessarily have some children depending on him/her. In Africa, children belong to society not to their biological parents. And this where I agree with the problem when he says bano bana ba ggwanga, a Luganda word meaning these are the nation’s children. I only find it strange that his government doesn’t give them the necessary attention they deserve to enable them make a meaningful contribution in future since they are the pillars of our nation, our continent and our world. Our children truly have biological parents but all of us are social parents to these children and therefore have a social obligation to ensure their welfare. I happen to have very many children calling me uncle and brother including my neighbours’ and friends’ children. These children have a lot of expectations in me. However, if I am terribly suffering from the clutches of unemployment, it becomes virtually impossible to extend a helping hand. Yet, personally I was helped when I was studying. It would only be fair that I do exactly what other members of our society did to me. Unemployment also hits a hard blow on children whose parents might have spent all the resources educating their elder brothers and sisters expecting that they will extend a hand to their siblings.
In Uganda, we have children whose parents have died of HIV/AIDS. Some of these of these children are infected with the virus while all of them are affected. This disease has left so many child headed households. I don’t know of any child headed home that gets financial or any other material support from our government through the ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development (MGLSD) under whose docket children fall. Most of the household heads who are too young to play any meaningful role in the homes they head end up being frustrated as a result of being overwhelmed by responsibility. Ultimately these children flee their homes and go to stay in town centres. In order for them to survive some of them end up working in bars, quarries, brothels, become motorcycle riders and involve themselves in hazardous activities including turning into petty thieves, drug abusers and so forth. These activities are detrimental to the children mentally, psychologically and physically. This is antithetical to the four general principles accentuated by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the children; namely, non-discrimination, the best interest principle, the right to life, survival and development, the child’s views about his or her own situation or simply put the right to freedom of expression. I elaborate how far these principles are enforced or not enforced in Uganda.
Non-discrimination
The children of the well placed people in government and close associates to the powers that be attend the best schools at the expense of the Ugandan taxpayer, they have the first class medical treatment and I am sure many of them don’t get treatment from Mulago. This is contrary to the NRM’s avowed reasons as to why they fought the so-called past dictators. One wonders whether those who genuinely joined the struggle to oust dictatorship such as Comrade Mugisha Muntu are not breeding at heart up to this day when they see that the revolution they sacrificed to champion and actualise has utterly been betrayed by the very person who nurtured the revolution idea and saw it to fruition.
Best interest principle
The best interest principle which is in other words referred to as the welfare principle is the cardinal principle that has even been accentuated in Uganda’s Children Act. According to the principle whatever should be done should reflect the best interests and the welfare of the child. If a child for instance faces problems either from the mother or the father, measures must be put in place to ensure that the welfare of the children is guaranteed. Because the Ministry in Charge of Children is always starved of funds, not much has been done to ensure this principle is implemented and enforced. At least even the budget that was recently read never underscored the importance of funding the inspectorate department of the MGLSD. This frustrates the ministry work however well-intentioned the ministry staff may be. This is despite the existence of a multitude of laws and instruments meant to protect children rights both domestic and international. For instance, Uganda ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the African Child Charter, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, among others. All these instruments clearly enshrine the rights to be enjoyed by the children. The government also has more often avowed its commitment to actualise the eight Millennium Development Goals all of which are reflected in the core instrument of children rights, the Convention on the rights of the child.
On the right to life; survival and development
I state unequivocally that we are still below the mark. The right to life, survival and development is very difficult to attain amidst biting poverty levels in our country that have hit children the hardest. Right now famine in North-Eastern Uganda in areas of Teso and Karamoja is threatening to cause human extinction. In the wake of such a catastrophe, the question is who takes care, who speaks for the voiceless children? Ironically, poverty threatens one region in Uganda when some other regions are experiencing plenty and reach the extent of feeding bananas to cows. At least western Uganda doesn’t face the problem of famine. Government has not put in measures to help those in need at this crucial moment. So the question is, whose responsibility is it to provide security to citizens including security from hunger and starvation which is partly number one of the Millennium Development Goals? It is my considered opinion that much as many of the rights of the children are positive in nature in a sense that we must commit resources if they are to be realized, it would not be difficult to realize them if we were not encumbered by the corruption monster.
