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Tag: child

  • Institution for child-training (5)

    Dear Reader, this week, as we round off this teaching, I’ll like to quickly share with you on The Power Of Prayer in the process of child-training and Tips for effective child-training.

    Prayer is a spiritual weapon that can be used to bring about discipline in the lives of your children. Prayer power makes child-training easy, because it moulds them spiritually. As a Christian parent, who desires disciplined children, you must spend time to pray with and for your children, daily.

    Mother Wesley, the mother of John and Charles Wesley, was a woman of prayer. She spent time praying for her children. No wonder, her children were foremost among the people who changed and affected their world positively, with impacts that are still being felt today.  You can also do the same. Your children need your prayers.  Do not faint in praying for them, because prayer changes things.

    If you put these two tools to work, disciplining your children will become the easiest thing to do.  I’d like to say here that there is no way you can discipline your children, if you are not disciplined yourself. It is my prayer that God will grant you grace to take responsibilities toward your children.  You will not fail in Jesus’ precious name.

    Let’s briefly outline some various tips for effective child-training:

    •Begin at birth by saying bedtime prayers with your children. You will be amazed how   quickly they pick them up and begin to say prayers with you! Help them to know Jesus as      early as possible.

    •Read to your children Bible stories from children’s Bible for their age group. Family time together and sharing the Bible can be a wonderful experience.

    •Be very patient with your children.

    •Always build confidence in your child by whatever you do.

    •Listen to them; don’t just hear what they are saying, give them your attention and direct eye contact when they speak to you. Your children will let you know what challenges they have, and what you may need to bring to the Lord in intercessory prayer for them. This is such an important way to show them how much you value them, and you will also teach them to pray for others.

    •Watch over your children diligently! Know where they are, who they associate with, what they are watching on T.V., the kind of music they are listening to. Get involved and stay involved. Train them with good Christian moral values.

    •Give your children responsibility early in life. Children love to “help” at a very early age. At first, they may not do things quite the way you would, but they grow up to be self-reliant and dependable.

    •Teach them to respect proper authority.

    •Keep control over the home! Your children must know who is in control.

    •Nothing delights a child more than praise from his parents. Let them know just how much you appreciate them, whenever they do wonderful things.

    •Spend time with your children. Get down to their level and see things from their perspective. Seek to have as much family time as you can; crack jokes and laugh with them because proper humour is good for the soul.

    •Study your children to know who they really are, what they love, etc. Bring out the good whenever possible and try to re-shape any tendency towards bad behaviour. Every child is a masterpiece from God.  Allow them to be individuals.

    •Keep your marriage together! Children need parents who love each other! If you grew up in a home where your parents did not get along, whether divorced or not, you have probably realized later in life the devastating results in your own personal life. However, you can overcome this.

    •Do not leave your children behind when going to Church or Christian gatherings, at whatever age or stage. The Church is also a good institution for learning.

    Do you need God’s grace in your life? Then surrender your life to Christ. This is by confessing your sins and accepting Jesus as your Saviour and Lord. If you are set for it, please say this prayer: Dear Lord Jesus, I come to You today. I am a sinner. I believe You died and rose on the third day. Forgive me of my sins.  Cleanse me with Your Precious Blood. I accept You as my Lord and Saviour.  Now, I know I am a child of God.

     

    Congratulations! You are now born again! Till I come your way next time, please call or write, and share your testimonies with me through: Email: contact@faithoyedepo.org, counselling@faithoyedepo.org and Tel. No: 07026385437, 08141320204.

    For more insight, these books authored by me are available at the Dominion Bookstores in all the Living Faith Churches and other leading Christian bookstores: Building a Successful Family, Understanding Motherhood, Raising Godly Children, and Success in Marriage (Co-Authored with Dr. David Oyedepo).

  • Institution for child-training (3)

    Institution for child-training (3)

    Dear Reader, in the previous teachings, we have seen the home as the first institution for child-training and the tool of example.  This week, God has something for us again as we go ahead to see God’s command to teach.

    From the beginning, God instructed parents to teach their children. Speaking to the ancient Israelites, God said: And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up  (Deuteronomy 6:6-7).

    This kind of teaching requires much more than a once-a-week session at church services. It must be a regular practice, all week long, so that it becomes a way of life (Proverbs 22:6).

    Abraham, called the friend of God in James 2:23, was given high praise by God for teaching his children and household God’s way of life. In Genesis 18:19 God said of Abraham: For I have known him, in order that he may command his children and his household after him, that they keep the way of the Lord, to do righteousness and justice, that the Lord may bring to Abraham what He has spoken to him.

    King Solomon understood that when we reach maturity, we reflect the training we have received as children (Proverbs 22:6). History clearly shows that when Israel neglected teaching and obeying God’s commands as they were told to do in Deuteronomy 6, they suffered tragic results.

    Apostle Paul wrote: And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4). This statement is simply a continuation of the same principle God gave the Israelite in the Old Testament.

    I read a scripture sometimes back that changed my perspective of child-training: A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother (Proverbs10:1). In other words, the son that is wise is the father’s, while the one that is foolish is the mother’s! That’s why I told myself that I must be ready to accept responsibility, so that my children will not end up as fools.

    In case you are a woman reading this article, you must rise up to the task and accept the responsibility of raising wise children. However, if you had your children before getting born again and they are thorns in your flesh, I want you to believe God for a miracle, for with God all things are possible (Matthew 19:26).

