Following the political and economic crisis in 2018 in South Sudan, the number of CRC membership dropped and the leadership structure was in active for the first time. In this regard, the steering committee was formed, mobilized members, revived the coalition and successfully conducted its second democratic election, giving power to the current leadership in office together with members to continue lobbying and advocacy for the protection and promotion of children’s rights in South Sudan.
Right to Grow Project
CRCSC is in partnership with the Centre for Economic Governance and Accountability in Africa and Save the Children International on a five-year project ‘Right to Grow’ aimed at “All children under 5 well nourished”. In 2021, CRCSC built a pool of members for budget monitoring and sensitisation on budget advocacy matters, conducted pre-workshop Capacity Assessment of budget advocacy skills among CBOs and CSOs and organised a capacity building training of CBOs and CSOs on Budget monitoring and expenditure tracking.
The output implemented by CRCSC is that CBOs and CSOs have the technical skills to track, analyse, report and on budget allocation and expenditure, and regularly engage with local government in programming and financial planning.
The Universal Periodic Review – UPR
The universal periodic review for 2021 was entrusted once again to CRCSC by Save the Children, which was core due to the mobilisation capacity and influence of the coalition. This commenced in March 2021, assigning coalition members to collect data from their locations of visible presence. The data collected was validated and submitted to the UN Human Rights Committee in July 2021.
Online Consultation on Early Child Marriage in Africa
In July 2021, ACPF organised an online consultation on early child marriage in Africa. Through CRCSC, South Sudan was represented by 12 girls from the different schools in Juba who are school partners of CRCSC. This discussion was a full-day event that climaxed with dinner with the children. CRCSC mobilised the children and provided the internet needed for them to join the Zoom meeting. The consultative meeting was a learning and experience-sharing opportunity for not only CRCSC but also the schools represented.
In September, 2021 African Capacity Alliance funded and supported a consultative engagement on early child marriage model laws. This engagement brought under one roof over 30 duty bearers and stakeholders to discuss the status and available laws on early child marriage.
Ratification of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child in South Sudan
As part of state’s obligation to ratify legal instruments aim at protection and promotion of children rights, Child Rights Civil Society Coalition with support from Africa Capacity Alliance organized a lobby meeting on 29th September 2021 for the ratification of ACRWC in efforts to engage the government, share ACRWC best practices, join commitments and chart the way forward for the final signature of the president. The lobby event was attended by government line ministries of gender, child and social welfare, ministry of education, ministry of health, ministry of foreign affairs and international cooperation, parliamentarians, office of the president, African Union, UN agencies, IGADs, R-JMEC, CTSAMVM, Human rights commission, Academia, Media, INGOs, CSOs, traditional chiefs, faith-based institution and children.
As a result of the event, the duty bearers and stakeholders agreed formation of a committee to search for the copy of ACRWC passed by parliament in 2014 and to continue follow-up with the office of the president for the final ratification.
The committee was segmented into a core committee that has all duty bearers, i.e. office of the first vice president service cluster, the parliamentarians, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Welfare, the Ministry of Education, the South Sudan Human Rights Taskforce, Academia, and the Ministry of Information. Sub-committee involved stakeholders, i.e. UNICEF, Save the Children, Office of the First Lady, CRCSC, and Media.
CRCSC collaborated with the only nationwide radio station, UNMISS-Radio Miraya, which offered talk shows before and after the event. The talk shows were attended by the Deputy Chair CRCSC, the legal advisor CRCSC and the National Coordinator CRCSC. The talk show was a live show that attracted live callers who needed more clarity on the ACRWC, and their responses were positive towards the ratification, though they knew not much about the children’s charter. This was an indication of a public demand to see the charter ratified and disseminated nationwide
Furthermore, as awareness was a concern, the team selected the most read and national newspaper, The JUBA MONITOR, and published an article on why South Sudan should ratify the ACRWC. The newspaper also has an online version that is read internationally.
Children’s Radio Program
With the aim to enhance and encourage child participation, CRCSC and SCI in August, 2021 partnered for an activity based project that saw school going children, primary and secondary participate in debates. Topics were preselected by CRCSC and approved by SCI. debates were first conducted in the schools including interschool competitions on the preselected topics. A few representatives of the participating schools were then taken to Radio Miraya. They then debated on radio and jointly issued their recommendations to be addressed by the government.
Celebration of International Girl Child Day 2021
On 11 October 2021, Girls who are part of the school clubs created with support from Save the Children were given one full day of work experience in the SCI head office, Aviation and UNMISS. This inspired many other girls to be interested in school activities and even the activities of the clubs. Girls were given the opportunity to take key office positions during the celebration of International Girl Child Day.
