Analysis: African IDP convention fills a void in humanitarian law

The African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa is a comprehensive document that will, if ratified, fill a void in international humanitarian law, say experts.

Whereas the rights of people who flee across national boundaries are protected under the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and a similar instrument introduced 18 years later by the Organization of African Unity (now the African Union), there has been no international legislation catering specifically for people displaced within their own country (IDPs).

IDPs vastly outnumber refugees in Africa. In just 10 of the 18 countries in east and central Africa, there are more than 10 million IDPs, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), with Sudan (four million), the Democratic Republic of Congo (2.12 million) and Somalia (1.55 million) heading the list.

In the same region, there are refugees in 16 countries, totalling just less than two million, according to OCHA.

This latest instrument, also known as the Kampala Convention because it was signed in the Ugandan capital, “obliges governments to recognize that IDPs have specific vulnerabilities and must be supported”, said Walter Kälin, Representative of the UN Secretary-General on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons.

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AFRICA: IDP convention – now the hard work begins

Photo: Allan Gichigi/IRIN

IDPs at the Mathare Chief’s camp where they have set up camp in the open field. Kenya, July 2008 (file photo

(IRIN)-Seventeen countries signed the African Union convention on internally displaced persons (IDPs) after years of preparation culminated in a week of meetings in the Ugandan capital but a lot more hard work remains before it becomes effective, according to observers.

“The most important step now is implementation,” Julia Dolly Joiner, AU commissioner for political affairs, said. “We need to move from intentions to actions.”

For the Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement,  it is crucial that implementation is carried out “in a timely fashion and in a manner that makes a real difference to the lives of persons affected by internal displacement in the region, including host communities.

“The first step forward should involve a process of national dialogue and civic education aimed at securing the Convention’s ratification and implementation by the State parties,” according to a statement by the project, which monitors displacement issues worldwide to promote best practice among governments and other actors.

Fifteen countries must ratify the convention before it enters into effect.

Organizers of the 19-23 October meetings insisted that the fact that only 17 signed did not represent a lack of political will and commitment on the part of the African states.

“We debated together and we agreed but when it comes to signing, the person has to have been given the authority by his government to sign,” one AU official told IRIN. “Only 17 had such authorization.”

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, who chaired the summit, praised it as “a very important milestone [that] has gone beyond conflicts to address issues of development.

“We have at least agreed in words, we now have to put our words [into] action,” he told a news conference. “The solace for the women in Darfur may not be very immediate, but the fact is that people have come together to discuss the matter.”

The IDP convention obliges states to:
	Prohibit and prevent arbitrary population displacements, respect the principles of humanity and human dignity, as well as aspects of international humanitarian law concerning the protection of IDPs;
	Ensure assistance to IDPs, incorporate obligations under the convention into domestic law and designate a body to coordinate IDP protection and assistance;
	Devise early warning systems on potential displacement and establish disaster risk reduction strategies, protect communities and respect individual rights on protection against arbitrary displacement;
	Respect the mandates of the AU and UN, and the roles of international humanitarian organizations; and
	Take necessary action to effectively organize humanitarian relief and guarantee security; respect, protect and not attack humanitarian personnel or resources, and ensure armed groups conform with their obligations.
It prohibits armed groups from:
	Carrying out arbitrary displacement, hampering the provision of protection and assistance to IDPs and restricting the movement of IDPs;
	Forcibly recruiting, kidnapping or engaging in sexual slavery and trafficking; or
	Attacking humanitarian personnel or resources.
It obliges the AU:
	To intervene in respect of grave circumstances such as war crimes and crimes against humanity;
	To respect the right of members to request such an intervention and support efforts to support IDPs; and
	Strengthen capacity and coordinate the mobilization of resources for protection and assistance to IDPs.

Partnerships urged

Joiner called for international support. “Africa cannot do it alone; that is why we are calling for partnerships,” she told IRIN. “We are optimistic that countries will be faithful to their commitments under the convention.”

The AU will now try to get more signatures, and lobby 15 countries to ratify the convention so it can become a binding document. Observers, however, say much more work needs to be done to generate political will, given that most presidents stayed away from the summit.

The convention addresses the root causes of displacement in Africa, where at least 11 million people are displaced by conflict and climate change-related natural disasters, among other reasons.

According to the Brookings-Bern Project, three of the world’s top five countries with the largest populations of conflict-induced IDPs are in Africa.

