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Archives
Category Archives: Children and Youth
Invisible little workers
By Zubeida Mustafa
JUNE 12 was Day against Child Labour. It is a shame that we still have to observe such a day. But we must if we have to make our society less insensitive towards children.
On this occasion, Sparc, which has been struggling since 1992 for the protection of the rights of the child in Pakistan, launched a weeklong campaign focusing on child domestic labour. It demands a ban on it. This is a laudable move though the strategy needs to be well-thought-out.
As is the case in Pakistan, anomalies abound. First of all, we do not even have reliable data. How many children are there in the labour force? The government has not conducted a survey to collect information since 1996 when it stated that three million children were working in the country. Today various agencies give much higher numbers which range between 10 and 12 million (the International Labour Organisation and Unicef, the UN children’s agency). Continue reading
Bomb or bread?
By Zubeida Mustafa
ON May 28, an email was circulating on the web from Dr Shershah Syed, whose services to women’s reproductive health are widely acclaimed.
Doctor Sahib wrote, “Today we are celebrating the atom bomb day when we are a country where millions of children are not going to school — where millions of kids start their morning without food and will work in factories.…”
How true. While chasing the bomb, we have destroyed our people. What Dr Shershah can add is that this is also a country where one cannot escape the heart-wrenching sight of little rag-pickers rummaging through the garbage for food leftovers to ease their hunger pangs. Their emaciated bodies taunt our bomb-makers with misplaced priorities. Defence spending is expected to increase in the budget to be presented later this month. At this rate, though, there will be no one left to protect. The data given out by the health authorities of the prevalence of malnutrition and stunting in Pakistan are not exaggerated. Continue reading
Language in learning
By Zubeida Mustafa
THE Children’s Literature Festival is the best thing that could have happened to the children of Pakistan. Six festivals have already been organised since November 2011 — the latest having been held in Islamabad last week.
It was a pleasure to see thousands of children assemble at the Pak-China Friendship Centre in Islamabad surrounded by gaiety, music and storytelling and, above all, books of all genres for young readers. The atmosphere was one of merrymaking. But the underlying mission was a very serious one. The objective of the organisers was captured in the words splashed all over the backdrops in the auditorium and the conference rooms —“Unlocking the power of reading”.
That is what the literary festival has undertaken to accomplish. It is too early to expect a visible change in the reading habits of children. If the tradition continues and the event reaches a large number of people in due course, it is hoped that it will make an impact. Continue reading
The perfect mismatch
By Zubeida Mustafa
Shan went to school for 10 years, and his mother, a domestic worker, spent thousands and thousands to pay for his schooling (Rs500 per month in the last two years). He had dreams and wanted to “work in an office on a computer”.
Last year Shan’s mother informed me that Shan had found a job as a janitor in a residential apartment block. “What about his studies?” I asked. She didn’t know because she had no idea if he had managed to clear his matric examination. I suspected that he hadn’t because I knew he had failed in the ninth class. It was then that I realised how little he knew. The little tutoring I arranged for him obviously didn’t help. Continue reading
Lessons of ‘long march’
By Zubeida Mustafa
DR Tahirul Qadri’s long march to Islamabad is over and done. It shook the political spectrum — at least for the five days that it held the nation in thrall. Whether it will produce any long-lasting impact and change the direction of Pakistani politics is doubtful.
As people continue to speculate about the ‘who, wherefore and what’ of the long march it is time to focus on one incontrovertible aspect of the event, namely, Dr Qadri’s ability to mobilise a huge crowd. I will not even attempt a guesstimate of the size of the crowd and start a debate on that. The fact is that the crowd was bigger than what we generally see in rallies organised by activists, to whom Najma Sadeque, a journalist, likens Dr Qadri. He himself doesn’t lay claim to political leadership. Continue reading
Librarians as teachers
By Zubeida Mustafa
AT the Children’s Literature Festival in Quetta last month, the provincial education secretary had promised to make provisions for a library in every government school in Balochistan.
If this actually materialises, the province will certainly have something to boast about. A school without a library is like a body without a soul. Can you expect students to love reading if they are not immersed in a world of books that a library creates? Continue reading
Malala and GMR 2012
By Zubeida Mustafa
EXACTLY a week before Unesco launched its 10th Global Monitoring Report 2012 (GMR) on Oct 16, Malala Yousufzai, Pakistan’s child campaigner for the right of education for girls, was shot in the head by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan. Pauline Rose, editor of the Monitoring Report, termed the attack a “tragedy” in a country where there are still over three million girls out of school.
The attack on Malala and her two companions shocked Pakistan. This shock also galvanised the nation as thousands rose with one voice to condemn the Taliban. Continue reading
What I am learning from Malala Yusufzai
By Durriya Kazi
I am a teacher and being a teacher I am actually a student as the oft repeated story tells us..
So as the story of Malala unfolds, she has become my most influential teacher today..
So what have I learnt? Continue reading
Whose child is this?
By Zubeida Mustafa
THE State of Pakistan’s Children 2011 report prepared and launched by the Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child puts the spotlight on us as caregivers of children.
But do we care or hold ourselves collectively responsible? Sparc’s report very appropriately quotes the iconic South African leader Nelson Mandela who said: “There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children.”
A glance at the report establishes beyond doubt that we have blackened our souls. How else will you treat the following information provided by the report: 25 million children out of school; 10 million child workers slogging it out in factories and workplaces to support their families; 300,000 street children with no homes to return to at night; 68 per cent of children in Pakistan found to be stunted in 2011 with the number growing every year. Continue reading
Books in times of war
By Zubeida Mustafa
A CHILDREN’S Literature Festival in Quetta sounds like a contradiction in terms. Quetta is in Balochistan and one doesn’t have to be reminded that the province is in the grip of a violent insurgency.
When I went there last week I could feel the tension in the air. Fear was palpable. So how could a festival — that too for children — be held in a place not considered very safe?
For me the festival amounted to making a political statement: children need peace. We knew that whatever the state of security, life has to go on. Yet one could not turn a blind eye to the tight security which in turn made one feel insecure. The event was not advertised and was reported in the media only after the show was over. Continue reading