COMMITTEE ON RIGHTS OF CHILD EXAMINES REPORT OF MALAWI

Committee on the Rights of the Child


13 January 2009


The Committee on the Rights of the Child today reviewed the second periodic report of Malawi on how that country is implementing the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Introducing the report, Anna Andrew Namathanga Kachikho, Minister of Women and Child Development of Malawi, in terms of positive achievements, highlighted that there had been a high level of political commitment and resources for scaling up the responses to the orphans and other vulnerable children crisis in Malawi. The Ministry of Women and Child Development had been strengthened to take on a leadership role to operationalize the National Plan of Action for Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children, and a national steering committee, national technical working group and a technical and advisory support unit were in place to anchor coordination efforts. Other progress included an increase in access to early childhood development services, which was currently at 30 per cent, as compared with just 4 per cent in the 1990s; an improvement in the under-five mortality rate from 133 per 1,000 live births in 2000, to 118 by 2007; and progress in addressing the problem of clean water and sanitation.

Ms. Kachikho, recalling that the Convention required States parties to ensure domestication of its principles, said Malawi acknowledged that those laws had not been promulgated. The delay was heavily attributed to the current political environment in the country, with Malawi's Parliament over the past four years prioritizing matters of political interest. The legislation delayed included the Child (Justice, Care and Protection) Bill; the Birth Registration Bill; the Constitutional Review, which included recommendations for consistency with the principles of the Convention; and the review of the Education Act, which recommended that primary education be free and compulsory for children under age 18. The National Plan of Action for Children, initiated in 2004, also had yet to be finalized although it was anticipated that by 2010 all child-related issues would be guided by one generic policy.

In preliminary remarks, Committee Expert Agnes Akosua Aidoo, the Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur for the report of Malawi, relayed the Committee's firm belief that Malawi could assert its leadership role more in ensuring children's rights, reminding the delegation that the State was the principal bearer of upholding children's rights. Priority for children needed to be clearer and stronger and perhaps it would require stronger advocacy on the part of the lead Ministry – the Ministry for Women and Child Development. Among concerns was the large number of bills for children's protection that remained to be enacted. The Committee would like to see when the new Parliament was elected that it established priorities so that the 10 or 11 bills pertaining to children be dealt with first, in particular the Children's Act.

Other Experts raised a series of questions pertaining to, among other things, discrimination against the girl child, including via female genital mutilation and forced and/or early marriages; a lack of procedures to ensure the legal right of the child to be heard; a lack of funding and resources for children's issues; a lack of data on cases of commercial child sexual exploitation; the situation of children deprived of family environments living in institutional care, in particular owing to HIV/AIDS; adoption laws; awareness-raising for adolescents on HIV/AIDS issues; measures being taken to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS; the situation of children in prisons; provisions for disabled children, and the lack of national policy in this area; and trafficking and sexual exploitation of children.

The Committee will release its formal, written concluding observations and recommendations on the second periodic report of Malawi towards the end of its three-week session, which will conclude on 30 January 2009.

The delegation of Malawi also included Anthony Kamanga, Solicitor-General and Secretary for Justice; Hyacinth Kishindo Kulemaka, Director of Women and Child Development; Augustine Kamlongera, Director of Education Planning; representatives from the Ministry of Justice; and a member of the Ministry of Women and Child Development.

As one of the 193 States parties to the Convention, Malawi is obliged to present periodic reports to the Committee on its efforts to comply with the provisions of the treaty. The delegation was on hand throughout the day to present the report and to answer questions raised by Committee Experts.

When the Committee reconvenes on Wednesday, 14 January, at 10 a.m., it will consider the second periodic report of Chad (CRC/C/TCD/2).

