'Children need an environment of safety and peace to learn'
- Dr Suomi Sakai, Representative, UNICEF Nepal
Dr Suomi Sakai, Representative, UNICEF Nepal, spoke to Nepalnews on challenges faced by the children of Nepal on education and health. Excerpts of the interview:
1. What has been the impact of the recent bombings of private schools and their closure for the first two weeks of the academic year?
In a time of conflict, one thing that helps children feel that they can maintain a normal life is to go to school. It is deeply upsetting to children to hear that schools are being bombed. It is very stressful and a direct threat to them.
UNICEF and its partners are working to build up and improve the quality of government schools. You have to remember than in the 1950s there were only about 150 primary schools in Nepal and there are still not enough schools for all its children. More than half a million children are not in school even now. A particular goal of the 2062 Welcome to School campaign was to increase enrolment into government schools of children from disadvantaged backgrounds.
Private schools account for roughly a quarter of all schools in Nepal and as such do play a major role in education. Enforced closure of private schools in some areas meant children from those schools then enrolled in government schools. This placed an impossible burden on government schools and their teachers. One effect was to shut out entry of the very disadvantaged children that the Welcome to School campaign was trying to help.
2. What about the impact of the conflict generally on education?
Children need an environment of safety and peace in which to learn. The conflict has instead created an environment of doubt, an environment of fear. Older children are scared that they may be marched off for political indoctrination and possible recruitment by one side, and scared of being harassed or detained as suspected insurgents by the other side. And in some of the conflict-affected areas, schools have been turned into barracks, playgrounds have been dug with trenches, and explosive devices have been left in school areas.
A more silent impact has been the steady erosion of the school year, which is supposed to be about 220 days. In some districts, this has been cut by 100 days or more. Frequent closures are hard for children learning to read – they may have to start again each time. Some just give up.
3. How about the impact of the conflict on the health of children?
One positive sign is that it has been possible to get agreement that basic health services for children must continue. Distribution of Vitamin A and de-worming tablets twice a year has been able to continue and coverage remains good. Vitamin A helps children fight disease. Without these distributions some12,000 additional children would die in the year –more than the total number of people killed in the conflict so far. Similarly, the national measles campaign is just finishing its final phase, reaching over 9.4 million children.
It is also vital that essential drugs reach health posts - and stay there – for use by children and their families. And it is also important for both sides to allow free movement of people requiring medical treatment. Far too many mothers in this country die during child birth as it is. It is particularly tragic when they die because they are prevented from reaching a health post or hospital.
4. How do you see the civil society’s response in Nepal to the Maoist threat especially in the areas like education and health?
The active efforts of civil society have certainly helped engender a common understanding and agreement by both sides to put the needs of children first when it comes to health, at least in terms of vaccination, Vitamin A and de-worming. These campaigns have also relied very heavily on the services of Female Community Health Volunteers. And we must also thank the human-rights and other organizations who mobilized so effectively to build understanding and support for the measles campaign.
The challenge is to expand this one area of common interest to include wider health services as well as basic education. Perhaps a starting point is to engage in a dialogue about what peace would look like, and to look at other countries affected by conflict. Some managed to keep health and education systems relatively intact so the job of rebuilding was much less. Sadly, in others where the conflict really hit hard on children, the task of rebuilding is longer and harder because the new generation lacks the skills of the previous generation.
Perhaps the question for civil society to be asking the adults fighting the conflict is what their vision of a peaceful Nepal looks like once the conflict is over. Does this vision include healthy children who can read, write and count? Or is this vision populated with children and young adults who are sick and illiterate?
There does seem to be a common understanding that this vision should be of children who are healthy. So what can civil society do to expand it to include children who can read, write and count? There are encouraging signs in some villages that parents and civil-society organizations have been able to get all people, irrespective of their stance in the conflict, to support the Welcome to School campaign and the concepts behind it.
5. Can you explain why there is going to be another meeting in Geneva this month about Nepal ?
This second meeting is specifically about child rights as opposed to the meeting last month which involved the UN Commission on Human Rights.
Nepal signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1990, and one of its obligations as a signatory is to make periodic reports to the Committee on the Rights of the Child. These reports indicate achievements as well as difficulties in implementation of the Convention.
Nepal will be meeting the Committee on 20 May to discuss progress on implementation of the Convention. It will then receive the Committee’s Concluding Observations including comments on positive factors identified, main subjects of concern and suggestions and recommendations for action.
Article 45 of the Convention calls on UNICEF and other agencies to foster the effective implementation of the Convention. Although UNICEF does not directly engage in the dialogue with the Committee, a UNICEF field presence at the Plenary assists in the follow-up which is why I will be attending the meeting also.
nepalnews.com dr May 06 05
(Editor’s Note: Nepalnews will continue this column by talking to officials, professionals, politicians, businessmen, diplomats, those who make outstanding achievements in their chosen field and newsmakers. Please post your suggestions/comments to feedback@mos.com.np )
