As South Africa commemorates Human Rights Month, Minister of Social Development, Lindiwe Zulu, has emphasised the importance of protecting children rights.<\/p>\n
The Constitution and the Children\u2019s Act advocate for children\u2019s rights to be regarded as basic services including the rights to life, shelter, protection, maintenance, education, social security and parenting. <\/p>\n
\u201cHuman rights cannot be complete as long as global trends replicate our country as a centre of violence, rape, abduction, teenage pregnancy, gangsterism and many forms of social ills and abuse encountered by our children on a daily basis,\u201d Zulu said.<\/p>\n
The Minister was addressing a National Roundtable Webinar on Child Killings on Friday, which she hosted in partnership with the United Nations Children\u2019s Fund (UNICEF).<\/p>\n
\u201cThe 2019\/2020 Annual Crime Statistics presented by the South African Police Service showed that child murders dropped by 7% meanwhile 943 children were murdered and more than 24 000 were sexually assaulted in South Africa.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis states we are an angry and wounded society that needs urgent intervention\u2026. We need to do everything we can, prevention is better than cure,\u201d Zulu said.<\/p>\n
She said all sectors of society need to reflect and introspect on what is not being done right in the cause of prevention.<\/p>\n
\u201cChild killings cannot be taken lightly as many children lose their lives and future during early stages in their lives, this paints a very bleak picture for us as a country,\u201d the Minister said.<\/p>\n
Zulu said the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the high levels of inequality, poverty, unemployment and other social ills impacting on the wellbeing of children.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a result, families wherein children reside were hard hit by the social economic conditions ranging from gender based violence (GBV) and femicide, substance abuse as well as job losses.<\/p>\n
\u201cChildren and families who are already vulnerable due to socio economic exclusion or those living in crowded setting become more vulnerable due to the manifestations of physical and emotional abuse, neglect or the death of family members<\/p>\n
\u201cMost concerning is when children die and are hurt at the hands of those they trust most as such as their parents, caregivers and family members,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The Minister expressed concern at children losing their lives for ritual purposes. \u201cThis is an indication that something is completely wrong with our society as we are often unable to take care and protect our children,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The webinar formed part of the National Human Rights Month commemorations which seek to highlight and address the plight of children and their rights to protection.<\/p>\n
This year, South Africa is observing the month under the theme: \u201cThe year of Charlotte Maxeke: promoting human rights in the age of COVID-19\u201d. \u2013 SAnews.gov.za<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As South Africa commemorates Human Rights Month, Minister of Social Development, Lindiwe Zulu, has emphasised the importance of protecting children rights. The Constitution and the Children\u2019s Act advocate for children\u2019s rights to be regarded as basic services including the rights to life, shelter, protection, maintenance, education, social security and parenting. \u201cHuman rights cannot be complete […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-184519","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-sanews","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184519\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}