On Day of African child, UNICEF calls for registration of every infant

Marking the Day of the African Child today, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) called on countries to register all youngsters at birth in order to ensure their right to a legal identity.

Without a birth certificate, UNICEF said, children have no official identity, recognized name or nationality. The unregistered child may be unable – among other challenges – to apply for a passport, a formal job, a marriage licence or vote later in life.

“If we do not get it right from the start and register babies, it is an uphill battle from there on,” UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy said. “Unregistered children lack the most basic protection against abuse and exploitation and become a more attractive commodity to a child trafficker, illegal adoption rings and others who seek to take advantage of their non-status.”

In a message to mark the Day that seeks to draw attention to the lives of African children, Ms. Bellamy said a birth certificate is one of the most important pieces of paper a person will ever own. Yet in 2002 alone, 50 million newborns were denied their right to a legal identity.

The Day of the Africa Child was initiated in 1991 by the Organization of African Unity (OAU) to honour the courage and memory of those killed in 1976 in Soweto, South Africa, when thousands of black school children took to the streets to protest the inferior quality of their education. More than a hundred people were killed and over 1,000 injured in the two weeks of protests.

UNICEF offices throughout the continent are coordinating events to observe the Day.