These include Sudan, with an estimated 4.9 million IDPs, the Democratic Republic of Congo, with at least one million, and Somalia, where the UN estimates 1.5 million are displaced. Hundreds of thousands more are displaced in Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, and Zimbabwe.

Overall, citizens in at least 20 African states are experiencing internal displacement.

The convention aims to promote regional and national measures to prevent, mitigate, prohibit and eliminate the root causes of internal displacement as well as provide durable solutions.

“People who flee persecution or conflict and cross into another country are categorized as refugees and, as such, benefit from a long-standing and well-oiled international legal protection system, including the 1951 Refugee Convention,” the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said.

“Until now [IDPs] have been more or less excluded from the system of international legal protection, even though they are often displaced in exactly the same way, and for exactly the same reasons, as refugees. At least in Africa, that should no longer be the case.”

African leaders to sign treaty on refugees

By Emmanuel Goujon

African leaders gathered Thursday in the Ugandan capital for a two-day summit aimed at agreeing a treaty on improving the plight of the continent’s 17-million refugees and displaced people.

The Convention on the Protection and Assistance of the Displaced People in Africa is the first of its kind aimed at internally displaced people, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

“The summit is aimed at pursuing durable solutions to the root causes and challenges of Africa’s 17-million IDPs and refugees,” Ugandan Minister for Refugees Tarsis Kabwegyere said ahead of the meeting.

Political upheaval, conflicts and natural disasters have left Africa with the world’s highest number of refugees and displaced.

“Internal displacement is one of the most daunting humanitarian challenges of our day, and no one would deny that Africa is the hardest-hit continent in terms of numbers of IDPs,” ICRC chief Jakob Kellenberger said in a statement.

Somalia’s long-running conflict, instability in DR Congo’s eastern region and recent political violence in Kenya as well as other hotspots such as northern Uganda and south Sudan have caused massive population displacements.

Around a third of Somalia’s 10-million people are in need of relief aid due to a prolonged drought that has plunged the Horn of Africa country into its worst humanitarian crisis in 18 years.

Close to a sixth of the population is displaced.

Even as the summit got under way, at least 17 civilians died in an exchange of mortar and artillery fire in Mogadishu, the latest in a string of such incidents that have sent tens of thousands fleeing the city in recent months.

African Union political affairs commissioner Julia Dolly Joiner called for political and economic stability for the continent’s trouble spots.

“Improvements in governance, rapid economic development and more appropriate food security strategies are among the actions that will ensure that the root causes are addressed,” she said.

On Wednesday, the AU executive council adopted the draft convention which calls for the prevention of forced displacement, protection of refugees and the internally displaced and helping victims of conflicts and natural disasters.

Under the convention, the draft of which was seen by AFP, countries will be required to provide special assistance for IDPs with special needs, including the elderly.

Leaders at the Kampala summit will also set up an action plan to implement the resolution which emerges from the meeting.

Last year, the 53-member bloc resolved to bolster the protection of refugees and displaced people, a move that was lauded by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees as historic.

“But some African countries are reluctant to ratify the convention which would be restrictive and have legal consequences,” an African diplomat told AFP. – Sapa-AFP

AFRICA: Shining the spotlight on the displaced

Forty years after the rights of Africa’s refugees were enshrined in a landmark convention, the continent’s leaders are due to make legal history again by adopting a new instrument to assist people displaced within the borders of their own country.

The African Convention on the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa is the main agenda for the heads of state summit on refugees, returnees and IDPs in the Ugandan capital, Kampala, from 19-23 October.

“It will be the first legally binding international instrument on IDPs with a continental scope, and UNHCR [UN Refugee Agency] hopes that it will translate into better lives for African IDPs,” the agency’s spokesman Andrej Mahecic told reporters in Geneva on 8 September.

Advocacy groups, including IDP Action, Amnesty International, the International Federation for Human Rights, and Refugees International, have hailed the convention. However, they noted, the initial draft contained elements that were vague or inconsistent with other international human rights standards.

“There are too many IDPs in Africa and their situation is too precarious for the situation to be allowed to drift any longer,” says Jeremy Smith of the advocacy group, IDP Action. “The AU needs to move quickly to adopt its IDPs Convention and then invest sufficient resources and political will to see it effectively implemented.”