Report of Malawi

The second periodic report of Malawi (CRC/C/MWI/2) says that in a quest to develop a comprehensive code on children which will reflect the general principles of the Convention, the Children and Young Person’s Act of Malawi has been reviewed. The review process was finalized in 2005 and culminated in a report of the Law Commission’s findings and recommendations and a proposed Bill entitled the Child (Care, Protection and Justice) Bill. This Bill is a comprehensive attempt to domesticate the Convention as it extends beyond issues of child justice to include matters pertaining to: duties and responsibilities of parents towards their children; determination of children in need of care and protection; guardianship; fosterage; residential placements; powers and duties of child justice courts in care and protection matters; duties and functions of local authorities relating to child justice and protection; and protection of children from undesirable practices. The Report of the Law Commission has been laid in Parliament and presented to Cabinet.

Regarding HIV/AIDS, the National Plan of Action for Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children, developed by the Ministry of Women and Child Development, is a strategic response to ensure that the rights of orphans and other vulnerable children are fully met through mitigating the effects of HIV and AIDS. The National Plan of Action, launched in 2005, also attempts to translate some of the Millennium Development Goals into reality. The six strategic areas of the Plan are: improve access for orphans and other vulnerable children to essential quality services in education, health, nutrition, water and sanitation, and birth registration with increased support from social safety nets; strengthen the capacity of families and communities to care for orphans and other vulnerable children; provide the legal framework and coordination to protect the most vulnerable children; build the technical, institutional and human resource capacity of key service providers for orphans and other vulnerable children; raise awareness at all levels to create a supportive environment for children and families affected by poverty and HIV and AIDS; and monitoring and evaluation. So far the National Plan of Action has been quite effective, with some minor problems being registered with Community Based Organizations, which still need some capacity building and training so that their efforts are better coordinated.

Presentation of Report

ANNA ANDREW NAMATHANGA KACHIKHO, Minister of Women and Child Development of Malawi, presenting Malawi's second periodic report, said that it presented major achievements since 2001 to date. It had been prepared with the active participation of all stakeholders – government officials, constitutional bodies, including the Malawi Human Rights Commission and the Malawi Law Commission, as well as representatives of non-governmental organizations and international organizations, which had not just participated in the report, but also in making the rights of children a reality in Malawi.

Ms. Kachikho noted that Malawi was currently translating the Millennium Declaration of the United Nations through the Malawi Growth and Development Strategy. That was the current overarching Government policy, which set out a strategic direction towards the progressive realization of the rights of children – and indeed all the people of Malawi. It streamlined the rights of children on the Government agenda and focused on children as a category through different themes, namely, social protection and social development, including health and education.

Recalling that the Convention required States parties to legislate on provisions to ensure domestication of its principles, Ms. Kachikho said Malawi acknowledged that those laws had not been promulgated. The delay was heavily attributed to the current political environment in the country, with Malawi's Parliament over the past four years prioritizing matters of political interest. As to where they stood right now, the Child (Justice, Care and Protection) Bill had been gazetted and was expected to be presented to Parliament after the May 2009 Parliamentary and Presidential elections. The Birth Registration Bill had been tabled in 2008 but had not been discussed by Parliament. The Government was hopeful, however, that the outstanding legislation on child issues would be laid before Parliament in 2009.

The Constitutional Review, which included recommendations for consistency with the principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, had been completed in 2007, Ms. Kachikho continued. Among others, the recommendations included provisions for ensuring that the definition of a child was consistent with the Convention. A report with a proposed bill had been submitted to the Ministry of Justice. Also, the review of the Education Act had been completed, which, among other things, recommended that the provision of primary education in government schools be free of tuition to all and compulsory for children under the age of 18. Malawi had also initiated the process of ratifying the two Optional Protocols to the Convention, which would complement other international and national legal instruments in creating a protective environment for children.

One outstanding issue in ensuring efficient programming of children's programmes was the National Plan of Action for Children. The Government had initiated the development of the National Plan in 2004, but it had yet to be finalized, Ms. Kachikho observed. It was, however, anticipated that by 2010, all child-related issues would be guided by one generic policy and National Plan of Action for Children.

