I Have the Right To Make a Difference in the World

Welcome to our first post on the Justice Gang blog. Sfiso, and myself, Gugu, will be taking turns to do the posts, and I’m starting off. We hope you’ll enjoy the blog, and find lots of useful information. This week we’re looking at The Right of Children to Make A Difference in the World.


A few days ago, we got an email from someone who saw our TV programme, this is what it said:

Dear Justice Gang. First of all I want to congratulate you. I’ve learned a lot about children’s rights from you, but I’m curious about something. It seems like we have been talking about Rights for a very long time, but when did all this talk about rights begin? How come we still have to talk about human rights and children’s rights or rights of ANY kind. When are we going to look around and see that our rights are for real?

Here’s some information about how children’s rights got started:

• In 1948 the United Nations drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which outlined rights which should be applied to all people in the world. 170 countries signed this declaration but these rights did not seem to apply equally to ALL people. Segregation in the United States and Apartheid in South Africa separated people from each other according to their race. Black people were not given the same rights as white people until both segregation and apartheid ended.
  

• Recently the United Nations felt that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights needed to be specially applied to children and they drafted the Convention on the Rights of the Child. This document gave children all the rights that applied to adults but also, most importantly, the right to protection. You can find more info about the Convention over here.

When Sfiso and I were doing our research we discovered that although many governments have signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child, children’s rights are still abused in many countries. Did you know that even today millions and millions of children work in terrible conditions?

Did you know that even though slavery was abolished a long time ago, child slavery still exists today? Imagine you are a 6 year old boy from India whose parents have sold you for income. You are smuggled out of the country. You are crammed with other children into a small room and fed very little. You are now a camel jockey. You are one of many children who are kidnapped or sold and taken to wealthy countries where camel racing is popular. A boy’s light weight and high pitched voice are thought to make the camel run fast.

Child camel jockeys in Qatar, read more here

When you hear stories like this you realise why it's so important to keep talking about children’s rights. Even though many countries have signed beautiful declarations, we still have a long way to go.
So, what can we do to make a difference in our world?

Here is an inspiring story about a child who made a huge difference to his world, and helped many other children:

Once upon a time there was a boy named Iqbal Masih who at the age of four was sold into bonded labour by his parents who had been in need of money. Iqbal was sold to a carpet maker and for 6 years he was forced to work 12 hours a day, six days a week, tying tiny knots to make beautiful hand-made carpets for export. Iqbal never had a normal childhood, never went to school or had time to play sports with friends. At the age of 10, he escaped the brutal slavery and later joined the Bonded Labor Liberation Front of Pakistan to help stop child labor around the world. Iqbal helped over 3,000 Pakistani children that were in bonded labour escape to freedom, and gave talks about child labour all around the world.

You can read more about Iqbal's story here.

If you want to do more to help promote children's rights and fight child labour, visit the website for Free the Children. This is an organisation that works to end child labour and child slavery. The link is here.



Here are a few links you can go to if you are having any problems with children's rights or if you feel your rights are not being upheld.

Childline
The Children's Rights Centre
Government Department of Social Development
Government Department of Labour

If you have any problems or challenges, write to us, we would really love to hear your story, and don't forget, you can comment on the blog and let us know what you think.

Well, that's it for this week, on Monday Sfiso will be writing the next blog post for the Justice Gang. I hope you have a great week, and if things are not going going your way, email The Justice Gang and we'll do our best to help, and put you in touch with an organisation that can help.

Bye for now
Gugu