CHILD ABUSE RAMPANT IN SOUTHERN AFRICA

by Winnet Mutimbe

Amid reports of increasing cases of child abuse in the region, law enforcement agencies are lobbying for the establishment of victim-friendly courts in southern Africa to enable the victims to testify in a comfortable environment and reduce the problem.

Child abuse, which generally refers to all forms of ill-treatment of children, includes negligence, depriving a child of education, health or food as well as physical, sexual and emotional abuse.

In Zimbabwe, the victim-friendly court system has reportedly been helping fight the problem as children feel protected against their abusers whom they do not see as they relate incidents of abuse to court officials under a less intimidating environment.

Indicators from press reports across southern Africa show that child abuse is rife in the region. However, the statistics that are available on the incidence of the problem, are not very accurate because no region-wide research has been carried out.

Nonetheless, media reports have highlighted cases of sex with children being prescribed by people claiming to be traditional healers. Sodomy has also been reported in male street children with men in cars enticing the children with offers of shelter or money.

According to a Swaziland-based Child Rights Committee magazine, when children are abused, they become confused and withdrawn. This greatly hampers the development of the child unless he/she is given professional help, it says.

In South Africa, a child is raped every five minutes and child abuse has rocketed by 108 percent since 1993, according to the National Council for Child and Family Welfare.

Figures from the South African police Child Protection Unit show 15,732 cases of child rape were reported in 1998 compared to 7,559 in 1994. Reported assault cases shot to 4,022 from 1,905 in the same period.

Tilly Brouwer, marketing director of the National Council for Child and Family Welfare, said in a statement that the statistics represented a national disgrace.

"Based solely on the cases, we are able to document, we know that rape and abuse of children in this country is way out of control. It is a moral outrage," she said.

Child abuse is so rampant in South Africa that the majority of entries to an Art competition organised by Childline a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in the country, showed widespread killings, sexual abuse, beatings, drugs and other related phenomena.

In an effort to curb the spread of the problem, SADC Heads of State and Government signed a Declaration on Gender and Development at their Summit in Blantyre, Malawi, on 8 September 1997, committing their countries to among other issues, take "urgent measures to prevent and deal with increasing levels of violence against women and children."

At international level, it is now more than two years since 122 representatives of the world's governments, inter-governmental and non-governmental agencies, members of the world's media and a delegation of young people, unanimously adopted the Stockholm Declaration and Agenda for Action to combat the commercial sexual exploitation of children.

NGOs such as Childline have been working intensely to reduce the rate of child sexual abuse.

Lynne Cawood, director of Childline South Africa said, "These children are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. They are fraught with fear of violence."

However, there is not enough funding available in the region to counsel children to deal with their experiences in the hope of breaking the cycle of violence, said Mary Robertson, a worker at a trauma clinic for children in South Africa.

"Children may not report abuse because of negative attitudes, where they are made to feel at fault, and usually strongly threatened never to report the abuse. This problem has crippled the effectiveness of efforts by authorities to monitor and eradicate child sexual abuse," she added.

However, most NGOs such as the Harare Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse (HAVS) in Zimbabwe, have called for stiffer sentences for child abusers and a directory with names of all child abusers so that they may be barred from places where children are.

Merryl Kantor, chairperson of the Child Abuse Alliance of South Africa, urged parents to have an open relationship with their children and listen to them when they complain about abuse.

Activists say children should be encouraged to report any form of abuse to their parents or guardian or the police. Information and awareness programmes should be linked to accessible forms of reporting, such as reporting boxes in schools and police stations, help-lines and phone-in lines. (SARDC)