In the area of protection and care of orphans and other vulnerable children, there had been a high level of political commitment and resources for scaling up the responses to the orphans and other vulnerable children crisis in Malawi, Ms. Kachikho highlighted. The Ministry of Women and Child Development had been strengthened to take on a leadership role to operationalize the National Plan of Action for Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children, and a national steering committee, national technical working group and a technical and advisory support unit were in place to anchor coordination efforts of the orphans and other vulnerable children response. At the district level, capacity-building of the District Social Welfare Officers was also being implemented, through deployment of volunteers and community child protection workers and support to draft district action plans.

In addition, to ensure that children were afforded the best opportunity to develop, the Government was implementing a social protection programme to support vulnerable groups (including children) that might not benefit from any socio-economic growth, Ms. Kachikho noted. A direct cash transfer scheme, a public works programme and an agricultural subsidy programme were some key productivity enhancing interventions that were targeted at transforming individual households under the plan.

Turning to education issues, Ms. Kachikho noted that access to early childhood development services was currently at 30 per cent. Although low, it represented efforts that the Government had taken since the 1990s, when early childhood development coverage had been just 4 per cent, and the Government was aiming to improve those numbers further.

Regarding health, during the period 2000 to 2004, the under-five mortality rate had been 133 per 1,000 live births, but that number had reduced to 118 by 2007, Ms. Kachikho reported. The infant mortality rate had also been reduced from 131 per 1,000 births in 2000 to 69 per 1,000 by 2007. The Millennium Development Goal of reducing the rate by one third would thus be achieved by Malawi if that rate of progress continued.

While safe water and poor sanitation remained one of the major contributing factors to high child mortality in Malawi, Ms. Kachikho said the Government was making some progress in addressing the problem. By 2004, 61 per cent of the urban population and 62 per cent of the rural population were using adequate sanitation facilities. By 2007, 98 per cent of Malawi's population had been using improved drinking water sources, although notably that was in urban areas and only 68 per cent in rural areas.

With regard to education, more girls (84 per cent) were attending school than boys (80 per cent), which represented a slight improvement compared to 2000 figures. Net enrolment for boys was 93 per cent for boys and 98 per cent for girls. Nevertheless, gender equality still remained a challenge for Malawi and it was a crucial programme being implemented by the Government. It had been noted that from grades 4 to 8 the 50-50 male-female ratio began to drop. In secondary school the male-female ratio was estimated at 72-28. Reasons for the high dropout rate of girls included pregnancies, early marriages, and the need for household labour, Ms. Kachikho posited.

On child protection, during the reporting period the Government continued to implement its Child Protection Programme, which contributed towards the creation of a protective environment for all children, with an emphasis on the most vulnerable, through protection, prevention and rehabilitation. In an effort to eliminate harmful traditional practices, the Government and its partners had continued to raise awareness on child abuse through the Zero Tolerance Campaign against Child Abuse. They were also increasing access to justice for both women and children by increasing support for victim support services and establishing 300 community-based victim support units on top of the 34 police-station-based support units across the country. Other achievements included the establishment of four child-friendly courts; increasing the number of child protection workers to 809; and training 34 police commanders on child protection issues and incorporating child and gender protection into the police training manual.

Questions by Experts

AGNES AKOSUA AIDOO, the Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur for the report of Malawi, began by highlighting some of the socio-economic background and challenges facing Malawi. Malawi was a landlocked least developed country, faced by persistent poverty, high fertility, and a high prevalence of HIV/AIDS. More than half of Malawi's children lived in general or extreme poverty. Moreover, the political impasse in governance impacted children seriously and there was a great concern that there was an absence of an effective or adequate legislative framework for pursuing children's rights. Many proposed good laws dated back to 2004/2005 and remained Bills before Parliament. In that connection, while the Committee had heard that the new parliamentary and presidential elections expected in May 2009 would end the political impasse, could they consider prioritising these bills concerning children when the new Parliament sat?

On the preparation of the report, Ms. Aidoo asked what the real role of non-governmental organizations had been in the preparation and drafting of the report. In addition, what was the nature and extent of collaboration between the Government and civil society in promoting children's rights and the Convention specifically?