The AU, in a statement, said it demonstrated Africa’s leadership in addressing forced population displacement. Observers, however, say action on issues affecting African IDPs has generally been slow.

Over the years, the AU has developed various initiatives, including deployment of peace support operations, appointment of special envoys and special representatives, and mobilizing international support for post-conflict reconstruction.

The objectives of the Convention:
	Promote and strengthen regional and national measures to prevent or mitigate, prohibit and eliminate root causes of internal displacement as well as provide for durable solutions
	Establish a legal framework for preventing internal displacement, where possible, and protecting and assisting internally displaced persons in Africa.
	Establish a legal framework for solidarity, cooperation, promotion of durable solutions and mutual support between the state parties to combat displacement and address its consequences;
Source: African Union Commission
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In some cases, regional blocks have intervened to prevent, de-escalate and resolve conflicts – including the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Cote d’Ivoire; the Southern African Development Community (SADC) in southern Africa; and the InterGovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) in Sudan’s north-south conflict.

In addition, various instruments exist that offer protection to the displaced, such as the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child.

“Africa has shown the most progress in transforming the [UN] Guiding Principles into binding international instruments,” Walter Kälin, Representative of the UN Secretary-General on the human rights of IDPs, said in a report to the General Assembly.

Half of all IDPs in Africa

Africa hosts at least 11 million of the world’s estimated 25 million IDPs. The causes of displacement vary, according to the AU, but are largely homegrown and exacerbated by extreme poverty, underdevelopment and lack of opportunities.

“Since the 1990s, African conflicts have witnessed massive brutality against the civilian population,” notes Bahame Tom Nyanduga, member of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and Special Rapporteur on Refugees, Asylum Seekers and IDPs in Africa.

Calling on African states to accept responsibility for addressing human rights abuses faced by IDPs, he notes that armed combatants in Somalia, Liberia, Sierra Leone, northern Uganda, Darfur and eastern DRC violated the Geneva Conventions’ protocol on civilian protection with impunity.

Climate change factors

Climate change has also increased the frequency and intensity of natural hazards in Africa, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC).

The situation at a glance

Africa hosts at least 11 million of the world’s 25 million conflict-affected IDPs. Millions more are displaced annually by natural disasters. full report

A study by the two organizations found that natural disasters displaced 284,000 people in Mozambique in 2007, 150,000 in Benin, 72,805 in Ethiopia and 59,000 in Algeria.

However, forced displacement across the continent is mostly attributable to the acts or omissions of the state, such as human rights violations, political and socio-economic marginalization, conflicts over natural resources and governance challenges, according to the AU. 

Unable to flee to another country in search of safety, IDPs seek refuge from violence within their own borders, sheltering in makeshift camps, shanty towns or scattered in local communities.

“The number and plight of IDPs in Africa is a scandal,” according to IDP Action’s Smith. “The African Union has talked the talk – drafting an IDP Convention which lays out the protections IDPs should be accorded – but does not walk the walk.”

No global agency

The situation is complicated by the fact that globally there is no agency with a specific mandate to protect and assist IDPs – unlike refugees, who fall under UNHCR.

IDPs in armed conflict have rights as civilians under international humanitarian law. They are also protected – although not expressly referred to therein – by various bodies of law, including, most notably, national law, human rights law and, if they are in a state affected by armed conflict.

“While they are displaced, IDPs are entitled to the same protection from the effects of hostilities and the same relief as the rest of the civilian population,” notes the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

However, while they make up almost two-thirds of global populations seeking safety from armed conflict and violence, they have fewer rights than refugees.

Sudan, for example, has the world’s largest IDP population, with an estimated 4.5 million people affected, including 2.7 million in Darfur – of whom 317,000 were displaced this year.

“Since they are living within their own countries, IDPs remain under the legal jurisdiction of their national authorities, which may well be involved in the violence that they are fleeing,” the medical charity, Médecins Sans Frontières, notes.

Africa’s IDPs in numbers

Photo: UNHCR

Most IDPs in Africa have been forced out of their homes by conflict, either between government forces and armed opponents or between communities. Here are some numbers

Binding hopes

The Kampala summit was recommended by AU ministers meeting in Burkina Faso in May and the AU Executive Council meeting in The Gambia in July 2006.

In 2007, NGOs meeting in Brazzaville urged the AU to “adopt legally binding instruments for the protection of the rights of migrants… the protection of and assistance to [IDPs] in Africa, based on the [UN] Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement”.

