STATE OF THE NATION ADDRESS
care system as the national health response, particularly expanding the number and scope of work of community health workers to include high-impact but low-cost child health and nutrition interventions. • The NCOP, in collaboration with the National Assembly and the provincial Legislatures, must develop a rigorous oversight programme from a multisectoral perspective to monitor the realization of child rights in the country. • The NCOP must develop a strategy to report back to the children, from across the country, who conveyed their messages to seminar participants. They should be told what we have done and what has happened; and • Special attention must be given to children with disabilities in realization of their rights, including providing transport to schools.
Issues affecting vulnerable groups are close to my heart. The listed recommendations will not only remain on paper but the Select Committees on Women, Children and People with Disabilities, Social Services and Education and Recreation will ensure that we follow up on them.
Children as a community responsibility
Despite the mammoth task that lies ahead of us in terms of our set targets, I am happy that a growing number of our children are growing up in a better South Africa.
Left: The President with his first wife, flanked by the Deputy President (left) and Parliament’s President Officers taking the salute.
This page: Pomp and ceremony demonstrates the importance of the State of the Nation Address.
They are growing up in a society where they are not discriminated against on the basis of their background or on the basis of who they are.
with the law, with special attention to children awaiting trial, unsentenced children and sentenced children. • Parliament must review the provi- sions of section 8 of the Child Justice Act for an amendment in the age of criminal capacity to ensure that South Africa complies with substantive pro- visions in relation to its international
obligations and standards. • Parliament should play a pivotal role in the oversight of the imple- mentation of the Child Justice Act, Children’s Act and other related laws that it has passed to ensure the survival, protection, development and participation of children. • Parliament should ensure that the
country reports in time and accurately on the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Children and other international treaties that South Africa has ratified. • The country should prioritize the strengthening of the primary health
Among many things we can do is bring back the notion that a child belongs to, and is the product of, a community.
The notion of a community was an African way of supporting families and raising children. Unfortunately, we seem to have abandoned it and as a result we are grappling to address the challenges that confront our children.
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