Given the "capacity limitations" raised in Malawi's report, including serious budgetary and financial constraints, how effective was coordination by the Ministry of Women and Child Development, given the numerous multi-agency, multisectoral technical working groups and networks established for different children's groups within the Ministry, as well as other sectoral ministries, especially Health and Education? Moreover, how effectively did the Ministry coordinate children's rights issues in the absence of a Children's Act, Children's Policy and a National Plan of Action on Children – instruments that provided a common framework for all actors and all stakeholders, Ms. Aidoo wondered.

Regarding dissemination and training on the Convention, Ms. Aidoo noted that in its previous concluding observations the Committee had recommended additional efforts in the dissemination of the Convention to all. Despite translation of the Convention into two local languages, the report in several places observed that awareness and knowledge of the Convention was quite low among policymakers, local government officials and traditional chiefs. What was being done to change that? Of particular concern was the phrase in the report that "child rights are a relatively novel phenomenon in Malawi" although it was now 18 years after Malawi had ratified the Convention.

ROSA MARIA ORTIZ, the Committee Expert serving as co-Rapporteur for the report of Malawi, asked about the coordination mechanism for children's rights and how that body insured that all plans, programmes and policies for children led to local-level guideline and policies. With whom did the body work at the local level? What was their strategy to ensure that those policies had a real impact on the lives of children at the local level?

With regard to non-discrimination, in what way had traditional leaders been involved in strengthening the provisions and principles set out in the Convention, Ms. Ortiz asked? Moreover, how was the Government going to ensure that the proposed legislation in such areas as HIV/AIDS and education would be implemented, in particular in the rural areas?

Other Experts then raised a series of questions. Regarding the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, what were the roles of the Ministry of Women and Child Development and of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in coordinating and carrying out that project, an Expert asked? With regard to the National Plan on Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children when would registration of orphans and other vulnerable children be extended to urban children, as it seemed to target solely rural children at the moment?

Despite some clarifications by the delegation today, an Expert remained confused about the status of planned legal reform and the current blockage in Parliament. He asked for more information on Parliament's methods of work, and in particular if Parliament had a children's committee.

Other issues of concern included discrimination against the girl child, evidenced by a high dropout and absenteeism rate among girls, female genital mutilation, forced and early marriages; a lack of procedures in civil law to ensure the right of the child to be heard, in particular given the primacy that traditional law was sometimes accorded over civil law; a lack of funding and resources for children's issues; how cash transfers to families were targeted to ensure that children benefited, by linking them to children's school attendance, for example; and a reported lack of cases of commercial child sexual exploitation, which might simply indicate a lack of reporting.

On independent monitoring systems, an Expert asked about the Human Rights Commission, which had a child rights unit that considered complaints from children, and wondered if it had a role in raising awareness about the Convention. Also, what had been the Government response to the recommendations that had been issued by that Commission on numerous areas involving children, including child abuse? Another Expert wondered about the statement in the report that the Human Rights Commission was "coordinating with other ministries" to fill in a data collection gap. For her, that raised serious questions about its independence.

Response by the Delegation

Responding to these questions and others, Minister Kachikho noted that, with regard to bills before Parliament and the current political impasse, that was just a matter of "frustrating anything that the Government is putting forward". However, Parliament had learned a lesson, as people had been making their concerns known. They were sure that after the 2009 Parliamentary elections those issues would be addressed. Also, while the bills remained unadopted, the various Government bodies continued to promulgate policies, including at the lower level. As an example, the Government had managed to come up with a school-feeding programme to ensure that children attended at the primary level. That programme also included a provision that girl children who completed a full month’s school would receive a food ration to take home.

Another member of the delegation, responding on the issue of what was being done about birth registration while the Birth Registration Bill was languishing in Parliament, began by noting that one consequence of the reintroduction of this legislation several times was that it now enjoyed wide support and was expected to be passed when the new Parliament was seated. Pending the enactment of the new legislation, they had gone ahead and set up a registration bureau and rolled out the programme of birth registrations ahead of the new laws that would make it compulsory.