Freedom of expression
I am sure it is news to many Ugandans that children have a right to express their own views. It is only children who were born with silver spoons in their mouth that can say, Dad, I need a shirt, I need this or that. The children of the peasants whom we always appeal for votes however, are as powerless as their parents. But also, although this is a right, as long as it remains unknown to the general public, children inclusive, it becomes meaningless to talk about it. I need not restate that the ministry in charge of children is always starved of funds yet this is a crucial ministry as it is a human rights-based ministry. In Uganda children have never been given a forum to express themselves. I believe the little step we have made forward is largely attributed to human rights non-governmental organisations. Trade unions would also be crucial in this area especially in combating child labour only that the government has deliberately made efforts to muzzle them and turn them into appendages of the NRM party in which case criticizing the party leads to them being branded as rebels. And the reason is largely if not wholly because the government usually extends funds to some trade unionists to contest for leadership positions including parliamentary positions.
Best practices we can borrow from our neighbours
In Rwanda for instance, they have passed a policy for each primary school to own a laptop computer and it is going to work. Rwandan children put on shoes as opposed to Uganda where shoes are a preserve of the privileged children. In Uganda, even in my district Bushenyi which is called a model district, majority of the children in primary school don’t put on shoes. In Rwanda, health insurance covers everyone so if anyone fell sick they can access treatment anywhere in any hospital and failure to go for treatment; one is charged with criminal negligence.
In Rwanda, the government abhors profligacy and this explains why government officials don’t drive posh vehicles which they park as soon as they finish work. In comparative terms, in Uganda government vehicles are used during dating, weddings and merrymaking of any sort outside the working hours. Not only do they depreciate but also the government officials use government fuel for private work. It is not uncommon to find government vehicles carrying charcoal and some have been seen in areas were prostitutes sell themselves. To make matters worse it is not uncommon to find a minister with say four government vehicles. One vehicle, he uses it himself, another o gives it to his son or daughter and does whatever he/she wants with the other two. All these vehicles are fuelled using taxpayers’ money and they do depreciate. The money that would be used to provide essential services is wantonly abused without any sense of decorum! This is a social evil! It is the highest form of corruption that has been presided over by a leader who promised to crush corruption and one might have thought that in one month it was to be history.
Ironically, I would argue that Rwanda was reborn after the 1994 genocide and Mr Museveni has in the past been deriding the Rwandan President Paul Kagame.
The problem we have in Uganda is that we don’t have our priorities right and that is why the enjoyment and realisation of rights generally remains a pipedream. I state without any fear of contradiction that Rwanda under President Kagame is turning into a social democratic state which values social welfare and social justice through the delivery of services based on meritocracy. On the other hand, Uganda which many scholars aligned to the Anglo-Saxon axis rate highly in terms of democracy in comparison with Rwanda has fully embraced the Darwin principle of survival of the fittest. I wish to state that those who rate Uganda highly in terms of democracy think liberal democracy is more important than social democracy. I discount that flawed notion. Individualism should have no place in Africa. Liberal democracy accentuates the primacy of individual interests at the expense of social welfare. On the other hand social democracy emphasizes the importance of the societal or common good.
Whereas Museveni is a far rightist ideologically who paradoxically also violates the civil liberties and political rights, Kagame, his practice has shown is a centre-leftist (social democrat) who cherishes the delivery of services for the common good. The question thus is who of the two is better? Haven’t we been hoodwinked and misled by our press which portrays Museveni as having more democratic credentials than Kagame? I think Africa must of necessity redefine the concept democracy based on our social needs as a continent. Both Kagame and Museveni may be interested in retaining power (although I cannot impute any wrong motive on Kagame now) but where Kagame may use his track record of service delivery to retain power, Museveni will use a combination of three strategies 1. Manipulation and deception, 2. Cooption and bribery and 3. Outright intimidation and coercion typical of all Machiavellian politicians. Ironically, these days the police has devised another wicked and outrageous means of muzzling the small critics which is connivance with the mental hospitals to declare tortured people persons of unsound mind. It has happened to me but no right thinking Ugandan agrees with that trash.
I believe at this point in time Africa needs more socio-economic rights than political rights and civil liberties and therefore social democracy as opposed to liberal democracy which focuses on the primacy of individual rights as opposed to social or group rights. I will elaborate how the negation of socio-economic rights is purely responsible for the violation of civil and political rights.
Vincent Nuwagaba
The writer is a human rights defender with keen interest in socio-economic rights and can be reached on email: vnuwagaba@gmail.com, cell phone +256772843552.
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