Dr Chidiebere Ezinwa,  a lecturer in the Department of Mass Communication, Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT) and a Child Rights advocate,  states that the Nigeria government must take deliberate steps in addressing children’s rights in order to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.

He spoke with Gom Mirian

What exactly is the content of the SDGs?

To start with, SDGs simply stands for Sustainable Development Goals.

 It encompasses all development objectives aimed at improving people, protecting our environment and planet, as well as safeguarding wildlife and marine life.

But here we are trying to say that SDG contains child’s rights that without fulfilling the rights of children we cannot achieve a Sustainable Development Goals, so the rights of the children are integrated in the SDGs so if we do not make efforts to fulfill the rights of the children we cannot realize this goals so that is the main point we are trying to establish, that we cannot separate the SDGs from the rights of children that as we struggle to fulfill the rights of children we are moving closer to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

For instance, you look at Goal 1, that is “No Poverty,” if we deal with poverty in our society,that means that we have dealt with hunger, we have dealt with some of our children not going to school, hawking in the streets to support their families, among others means of survival and forms of social vices.

So we are saying that if we provide for our children and recognize their rights within the “No Poverty” goal we will see that we have recognized the rights of the child to live, the rights of the child  to good health and  education, the rights to adequate nutrition all these rights will be guaranteed. Looking at SDG 2, “Zero Hunger” incorporated within the goal is also child right to live.

 Here we are talking about the child’s right to nutrition that the child should be fed well from the moment of conception which is the duty of the mother to feed well for the child to develop well. There no way a mother that is not healthy will give birth to a healthy child. So you see that the right to nutrition is very critical in the sense that if the right is neglected so many other things will not work out well.

First, the right to health is affected because a poorly nourished child will not be a healthy child, an unhealthy child cannot go to school nor allow the parent to go out to work which will affect the income of the family and the progress of other children in the family is also affected. The goals are human rights-driven and because the child is also a human being we try to incorporate the right of the child in these goals.

Looking at climate change as one of the goals, you see incidents such as drought, flood, famine in different places. Families which are displaced are likely to face hunger, their rights to property will be taken away, their rights to health is also endangered because during flooding there could be incidence of outbreak of diseases because people are moving from different places this is also a problem.

If you look at Goal 6, “clean water and sanitation,” if you are in a dirty environment, it is very likely that the children will be affected with various diseases. Nigeria is ranked number one in open defecation, as reports show that 46 million Nigerians still defecate in the open, so having such a situation on ground, you can imagine how vulnerable our children are exposed to diseases. If you go to some of our schools, you will discover that some of the children are out of school because they do not have toilets in the school, especially the girls. They wouldn’t want to go to school where they do not have the toilet

Which of the goals do you think a country like Nigeria prioritizes and why?

These goals are indivisible, you can’t say one is important than the other. Because just imagine a child is alive but do not go to school, the child’s rights to education is taken away for instance, you cannot compare an educated mother with an uneducated one in terms of parenting and care of the child.

The educated one is more likely to take better care of the child, she also has more power in decision making process in the family also when a child fails to go to school the next step is marriage and you know the consequences of early child marriage.

The Goal 7, “clean and affordable energy.”

Smoke inhaled by our children from indoor cooking, emission from generator set and vehicles pose a danger to the child’s right to health.

So that is why these goals are very critical that we argued that without fulfilling them we cannot achieve nor realize the Sustainable Development Goals. Without taking care of children we cannot achieve SDGs.

SDG is futuristic, the ideal is that we should be careful of things will do today in order not to endanger tomorrow that if we treat the children rights, respect their rights, protect their rights according to law that it is going to ensure a better future for us and that when we do that we are moving closer to achieving SDGs. We are half way into the programme. As at 2019 Nigeria occupied 159 position and in 2020 , the 160 position when you look at other indicators of the goal you will see that we are not doing well as open defecation and malnutrition Nigeria are number one.

Going forward, apart from the government, what must individuals do to achieve SDGs by 2030?

I believe that the media should create that awareness because most of these problems spring from high level of ignorance in our society . When you talk about SDGs many people do not know what it’s all about. So first of all that ignorance should be taken away from the public. People should be educated, the mass media should join in public enlightenment to create awareness about what these goals are the implications and the essence of the goals so that everybody will join hands because Goal 17 talks about partnership and for us to achieve SDG we need to partner, to come together at both local, national and international levels in order to allow for 50:50 contribution by all to achieve the goal.

Individuals also have a lot of roles to play as the universal basic education duty imposes on the parent to take the child to school. So it is not the government’s duty to take the child to school, and also it is the duty of the parent to take the child to health facility for routine immunization and to seek health care when the child is sick.

What are the implications if these goals are not achieved?

The implications are that there will be massive denial of rights of the child and the essence of the goal is that there should be a better future for everybody.

That means if we fail to achieve this goal, it means that the future is bleak because tomorrow starts now. That whatever we are doing today, have implications for tomorrow. The kind of training we give our children today will give us an idea of the kind of future to expect. If these children are not educated, where are we going to get medical doctors, other professionals from? That means we will lack them.

Presently, the rate at which our doctors are leaving the country, you will see that our health care sector is already endangered. 

What does Nigeria stand to gain if these goals are achieved?

If we achieve the goals that means the future will be bright, everybody including children will be happy, there will be reduction in crime, out-of-school children, infant mortality rate, mental mortality rate, conflict and crime.

For instance, you look at farmers- herders issues is also related to climate change, they want to move their animals from where there is no water to where there is water and in the process run into conflict with farmers.

Goal 6, talk about peace, justice and strong institutions.  If we do not have peace like what is happening in Ukraine – Russia and Syria, children will be dying from malnutrition as a result of conflicts. You look at the North-East of Nigeria and North- West where there is conflict a lot of children are malnourished, a lot in IDPs camps suffering. So if we achieve these goals it then means that all this negative forces mentioned will be taken care of.