Regarding nationality concerns raised by Experts, it was certainly not the case that if a Malawian lady married a foreigner she would lose her nationality. However, there were complications, there were challenges with respect to the children. The delegation did not believe that the children of such a marriage would necessarily be entitled to Malawian nationality as a right. But that was something the Malawian Law Commission was working on.

On social protection issues and the social cash transfer, there was already a draft national policy on social protection, which had already been circulated to relevant ministries for their comments, and there were already plans to develop a national strategy plan for implementation. As to how this would benefit the poorest children, the delegation observed that the social cash transfer had been developed specifically to address issues of poverty. It was keyed to the most vulnerable, which were often the poorest single-parent or child-headed families. Cash payments were also was likely to benefit AIDS orphans, through the Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children Protection Programme.

Turning to dissemination, the child-friendly schools programme, which was being implemented by the Ministry of Education, was a rights-based programme and sensitized children on the Convention, the delegation said. A shorter version of the Convention was available and was used to target those who might not have the time to read the whole text. They had also produced flyers that were disseminated at national events, such as the National Day of the African Child, to ensure that most Malawians were sensitized on Convention issues. It was underscored that dissemination of the Convention to teachers, professionals and the general public was a targeted part of the Ministry of Women and Child Development's plan every year.

Directly on child abuse, evidence that the programme to raise awareness on this issue was working were high levels of reporting on this issue, the delegation said.

Turning to coordination issues, the delegation said that in an attempt to better coordinate work on children they had established national networks and national technical working groups which reported to a National Steering Committee on Children, in an attempt to anchor all children's issues with the Ministry. The National Steering Committee was the permanent secretariat for the Ministry of Women and Child Development.

Responding to the query about the coordination of Government ministries with the Malawi Human Rights Commission regarding data, the delegation explained that the Ministry of Women and Child Development had wished to coordinate with the Human Rights Commission because it had collected data on human rights violations against children as part of its mandate. That data could be of use to the Ministry in drawing up its policies and programmes; however, there were other data collection projects the Ministry was pursuing.

Further Questions by Experts

During the second round of questions, Ms. Ortiz, the co-Rapporteur for the report of Malawi, noting that there were 500,000 orphans in the country, many of them due to HIV/AIDS, wondered what measures had been taken to strengthen family structures for such children, in particular for rural children. In addition, given that many children deprived of family environments were living in institutional care, what was being done to regulate and monitor those institutions and the selection process? For example, how did they ensure that children were not simply relegated to such institutions when family links existed? Also what was done to ensure that such children were able to maintain links with remaining family members?

Some 1,000 children were given up for adoption both nationally and internationally in Malawi, Ms. Ortiz said. Under what laws were those adoptions regulated? As the delegation had said that judges had a wide latitude to impose the law as they saw it, was there any rule that ensured consistency in the area of adoption laws?

Other Experts asked further questions on topics including, among others, effective awareness-raising for adolescents on HIV/AIDS issues; what was being done to improve immunization rates for children; what measures were being taken to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS; and the situation of children in prisons and a lack of progress in that area.

Regarding children with disabilities, an Expert asked, in view of the lack of policy on children with disabilities in Malawi, what was being done through legislation and other programmes to provide a minimum standard of community-based services for such children? For example, did such children have access to education?

An Expert said that the Committee felt that child sexual exploitation was a real challenge for Malawi and wanted to know what steps were being taken. Other concerns were reports about initiation rates that contained sexual abuse for children, as well as female genital mutilation. On trafficking, the report said that trafficking in Malawi was internal and that the Government had no reported cases of child trafficking. In that connection, what was the mechanism for monitoring and reporting on trafficking and how were professionals trained to work with children who might be trafficked?

An Expert asked about services to victims of sexual abuse, especially in the family context, given that children were often reluctant to come forward and might need protection if they came forward.

Another Expert asked about the various legal ages for the child in Malawi. Under current legislation, the legal age for criminal responsibility was 7; 16, and not 18, was the age at which children reached majority; and there appeared to be a variety of different legal ages for marriage.

