Teach-In: Africa: Why are her Children at risk?
( Feb. 4 - 5 2000) @ Ohio university

Overview of the issues surrounding children as soldiers throughout Africa

AFRICA: Why are her children at risk?
A Teach-in at Ohio University
February 4 - 5 2000

Report
Moved by media reports that a new ‘Child Risk Measure’(CRM) developed
by UNICEF, described Angola, Sierra Leone and Somalia as, in effect, the
‘toughest places on the planet in which to grow up,’ the Institute for the
African Child at Ohio University planned a two day ‘teach-in’ to answer the
question, Why? With more than 140 people from across the community in
attendance for the Friday night opening of the program, and 65 students and
guests engaged in the all-day Saturday deliberations, perhaps the most
important outcome of the teach-in was that the African and Africanist
students at Ohio University found a new vehicle to promote relevance in
their academic programs. The participation from the African community at
Ohio University was gratifying and signaled that the Institute for the African
Child is broad-enough an umbrella to support a wide variety of important
agendas.

Other important understandings of the teach-in included,

• The manifestation of child soldiers and AIDS in the post-colonial era are
  significant obstacles to the promotion of children’s well being on the
  continent;
• The experience of African children in the United States, as compellingly
  illustrated by representatives of the SEED organization from Columbus,
  Ohio, can be an important agenda for the Institute for the African Child
  and bring new OU constituencies, such as the Department of Social Work,
  into our programs;
• The African student community at Ohio University can be an important
  source of change in the teaching, research and service agendas of the
  University as it seeks to find a place in the 21^st century.
• The professional experiences of the African students at Ohio University
  are unheralded resources that will find a greater place in our future
  programming.
• Avoiding American ‘triumphalism’ in the face of growing US economic
  strength and deteriorating socio-economic conditions in many African
  countries, will turn our concern to practical solutions and a more of a
  sense of global and humane solidarity.

While Angola, Sierra Leone and Somalia came out on top of the
UNICEF index on child risk, our program pulled these countries in
as examples and covered the issues as they effected the entire
continent. We began with an evening of African food and culture
to promote the sense of community and to introduce our
participants to each other.

African music as interpreted by two groups of former African
children, the Kwanzaa Jazz Band and the Ohio African Drumming
Ensemble, carried us into a screening of the Zimbabwean feature
film, Everyone’s Child (1996), a compelling story of the spreading
effects of AIDS on children and their extended families.

On Saturday we adopted the format of a ‘1960s-style teach-in’
to encourage as much participation as possible. The teach-in
featured presentations by Ohio University students and invited
guests and grew out of the idea that we had expertise within our
community that could be tapped. For 13 years, the College of
Education had sponsored an annual "African Educational Research
Symposium" and this interdisciplinary and interactive teach-in is
seen as its contemporary successor. Teach-in participants were
encouraged to develop their personal research and activist
agendas during the course of the program and engage their fellow
participants in areas of mutual interest.

We began by reviewing the details of the
UNICEF Child Risk Measure index. The CRM was developed as part
of the celebration of the birth of the 6billionth child on Earth, and
while admittedly controversial, the CRM has sparked a wide-ranging
debate. The CRM provides for comparisons between countries and
regions on core child development issues:

In 1990 the World Summit on Children promoted several goals for
reducing the gap between rich and poor countries on several basic
child development indicators, and our discussion turned to how far the
world was from realizing these minimal standards in most African countries.
The remainder of our Saturday program examined why this gap persisted.

Ms Beth Verhey, former UNICEF official in the Child Protection Unit for the
Great Lakes region (east-central Africa) and researcher for former Special
Representative of the Secretary General for Children and Armed Conflict,
the Honorable Graca Machel, gave an
overview of the issues surrounding children as soldiers throughout Africa.
She discussed the contextual impact of children as soldiers on their health,
education, and psycho-social well-being and the effects on their social lives
of death, separation from families, and destruction of social facilities such as
homes and schools. Then her talk focused on a compelling case study of child
soldiers in the Angolan conflict that emphasized negotiated demobilization of
the child soldiers through early and persistent advocacy by a variety of
agencies. Protection of the children during demobilization and family
reunification were emphasized, using a ‘catequista’ model that had had
success in Central America. These were lay-church officials with strong rural
and community roots, who were able to intervene on the children’s behalf in
numerous cases and serve as adult role models for the demobilized child
soldiers.

Ms Lucky Odirile, doctoral candidate in Counseling Education at Ohio University,
then made a presentation on the emotional impact of HIV/AIDS on the children
of Botswana. Her talk focused on the staggering dimensions of the disease in a
small country, with many children being exposed to daily funerals. She made
potent reference to the previous evening’s film, Everyone’s Child, which
dramatized a similar story from neighboring Zimbabwe.

Our afternoon program started off with a panel that demonstrated the immediate
impact that our Institute for the African Child may have here in Ohio. Three
professional social service workers from Franklin County (Columbus) Ohio, who
began their lives here as refugees from the Somalia conflict, described the
struggle of the refugee child in this country that continues long after he or she
has sought asylum. Dr. Abdinur Mohammed, Mr. Abubakkar Osman, and
Mr Abubakkar Arman, provided insight into their efforts to found an organization,
SEED, which assists Somali and other refugees with their social resettlement issues.
Much of their work has been devoted to training social workers to understand the
cross-cultural issues that effect their interaction with Somali clients, and serving
as cultural interpreters for members of the Somali community itself. They have
been raising funds to improve the lives of their community and serving as its
advocates to the wider society. Themes from the previous evening’s film came up
once again as Mr. Abubakkar Osman described a young Somali who
had been sent to a youth detention facility on charges stemming from mutual lack
of cultural understanding. The dislocation that many of these Somali young people
feel is being expressed through drug and alcohol abuse, sadly alienating them from
their families. The case of the Somali refugee community in Columbus is an
important illustration of both the negative impact that globalizing forces can have
on a struggling community, and on the continued resilience of the American
immigrant story.

At the conclusion of this important panel it became clear that the Institute for the
African Child had a burgeoning agenda of domestic/African issues to include in its
work. We want to establish a community of professionals and activists who are
comfortable in all of the environments where African children are found, and who
are able to make the connections and networks that will support African children’s
struggles everywhere.

The second panel of the afternoon featured outstanding representatives from
Sierra Leone, describing the brutal conflict in that country and its impact on
children. Ohio University African Students Union president Mohammed
Mbakui-Ngegba presided  and introduced Mr. Mohammed Lamin to describe the
background of the conflict, and Mr. Abu Bakkar Kalakoh to offer personal
experiences from that situation. These men had worked as a civil servant and
lawyer respectively, and spoke movingly of the problems posed by Sierra
Leone’s turmoil. The panel also featured a presentation with more background
information on Angola by Mr. James Ochwa-Echel. It became clear that, while
we were initially motivated by the UNICEF CRM statistics on Angola, Sierra
Leone and Somalia, that no country’s problems were contained by its national
borders.

We concluded the teach-in with a round table discussion of all the
participants, summarizing and evaluating the program, and making a list of
issues to be addressed in the future work of the Institute. These included

• An urgent call for student and governmental activism on behalf of Africa’s children;
• An agenda of raising media consciousness about the public effects of constant
  negative images of Africa’s children;
• A pledge to bridge the African-African American gap around the issue of children;
• Seeking platforms each academic quarter for Institute for the African Child events;
• Establishment of Student Advisory Group to the Institute for the African Child;
• To work towards more research, publications, and general public awareness
  of the work of the Institute for the African Child.