    Today, we need to likewise teach our children God’s commands. These commands, when applied, provide a moral compass to guide their conduct for the rest of their lives.

    How, then, can you effectively teach? Biblical passages on parenting show that God wants you to use love, patience, dignity and respect in working with your children, just as He does with you. Love is the foundational principle for all Christian relationships (Matthew 22:37-40; John 13:34-35). Paul said obeying the Ten Commandments expresses love toward God and your neighbours (Romans 13:9-10).

    Just as God instructs because He loves you, you must likewise instruct your children, if you love them (Hebrews 12:7). Loving your children does include discipline. Establishing fair rules and consequences for breaking those rules has been described as setting up boundaries. The purpose for boundaries is that children learn appropriate behaviour and feel secure.

    Your attitude toward your children is, perhaps, the single most important consideration in proper child rearing. Your words and actions show your children whether you love them or not.

    To effectively obey the commandment on child-training, you need to identify with Chris, by being born again. To be born again means confessing your sins and accepting Jesus as your Saviour and Lord. If you are set for this, please say this prayer: Dear Lord Jesus, I come to You today. I am a sinner. I believe You died and rose on the third day. Forgive me of my sins.  Cleanse me with Your Precious Blood. I accept You as my Lord and Saviour.  Now, I know I am a child of God.

    Congratulations! You are now born again! Till I come your way next time, please call or write, and share your testimonies with me through: Email: contact@faithoyedepo.org, counselling@faithoyedepo.org and Tel. No: 07026385437, 08141320204.

    For more insight, these books authored by me are available at the Dominion Bookstores in all the Living Faith Churches and other leading Christian bookstores: Building a Successful Family, Understanding Motherhood, Raising Godly Children, and Success in Marriage (Co-Authored with Dr. David Oyedepo).

  • Female child traffickers arrested in Calabar

    Female child traffickers arrested in Calabar

    Men of the Quick Intervention Squad (QIS) of the Emergency Response Centre in Calabar, Cross River State, yesterday arrested two women said to be part of a syndicate that specialises in child trafficking.

    The Commander of the QIS, comprising security outfits, Capt. Mohammed Tanko, said the women were arrested on the Etagbo Road, following a tip-off that they were transacting the sale of a two-year-old boy for N600, 000.

    He said when the suspects were arrested, they attempted to bribe with N500, 000.

    The suspects, a 30-year- old woman from Etinan in Akwa Ibom State and a 33- year-old woman from Akpabuyo in Cross River State, confessed to the crime.

    They said they were married and had children.

    The suspect from Akpabuyo, who served as an intermediary between the seller and the buyer, said she was a worker with the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital.

    She said she got the child from Akpabuyo.

    She said her share from the transaction was N20, 000.

    According to her, the buyer said she needed a child to adopt, but didn’t want to go through the proper process because she feared one day the child would be collected from them by the government.

    The suspect from Etinan, who was the buyer, said she had paid the money.

    The Security Adviser, Rekpene Bassey, said investigation was ongoing to bring their accomplices to book.

    He said the suspects would be handed over to the police.

    Bassey said the state would uphold a zero tolerance policy for crimes.

  • Child’s play

    Child’s play

    With the long vacation for schools fast approaching, the National Troupe is preparing to host the fourth edition of its annual Children Creative Station Workshop (CCSW). The workshop is conceived as a long vacation theatre workshop for children between the ages of five and seventeen and it is primarily aimed at exposing participants to general theatre practice and appreciation of the creative arts.

    The 2014 edition according to the coordinator of the project and director in charge of Drama of the National Troupe, Ms Josephine Igberaese, would begin as from the first week of August 2014 and will run for a period of one month. She also disclosed that at the end of the creative workshop exercise, the participants would be expected to put up a performance that will detail all they have learnt during the one-month training period. ‘What we are doing is in line with one of our objectives which is to encourage the development of children’s theatre. But beyond that we have used the project successfully over the last three years to groom future theatre practitioners who may want to take up a career in the theatre and allied genre like taking part in Nigeria’s Nollywood’’.

    Explaining further that one of the other objectives behind the exercise is to engage the children creatively during the long holidays

  • The girl-child needs education’

    To mark the annual International Day of the African Child, the Basic Education Africa (BE Africa), in partnership with other concerned non-governmental bodies, has sought urgent attention to the fate of the girl-child in the country. It was at a seminar tagged: “Basic Education for All – A Focus on Girl-child Education.”

    It was held at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Victoria Island, Lagos to raise awareness on the plight of children in Africa, and on the need for continued improvement in their education.

    Seasoned speakers at the event, who were drawn by the BEAfrica founder and chairman, Ms. Abimbola Okoya, included: Director, Oando Foundation, Ms. Tokunbo Durosaro; founder, Slum2School Project, Mr. Otto Orondaam and Ms. Daphne Akatugba, The Future Project Nigeria. Mrs Olusola Adeola moderated the question and answer session.

    The theme of the seminar was hinged on the fragile fate of girls’ education in Nigeria as being recently threatened by the recent kidnapping of over 200 girls in Chibok, Borno State by Boko Haram.

    Ms. Durosaro who spoke on “Promoting a Holistic and Sustainable Approach to Enabling Access to Quality Basic Education,” said about 10.5 million children were out of school in Nigeria, adding that in Northern Nigeria states about two-thirds of primary age children are out of school.