An Expert was concerned about the fate of street children, who appeared to be kept in remand centres rather then in children's shelters. She had the impression that they were treated as offenders or criminals rather than benefiting from protection, rehabilitation and other social services.

Response by Delegation

Responding to those and other questions, on the topic of education, the delegation said that the Ministry of Education had taken on board the policy that had come from the Ministry of the Disabled and Elderly and was translating that policy for disabled children. There were also those in need of special education – namely, the blind and the deaf – and there, through Heavily Indebted Poor Countries' funding, the Ministry was procuring special equipment. At the same time, they were trying to take into account as much as possible those who were physically challenged, by installing infrastructures, such as ramps, in schools.

Regarding life skills, the Government was looking at establishing this in the curriculum starting in the third cycle, the delegation said. In the past, the Government focused on provision of basic education. Currently, the Ministry of Education was trying to have a more holistic plan for education, from early child development through secondary school. Equitable access was one of three key focuses of early childhood development plans – and while 30 per cent were currently benefiting, the Government was shooting for a 75 per cent rate. Another new focus in education was complementary basic education for those who had dropped out of school. These focuses and targets were all part of a 10-year plan on education to 2017.

On teacher education, the plan was looking to improve teacher training as well as teacher-student ratios, which now stood at 1:96.

As for the preparation of the report, NGOs were not only used as sources for the report, in terms of gathering data, but had also participated in the drafting of the report.

On the lack of data on sexual exploitation, the delegation explained that there were statistics kept by the police on cases of sexual exploitation and abuse. However, it was not easy to access as that data was still manually recorded. They would need more time to establish a computer database before they could report on this issue to the Committee.

With regard to corporal punishment, the delegation noted that the laws of the land and the Constitution itself prohibited corporal punishment. Corporal punishment was prohibited in the schools. That did not mean that isolated cases did not occur, but when they did they were dealt with by the justice system.

Concerning juvenile justice, there were still cases of children being kept in the same facilities as adults, despite the fact that the law required juveniles and adults be separated. However, when that was discovered they were separated and sent to juvenile remand centres. Child protection measures in juvenile justice included that no child should be tried in public, that children's names be kept out of the newspapers and that judges could hear evidence by children in his chambers. With the help of UNICEF the four child-friendly courts had been rolled out. The training carried out by the Ministry of Women and Child Development for prosecutors and magistrates had been evaluated, and training adjusted accordingly.

Regarding detention of minors, the Constitution was very clear on this issue. It set a time limit of 48 hours for preliminary detention and provided that children had to be separated from adults in detention. Under the current system, children were not convicted; they were "held at the pleasure of the President" in reform institutions. The Board of Visitors periodically visited and reviewed children's cases to determine whether the child had been "reformed" or not and then made a recommendation about the child's situation.

It was true that the age for criminal responsibility in Malawi now stood at 7 years, the delegation confirmed. That issue had been the subject of much discussion. The National Law Commission had recommended that the age be moved to 10 years, but that was one of the outstanding legal reforms that remained to be acted upon. Similarly, with regard to the current age of majority, which was 16 in Malawi, the Law Commission had made a recommendation that that age be raised to 18.

With respect to adoption, the delegation could not confirm the figure of 1,000 children being adopted in Malawi. What could be said was that any adoption had to go through a court process.

Regarding funding for HIV/AIDS, the delegation noted that every government Ministry was required to set aside 2 per cent of their budget to provide support for their staff that were HIV-affected or had AIDS. The National AIDS Commission had also successfully mobilized and effectively managed funds from a wide range of donors. Ministries and government departments had formulated guidelines, programmes and policies to guide implementation of HIV/AIDS action plans. That had been done with wide consultation with relevant stakeholders, including children.

