COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILDFifty-first session25 May-12 June 2009

WRITTEN REPLIES BY THE GOVERNMENT OF the NIGER TO THE LISTOF ISSUES (CRC/C/NER/Q/2) PREPARED BY THE committee ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD IN CONNECTION with the CONSIDERATION OF THE second PERIODIC REPORT OF THE NIGER (CRC/C/NER/2)*

[Received on 27 April 2009]

PART I

Under this section, the State party is requested to submit in written form additional and updated information, if possible before 6 April 2009.

1.The lack of coordination between the various public services was identified on a number of occasions in the report (CRC/C/NER/2) as posing an obstacle to the implementation of the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (“the Convention”); please indicate the measures envisaged to remedy this situation. Please also indicate the measures taken or envisaged to improve the functioning of the Committee for the Survival, Protection and Development of Children and the resources available to it to carry out its role of supervising and implementing children’s rights.

The lack of coordination between the various public services is being overcome thanks to the discussions being held among all stakeholders, with the support of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), on how to reinvigorate the Committee for the Survival, Protection and Development of Children. The Committee consists of representatives of the various ministries responsible, each in its own field, for implementing the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The additional resources that will have to be mobilized will be identified at the end of the discussions.

2.Please provide additional information on the powers and resources of the Department for the Promotion of the Rights of Women and Children established under the National Commission on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, in particular its capacity to receive complaints.

The Department for the Promotion of the Rights of Women and Children established within the National Commission on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms has the following tasks:

To ensure that the fundamental rights of the most disadvantaged sectors of the population are effectively applied

To monitor implementation of internal legislation and international conventions on the protection of children’s rights and the family environment

To study factors that harm children’s education, health and development, as well as the best ways to mitigate these factors

To establish links with ministries and national and international bodies concerned with women and children

To provide assistance to children in difficulty

To monitor the implementation by the Niger of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and all other instruments ratified by it

To promote and strengthen strategies to improve women’s living conditions

To study the issues of divorce, forced marriage, street children and domestic workers, and to find suitable ways to tackle these problems

To establish links with women’s associations, movements and institutions

To produce quarterly and annual activity reports

Complaints are filed directly with the office of the Chair of the Commission, which forwards them to the permanent secretary.

The complaints are then distributed to the relevant directors.

The Commission’s resources come from funds allocated by the Government to their departments.

3.Since the adoption in December 2007 of Act No. 2007-30 on birth registration and the national civil registration policy, please indicate the measures taken to facilitate rural communities’ access to civil registry offices and, in particular, those measures targeting communities in the most remote areas. Please also indicate the measures taken by the State party to support the decentralized administrative units responsible for birth registration.

The action plan for the national civil registration policy is now being implemented. It includes the establishment of regional civil registration offices, a wider range of declarations, the preparation of materials and their introduction in the various registration centres, and staff recruitment.

4.Please briefly describe the situation of children in the Mahamid community, which has been established in the Niger for decades but continues to have an unclear legal status.

Mahamid people living in the Niger have the same rights and duties as other Niger nationals; no community is subject to exclusion in the Niger.

5.Please inform the Committee of any initiative to combat harmful traditional practices such as those that occur in Koranic schools, including corporal punishment.

Every year a campaign against violence directed at women and children is organized throughout the country in order to raise awareness of the problem among the general public, including Marabout teachers. The campaign notably involves religious and traditional chiefs.

The Niger’s Criminal Code prohibits all forms of violence against children.

6.Please provide information on the situation of children living in slavery-like conditions, public information campaigns on the new provisions of the Criminal Code on slavery and prosecutions brought against those who continue to keep people in slavery and on the reintegration and rehabilitation of victims, including the civil registration of freed children.

“Slavery-like conditions” are taken to refer to the worst forms of child labour. The Department for the Promotion of the Rights of Women and Children established within the National Commission on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms has had International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions Nos. 138 and 182 ratified, and a national steering group has been set up to combat child labour. An action plan has been drawn up and implemented. Rehabilitation work is under way in partnership with the Ministry for the Advancement of Women and Protection of Children, the Ministry of Labour and civil society partners. Birth registration drives aimed at children in vulnerable situations are organized on a regular basis.

7.With reference to paragraph 38 of the report, please specify which measures intended to prevent births are considered to constitute the crime of genocide.

“Measures intended to prevent births” means any act likely to prevent a group or community from having children, such as abortion, sterilization of women of childbearing age or castration of men.

8.Please inform the Committee about the level of water reserves and indicate whether the State party has reviewed its national plan for water and sanitation. If so, what measures have been enacted with a view to urgently increasing access to drinking water and sanitation services?

The Niger has the following reserves of drinking water:

Surface water: 30 billion m3 a year

Groundwater: 2,000 billion m3

Water-supply coverage was 62 per cent in 2007. Every village of 250 inhabitants or more must have a modern water connection. All these points are covered in the Niger’s rural development strategy.

9.Please indicate the children’s issues that are considered as priorities for implementation of the Convention.

One of the principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child is non-discrimination. The Niger does not consider any right as having priority over another, and no category of children as more privileged than another in the enjoyment of rights.

PART II

Under this section, the State party is to briefly (three pages maximum) update the information provided in its report with regard to:

New proposed or enacted legislation (the Children’s Code, the General Family Code or Personal Status Code, the Trafficking in Persons Bill)

New institutions (the Department for the Promotion of Women’s and Children’s Rights, the Central Minor Protection Service, the D irectorate for Promotion of the  School Enrolment and Training of Girls, the Youth Parliament, the National Youth Council , the National Commission for Oversight and Coordination of the National Plan of Action to Combat Child Trafficking)

Newly implemented policies (national civil registration policy, draft framework document setting out a national integrated development policy for early childhood, national strategy for specialized education)

Newly implemented action plans, programmes and projects, and their scope

The Children’s Code was drafted and approved in 2005. The national civil registration policy and the draft framework document setting out a national integrated development policy for early childhood are being processed by the General Secretariat of the Government for adoption.

The Youth Parliament, the National Youth Council and the National Commission for Oversight and Coordination of the National Plan of Action to Combat Child Trafficking are operating as before, with no changes in the way they work.

The strategy for specialized education has been to establish integrated classes in every region and to equip them with teaching materials; to better train teachers and supervisors; and to identify and enrol disabled children. The curricula are under review.

The Directorate for Promotion of the School Enrolment and Training of Girls was set up in 2005 and has carried out advocacy and awareness-raising activities aimed at the enrolment of girls in school, especially through the school management committees (COGES), and has taken a number of initiatives to encourage girls, awarding prizes for excellence and providing educational support.

PART III

Data and statistics, if available

In the light of article 4 of the Convention, please provide disaggregated data by sex, age group and geographical area covering the years 2005, 2006 and 2007 on child victims of abuse and neglect, in particular on the:

(a)Number of reported cases;

(b)Number and percentage of cases that resulted in prosecution, conviction or other type of follow-up;

(c)Number and percentage of child victims who have benefited from legal aid and rehabilitation measures.

A system of legal aid is being set up. Lawyers will shortly be assigned to the regions. Disaggregated data are not available at the national level, though a statistics department has just been set up to fill this gap.

In the light of article 4 of the Convention, please provide disaggregated data by sex, age group and geographical area covering the years 2005, 2006 and 2007 on the economic and sexual exploitation of children and on child victims of trafficking.

Legislation is in place, but the above-mentioned problem with regard to statistics applies here too.

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