Agencies hail Oman’s protection of children

SALALAH, Feb 3 - The progress made in ensuring child protection in the Sultanate evoked praise from the representatives of some international agencies working in the same field. They were in Salalah for a knowledge sharing exercise to develop a better understanding of the issue and adopt more aggressive approach for child protection.
The participants at the knowledge sharing meeting included members of the Child Protection Committee (CPC) in Dhofar, who are drawn from different ministries, government departments, civil society and some experts in the field.
The two-day meeting organised by the Sultanate’s Ministry of Social Development and British Embassy in Muscat began at Grand Taiba Hotel on Sunday. Paula Jack, Justice Adviser of not-for-profit public body Northern Ireland Cooperation Overseas (NI-CO) and her associate Patricia Higgins, did an interactive session with the CPC members, as the participants came out with valuable suggestions to tackle the issue in a better way.
In her comments to Observer regarding the Sultanate’s preparedness to tackle the issue, Paula Jack said: “I see a lot of development both in the development of child law and work on hotline… so the people here have procedure for reporting abuse and also I see the excellent formation of child protection committees in all the governorates of Oman.” “The good thing I see here about the CPCs is the fact that it is multi-ministerial and multi-departmental. There is representation also from the civil society. So I find there is concerted effort to ensure child protection in Oman,” she said.
Commenting on the knowledge sharing exercise Jack said, it was designed to share the UK experience of our development of child development policies procedures and work we do to protect our children in UK, with the developments here in Oman like formation of child protection committees and relevant codes.
Khamis Zaher al Fahdi, Director-General of Social Development in Dhofar, called it an important gathering and an exercise to learn from the international agencies, which have done intensive work on child protection.
Abdullah Ramadan bait Mujazah, Manager of Family Development at Social Development Directorate, said the participants in the meeting were drawn from the departments of prosecution, Royal Oman Police (ROP), and ministries of education, health and social development. Omani Women Association and some other civil society participants were also there in the meeting.
There was general thrust on awareness among parents and children to ensure protection.
The CPC members sought mechanism to instil confidence among the parents, “as most of them were prone to hiding the facts due to the fear of social stigma.” The lack of follow-up, according to them, lets the perpetrators of the crime go scot free, which ultimately fails to have any deterrence among such elements.
A section of participants sought rehabilitation centre in Dhofar while many others felt role of family and educational institutions important to address the issue.