Description

UNICEF correspondent Guy Hubbard reports on a far-reaching campaign to protect the rights of all Namibian children through birth registration.

Transcript

Birth Registration Aims to Protect Child Rights in Namibia Guy Hubbard: More than a year ago, another idea for children became a reality. For the Namibian ministry of home affairs and immigration, set up an office in the maternity ward at Katutura Hospital, the main public hospital in the country’s capital Windhoek. The purpose to make suer every child born gets birth certificate. In a country where 80 percent of women deliver in a hospital, but only four out of every 10 children have a birth certificate, what better place to start. The unique partnership between two ministries with support form UNICEF is not being rolled up to 34 health facilities. It was clear though that in such a sparsely populated country this alone was not enough. There was an urgent need to take services to those children who had missed out. In the remote sandy down of Okongo, in northern Namibia, hundreds of people including children and the elderly have been camped out overnight waiting for the mobile registration services. They are desperate to be counted as a Namibian but the nearest home affairs office is more than 100 kilometers away, out of reach for many of the people who live here. The mobile campaign is the second in a year and has sought to bring these critical services to the most remote communities and to protect with documentation some of the poorest and most vulnerable children from early marriage, abuse and trafficking. Rosalia Nghidinwa: Namibia is a member state of United Nations, mandate given to all states to have their people registered and have their certificate is the right they can have access to health facilities, education, social grants. Guy Hubbard: Birth certificates are even more of necessity from the Namibia’s indigenous san children. In a country suffering from very high levels of disparity, these are the poorest and most marginalized minority, who often live on the periphery without access to the most critical services. Sakaria does not know his age nor full names of his parents. A relative brought him along to get his papers. As an orphaned child, getting his certificate should now translate into access to a child grant as well as access to school. Tilames Augustinus: The problem is that many people like nomadic people, they do not know their dates of birth, the ages and do not know their names and their father and their mother’s names. Guy Hubbard: Petras’s mother has brought her newborn son. Parents are supposed to bring their own documents to prove lineage. Since she does not know his age and is herself illiterate, she places her thumbprint on his form. For the san, the civil register for the region makes an exception, otherwise it is likely they will remain undocumented and subsequently disenfranchised. The new approach being undertaken by the government of Namibia to register all children illustrates that with a mix of creativity and pragmatism, they can ensure that all children now and in the future have access to the rights of citizenship. A birth certificate alone will not ensure Petra’s breaks out of the cycle of poverty in which he lives but it is a critical first step in protecting and empowering him with his rights as a Namibian child. This is Guy Hubbard reporting for UNICEF Television, Unite for Children.