The President of Senegal Abdoulaye Wade, on Monday said the incidents of wars, conflicts and poverty were no justification for the violation of the rights of children.
He said wars, conflicts and poverty were being used as tools to engage children as soldiers and
prostitutes.
Opening a three-day Pan African Forum on building trust for immunisation and child survival in Senegal, the President said Africa needed to revisit her traditional values to ensure the survival of her children.
Hundreds of participants including priest, chiefs, imams, journalists and health experts are attending the forum.
It is being organised by UNICEF in collaboration
with leading faith-based organisations.
Among some of the highlights of the opening was the opportunity given to various religious leaders from varied faiths to lead prayers and meditation as they made brief presentations of the roles of their religious belief in child survival.
The forum, which is being held at the start of the Ramadan has brought to the fore the increasing need of bringing religious and traditional leaders on board immunisation campaigns.
The suspicions over the safety of polio vaccines, which led to the boycott of the synchronised polio vaccination in West Africa last year by some Moslem states in Nigeria took centre stage as various speakers sought to deal with the sensitive issue.
President Wade said there were many challenges
facing the continent, including those of diseases and there was the need for key players such as traditional rulers, religious leaders and the media to network to bring about the needed change in the lives of children on the continent.
He described the absence of the involvement of the traditional and religious leaders
in immunisation campaigns and other health drives as the missing link in health promotion.
He said these leaders were very close to the
communities and the people, even in very intimate
matters that affect them, and therefore they had a
unique role to play in advocacy. He urged such leaders to use their sermons to promote preventive health care.
Madam Carole Bellamy, Executive Director of UNICEF, said there have been lots of talks about pushing forward the welfare of children and addressing issues such as malnutrition, education and survival.
She said: "we often talk about mobilising
political commitment and government funding for
ensuring these rights. Yet we have paid insufficient attention to the community of religious and traditional leaders whose influence -at the family, community and central government levels - could ensure that children do not only survive , but develop."