XUNICEF News and Views

  Capturing four seasons by mobile phone Happy New Year 2022, everyone. I hope you are all well and healthy, and have started the new year with optimism and high spirits.

Putting Article 7 of the CRC into practical use in Uganda By Kari Egge After close to 6 years in UNICEF Tanzania, I joined UNICEF Uganda as Deputy Representative in April 1999. With Michel Sidibe at the helm, the country program was rocking with ideas, initiatives and challenges. This led to a number of interesting components, such as around HIV/AIDS and alternative breastfeeding practices, the launch of the Girls Education Movement, and the protection of children abducted by the Lord Resistance Army (LRA). There also were challenges within the water sector in Karamoja, including Guinea worm eradication. Collaboration with resident donors and NGOs was strong and there was plenty of room to “experiment” in the field. One of these experiments has had a major impact on the lives of children in Uganda and in many, many other countries in Africa and beyond, at the time and today. The Dutch embassy, which was based in the same building as UNICEF Uganda, decided on their own to donate a rathe...

By Kari Egge Uganda and other African countries sent forces to DRC Congo during the war in the early 2000s. Many rumors were floating in East Africa about illegal export of timber, ivory and diamonds from the DRC, but there was another particular concern for UNICEF at that time. Through our own assessments, we got to know that a number of children had been brought from Bunia in Ituru province in DRC to be trained in military camps in western Uganda. Ugandan military planes had taken the children to the training camps. The case of child soldier trainees was well established and it was not the first time that this happened, but it was the first time that children were flown in from a neighbouring country. The issue of child soldiers is sensitive and not a popular theme for discussions with government partners anywhere. It was also challenging for Michel Sidibe the UNICEF Representative in Uganda, to find a way to bring it up with the responsible authority, in this the Honourable Minister...