As for remanding orphans to institutional care, the delegation said once a child was identified as unable to be fostered within the extended family system and the only solution was to take the child to an orphanage, the district authorities were responsible for identifying the appropriate orphanage. A social inquiry was then undertaken by the district authorities to determine that there was no other relation within the child's community or elsewhere in Malawi that could take care of the child and made a recommendation. An evaluation was also then undertaken of the orphanage identified to ensure that it had the capacity to take on the child. Only then would the District Assembly go back to the social inquiry authority and the child was taken into the orphanage. Orphanages were inspected at the District Assembly level. There were guidelines for homes and orphanages for children as well as for the care of orphans and other vulnerable children. Guidelines for foster care had also just been finalized, and specifically for informal fostering situations.

There still was a lack of services for the rehabilitation of victims of sexual abuse, the delegation continued. No set procedure or standards for the treatment of such victims had been established. Currently, victims were mostly rehabilitated back into society by the family. The court was allowed to order that the State was responsible to pay for certain services, but that was not normally the case. There was currently a rehabilitation centre in one city that was run by the Ministry of Women and Child Development and that was mostly devoted to battered women.

As for reports that orphanages had been used to arrange adoptions, that was "news to them" the delegation said. They would appreciate any information on this issue so they could follow up, and if the State had information about this and not shared it with the delegation, that was certainly very wrong.

Further Question by Experts

In a third round of questions, Experts asked about refugee children and their access to education, and what was being done to overcome their language handicap; enforcement of ILO Conventions on the minimum age for employment and on the elimination of the worst forms of child labour; and complaints by children to the national Human Rights Commission.

Further Responses by the Delegation

In response to the third round of questions and questions asked earlier, with regard to street children, the delegation noted when they had originally set up children's reformatory centres a few decades ago, they were conceived of also as protection centres for care of children without anywhere else to go. It should be remembered that that system had been established before the growth in the number of orphans and orphanages that they had today. There were categories of children on the street that could not be put under any kind of foster care system; the process of helping those street children had been to use the existing reformatory schools so that they received the much needed care and protection. That was of course being coordinated with other care modules that the government was pursuing with regard to the whole issue of orphans and other vulnerable children.

In terms of current work on birth registration at the local level, pending the enactment of new legislation, the delegation noted that the Government had involved 8,219 chiefs in 14 districts of the country in birth registration exercises.

Preliminary Remarks

AGNES AKOSUA AIDOO, the Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur for the report of Malawi, in preliminary concluding remarks, said that the Committee appreciated the open, informative and hopefully constructive dialogue with the delegation of Malawi. The Committee noted the achievements Malawi had made, its continuing efforts, as well as the very real challenges it faced. God willing, with the elections that were coming up children's legislation would be enacted that would strengthen their rights.

The Committee had a firm belief that Malawi could assert its leadership role more in ensuring children's rights. There was a lot of technical capacity to do that. Moreover, Ms. Aidoo reminded Malawi that the State was the principal bearer of upholding children's rights.

Ms. Aidoo said priority for children needed to be clearer and stronger and perhaps it would require stronger advocacy on the part of the lead Ministry – the Ministry for Women and Child Development. The Committee was always concerned where a ministry had a hybrid mandate, as often was the case in Africa, often covering children, women and development issues. The Committee wanted to see children as the priority.

Regarding the legal protections and the legal framework for ensuring children's rights, Ms. Aidoo remarked that there were a large number of bills for children's protection that remained to be enacted. The Committee would like to see when the new Parliament was elected that it established priorities so that the 10 or 11 bills pertaining to children be dealt with first, in particular the Children's Act.

Investment in children should also be considered essential, so that the Government really allocated its resources to the maximum extent possible for children's issues – as required by article 4 of the Convention, Ms. Aidoo added. That was particularly important as Malawi was moving to the multi-donor system, which channelled resources into one basket, and that action would ensure that children got their fair share.

Finally, Ms. Aidoo encouraged the implementation of the many good existing plans and policies already in place, which could be accelerated. The Committee wanted to see greater results for children. The Committee urged Malawi not to wait for all its political problems to be resolved before it undertook to take action on children, because they could not wait.

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