The current draft is heavily informed by these principles, whose contents are mainly derived from existing international legal rules and standards. It is, however, a non-binding, soft law.

According to IDP Action, it “offers the hope of African states being held to binding standards by which they are to prevent displacement, respond to the immediate needs of those displaced and create the conditions for sustainable return and resettlement”.

Approved by African ministers in November 2008, the convention will become legally binding once endorsed at the Kampala summit.

“The theme of the special summit,” notes Tarsis Kabwegyere, Ugandan Minister for Disaster Preparedness, Relief and Refugees, “…fits in well, given the displacement trends on the continent, which have continued without a stop since the days of independence”.

Also see

Four short videos on displacement
IRIN’s rolling daily forced migration (refugees and IDPs) coverage
IRIN 2008 backgrounder on the Guiding Principles
IRIN’s 2002 In-Depth on displacement

AFRICA: Why family is best for orphans

Africa’s orphans will experience a richer, more wholesome childhood if they are raised within a family rather than in a childcare institution, according to speakers at a conference on family-based care for children in Nairobi.

“We need to heed the cry of a child’s heart for an adult who will care for them and be crazy about them,” said Monica Woodhouse, who runs the South African NGO, Give a Child a Family.

According to the UN, there are more than 34 million orphans in sub-Saharan Africa today, 11 million of whom lost parents to the AIDS pandemic.

Traditionally, orphans in Africa are raised by the extended family, and while many families continue to take in orphaned relatives, conventional family structures are buckling under the pressure of caring for additional children; a 2006 study in Korogocho, a Nairobi slum, found that more than half the 436 people surveyed were caring for at least one child orphaned through HIV/AIDS.

Too poor to cope, many families now reject these children, leading to a proliferation of institutional childcare facilities across the continent; in Uganda, for example, government statistics show that the number of children in orphanages nearly doubled between 1998 and 2001.

Separation is hard

“There are plenty of studies which show that raising children in institutions as opposed to families affects their cognitive, social, emotional and even intellectual development,” Philista Onyango, regional director of the African Network for the Prevention and Protection against Child Abuse and Neglect (ANPPCAN), told IRIN.

“In Africa, people are not trained to work with these children and often don’t know what they are doing, so orphaned children in institutions can wind up being physically or sexually abused,” she added. “Many are not even registered and those that are, are not properly regulated.”

According to the National Council for Children Services in Kenya, there are 417 charitable children’s institutions registered, while another 800 are estimated to be operating unregistered.

“Separation from the family is harmful to children; it doesn’t matter if I have grey hair on my head, my mother is still my mother, my family is still my family – children need that sense of belonging,” said George Nyakora, regional training director for the SOS Children’s Villages, which places children who cannot be connected to their biological families in family environments.

Photo: Keishamaza Rukikaire/IRIN

Many African orphanages are unregistered, making it impossible to monitor the progress of the children they care for

Cost issues

Speakers also said the cost of supporting families to raise orphans was significantly lower than keeping a child in an orphanage; a study from South Africa showed the cost of residential care can be as much as six times that of providing care to children living in poor families.

“All the money donors are pouring into institutions should instead be invested in enabling families to raise these children,” Onyango said.

Even HIV-positive children on life-prolonging anti-retroviral medication do better growing up with family, according to Protus Lumiti, chief manager of the Nyumbani Children’s Home in Nairobi.

“We run a home with about 110 HIV-positive children, but even we realise this is a last resort,” he told IRIN. “We have another facility in Nairobi caring for 3,500 children who are based with their families but come to a centre for drugs and nutritional support – community-based care has worked very well in our experience.”

“There are some extreme situations, for instance, where a child’s disability is so difficult that it can only be properly managed by professionals in an institution, but there is certainly no need for as many childcare centres as we are seeing on the continent,” ANPPCAN’s Onyango added.

Protection factors

However, steps – including legislation, screening of families, training of child welfare professionals and setting up monitoring and evaluation mechanisms – are necessary to ensure children are successfully placed with relatives.

“We tend to focus on the moral issue of homeless, orphaned children, but we need to look at the economics of it, and to create minimum standards that families must meet in order to care for children,” said Nyakora.

Onyango noted that it was not unheard of for children to be abused within their own families, so mechanisms needed to be in place to ensure families were assessed for suitability and monitored to ensure they were giving children the best possible upbringing.

