Child labor is still a serious problem threatening Yemeni society and requiring effective solutions, said the Children’s Parliament in its fifth convention. The convention was held in three sessions, from August 6 to 8 in the Yemeni Parliament building. The sessions were held under the slogan, “Child labor: A problem requiring a solution,” and were supported by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation.
“We are supporting the Democracy School, especially these sessions of the Children’s Parliament, because we know that it is very important that young people start already at an early age to get use to democratic process and it is a very good opportunity for these children in youth to get some experience on how democracy works,” said the resident representative of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Felix Eikenberg. “It is not only electing, it is also working in Parliament, in communities, in talking to the government representatives, and they can learn in these sessions and this is why the Friedrich Ebert Foundation since we are supporting process of democratization that Yemen has impact on, this is a way of supporting this process for the future as well.”
The recent sessions were preceded by some field visits conducted by members of the Children’s Parliament in the various governorates. They talked to people in the streets and houses, including street children and people in police stations, to become more aware of the children’s conditions in such places in general. “The report resulted from the previous visits was made to be discussed in these sessions,” said the Chairman of the Democracy School, Jamal al-Shami. “The recommendations will be sent to President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the president of the Parliament and the Prime Minister.
We tried to discuss such important issue with the authorities involved in such thing but every one of them throws the responsibility on another one,” said the president of the Children’s Parliament, Nada al-Shira’i. “We can just bring some recommendations and suggestions for the authorities. The strange thing is that until now the government does not have a statistics base to show the real number of children working in the different governorates,” said Safa al-Watari, a member of the Children’s Parliament.
In 2001, the International Labor Organization estimated that 19 percent of children ages 10 to 14 years were working in Yemen. Child labor is growing in Yemen, since the rate of children working increased from about 7 percent in 1990 to 9 percent in 1999. The rate is still increasing, and is at about 11 to 15 percent these days, according to the implementation report of the ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour for 2006. The children working in Yemen were estimated to be more than 700,000, according to the poverty survey conducted in 1999.
Child labor is common, especially in the rural areas, where there are 90 to 95 percent of the total number of working children in Yemen. Children also work in urban areas, in stores, restaurants and workshops, and peddle goods on the street. The vast majority of children work in agriculture, without wages. Other children work as street vendors, beggars, domestics, and in the fishing, leather, construction, and automobile repair sectors. There are no official reports that children in Yemen were victims of trafficking. Children under age 18 are prohibited from entering the government’s armed forces, but there are some reports that children are involved in armed conflicts.
The Constitution guarantees free and compulsory education to all Yemeni citizens. Education is compulsory for children from ages 6 to 15 years. According to the ILO, the gross primary enrollment rate in 2000 was 79 percent, including 61 percent for girls and 97 percent for boys, while the net primary enrollment rate was 67 percent, 49 percent for girls and 84 percent for boys. Primary school attendance rates are unavailable for Yemen. While enrollment rates indicate a level of commitment to education, they do not always reflect children’s participation in school.
The Ministry of Education reported that nearly 200,000 boys dropped out of school in 1999. Child labor is reported to interfere with school attendance, particularly in the agriculture and domestic service sectors. During these sessions, the members of the Children’s Parliament interrogated a number of the governmental authorities involved in combating the child labor phenomenon, and a number of the international organizations working in the children’s rights such as the ILO, Friedrich Ebert Foundation, and some social organizations. The members have also received training in communication skills, recitation, and writing reports.
Poverty was cited by the participants as the main cause of the rise in child labor. The factors that mainly cause poverty include social and educational difficulties, wars, natural disasters, migration, and rapid population growth. When children enter the labor market, they often lose their legal, social and cultural rights. In the long run, this results in increasing unemployment, a change in the social structure, and harm to their health.
Therefore, the participants have expressed their concern regarding the rise in poverty, and stressed the need to expand the social safety network. “The children labor phenomenon in Yemen is increasing and our abilities are very limited, so our efforts will not appear in fighting such problem. We cannot solve such a problem in one day, but we try to do what we can do in our limited abilities,” said Mohammed al-Ansi, a representative of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor. At the end, the Children’s Parliament recommended a lot of things but most of them are focused on how to support the poor families and how to educate them towards such issues.