INTERNATIONAL CHILD AND YOUTH CARE NETWORK

7 JUNE 2002
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Africa, The Gambia: A speech delivered by Emmanuel Daniel Joof, Human Rights Lawyer and Legal Officer of The African Society of International & Comparative Law, on the occasion of the Speech Day of The School of Educational Pursuits (SEP), May 10th 2002.

Rights, Responsibilities and Duties of Students and Young People

It gives me great pleasure to have been invited here today on this very important day of the school as guest speaker. The School has been kind enough to allow me to give a talk on any given topic. The topic I have chosen is the Rights, Duties and Responsibilities of Students. I have done so for two main reasons. One is to highlight the rights given to children and the rationale for giving them those rights.

Today, most teachers, some parents and some adults feel rightly or wrongly that much emphasis is given to the rights of children. There are some who would say that it is these so called rights given to children that has caused and is causing indiscipline in our schools, homes and society at large. If one looks around in our schools and in the streets, perhaps one can excuse them for nurturing this idea. Not long ago it was splashed in the front page of a daily newspaper, a story about how some secondary school students of a particular school flogged their teacher for allegedly misusing monies given to them by the President of the country. In Basse at the Tahir Ahmadiyya Secondary School about two years ago, some students went on the rampage, assaulted the Principal, destroyed school property in protest they claim for not being promoted to a higher grade even though some of them never passed their exams to qualify them for promotion.

Madam Principal, there is today a general lack of observance by students of school rules i.e. failure to learn and do assignments, using abusive, insulting language and threatening behaviour towards fellow students and teachers - the list goes on and on. Unfortunately these problems are usually attributed to the so call human rights given to children and also blamed, are those that advocate these said rights.

Madam Principal, children do have rights. These rights are today guaranteed and protected in international conventions and treaties notably the 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and the 1999 African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child both of which The Gambia has ratified and is therefore bound by its provisions. Likewise our 1997 Constitution contains provisions, which not only recognize the rights of children but it guarantees the protection of those rights.

Why should children be given special protection?

Children are a vulnerable group and have been subjected to all kinds of exploitation by adults. They have been the targets of violence, sexually abused, economically exploited, neglected and generally abused by society. Children for the most part have been regarded as the property of their parents, guardians and even employers. They have for a long time been denied a voice especially in the shaping of their own development. So entrenched was this belief that the famous phrase was coined and accepted that "Children must be seen and not heard".

Half of the world's population are children and the world has waken up to the fact that they should be protected since they are a vulnerable group and that special care and attention should be given to children to protect them from abuse, exploitation and help them prepare themselves to the best of their abilities for a full and satisfying adult life.

The Convention applies to any person below the age of 18 years (unless the national law stipulates the age of maturity at an earlier date) regardless of the child's race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national, ethnic or social origin, property, disability, birth or other status (see Art. 1&2 CRC)

Under the CRC, a child has a right to name, nationality (Art. 7) and that every child has the inherent right to life and that a member state shall ensure to the maximum extent possible the survival and development of the child (Art. 6). Articles 24 and 27 provide for securing the rights of the child to the highest attainable standard of health and standard of living adequate for the child's development.

The CRC also gives to children a wide range of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights such as freedom of expression, thought, conscience, religion and association (Arts 13,14,15). The exercise of these rights may however be subject to restrictions as provided by law for respect of the rights and reputations of others, protection of national security, public order, public health or morals.

Article 12 directs state parties to assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the view of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child. For this purpose, the child shall in particular be provided the opportunity to be heard in any judicial and administrative proceedings affecting the child, either directly or through a representative or appropriate body, in a manner consistent with the procedural rules of national law.

Article 3 is perhaps one of the most important provisions and it states that in all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interest of the child shall be of primary consideration. Article 3 further directs member states to ensure that the institutions, services and facilities responsible for the care or protection of children shall conform with standards established by competent authorities, particularly in the areas of safety, health the number and suitability of their staff as well as competent supervisions.

The CRC also gives the following rights and protection to children: the right to be free from physical or mental harm and neglect, including sexual abuse and exploitation (Article 19 & 24); the right to education on the basis of equal opportunity (Article 28); the right to be free from economic exploitation and from labour that may interfere with the child's education or be harmful to her health or well being (Article 32); the right to be protected from torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, capital punishment, life imprisonment without possibility of release shall not be imposed for offences committed by person below the age of 18 years, unlawful arrest detention; and the right to be free from compulsory military service if the child is below the age of 15 years.

