The Ministry of Gender and Family Promotion (MIGEPROF) together with partners have renewed calls to end child exploitation in Rwanda in order to contain cases of mental distress, early pregnancies, and sexually oriented risk-taking.

World Vision and MIGEPROF will spend US$2 million on a five-year campaign against child exploitation, a practice that consists of various forms of violence, among them, sexual abuse and child labour. The campaign was launched yesterday.

Some 437,000 children across the country are considered to be in child exploitation, according to the 2016 Child Labour Survey by the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR).

"The Rwandan constitution says that everyone has the responsibility of protecting children, including parents, neighbours, and others, and if they don’t, they are going against the law,” said the Minister for Gender and Family Promotion, Espérance Nyirasafari.

In addition to figures from NISR, a report by MIGEPROF on violence against children and youth, which was conducted two years ago, showed that half of all girls and six out of ten boys experience violence during their childhoods.

This includes physical violence, sexual violence and emotional violence, which most of the time result from child labour.

"Perpetrators of violence against children are not foreigners; they are those people who have the responsibility to protect them including their parents, neighbours, teachers, boyfriends and friends,” the report reads in part.

The report says that children are more likely to be violent if they themselves have experienced violence.

Details of the report show that 12 per cent of physically abused boys have been violent towards another person compared to 4 per cent who have not been physically abused. In addition, 51 per cent of young men who were sexually abused in childhood had experienced mental distress compared to 21 per cent of those who had not been abused.

The same fact goes to girls in the same category, as 32 per cent of young women who had experienced emotional abuse as children had considered suicide, compared with 8 per cent of those who had not, the report indicates.

Many people think children should work, regardless of the types of job they are given to do, she said.

Every child, depending on their age can give a hand to the parents at home, the Minister said.

However, she added, "children under five years are not allowed to do anything like fetching water, but you can ask them to pass the message to someone else, which is a way of helping them grow mentally.”

"When we talk of worst forms of child labour, we are talking about those works which may hinder children from going to school, those works which are highly demanding and horrible compared to the level of a child like asking kids to work in farms, mining, fishing and other scaring works,” she said.

"Laws are there and they are enforced, some people have been punished, some companies and enterprises have been closed due to employing children, we are seeking a synergy from all Rwandans and partners so that they give information to security organs and local leaders in case they see any child labor practices,” she added.

Sean Kerrigan, the Country Director of World Vision Rwanda Programme, said they thought on this project in order to help everyone to play a role in ending child exploitation.

Recently, the lower chamber of the Parliament rejected article 5 of the Labour draft Law, which stipulated that children should start working at the age 16.

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