Child friendly communities
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© UNICEF South Africa/2009/Hearfield |
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UNICEF is supporting the government to launch the Child Friendly Community Initiative in South Africa. |
The context
Many of South Africa’s municipalities are failing to provide their residents with the quantity and quality of services they need and want. This is happening despite a decentralisation policy, which aims to bring government closer to the people.
Children are most affected by poor service delivery. About seven million South African children live in households with no clean drinking water, 4.8 million in over-crowded homes and 40 per cent live far from a primary health clinic. Children are dying every day of easily preventable diseases and many leave school with poor grades and a bleak future.
The poorest municipalities are the worst off. They inherited the greatest service delivery backlogs from the days of apartheid, and most of their households cannot afford to pay for new services. Municipal workers need to have the right technical and managerial skills to do their jobs properly. There is also a general perception among poor South Africans that the State is too remote, not easily accessible and is not really listening to them.
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© UNICEF South Africa/2009/Ingham Brown |
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The Child Friendly Community Initiative plays a strategic role in making local government more accountable to its citizens and in empowering ordinary South Africans to demand and enjoy the services they are entitled to. |
What is UNICEF doing?
UNICEF is supporting the government to launch the Child Friendly Community Initiative in South Africa. The initiative helps to guide local government in including children’s rights as a key part of their goals, by-laws, programmes and budgets.
What has been achieved?
The Ministry of Women, Children and Persons with Disabilities, in collaboration with UNICEF, consulted a wide range of partners interested in joining the movement in July and August of 2009. A steering committee was set up to take the initiative forward.
Going forward
The Child Friendly Community Initiative plays a strategic role in making local government more accountable to its citizens and in empowering ordinary South Africans to demand and enjoy the services they are entitled to.
UNICEF is working with a range of partners to design and implement the programme, starting with three municipalities in 2010. The aim is to develop a national accreditation system on the basis of which municipalities in all parts of the country will be designated as ‘child friendly’ (or not). There are four stages to the launch of the initiative:
- Assess the situation and needs of children in selected municipalities, and the local government response to realise children’s rights.
- Develop a South African system of accreditation, including child friendly criteria, assessment tools, guidelines and communication material.
- Pilot the system by training 500 municipal workers and 2,000 young people and community groups in municipal planning and monitoring of child rights.
- Implement a scale up plan to bring the Child Friendly Community Initiative to all municipalities in the country.
