By Amos Aar
THE STATE Child’s Right Implementation Committee (SCRIC) has reiterated the need for the Benue State Government through the ministry of Women Affairs and Social Welfare to include SCRIC in the state’s budget.
Participants re-echoed this request at the first quarterly meeting of SCRIC in the year 2024 presided over by the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Welfare, Mrs Helen Nyikaa, organised by the ministry in collaboration with Sexual Offences and Response (SOAR) initiative with the support of the United Nations Trust Fund in Makurdi, the Benue State capital, as solicited in previous meetings of the committee.
Underscoring the importance of the budget, SCRIC Secretary, Mr Paul Amokaha, said apart from organizing meetings, SCRIC also spends on symposiums, seminars, policies and other salient needs. So, the budget would come handy. He disclosed that Benue is one of the five states that have embraced child’s right protection law and encouraged the committee to do everything possible to sustain it.
On sustainability of the SCRIC project to continue to prevent and eliminate abuses against minors as the United Nations Trust Fund winds up the project in May this year, SOAR initiative representative, Janet Abah, said deliberations were ongoing to sustain the project. According to her, the Director of Planning, Research and Statistics of Women Affairs and Welfare has already started working out modalities to keep the project moving and to include it in the budget, saying the desired budget approval would provide the needed strength to sustain the project when the United Nations Trust Fund finally exits.
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She further stated that the United Nations Trust Fund project which has been strengthening communities in emergencies to better address sexual violence against women under the COVID-19 pandemic right from when it was in serious discussion and context. So, the project has lasted beyond the period of COVID-19 pandemic but for now, it is winding up by the end of May this year.
Abah explained that the winding up of the project is due to “bottlenecks from the funders and other unforeseen obstacles. So, we had also gotten an information from them on winding up reminder of the project. We all know that the pandemic has in one way or the other folded off. So, it shows that the project has lingered beyond the COVID-19 pandemic”.
She announced that SCRIC was planning a 2-day child protection capacity building training for members of the committee to be held on Wednesday and Thursday this week at Pauline Makka center at 9AM each day.
The participants who also stressed the need to sensitize children on social vices attributed moral decadence portrayed by children to poor parenting which the permanent Secretary lamented that parents have failed to train their children and their failure has caused the government to fail on its part as well.
Earlier in her opening remarks, the Permanent Secretary, called on all hands to be on deck to achieve results, assuring that she was ready to welcome positive ideas to succeed in her new position.
The participants were drawn from the ministry of Health, National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), Benue state police command, child protection network, Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB).
