Hon. Fatoumatta Jahumpa-Ceesay, Speaker of the National Assembly, yesterday officially opened a week-long capacity building training workshop for National Assembly Members on Child Rights, child friendly budgeting, gender-based budgeting and advocacy strategies, at the Paradise Suites.

The training organised by the Child Protection Alliance (CPA) in collaboration with UNICEF and Pro-PAG, is aimed at engaging NAMs in charting the best way forward to ensure that national budget are sensitive to the need of children and to ensure an effective and proper use of the scare resources allocated for the benefit of the children.

Declaring the worhshop open, Speaker Jahumpa-Ceesay described the training as a great opportunity for the NAMs as it will greatly equip them with the skills needed to exercise their oversight and legislative functions and also to better respond to current development issues.

According to her, international instruments on child and women’s rights and genuine efforts are being made to domesticate them in the Gambia. “Among them worth mentioning are the Beijing Declaration and platform at action, the CEDAW, Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, The African Union Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality and the Protocol on Women’s Rights to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights. For children, we can cite the convention on the Rights of the Child (RC), the African charter and the 1997 constitution” she said.

She then emphasised that, promoting the rights of the children and protecting them from abuse and exploitation would require concerted efforts and commitment from everyone. 

Speaker Jahumpa-Ceesay added that promotion of child and women’s rights is good for poverty reduction and national development. She said the children of today are the future leaders of tomorrow,  cognizant of that fact, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child states that, every child has a right to an adequate standard of living and the highest attainable standard of living and the highest attainable standard of health and education on the basis of equality of opportunity.

She then stated that the Gambia government and the APRC are committed to reaching a higher moral ground by building a Gambia fit for women and children, adding that serious and sustained efforts are being made to promote child and women’s rights.”

She described the partnership initiative between Pro-PAG, Child Protection Alliance and UNICEF is to build the capacity of the People’s representatives as indeed a laudable and further registered deepest appreciation to all three organisations for the resources, time and energy they are investing to address the capacity needs of the people’s representatives.

For her part, Siga Jagne-Jallow, Director of Pro-PAG, said that Pro-PAG is mandated to build the capacity at the National Assembly to enable them function effectively.

In her opening remarks, Marie Saine-Firdaus, CPA Vice Chairperson, described the theme of the training as important to discussion by National Assembly members so as to ensure an effective implementation of the constitution and international obligations to make the Gambia fit and proper place for children.

She added that, the Government of The Gambia in collaboration with its development partners and stakeholders have been very proactive in the promotion and protection of the rights and welfare of children and have made giant strides which are recognised both nationally and internationally.

Cheikh T. Lewis chaired the ceremony.