On 23 June 2021, Cities for Children facilitated a workshop for civil society organizations in Pakistan entitled “Change Our Story” – Understanding and Implementing UN General Comment No. 21 on Children in Street Situations.
This was the second in a series of three events to forge a path forward for street-connected children in Pakistan, with support from the Consortium of Street Children. The aims of this session were to promote participants’ understanding of the UNGC 21 as an authoritative international instrument; to discuss real-world challenges faced by organizations in education and protection; and explore how to embed the rights-based approach of the UNGC in practice.
Participants included representatives from a number of organizations who have been working on issues related street children and child protection in Pakistan, including Dost Foundation, Sahil, Search for Justice, Door of Awareness, National Commission on the Rights of the Child and SPARC.
The session began with a conversation on who we meant by “children in street situations” or “street-connected children,” and an exploration of some of the salient features of UNGC 21. The UNGC 21 takes a non-discriminatory, rights based approach towards street-connected children, with an emphasis on children’s participation in matters concerning them. It lays out three kinds of approaches: the welfare approach, taking the lens of rescuing children as victims; the repressive approach, which includes criminalization for survival activities; and the rights-based approach, which considers the child as a rights-holder and the state as the duty-bearer.
UNGC 21 holds guidance for prevention (pre-empting the challenges of poverty and domestic violence) as well as the response that governments can adopt to ensure the rights of street children. It lays out a roadmap for developing comprehensive national strategies related to such children. These include a legislative and policy review to eliminate provisions that discriminate against street children, and the practices that place them at risk including forced eviction. Data collection to gauge the scale of the challenge (while avoiding stigmatising street children or placing them at greater risk) is another national level recommendation, as is the creation of comprehensive child protection systems. Also, importantly, the General Comment reminds policy makers and civil society organisations to acknowledge the complexity of the issue and to prioritise individual children’s best interests in all situations. As adults, it is easy for policy makers and civil society members to assume that they know what is best for a child. The UNGC 21 emphasizes that children must be given a say in determining their future.
Urgent challenges
After an initial description of UNGC 21, the workshop participants were asked to share their experiences and identify urgent challenges faced by street children in Pakistan. Five major themes emerged during this brainstorming session:
- Violence of different kinds including physical, sexual and psychological
- Access to education, impeded by factors like lack of documentation
- Discriminatory laws and policies that criminalise children and families
- Lack of data on the nature and scale of the challenge
- Absence of a national strategy for street children.
Sexual violence, corporal punishment in schools and domestic settings were identified as major challenges for street-connected children in the country. Azaz from Dost Welfare Foundation emphasized that breaking the cycle of physical, sexual, emotional and psychological abuse for street-connected children was extremely important as survivors could turn to violence if they did not receive the help and support they need.
Identity documents like B-form and birth certificates were also described as one of the biggest impediments to street children’s access to education. Participants pointed out that since many children were from displaced communities and had been on the move for years, they did not have the required documentation to access public schooling. Sabeen from SPARC emphasized that a national strategy was needed to address the challenges faced by street connected children, to ensure that national and provincial institutions were working towards the same end goals.
Iqbal Detho from NCRC shared that the present criminalization of street children, their vagrancy and presence in public spaces could be traced back to colonial times. Colonial definitions of vagrancy were designed to prevent people from gathering and protesting, something that could not be extended to street children in the present day and rendered the current legislation problematic. A point of discussion in the group was shared that many organisations were using the pretext of rehabilitation to institutionalize street children, which was against the spirit of UNGC 21 and needed to be rectified. According to the UNGC21, “Deprivation of liberty is never a form of protection”.
Recommendations for action
After a brief introduction to the case study of Uruguay’s participatory national strategy on street-connected children, the discussion moved towards potential solutions for Pakistan.
Some major takeaways highlighted during the discussion were:
An urgent need for a national action plan to make progress on street children’s issues, possibly within a larger framework of child protection. Ifitkhar Mubarik from SJFP stressed that the government needed to make its commitment to street children clear before passing any national or provincial legislation to tackle the issue.
Comprehensive legislative and policy review in line with the rights-based approach and UNGC 21. Iqbal Detho called for the removal of discriminatory laws in particular.
A life skills-based educational approach including vocational opportunities for street children, for learning to be valued. Manizeh Bano from Sahil and Ghazi Taimoor from Doors of Awareness both had insights to share around this, as there is a need to frame education as something that will add practical value to the lives of children who often need to choose between earning or going to school.
Simplifying the process for obtaining identity documents, especially for children with refugee or displaced community backgrounds. Sajida from SPARC shared that the difficult process of retrospectively obtaining B-form and birth certificates compounded problems by hindering their access to healthcare, public schooling and jobs.
- Strengthening of child protection legislation and systems. Children face multiple risks of violence with little recourse, and working to prevent them from taking to the streets as well as to provide real support in working with families to overcome the challenges of urban poverty will take careful thinking as well as investment. According to the UNGC, interventions moving children into alternative care without consultation don’t work – they won’t stay – so sustainable solutions must be found. There is need to train officials as well as law enforcement agencies and put in place measures to reduce risks of harassment and have transparent systems set up to protect their rights.
Overall, the workshop provided civil society organisations with a chance to share their expertise with each other and gave them an opportunity to use the UNGC 21 framework to discuss the challenges faced by street-connected children. It will be followed by an in-person action-planning session involving a broader swathe of policymakers and civil society representatives, being planned for August 2021.