    Durosaro who said 17.21 per cent of children that are out of schools in the world are Nigerians, added that one in every six out-of-school children is a Nigerian.

    She said the barrier to quality education in Nigeria is inadequate budgetary allocation, saying that what the government is putting into education was against the international board recommendation monitoring education in Africa.

    Durosaro also said that when people’s standard of living is poor, they would never have time to think of school, adding that they would rather think of scouting for daily survival. She said the way forward is to increase the private sector participation in the education sector.

    Orondaam, who spoke on “Basic Education for All: Making it a Reality for the disadvantaged child in Nigeria,” emphasized that cities are more developed than communities because educational focus is more on urban areas than rural.

    “Slum still exists in some communities because they have not seen a good reason why a child should go to school. All these happen due to poverty and lack of faith in Nigeria,” he said.

    Ms. Akatugba, who spoke on “Education and the Future Generation: Advocating for Equality in Access to Quality Basic Education in Nigeria” said despite the country’s progress in education since 1999 in Millennium Development Goal (MDG), over seven million school-age children still do not go to school, while at least 17 per cent of those who attend schools do not complete primary school education.

    Akatugba said that in some states, poor parental view on formal education for the girl child is still high. She said it is worsened by early marriage for girls in some areas and a situation where their boys and girls engagement in income-generating activities to supplement household income in the South Eastern and North- Eastern parts of the country.

    She advocated the expansion of partnerships and with the civil society and ministries to stop the gender disparity.

    The Baale of Omole Land, Chief Taiwo Bakare, said every community should know its role in the education of girls in its environment. He urged traditional rulers to lay good examples by sending their daughters to schools.

    He added: “Schools in the community should also encourage these girls to learn by providing suitable and conducive environment for learning.”

  • Home of child labourers

    Home of child labourers

    There is enough to engage your interest in the nation’s capital. You will find the rich and powerful but so will not miss the segment that is always threatened by prohibitive rent. Now, add to that the army of child labourers, especially those who, instead of being in school, hawk all manner of wares on the streets and highways of the glitzy capital city.

    While some children are seen going to school, reading hard and having lesson teachers come home to teach them after school hours or during holidays, others can’t wait to leave classes and go out to sell one or two things in order to sustain their families.

    With the influx of people into the capital city and the high standard of living experienced by residents, it is very common to see children as young as six or seven carrying wares on their heads and walking about trying to sell their products, in either traffic or street corners.

    Just like you will find in any Northern part of the country where young Hausa girls carry little wares like vegetables, pepper, tomatoes, okra, etc and selling on behalf of mothers who are not allowed outside the house, it is now slowly becoming a trend in satellite towns of Abuja like Kubwa, Zuba and Nyanya, among others.

    Unfortunately, most of these children barely go to school and begin their trade very early and can be seen sometimes dosing or lounging under trees when the sun becomes unbearable.

    Some banana sellers at the satellite towns do not come out to sell alone, you find most of them and all of their children especially at night selling banana and groundnut especially at the phase 3 traffic in Kubwa, even on school days, young children are seen in traffic as late as 10pm trying to sell their bananas to motorists and passerbys, these children that have so mastered the trade that they can be seen convincing people to buy even under the rain or when the weather is extremely cold.

    With the coming of groundnuts and fresh corn season, most of the peddlers of these food items are mostly children. Visit the Kubwa market and you will see a lot of children selling corn, groundnut, vegetable, yam, cooked cassava flour or fufu, among others, all trying hard to sell and supplement their family earnings.

    Another popular trend is common on Fridays before prayers Children lead disabled relatives to places close to popular mosques to beg for alms and sometimes even fight over people trying to give them money, even though it seems like the almajiris are not in Abuja, a visit to most of the satellite towns will prove to a visitor that they are gradually taking up a stand in these parts of the city. Here young children with their famous plastic bowls go about singing to residents for money. Some of them hang around parks and overhead bridges. The overhead bridge at the famous Second Gate in Kubwa is popular for accommodating these children; they lounge around the steps and yell greetings at passersby. Most times, when a passerby ignores and refuse to give them money after their rendition of praises, some of them will begin insulting the innocent person in Hausa.

    With the level of hardship on the increase and the almajiris making less and less money, some of these children have found alternatives to begging, some hand around the Kubwa market, following people around and asking to carry heavy loads, some that sit around the overhead bridge carry heavy loads across the bridge for stipends while of almajiris in town have now taken up another trade, they hang around traffic in town, they can even be seen at the Central Area, here they wait patiently for the light to turn red and as soon as it does, you will find little boys, some as young as six or seven struggling to wash the windscreen of cars with their readymade detergent water and stick. They do not bother to ask permission from motorists but simply dive

    on the windscreen and begin washing, most angry motorist drive them away while some allow them to finish and hand them stipends.

    Mr Benard, a taxi driver who takes Nicon junction to Secretariat route insisted that the children are a great nausea and need to be flushed out of the city centre. “ they are so annoying honestly, they won’t even take permission but use that their dirty water to stain the windscreen that you

    have already washed, i don’t give them anything oh, i just yell at them anytime they come close to my car. What they do is very dangerous and they could easily be hit by a car but they never listen and security operatives simply watch them without chasing them away.”

