*Odinkalu is the Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Abuja.
The global call for children to be protected from all forms of violence, in all settings was sounded on this day in 1989, when the UN adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Africa rein- forced this call to end violence, one year later, when it adopted its own African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child.
A four year-old girl raped by her uncle; a ten year old boy beaten to death by his father; yet another heart wrenching story of abuse. No day passes without similar stories in the media. Many of us will sigh and turn the page, searching for the financials, the latest corruption scandal, or the sports news. We seem to have become desensitized to these horrors our children suffer. On Universal Children’s Day, marked on November 20, and as the Goodwill Ambassador on Ending Violence Against Children, I urge you, please read on.
Nigeria readily signed up to both treaties in 1991, and in 2003 we passed our own national law – the Child’s Rights Act – bringing in comprehensive protection for children from violence.
Paper commitments, however, are meaningless without action and our children continue to suffer extreme levels of physical, sexual and emotional violence. Six out of ten children (60%) in Nigeria, according to the National Violence Against Children Survey, conducted by the National Population Commission with support from UNICEF and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suffer such violence. By any measure, that is shocking, horrific and, for Nigeria as a nation, an embarrassment.
One in four girls (25%) and one in ten boys (10%) will suffer sexual violence before they reach 18 years old; this year alone 9 million of our children will have been subjected to rape and sexual abuse. And they suffer in silence. They are prevented from reaching out for help by shame, stigma and a lack of knowledge about where to get help. Most worrying is that sexual violence is so normalized amongst our children that many of them do not realise that what they suffering is wrong.
Before they have turned 18 years
http://abagram..com.ng/2015/11/ending-violence-against-children.html

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