Protecting our children — I

Consecutive governments have failed to show commitment and will to implement the Convention on Rights of the Child.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child, hereafter called the Convention, is a landmark in the arena of child rights with almost universal ratification. The drafting of such a unanimously accepted document is a great achievement in itself, yet it seems that the expected impacts on the lives of children are far from realisation. The real issue is its implementation which requires the efforts and cooperation of all those working in the field of children’s rights but above all requires the efforts of the ratifying state. Consecutive governments in Pakistan have failed to show the required commitment and political will to implement the Convention.

Pakistan ratified the Convention on November 12, 1990 but has not been able to implement it. This can be judged from the following indicators: legislation in accordance with the Convention, resource allocation, establishment of effective coordination mechanisms and training and sensitisation of professionals. In its recommendations, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child reiterated that “the State party scrutinise carefully existing legislative and other measures, both at the federal and provincial levels, with a view to ensuring that the provisions and principles of the Convention are implemented throughout the territory including the Northern Tribal Territories”.

Legislative measures have been taken in bits and pieces by the governments during the past 10 years including changes in the Hudood Ordinance, the introduction of the Punjab Destitute and Neglected Children Act 2004 and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Child Protection and Welfare Act 2010. However, the federal government has not been able to introduce the long-awaited legislations at the federal level; the Child Protection (Criminal Laws Amendment) Bill, the National Commission on the Rights of Child Bill, the Charter of Child Rights Bill, the Prohibition of Corporal Punishment Bill and the Child Marriages Restraint Amendment Bill 2009. The Bills have taken into consideration most of the Committee’s recommendations regarding bringing the local laws in conformity with the Convention i.e. increasing the minimum age for criminal responsibility from 7 to 12 years, banning corporal punishment, criminalising offences against children and raising the marriageable age of girls from 16 to 18 years. Despite the fact that several consultations were held on the draft bills, pushed by the civil society, the bills could not be placed before parliament due to lack of interest of the government and various bureaucratic hurdles.

Similarly, implementation of the provisions and principles of the Convention throughout the country could not be realised. This is because under Article 247 (3) of the Constitution, legislation in the country is extended to the Provincially Administered Tribal Areas (Pata), Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), Federally Administered Northern Areas and Azad Jammu and Kashmir through a special notification by the president, in case of the federally administered areas, or by the provincial governor, in case of the provincially administered areas. Although some children-related laws such as the Employment of Children Act of 1991 and the Juvenile Justice System Ordinance of 2000 have been extended to Fata and Pata, the required infrastructure such as a judicial system, legal assistance, probation system, rehabilitation and so on, still need to be put in place. Due to this, these laws could not be implemented, and thus their passage has had no impact on the rights of children of the region. The present government repeatedly promised to repeal the Frontier Crimes Regulations  which is based on the doctrine of collective responsibility but have failed to do so particularly when a number of such constitutional changes were made through the 18th Constitutional Amendment.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 23^rd, 2010.