    A resident of Kubwa, Mercy Kalu called parents that allow their children sell things in the traffic late at night careless. Her words, “how much is it that the children are going to make for their families that they are being kept out late selling bananas that people don’t even want, some

    parents can be very careless and you see them crying when something happens to the children. These children rush through traffic most times not even checking properly to be sure that the road is clear. The government of the Federal Capital Territory needs to do something about taking these children off the streets because it is child abuse.”

     

  • Child’s play

    Child’s play

    With the long vacation for schools fast approaching, the National Troupe is preparing to host the fourth edition of its annual Children Creative Station Workshop (CCSW). The workshop is conceived as a long vacation theatre workshop for children between the ages of five and seventeen and it is primarily aimed at exposing participants to general theatre practice and appreciation of the creative arts.

    The 2014 edition according to the coordinator of the project and director in charge of Drama of the National Troupe, Ms Josephine Igberaese, would begin as from the first week of August 2014 and will run for a period of one month. She also disclosed that at the end of the creative workshop exercise, the participants would be expected to put up a performance that will detail all they have learnt during the one-month training period. ‘What we are doing is in line with one of our objectives which is to encourage the development of children’s theatre. But beyond that we have used the project successfully over the last three years to groom future theatre practitioners who may want to take up a career in the theatre and allied genre like taking part in Nigeria’s Nollywood’’.

    Explaining further that one of the other objectives behind the exercise is to engage the children creatively during the long holidays,

  • Nigeria gets Norwegian $15m grant for mother, child healthcare

    Nigeria gets Norwegian $15m grant for mother, child healthcare

    Efforts to improve the country’s healthcare delivery service, especially for mother and child care received a boost  yesterday as Norwegian government offer Nigeria a grant of $15million.

    The money is to assist Nigeria to  upscale it’s  maternal and child health programme.

    A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to that effect was signed yesterday in Abuja.

    The project is to be implemented by Clinton Health Foundation.

    Speaking at the occasion, Minister of Health Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu said the country remain committed to meeting the Health-Specific Millennium Development Goals (MDGS) by 2015.

    He explained that the “Norwegian government is supporting Nigeria with equivalent of 90million Norwegian crones. When you change it to US dollars, it translates to $15million. Now, they have given Nigeria that money as a grant or donation to support the work we are doing in terms of maternal and child health to ensure we meet the MDG target by next year; as far as goal number four and five are concerned.

    “This commitment by Norway of giving us $15million to support our maternal and child health is in furtherance of friendship between the two countries. We called it tripartite agreement because to execute it, both countries agreed that we will use the Clinton Health Action Initiative, what we call CHAI. They’ve been working for us in Nigeria and they have demonstrated capability and capacity to work in the health sector particularly in this area of maternal and child health. They also have to commit that they will do exactly what the two countries want the money to be used for. That is the essence of today’s ceremony.”

    He further explained that “although Nigeria has mainstreamed MDGs target into various national initiatives and strategies in order to fast track the attainment of the MDGs, more efforts continue to be required to ensure we achieve the goals, or come as close to achieving them as possible by the end of next year.

    “The development of Harmonized Country Plan of Priority Interventions for 2014-2015, HCPPI, is one of such initiatives to step up our efforts in this regard.

    “This plan represents a call to action to all states and supporting partners to improve programming and focus more resources on the identified, evidence-based, cost-effective and scalable interventions that are already producing results in order to achieve better health outcomes.

    “Through this plan, we aim to save an additional 420,000 maternal and children’s lives by 2015 at a total cost of $650 million as identified in the Harmonized Country Plan, and we have an estimated funding gap of $420 million. We have available commitments totaling $121 million currently being mobilized through projects from the Private Health Sector Alliance, UNICEF, GFATM, the Federal Ministry of Health, USAID and GE Healthy Imagination among other, leaving $299 outstanding.

    “The Tripartite Agreement we have signed today represents one of the many efforts to meet the resource gap. The expected impact on the target group is the reduction of maternal and neonatal deaths in the three selected states by 40% by 2015. This translates to approximately 2,961 maternal and 19,825 neonatal additional lives saved.”

    In his short remark, Norwegian Ambassador to Nigeria, Rolf Ree said the  collaboration could not  be successful without the strong leadership of Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu.

     

  • ‘Child Rights Act gets action plan’

    ‘Child Rights Act gets action plan’

     A meeting of some stakeholders from three states has been held in Lagos to assess the implementation of the Child Rights Act of 2003. ADEBISI ONANUGA reports

    CHILD abuse, rape of the girl-child,domestic violence and other vices against the child were discussed as stakeholders from three states converged on Lagos to review the Child Rights Act.

    Bayelsa, Cross River and Lagos State are among the nine that United Nations  International Children’s Education Fund (UNICEF) is using for the law’s enforcement. Others are  Imo, Anambra, Benue, Yobe, Kastina  and  Osun.

    The workshop with the theme: ‘Self-assessment of the Child Rights Law in Lagos, Bayelsa and Cross River states’ was organised by UNICEF and funded by the European Union (EU).

    It attracted stakeholders from the Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Women Affairs and Empowerment (MWAPA), the Police, Child Protection Network (CPN), National Human Right Commission (NHRC), the Bench and the bar in the three states, Non-Governmental Organisations(NGOs) and the media in the three states.

    They looked into implementation and enforcement of the act and came up with fresh action plans on enforcement to stem the increasing tide of the vices. Of the three states,  only Bayelsa is yet to domesticate the law.

