Over 400 children representatives from all the five East African Community (EAC) member states are expected at Rwanda’s National Children’s summit scheduled to take place on Thursday in the capital Kigali.
The Gender and Family Promotion minister, Jean d’Arch Mujawamariya, told APA that the summit, fifth of its kind aims at giving children a voice and sense of responsibility at an early age.
“Rwanda has been holding the summit since 2005 to give the children a platform to express their views and enhance a sense of decision and leadership skills at an early age,” Mujawamariya said.
She said the involvement of the other four EAC member countries would help children and their teachers share knowledge and exchange ideas from across the region on a range of issues.
The four guest countries- Burundi, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania- are expected to send at least two girls, two boys and a representative of children with disabilities each.
Also for the first time refugee children are expected to be represented according to their host refugee camps in the country.
According to Mujawamariya, the children’s summit in Rwanda managed to influence the relocation of education fund from the Local Government ministry to the ministry of Education, inclusion of a children’s chapter in the country’s Economic Development Programme for the rural sector among others
The children’s summit was conceived during the tenth commemoration of the 1994 genocide where children demanded a representation as double victims of the killings.
Rwandan children urged that they stood better chances of reconciling the society as a neutral force since they were innocent of all that happened as children from genocide perpetrators’ families and those from victim families.
The summit falls on the 20th anniversary of the declaration of the United Nations Children’s Rights of which Rwanda is a signatory.
Source African Press Agency
