African values and the rights of the child: Challenges and prospects

The realization of a culture of human rights and especially the rights of children in Africa has not received a lot of international attention and concerns. In most cases, concern for such rights only come to the fore during periods of famine and conflicts in the continent. In other periods there seem to be little efforts by governments in Africa to promote and protect the facts of the child. This lack of concern especially at the regional level has certain underlying issues that need to be explained. In this book, we acknowledge the fact that since the CRC of 1989, children are now holders of rights just like adults but the enjoyment of these rights is problematic for children especially in African communities. The communal nature of the African social structure has had its own toil on the rights of the child in most rural African villages to date. In such structures an individual adult or child is part and parcel of the community. The welfare of the community supersedes the rights of the individual members of the community. This is the structure in which the African child, in addition to the disadvantage of vulnerable age, finds himself/herself.