Responsibilities

Madam Principal, these provisions i.e. these protected rights given to children were not designed to give a free hand to children for them to do what they like. It is certainly not a recipe for children to be rowdy or unruly. It does not attempt to stop parents, guardians and teachers from disciplining children. Its main objective is to stop the abuse and exploitation of children and to allow them have a say in their own development.

Students have responsibilities and duties, as do all members of society. As parents are obligated to take care of their children i.e. feed, clothe, shelter, educate and instill moral and cultural values in them, and as teachers are obligated to teach us and educate us and as our religious leaders are obligated to teach us our respective religions, morality and forthrightness, and as our political rulers are suppose to rule us through the observance of the rule of law, transparency and accountability so do students have responsibilities.

What then are these responsibilities? Students have an obligation to learn. Enormous sums of money are spent on educating students.

Government has invested a lot of money in building structures, providing teachers and books; parents sacrifice their meagre resources to pay for school fees, book bills, transport fares for students to get to school; teachers as well, most of the time poorly paid spend their time and effort to teach you; students must therefore play their part. Students must obey school rules and respect their teachers and fellow students and they must learn.

It is a sad fact today that students pay little attention to their education. Most of them claim to suffer from an imaginary illness they call the "nerves" syndrome i.e. they want to go abroad. The idea they have is that the streets of Europe and America are paved with gold and as soon as they get there all will be well. This belief is nothing but fantasy and delusion. If you do not have a good academic background at home with good results how can you gain access and be accepted in Universities and institutions of higher learning when you go abroad.

Sadly for most who abandon their education because of the "nerves" and happened to travel abroad, they usually find that their options are very limited. They are likely to do menial jobs or end up selling drugs and for the not so lucky ones, they end up in prisons and finally deported.

I am not saying that one should not aspire to go abroad to further ones education. What I am saying is that study hard, teach yourself discipline and get yourself a good educational grounding. Venturing abroad will not necessarily make you a genius. There is no substitute for hard work. Although it is true that some students are much more receptive, sharper and dexterous than others, hard work is still the key to success and to paraphrase the words of a well-known scholar- 'genius is 99 percent perspiration and one per cent excellence.' Again this means that there is no luck in education but hard work. It is true that we have all been thought the famous phrase "all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy," a phrase which most playful students will want to trumpet over and over again, but Madame Principal I think it is equally correct to also say that all play and no work makes Jack an unproductive, incompetent and inept boy. They key to success in education is hard work and the prerequisite to all this is discipline.

The world we live in today is very complex and competitive. Even those with good education are finding it difficult to secure the type of jobs they want. Students, I am not saying that education is a panacea to all of life's problems. A good and solid education will not necessarily make you millionaires or given you a perfect health, etc. It will however enhance your chances of getting a better job, better standard of living and thus put you in a better position of giving your children better education and provide for their need generally and they will in turn be in a better position to provide for their children and grandchildren. Greek writers such as Plutarch during the Hellenistic period urged that the education of parents was the first essential step in the education of children. In general, educated parents tend to educate their children because they understand and appreciate the value of good education.

Madam Principal, Parents and Teachers, the lack of discipline in our schools should be addressed by taking a holistic approach to the problem. Children do not exist in a vacuum. They live with their parents, guardians and they live in the community. They therefore emulate members of society that live around them. If they are made to believe that hard work is not rewarded with success; if they are made to feel that honesty and fair play does not pay; if they are made to feel that importance and respect is given to these who acquire material gains no matter how; if they observe that little or no respect is given to the rule of law and established procedure from those who should, then Ladies and Gentlemen we ourselves are part of the problem.

Madam Principal, the duties and responsibilities of students and young people are also inextricably linked with that of their parents, guardians, teachers, religious leaders and society at large and each and everyone of us has a part to play in this process especially institutions of learning such as yours.

In conclusion I would like to quote from an anonymous letter discovered on the notice board in a head teacher's study in a Bradford Secondary School and here it goes:

Dear Teacher,

I am a survivor of a concentration camp. My eyes saw what no man should witness: Gas chambers built by learned engineers. Children poisoned by educated physicians. Infants killed by trained nurses. Women and babies shot and burned by high school and college graduates. So I am suspicious of education. My request is:

Help your students become human. Your efforts must never produce learned monsters, skilled psychopaths, educated Eichmanns. Reading, writing, arithmetic are important only if they serve to make our children more human.

I thank you all.

Emmanuel Daniel Joof
http://allafrica.com/stories/200206030262.html

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