    On November 20, 1989, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The convention was later adopted by the assembly of Heads of States and Governments of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU, now African Union (AU) as the African Union Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (CRCW) in July 1990. Nigeria has signed both the International Instruments and had ratified them in 1991 and 2000. Both protocols reflect children as human beings and as subjects of their own rights.

    After  heated debates, the bill was eventually passed into law by the National Assembly in July 2003. It was assented to by former President Olusegun Obasanjo in September 2003, and promulgated as the Child Rights Act 2003. Regrettably, only 24 of the country’s 36 states have passed the Act to date but with little or no enforcement in majority of such states. The Act is a legal document that sets out the rights and responsibilities of a child in Nigeria and provides for a system of child justice administration. It recognises the rights of children, restores their confidence and self-esteem and improves their status. It also enables children with disabilities, to enjoy their rights fully, as it provides special measures for their care and protection.

    But in spite of the good intention of the law, developments in the country indicate that  the law has not translated into improved legal protection for the child throughout the federation. Several issues such as sexual violence, particularly rape of the underage, children living or hawking on the streets, children affected by communal conflict, drug abuse, human trafficking coupled with the weaknesses of the juvenile justice system, have remained a challenge to a successful enforcement of the Act.

    Besides, the three states it was revealed that the implementation of the Act is faced with similar challenges. It was discovered, for instance, that all the states have challenges with the Police, even when there are Juvenile Officers.

    Vernice Guthrie told participants what was expected of them at the workshop. According to her, participants were expected to identify the gaps since  implementation of the Act commenced after its domestication, how to improve on the gaps and come up with a work plan for their respective states on the implementation:

    UNICEF Child Protection Specialist, Mrs. Maryam Enegiazu, who gave an overview of the programme, said since the states domesticated the Act, not much effort have been seen to advance the cause of the right of the child in Nigeria, especially to achieve international standard.

    She said this explained why UNICEF is taking the issue of the child with all seriousness, particularly on education, health, protection against violence, abuse and exploitation among others.

    She said the organisation has been working in adhoc manner by providing training for the Police and lawyers but without achieving the desired  result, hence the reason for organising a workshop of this nature.

    Despite of the domestication of the Act in most states, Mrs, Enegiazu lamented that the issue of rape has been on the increase. She said  their expectation was that states would provide protective environment for the child but that this has not been the case. She said the UNICEF is now placing emphasis on strengthening the social partners to protect the child, particularly in states that have domesticated the Act.

    For instance, Hon. Ebamua Empere of Bayelsa State House of Assembly said at an attempt was once made in his state to domesticate the law.  He said the bill came before the assembly in 2010 but was sent back to the executive to correct some lacuna discovered in it so that it could be passed and domesticated in the state.

    Head, Family Court, High Court of Lagos State, Justice Yetunde Idowu, who gave an account of the situation in the state, said  its problems were so many because of its nature. Justice Idowu said, Lagos like other states, has witnessed increased child rape and child hawking among other abuses. She also said  there were abuses against the child even at home. She said the state government has, however, taken it upon itself to stem the tide.

    According to Justice Idowu, a lot of sensitisation is on-going in Lagos, adding: ”People are being made aware of their rights,  that where to go when raped is the Mirabel Centre at LASUTH in Ikeja or the police station. We have also been creating awareness in schools among female students that nobody has the right to touch their body.”

    She lamented that in some cases, the culture of the people was  a challenge  where abuses are coming from the family. She said there was need to let the women know that while they are to be submissive to their husbands, they should not keep quiet when their husband is defiling their female child.

    UNICEF Project Coordinator, Vernice  Guthrie, said at the end of the one week workshop, stakeholders the three states met her expectations in the sense  that they all came together and engage on honest discussions about the degree that their respective states had met statutory obligation about Child Rights Act.

    “I think they have done that and they have done it quite effectively. Some of the gaps identified will require reform of the law absolutely”, she noted.

    Guthrie said many of the challenges discussed at the workshop reflects challenges  in capacity, “so  there is going to be more focus on training, institutional engagements, we have the police, the prisons, the judiciary, the bench, social protections, how do they function on a more comprehensible coordinate  factions;  all   those areas are part and parcel  of UNICEF programmes  and commitment to supporting full implementation of the Child Rights Act. And it has been fully discussed here”.

    Guthrie said UNICEF’s  first state of support will be to assist and learn from other states the best practice to domesticate the Act; thereafter assist  in putting the various institutions in place and  of course building the capacity of various stakeholders responsible  under the new law. She said that the three states at the workshop have committed to taking the issue raised starting from September, this year.

    Director, Child Protection Solutions, Mr. Taiwo Akinlami, one of the stakeholders from Lagos, described the workshop as the  coming together of experts to discuss the justice sector. It is a big project that we want to reform the justice sector for quick and justiciable service delivery.  He said stakeholders came to look at critical issues of  justice reforms as it relates to  children in Lagos, Bayelsa and Cross River states as it affects the implementation of the law.

    “The making the law, the enforcement and the implementation of the law, all the key sectors were represented in the workshop. Through the workshop, we have come to identify that in Bayelsa, there is no law and they are saying that between now and September, they are going to come up with the law. We have also been able to find out that in Cross river, the family  court that sat only one year and is no more  sitting, they are going to look back to their budgetary provisions and put their house in order.

