The Child Rights Coalition – Sierra Leone (CRC-SL) has fully endorses the Child Rights Bill gazetted in November 2022 and urged Members of Parliament to pass it before the dissolution of the Fifth Parliament.

The Coalition made this call in a press statement issued on Thursday, 6 March 2023.

This Bill is an outcome of the review process of the Child Rights Act (CRA) 2007, which was initiated after the Child Rights Coalition released the Report on the Assessment of the implementation of the CRA in 2019.

The Coalition recommended a review of the CRA based on the major gaps revealed in the content and implementation of the CRA.

Speaking on the importance of the revised Bill, Victoria Square, representing Save the Children affirmed that they need stronger laws to protect girls because they want girls to grow up and reach their full actualization.

She expressed their vision of wanting girls to be doctors, lawyers, First ladies and also to participate in decision making especially on issues affecting them. She cited child marriage as a serious issue that has a negative effect on their body as some of them suffer from fistula while most of them die during child birth.

Abdul Kemokai , representing Defence For Children, speaks on  the stance of the new Bill in relation to children in conflict with the law. He described them as usually suspected to have committed crime and there are different crime children suspected to have involved either or together with adult.

He pointed out that children by law are not above the law. However, by International as well regional standard there should be child friendly procedures through which their own cases should be administered. He added that by virtue of the fact Sierra Leone is a signatory to international treaties like the Rome Convention, Rights of the Child, African Charter we are also to draft our laws to be in line with international standards. He confirms that the new Bill makes proper provisions for children in conflict with the law.

”Uptill now the child Rights Acts that was passed in 2007 did not really make much provisions  for the treatments of children in conflict with law,” he stated.

The CRC-SL is a civil society Network that monitor, advocate and report on the implementation of regional and international child Rigrightsstruments in Sierra Leone. It comprises national and international Civil Society and nonnon-governmentalganization that promote and protects rights of the child.