“Sometimes the relatives are only interested in the deceased’s property, and not the child’s welfare, when they offer to take in orphans,” she said. “Setting up child welfare committees at the community level who can monitor a child’s progress would be an excellent idea.

“The people left to care for the children – often their grandparents – also need support beyond ensuring the children are fed, clothed and educated,” Onyango said. “They need community support in parenting these children, and structures that will ensure the young children will not wind up looking after their old grandparents instead of living a child’s life.”

“As long as they have the financial capacity and social support to raise children, a family is the best place for a child,” Nyakora said.

UNODC tool to help prevent people trafficking

Photo: Naresh Newar/IRIN

The UNODC manual is a practical guide and training tool based on the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and its protocol to prevent, suppress and punish trafficking in persons, especially women and children

The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has released a manual to help build capacity among criminal justice practitioners to prevent and combat human trafficking.

The Anti-Human Trafficking Manual for Criminal Justice Practitioners is a practical guide and training tool based on the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and its protocol to prevent, suppress and punish trafficking in persons, especially women and children.

The manual explores a victim-centred approach to effective law enforcement and some content is based on the experiences of more than 45 judges, prosecutors, investigators, academics and NGO and inter-governmental organization representatives.

According to UNODC, more human traffickers are being convicted globally but the process is bogged down by the absence of anti-trafficking legislation in some countries or by the inability to translate legislation into action.

In some cases, human trafficking is mistaken for migrant smuggling, while some victims fear to cooperate because of threats and intimidation by traffickers.

The most common form of trafficking, UNODC noted in a February report based on data from 155 countries, was for sexual exploitation, especially of women and girls.

In 30 percent of the countries, women were the main traffickers. Globally, almost 20 percent of victims were children – although in parts of Africa this proportion rose to 100 percent.

“More must be done to reduce the vulnerability of victims, increase the risks to traffickers, and lower demand for the goods and services of modern-day slaves,” UNODC Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa said during the release of the report.

ANALYSIS-Clinton’s Africa trip breaks little new ground

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s wraps up her Africa trip on Friday, urging nations such as Nigeria and Kenya to tackle graft but showing no big policy shifts by the Obama administration towards the continent.

For the most part, experts said the 11-day, seven-nation trip was a goodwill and listening tour, following up after U.S. President Barack Obama’s one-stop Africa trip to Ghana in July.

“I expected more than just the hugging of the status quo,” said Africa expert Bronwyn Bruton of the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington.

“I have the impression that she reached out and let it be known that Africa is on the radar, but Clinton is also trying to make the most of the existing framework,” she added.

The trip was her longest as secretary of state and aimed at proving Africa was a priority for the first African-American U.S. president, whose father was from Kenya. But no major initiatives or “goodies” were announced, except for $17 million in new aid for sexual violence victims in Democratic Republic of Congo and funding for AIDS programmes.

“There were enormous expectations after Obama was elected and after the inauguration. People thought that the flood gate of aid will be opened but now they are aware of the limitations,” said Tom Wheeler of the South African Institute of International Affairs. Africa policies are still being formulated in two key places — Sudan and Somalia — and domestic politics from health care to the economic crisis are priorities.

Washington is also juggling wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, seeking to rein in the nuclear programmes of Iran and North Korea and trying to broker Israeli-Palestinian peace.

GOVERNANCE THEME

Princeton Lyman, former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria and South Africa — both stops on Clinton’s trip – said her tour would be remembered for its good governance message, which Obama called for in his Ghana speech, saying Western aid depended on it.

“The theme of better governance will be the mantra of the Obama administration,” Lyman said.

Her toughest anti-graft message was in Kenya, where a sharp tone was easiest to digest because of Obama’s heritage.

“It is tough, but it is also lovingly presented. President Obama very much wants Kenya to be the leaders of a reform movement,” Clinton told students at the University of Nairobi.

“It is where his blood comes from,” she said in Abuja.
While firm in Kenya, the top U.S. diplomat did not publicly berate ministers in key oil producers Nigeria and Angola, saving her toughest criticism for “town hall” meetings that have become a style of her diplomacy. With Nigeria’s foreign minister, she “supported and encouraged” anti-corruption efforts.

A few hours later, she blamed poor governance for the gap between rich and poor. “The most immediate source of the disconnect between Nigeria’s wealth and its poverty is a failure of governance,” she said to applause from the crowd.