    “We have also been  able to  discover that in Lagos, we have offences that not  have punishments, for example child defilement, child rape is an offence under the law but it is not criminalised.   We have a situation where we are not able to charge offenders appropriately  under that law and so we have to use the criminal code. The  criminal code, by not making specific provisions as it affects the severity of punishment, which the Child Rights Act has recommended. For example  Child molestation,  that is rape ,is life imprisonment.  Any form of abuse is 14 years’ imprisonment. If we are able to bring it to bare here it will help.”

    Justice Doris. E Adokeme of the Bayelsa State High Court, said since  the state appears to be  the only one that has not enacted the Child Rights law,  they have  to ensure that the law is enacted soon.

    She also stressed the need  for the state to do  proper sensitisation since the public  is  not well sensitised in the knowledge of the law.

    “In Bayelsa, we will soon establish Family Courts. She, however, counselled that  in  states, where they have family court, victims should  go there get redress of the issue. As I said every  court will give redress to any infringement of  the Child Rights Act.

  • My travails for three and a half years over child trafficking allegation —Bisket

    My travails for three and a half years over child trafficking allegation —Bisket

    Bisi Dan Musa, a.k.a. Bisket, bestrode the social scene like a colossus in the 80s, 90s and early 2000. Now 66, her life is one that movie makers can make a fortune from. As a fabric merchant, she was already comfortable enough to build her own house at 24. And by the time she clocked 30, she was already a mother of eight children. Tall, graceful and endowed with benevolent disposition, it is no surprise that celebrities were always flocking around her. As a matter of fact, her business office, called Bisket Store, on Allen Avenue, Ikeja, Lagos, was always a beehive of activities. It was the first to run a 24-hour schedule. She later became a born-again Christian and before any of her top society friends knew it, she had become seriously involved in ministry work. She founded a church and intensified her work in humanitarian services, picking up orphans and destitute and rehabilitating them. It was a success story that turned into a nightmare when she was arrested for alleged child trafficking in 2001. It was one incident that shook her life to its very foundation and forced her into a quiet life when she got over the storm that lasted for three and a half years. She went down memory lane as she discussed these and more with PAUL UKPABIO

    IT is not unusual to hear that you are in Jerusalem, Rome or some other holy cities on pilgrimage. How does one reconcile this with the fact that you were once accused of child trafficking?

    I believe that in the journey of life, God will always take you through different phases. The Bible tells us that there was a time in Joseph’s life that God gave him a vision, the vision backfired and he went solo like I did. But that did not deny God’s promises upon his life and the vision was made manifest. When God wanted him to go solo, he went solo. When God wanted him as a slave, he became one. When God wanted him in prison, he was in prison. But the promise of God upon him, he never missed. And those channels of suffering became the channels through which God elevated him.

    A vision is like a divine promise. Before something can materialise in your life, you and God must share a vision together. He will first give you a vision; not necessarily in a dream. It may be an idea in your heart. It may be something that you visualise that is coming to you and you are excited about it.

    You went into fabric business early in life and made great fortune from it. How did you get involved with the poor and the destitute?

    I did not go into fabric business, I was born into it. I am always a dreamer. I diversified into supermarket line and I happened to be the first to run a 24-hour supermarket in Nigeria. Up till now, nobody has achieved that feat. I did the business when Nigeria was tensed up during the military era. There were guns everywhere and I did a 24-hour supermarket business because God gave me the inspiration to do it. And anything I have an inspiration to do, I go for it and I achieve it.

    God also gave me an inspiration to serve him. Up till now, people cannot understand the calling. Not even my family members, my children, my husband, my late mother and other people who are close to me. None of them could understand why somebody at the highest level of her career would suddenly divert into taking care of the ordinary people on the streets. They believe that most people who divert into such callings do so out of frustration or career breakdown. But I was still in limelight and at my prime, because at the time I answered the call, I was still in my 30s.

    I did so many things very fast in life. Even my tenants thought that my building belonged to my mother. I had been delivered of eight children before I reached 30. Some preferred to believe the rumour that I had no children. In between all that, I was still working, travelling overseas and importing goods in containers. I was fine and I already had five branches of the supermarket. At 20, I was doing all that. I was never a wayward woman. No man in Nigeria can stand up today and say he invested in me. No man can say he has gone out with me, and no governor or minister can say he helped me or gave me a contract. I have never gone out for such largesse in my life. It was my sweat and the benevolence of my husband.

    As a wealthy woman, what is your take on success and wealth?

    My children are in their late 30s and above now. They tell me that I am a genius. They compare me to Bill Gates. They and others who know me would tell you that money is not my priority. If I were to value money, I would be one of the richest women in Nigeria today. I see many opportunities I can make money from, but I don’t go for it. Rather, I give out to people. Many whose lives I have touched are living witnesses to my generosity. I am rather careless with money. I give out more money than I make. That is why I say I don’t value money the way other people see it as a matter of life and death. Some people are so eager to achieve and do not care if they hurt anybody in their shrewd desire to make money. People hurt me. Even those that I have helped hurt me, but I just look at them and laugh. They don’t even know how to say thank you.

