Tackling Child, Maternal Mortality Challenges

Since its inception in 1989, after more than 60 years of advocacy, the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), has been ratified more quickly, and by more governments than any other human rights instrument. Its basic premise is that children are born with fundamental freedom and the inherent rights of human beings.

Many governments have gone even further enacting legislations, creating mechanisms and putting into place a range of creative measures to ensure the protection and realisation of the rights of those under the age of 18.

This has been the cornerstone of brainstorming sessions between journalists and various interest groups including the UNICEF, and the aim has been how to solve the problem facing women and children in the country, two groups that have been identified as vulnerable and seeking attention and care.

During one of the forum, the officer in charge of the UNICEF, ‘D’ field office, Dr susan Ojomo, had painted a gloomy picture of what children and women are going through in the country. Some of these include high child mortality and poor health care services, poor environmental and hygiene, malnutrition, lack of basic education and AIDs scourge among others.

Dr Ojomo therefore called for the implementation of the Child Rights Bill by the state Houses of  Assembly, so as to improve the lots of children, adding that surveys carried out on acceptable standards for improvement of the situation of women and children clearly show that most states one still far below the required standard with the exception of some southern states in the country.

“The situation is one the government has to intervene and put in more resources to improve the situation because scores of women and children die daily because of no access to health care services. On our part as UNICEF, we have done a lot in terms of the provision of grant and medical equipment, training and drugs to tackle the problems in the country,” she said.

The UNICEF official gave instances where the UN body had assisted with over a quarter of a million worth of Insecticide Treated Nets (ITN) to prevent malaria attacks on mothers and children, apart from N60 million spent last year to tackle malaria alone. She noted that 35 states in the country, with the exception of Cross River State, were high burden area, implying that they were lagging behind in the use of ITN.

While commending the effort of the UNICEF, a medical practitioner in Rivers State, Dr Tonye Godswill, said there was the need for government in some states to complement the effort of UNICEF and other development partners in the provision of ITNs to reduce occurrences of malaria attack, adding that Rivers State government has done a lot in this regard.

Dr Godswill noted that if other governments did more in this area, it would greatly reduce malaria in the country, pointing out that the role of the UNICEF is to complement government but not to take over government responsibility.

He noted that a parlay with the media and focal persons would lead to effective programme service delivery that would better the lot of women and children in the state and also avail the two the opportunity to work together and achieve results.

A Port Harcourt-based social  critic, Mr David Lawson, in his opinion canvassed for increased budgetary allocation for issues relating to women and children and the other socially disadvantaged group as well as the implementation and domestication of the UN convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.

Mr Lawson called for the improvement in maternal and child healthcare, stating that a large number of women suffer preventable and premature loss of life while giving birth as a result of inadequate healthcare facilities and incentives for health personnel, ignorance and cultural taboos among others.

“To us it is sad that women have to die while giving life. Nigeria has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world with high prevalence in the rural areas. In fact, mortality is also high and estimated at 105 per 1000 live birth with less than five mortality rate at 178 per cent per 1000.”

On women economic empowerment, he said several other rated socio-economic factors have led to the poor economic status of a large segment of Nigerian women, such that 70 per cent of people who live below the poverty line are women. To address this trend, he said the ministry of women affairs was to take some initiatives including supplies of food processing machines to the states for distribution to women cooperatives at the grassroots.

To further boost economic empowerment through income generation activities among women, the ministry in collaboration with Nigerian Agricultural Cooperative and Rural Development Bank (NACRDB), it was learnt has already created a women fund for economic development which some states have benefited from, but are yet to pay their counterpart funding to enable more women co-operative groups to take advantage of, adding that the fund is another scheme established in collaboration with the Bank of Industry (BOI) to enhance inter-prenural  activities through the provisions of micro-credit facilities to women entrepreneurs.

“Both schemes are primarily designed to bridge gender gaps in the credit finance sector by reducing the vigorous conventional bank procedure for accessing loans that have kept women marginalised in that sector.”

Infact, the former Minister of Women Affairs, Mrs Josephine Aneni at a forum in Nassarawa State late last year,  urged the government to provide an enabling environment for women in the state to benefit from the scheme in addition to passing appropriate legislation that will empower women’s economic status.

On girl – child education, she said according to a study by UNESCO and UNICEF, measuring exclusion of the girl-child from primary education, more than four million girls aged between six and 11 years do not attend school in Nigeria. The report, she said, disclosed that illiteracy is a catastrophe for any child but devastating for the girls because it makes them more vulnerable to poverty, ignorance, maternal mortality, hunger, violence, abuse, exploitation, trafficking, HIV/AIDS and other diseases.

“As we all know, education is a basic human right, vital to social and personal development and well being. Therefore, all children, including the girl-child deserve quality education. Unfortunately, the girl-child is often marginalised and her prospects sacrificed when it comes to sending children to school,” she stressed.

She said although there is steady progress in primary school enrolment girls still account for more than half of Nigeria’s out of school children, while progress in girls enrolment retention and completion will have to be twice as rapid as it is now, the minister said that if Nigeria is to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) of achieving gender parity in education by the year 2015, including the attainment of Universal Basic Education, she needs to do more than she is doing now.

Patterson Koko