LEVERAGE GAMBLE, CHINA

While leveraging Obama’s prestige is useful, Clinton has to follow up with results, said Stephen Morrison of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington thinktank.
“Whether this approach pays off remains to be seen,” he said.

Some experts were disappointed Clinton did not lean harder on South Africa over Zimbabwe, saying she should have more publicly backed opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai who uneasily shares the government with President Robert Mugabe.

“It was eerily reminiscent of President (George W.) Bush when he went to South Africa,” said Lyman of Clinton’s muted response to reporters in Pretoria and in Durban over Zimbabwe. While she pressed for food security in Kenya and Angola, Clinton, it was less of an issue on other stops, probably, said some experts, because she still does not have a U.S. Agency for International Development chief in place, who would spearhead most of that policy.

Where Clinton did get high marks was on tackling sexual violence in eastern Democratic Republic Congo with a visit to the provincial capital Goma, where she spoke to several rape victims and visited a camp for displaced people. However, that message was partially drowned out — largely by U.S. media — when Clinton snapped at a student in Kinshasa who asked what her husband, former president Bill Clinton, thought of China’s deals with Congo. “My husband is not secretary of state, I am,” she said.

As the Obama administration has sought to show its commitment to Africa, so has China increased its clout, a claim Clinton sought to squash at every stop. Kenyan political analyst Gitau Warigi wrote in the Daily Nation that there was more at stake in Clinton’s visit than altruism.

“There are strategic interests involved,” wrote Warigi, referring to China. Clinton leaves Abuja on Thursday for a brief stop in Liberia’s capital Monrovia and then Cape Verde for an overnight visit. She returns to Washington on Friday.

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AFRUCA Celebrates Eight Years of Promoting the Welfare of African Children

On its 8th anniversary, AFRUCA outlines its achievements promoting the rights and welfare
of African children in the UK and in Africa

AFRUCA – Africans Unite Against Child Abuse was established in May 2001 to campaign against the abuse and exploitation of African children. Since then we have gained recognition as the premier charity working to promote the rights and welfare of African children in the UK.

“Many African children in the UK experience a multitude of challenges that affect their ability to flourish and grow. Our main focus has been to ensure we can work successfully with others to address those challenges for the benefit of our children” said Debbie Ariyo, AFRUCA Founder and Executive Director.

AFRUCA has played a leadership role in addressing the trafficking of African children to the UK and is known to be very active in this regard. Over the years, our work on child trafficking has imbibed a holistic approach, working with others to highlight the issue, influencing government policy through knowledge gained from working in the community as well as through the provision of direct support to victims. At least over 40 young people have directly benefitted from our work in this area. With new funding from Comic Relief, we are now able to expand the menu of support and assistance to reach more victims of trafficking in the London area.

AFRUCA is deeply concerned about the disproportionate number of African children who are experiencing abuse and harm and who are ending up in Local Authority care across the UK. Most children who are removed from their parents are due to allegations of culture-related child abuse and other practices harmful to children.

In tackling this growing problem, AFRUCA has launched an England-wide prevention and early intervention project aiming to help improve the knowledge and understanding of African parents in Child Protection as well as the rules and regulations governing how children are brought up in the UK.

With funding from the Big Lottery and the Government Department for Children and Families, this project operates in London, Manchester, Newcastle and Liverpool. So far, since June 2007, over 500 parents from a wide range of African backgrounds have benefited from our training programme across London alone. In addition to working with parents to improve their parenting skills, AFRUCA also provides intensive support to families in crisis who are experiencing a breakdown in relationships. This area of work has enabled us to intervene successfully in over 30 families across London and the South East since June 2007. This element of our work has been boosted by our recent success in winning a tender from Thurrock Council in Essex to establish a Service Office offering a menu of support services for Black African families at risk in that area.

Aside working with families and within the community, AFRUCA is actively engaging with practitioners to help improve their knowledge and skills so they can intervene successfully when working with African families.

In April 2007, we launched a National Training Programme for Practitioners working with African children across the UK by offering a menu of training courses to help broaden their knowledge and skills in intervening in and assessing families. So far over 400 practitioners have taken part in our training programme.

Our knowledge and expertise in child protection work with African children is highly valued and respected by agencies and their workers across the country. This is evidenced by the level of demand for AFRUCA’s intervention and expert advice in case assessment.