    Money is nothing in this world. It is only those who God has given the vision that understand the power of the source. They are the ones who know the value of life and also know that money is not everything. Money is good. I pray for it every day. I pray for my generation not to taste poverty. But one thing I used to tell my kids any time they feel bad and say, “Ah, Mummy, you are nice to a fault,’ is that life and power are transient. Everything that has a beginning also has an end. Nothing is too big to gain and nothing is too big to lose.

    I was in the office of an influential government official who is close to retirement. He was telling me that all he needed in his life was N3 million so that he could retire to his farm. I looked at him and I felt like weeping, because I know what that means. Some months ago, I gave someone a property worth N8 million free of charge. My children were angry, but I pacified them that God has favoured us and we have never lacked. I told my children that the ones they needed, I had already given them.

    Tell us about your background

    I was born into affluence. My dad and mum were very rich. My father, Chief Zacheaus Adekoya Okeowo, brought power to Ijebu-Ode. He owned the first petrol station in Ijebu Ode, and at a time, he was one of the finest politicians in the progressive politics of that era. And my mother, Chief (Mrs.) Christiana Alaba Okeowo, was one of the pioneers of the fabric business in Nigeria. She started in Lagos and went up to have her own factory. She didn’t stop employing foreigners to work in her factory. So I grew up with silver spoon. I have never tasted poverty in my life. I don’t even know what they call poverty. My parents bought me my first car at the age of 16. So, I have never tasted poverty. Maybe that is why money is not a big deal to me. When I see people running after money like life and death and they are ready to hurt anybody because of money, I feel sorry for them. Even when they accused me of stealing children, I just laughed. The question I first asked is how much would I sell them? As an individual I built my first house at the age of 24. I know how much I get from rent alone. Up till now, I live on rent because I decided not to work again. I retired at the age of 40.

    What has life has taught you?

    There are some positions God put us in, though they make us unhappy or uncomfortable, they are part of the packages that will locate our destiny. I always tell my kids that I know I may have hurt you, you may not be happy with me as your mother, maybe I wasted opportunities in which you would have been swimming in money, but it could also be that I am preparing your future. You will enjoy it. I tell them to trust me that my seven generations will reap the fruits of what I am sowing. I may not reap it, but I pray that God will give my children the grace to reap it. That’s because He works according to His grace.

    If Jesus can die at the age of 33, who am I to query God for my own cross? Jesus’ short time on earth did not deprive Him of God’s promise upon his life. Today, He is worshipped and adored globally. Before Adolph Hitler died, he confessed that Jesus was the greatest and most popular entity in the world. Even Times magazine at a time adjudged Him the Greatest Personality of the Century. Even Muslims appreciate Him. They say He is not the son of God, but they still accept him as a prophet of God. I just came back from Jerusalem and I visited where Jesus was buried. It is Muslims that are watching over the place. And it is a mosque that is beside Jesus Christ’s burial ground. They said the land is owned by Muslims and the Muslims were very careful; they were watching us. They didn’t want us to damage the place or do anything evil to it. So, they hurry you out so that you don’t overstay your visit. They say they open the place in the morning and close it in the evening. They are very watchful of the place, so that nobody will come and bomb it or do any evil to it.

    So, if God can glorify Christ up to that level and Christ promised us as His followers that ‘when you take my step, I will never owe you,’ I say that God will not owe me. It may take time for people to realise who this woman is, but God will never owe me.

    Do you regret helping abandoned children and destitute after you were accused of child trafficking?

    Thank God, one of the children they said I stole is in The Bells University today. We spend over a million naira on him in a year, but the papers are not reporting that, I don’t care. All I care about is what God asked me to do. That child (points to a sleeping baby) is a child to one of the children they said I stole. I am taking care of the mother and I am taking care of the child. Nobody is seeing that. They accused Jesus more than that. People fight what they don’t understand. My children too don’t understand, but I know with time, they will understand that I have a purpose on earth. I have a vision that I am pursuing. Nobody is seeing that vision, but I don’t care. It is not about money. God has given me a time to enjoy. I have enjoyed money. I have entered presidential jets many times. I have been to places in England where it was white people that opened the gates for me and white executives chauffeured me. So, God has given me my good times.

    Even now, I am still having my good time because at my age, I have no sickness: no diabetes, no high blood pressure, no headache, nothing. People see me and they cannot believe my age. Some people even see me and they say it to my face that all your friends are old, why are you looking young like this? It is the grace of God. Because what I have gone through, they have not gone through it. They have stayed in the limelight. They have enjoyed their lives. They are mixing with their likes while I have been mixing with the low class for the pass 20 years. I still enjoy being around them and I am not complaining. I don’t want to be in the limelight. But I do tell my children if you want the limelight, go for it.

    As a popular society figure then, a lot of people must have swam around you…

    From youth, I was happily married and started rearing children. I have never lacked anything. So, nothing prepared me for such a huge challenge. I was giving birth to children every year. Some people even said to me, pretty women like you don’t normally have kids, how come you are having children every year? God has been too kind to me. So, when the other side came, it was like a big blow. It knocked me on the floor that I couldn’t even pray. There was a time I was no longer praying. Since I gave my life to God, I have never done anything fetish and I will not do it until the day I die. But in that period of tribulation, I was just blank.

    It was not even the incident per se, but the way people disappointed me. It was something I never thought could happen. The first day they took me to court, I was thinking that I would see thousands of people waiting there to fight my cause and say, ‘No, Bisket is not like that!’ But I got there and saw only those who wanted to persecute me. The mob was shouting. They were carrying stones. I looked into the heavens and said God, I am not Jesus Christ. Jesus is your son, you both died together in heaven, but I am a child of faith. This woman is about to break to pieces. I was praying to God in my heart.

