Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child (SPARC) demanded immediate enactment and enforcement of Child Protection Bill.
While addressing a press conference Arshad Mahmood Executive Director SPARC said that the torture and subsequent death of Shazia Masih, a 12-year-old maid, at the hands of her educated employers in Lahore in January makes it absolutely important that the National Child Protection Policy, the Protection of Children (Criminal Laws Amendments) Bill 2009, the National Commission on the Rights of Children Bill 2009 and other related legislation should be enacted and enforced on priority basis, if vulnerable and marginalised groups of children are to be protected in Pakistan.
The press conference was organised by SPARC to highlight the Shazia Masih case in particular and to express strong condemnation on the gross violation of child rights especially, who are poverty stricken, illiterate and down trodden.
Arshad said that it is high time that present government demonstrates political will by passing pending legislation, such as Protection of Children (Criminal Laws Amendments) Bill 2009, the National Commission on the Rights of Children Bill 2009 and the Charter of Child Rights Bill, which is an enabling law for making the UNCRC (UN Convention on the Rights of the Child) effective and enforceable as required international obligations.
"Pakistan will celebrate the twentieth anniversary of ratification of UNCRC but after the lapse of two decades neither adequate resources are spent for socio-economic development of children nor mechanisms for legal rectification such as child rights commissioners or child protection authorities exists", said Mahmood.
Iqba1 Detho, National Programme Manager, Child Rights stressed that in a country of about 165 million people where children comprise almost 48 percent of the population, there is no ministry for children. He further said that existing National Commission on Child Welfare and Development (NCCWD) and Provincial Commissions (PCCWDs) are not effectively catering the rectification mechanism and are just recommendatory in nature.
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child based in Geneva, which monitors the compliance of State Parties to UNCRC has raised its concerns in its subsequent reports on Pakistan that there should be a body with legal status to work for the promotion and protection of children's rights and there should be more budgetary allocation for the implementation of laws and policies concerning children.
SPARC presented a charter of demands for the promotion and protection of child rights in Pakistan which included punishment for the alleged abusers of 12-year-old Shazia Masih, immediate approval, enactment and enforcement of National Child Protection Policy and enactment of the Protection of Children (Criminal Laws Amendment) Bill 2009 and the National Commission on the Rights of Children Bill 2009, place Child Domestic Labour on the list of hazardous forms of child labour in the schedule of Employment of Children Act 199, enforcement of legislation related to child labour such as Employment of Children Act 1991 and Child Labour Policy 2002, banning child labour in homes of elected representatives and government officials, enforcement of the compulsory primary education ordinance in Punjab, Sindh, NWFP, FATA and the ICT, raising the minimum age of criminal responsibility from 7 to 12 years, extending free legal aid to juvenile offenders at the expense of the state, setting up exclusive courts for juvenile offenders, activating probation facilities and activating district vigilance committees under Bonded Labour System Abolition Act (BLAA-1992) to monitor child labour.
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