In 2008, AFRUCA was commissioned by Southwark Council to help review its child protection work with Black African families. Our work has helped to highlight key gaps in service provision which we expect to be addressed by the Council. In recent years, there has been a lot of attention paid to the plight of children and young people accused as witches or as possessed by evil spirits. Many children across the UK suffer untold physical and emotional harm as a result of accusations of witchcraft. In 2007, AFRUCA launched a community consultation to gather views on whether branding children as witches should be a criminal offence. Majority of respondents supported our proposal for the criminalisation of child branding. Through our Safeguarding African Children Network, we continue to work with the relevant community and faith groups and other agencies to address this very important issue.

AFRUCA is very proud of our achievements in supporting African children and their families across the country, in helping to keep families together and in helping to support victims of trafficking. As we continue to expand our work across the UK, with a Regional Office in Manchester and a Service Office in Thurrock, Essex, it is our hope that we can continue to make a difference in the lives of African children in the UK and help to address the root causes of the problems they experience.

However, it is important to note that our intervention in the past eight years has not been limited to the UK. In partnership with Youth Alive, a children’s charity based in the North of Ghana, AFRUCA is also working to help meet the needs of over 300 street children each year in that country through the provision of access to education, training and health care.

In Nigeria, we are working with partners in the East of the country to address the horrific problem of “baby factories”, a fertile ground for child trafficking and exploitation. On the issue of child trafficking itself, we are actively engaging with local groups to conduct advocacy campaigns.

In 2004, AFRUCA held a series of awareness raising campaigns as well as an international conference in Lagos, Nigeria to highlight the growing number of Nigerian children trafficked to the UK and the need for urgent intervention. Based on our growing activities across the continent, AFRUCA is now seeking to develop a physical presence in Africa.

In celebrating our 8th year of supporting African children and promoting their safety and well- being, we wish to acknowledge the overwhelming goodwill and support we have received over the years from our various partners, including other African community organisations, government local authorities and other agencies, Safeguarding Boards, our funders and sponsors, other charities across the UK and in Africa and most importantly the children, young people and the families that make our work worthwhile.

From 22 to 26 June 2009, AFRUCA will hold a series of events in London and Manchester to celebrate its 8th anniversary.

Please visit our website at www.afruca.org for further information.

For further enquiries please contact:
Debbie Ariyo
AFRUCA Director
Tel: 0844 660 8607
Email: info@afruca.org

Africa plans landmark convention on internal refugees

Written by Emma Batha

African countries are set to adopt a ground-breaking convention providing rights to millions of people forced to flee their homes because of conflict.

Africa has some 12 million internally displaced people (IDPs) who have been uprooted within their own country. Unlike refugees – people who have fled to another country – IDPs benefit from little or no protection.

The convention, the brainchild of the African Union, will for the first time provide them with similar rights to refugees, according to a draft seen by AlertNet. U.N. refugee chief Antonio Guterres welcomed the initiative and hoped other regions would follow suit. “This will be the first international legally binding instrument in relation to internal displacement and we hope that this can become an example to be followed in other parts of the world,” he told AlertNet.

“We are talking about … a full range or rights that up to a certain extent are similar to those granted by the 1951 (U.N.) convention to refugees when they live in a foreign country.” The African Union, which groups 53 countries, expects the convention to be adopted at a special summit on refugees and IDPs opening in the Ugandan capital Kampala on Oct. 19.

DARFUR UNDERLINES NEED FOR CHANGE

Although refugees and IDPs have often fled their homes for the same reasons, there are crucial differences in how the two groups are treated. Once they cross an international border, refugees will normally receive food, shelter and a place of safety. They are protected by international laws and have a specialist U.N. agency to help them. By contrast, IDPs remain at the mercy of their government, which may view them as enemies of the state. They may also fall prey to rebels and militias operating inside or outside camps.

The draft convention obliges states to prevent displacement and bans the use of displacement as a method of warfare or for collective punishment. Signatories are required to protect IDPs’ human rights and prevent war crimes, arbitrary killing and detention, abduction, torture, rape, slavery and the recruitment of child soldiers. IDP Action, a London-based campaign group, said the situation in Sudan’s Darfur region, where some 2.7 million are displaced, highlighted the urgent need for the convention. It said displaced Darfuris were often attacked by government and rebels, with women raped and children recruited to fight.