    That is why my husband, Dan Musa, no matter who they say he is, I can never leave him. My marriage to him may not be a bed of roses. People said I should leave him, but I will never because during my trying moments, he was there for me. God used him. He stood as a man to the last minute, and for that, I can never abandon him. He is with me and we will be together for life. That is my destiny. But the whole episode made me to see life from a different perspective and that really weakened me for a couple of years.

    So, how was the issue resolved?

    I pursued the case for three and a half years before I was discharged and acquitted. They could not prove any case against me because God knows that I don’t have any case, and I proved myself in the court of law. No policeman or law enforcement person can say that I bribed him with one naira, and the heavens witnessed that. I intentionally did it so that I can still trust God. If I had bought my way out, I might not trust God again. I wanted to see whether the righteous would be punished, because according to His word, the child of the righteous will never be a victim of misfortune. I wanted to establish that biblical fact.

    When I first came, the Magistrate was very hostile. But when I proved my case that I take the children with me to England, I take them on holidays, and how much will I sell them in Nigeria? Even if they say they are selling children every day in Nigeria for N500,000, the money I spent on their return ticket to London for holidays alone is more than that. So, any magistrate who knows her onions can see the proof, with their passports. The hospital they were attending was Eko Hospital. They were not going to General Hospital. And I told the magistrate to go there and check the records. There was another hospital we used on Norman Williams Street, Ikoyi. I said go and check. So, how much will I sell them? The magistrate became sympathetic. I read it in her. But she was hostile when the case started. They even begged her to give me a seat in the dock. But when she saw the reality of the case, she changed.

    Chief Rhodes insisted that I should go into trial, because they wanted to set the case aside. I have forgotten the term they used in law, but Chief Rhodes said if what I had told him was true, I had no case. He said I should not go for the easy way out because my enemies might bring the case back in 10 years’ time. He said, ‘Let them put you in the dock. If you have passed through this and you have not collapsed up till now, you can’t collapse again.’

    So, I went into the dock. By the time we finished the case, people were on my side. When I am testifying, people shed tears. By the time I was discharged and acquitted, the whole court was jubilating. People were clapping. If they didn’t believe in the discretion of the magistrate, they would have hissed or protested. But when they counted charge one, discharge and acquitted; charge two, discharge and acquitted up to charge 21, the whole court started clapping.

    People said you cried on TV

    That was because the children were not allowed to follow me. I couldn’t clap, so I was crying. That is why people who saw the television footage thought I didn’t win the case. They saw me crying on TV and thought I had been sent to jail. And you know after that case, I went into my shell. So, everybody thought I went into jail. They never knew that I was discharged and acquitted. But my joy was not completed because I said I am going home but these children are going into detention with no care and love. As a mother, what is my joy?

    It was three and a half years later, through the favour of God under Governor Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, Barrister Opeyemi Bamidele, who was the Commissioner for Sport and Youth Development, assisted and the children were returned to me. May God continue to favour these two people. One of the children is at The Bells University. Others are in other higher institutions.

    We hear that you have a new passion caring for animals…

    That is funny, because I never grew up in the village. I grew up in the city. But I have the tendency to love not just animals but anything that has life. I don’t play with life. I don’t also believe that it is my doing. It is God that creates human beings and He will just create you the way He wants you to be. I always explain this to my kids that the fault you see in me is exactly how God created me. There was a time my daughter’s friend came from England into my house. She saw me spoon-feeding a kitten. She looked and went to tell my daughter that ‘your mother has a problem o. She is now spoon-feeding animals.’ I appreciate anything that has life. That is how God created me and that is who I am.

    And your beauty has stayed over the years. How do you do it?

    There is no secret to it. I relax. I don’t worship money. If one has stroke, that means wheel chair. You can’t enjoy that money again. God didn’t allow me to beg my enemies for food. That means I am a rich woman in the Lord. So, I always thank God.

    And how is life in retirement?

    My husband lives in Kwara State, and where a man stays is where his wife takes as her home. But I am somebody who cannot just stay permanently in Kwara because of my kids. They are in the stage where they need me most. So, I need to be around them even though they may be older. They are actually in their 40s, and late 30s, but a child, no matter how old, still needs the native wisdom of the mother. Moreover, many of them are just re-settling in Nigeria. They are just returning home from the UK and the US, and they don’t know much about Nigerian way of doing things. So, I make sure I shuttle between them and my husband.

    And thank God, I have a reasonable husband who is very accommodating and caring. I live in his house here in Lagos. Dan Musa gave me a whole house I live in here in Lagos. So, I shuttle between Kwara and Lagos. I live on rent. My husband has a rice plantation with a factory in Ilorin. It is such a huge agricultural investment. He produces all brands of rice. I also have a store in Ilorin because my family is into buying and selling.

    What advice do you have for young couples?

    I believe that no woman should break up her marriage, because I believe from experience that there is no perfect human being. Anybody God has given you, just take him as your destiny. Even when you change, you will not find perfection in your new partner. So why change? And the changes always affect the children. Like I always advise my kids, the love story you see on television is different from reality. Don’t believe it. Don’t even expect it! Marriage is a reality show, and reality means no perfection.