IDP Action director Jeremy Smith said Khartoum’s expulsion of 13 international aid groups this year would also contravene the convention which obliges states to facilitate access for humanitarian agencies. Africa is home to around half the world’s IDPs. Smith said the number of displaced in five African countries alone – Sudan, Congo, Uganda, Algeria and Somalia – was greater than the global total of refugees.

“The number and plight of IDPs in Africa is a scandal,” he added. “(The convention) sends a potentially hugely significant signal to the rest of the world that Africa takes the issue of internal displacement very seriously.” But Smith said he was concerned that the convention was too vague on the subject of monitoring and compliance.

What the draft convention says:

Land acquisitions in Africa pose risks for poor

First detailed study of phenomenon warns of impacts to rural communities, but notes possible benefits as well

Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

Land acquisitions are on the increase in Africa and other continents, raising the risk, if not made properly, that poor people will be evicted or lose access to land, water, and other resources, according to the first detailed study of the trend.

The study has been realized by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) at the request of FAO and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). It warns that such deals can bring many opportunities (guaranteed outlets, employment, investment in infrastructures, increases in agricultural productivity) but can also cause great harm if local people are excluded from decisions about allocating land and if their land rights are not protected.

The report highlights a number of misconceptions about what have been termed land grabs. It found that land-based investment has been rising over the past five years. But while foreign investment dominates, domestic investors are also playing a big role in land acquisitions.

Private sector deals are more common than government-to-government ones, though governments are using a range of tools to indirectly support private deals.

Concerns about food and energy security are key drivers, but other factors such as business opportunities, demand for agricultural commodities for industry and recipient country agency are also at play. Although large-scale land claims remain a small proportion of suitable land in any one country, contrary to widespread perceptions there is very little “empty” land as most remaining suitable land is already under use or claim, often by local people.

The report found that many countries do not have sufficient mechanisms to protect local rights and take account of local interests, livelihoods and welfare. A lack of transparency and of checks and balances in contract negotiations can promote deals that do not maximize the public interest. Insecure local land rights, inaccessible registration procedures, vaguely defined productive use requirements, legislative gaps and other factors too often undermine the position of local people.

It calls for carefully assessing local contexts, including existing land uses and claims; securing land rights for rural communities; involving local people in negotiations, and proceeding with land acquisition only after their free, prior and informed consent.

A complicated picture

Co-authors Sonja Vermeulen and Lorenzo Cotula of IIED caution that land acquisitions vary greatly and that blanket statements about land-grabbing are highly misleading.

“Ultimately, whether international land deals seize opportunities and mitigate risks depends on their terms and conditions – what business models are used, how costs and benefits are shared, and who decides on these issues and how,” says Cotula. “This calls for proper regulation, skilful negotiation and public oversight.”

“In many countries, provisions for including local people in decision-making are usually absent or poorly implemented and this increases the risk of them losing access to land and other resources,” adds Vermeulen.

“The scale of land acquisitions has been exaggerated but in many countries the agreements that allow foreign ownership of land can be very problematic,” she adds.

Alexander Mueller, Head of the Environment and Natural Resources Department at FAO stresses the need to see foreign investment and large-scale land acquisitions in the context of global food security challenges.

“This new trend is a result of the recent food crisis and volatility of food prices, among other factors. The new challenges of global food insecurity and global investment should be addressed through appropriate regulations, and well-informed agricultural and food policies. The study should help to link decisions on investment with an awareness of all implications, including social and environmental ones. Developing guidelines for land governance, or a code to regulate international investments might be useful to improve decision making and negotiations. FAO and its partners are currently working together to develop such guidelines, and this study is a first step in this process,” Mueller said.

“I would avoid the blanket term ‘land-grabbing’,” says Rodney Cooke, IFAD Director, Technical Advisory Division. “Done the right way, these deals can bring benefits for all parties and be a tool for development.”

“The poor women and men that IFAD works with every day must not be sidelined,” adds Cooke. “Their input and their interests must be central, and we must ensure that any benefits promised, such as employment, infrastructure, agricultural know-how, do materialize.”

New research

The study, Land Grab or Development Opportunity? Agricultural Investments and International Land Deals in Africa, includes new research from Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Sudan, Tanzania and Zambia.

It was undertaken by an IIED team with inputs from, and in close collaboration with, FAO and IFAD. It was funded by FAO, IFAD, IIED and the UK Department for International Development.

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