In the small Pacific nation of Samoa, there is a residential Campus and shelter for children and other victims of violence and sexual abuse run by a non-government organisation called the ‘Samoa Victim Support Group’, modelled on similar groups around the world.

The Group comprises mainly volunteers and is funded by several good Samaritan donors and businesses both local and overseas, as well as by international donor partners, various international organisations and public donations.  The Government of Samoa is also a donor and supporter.  The Group fills a vacuum in the kind of support service that should be available to such child survivors according to the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (‘CRC’) to which Samoa has been a signatory for some 30 years.

On the Campus are situated many buildings bearing names such as ‘House of Hope’ (for children aged 3-12 years), ‘House of Dreams’ (for children 13 years and over), ‘House of Blessings’ (nursery for children under 3 years old), ‘Ray of Hope’ (for pregnant survivors), and one recently opened by Her Majesty Queen Camilla during her trip to Samoa for CHOGM 2024,  the ‘Queen Camilla Pre-school of Hope’ (for pre-school learning).  The Campus itself bears the name ‘The SVSG Campus of Hope’ and has been described thus:

“This shelter is not just a refuge but a haven of hope for a new life free of violence and pain.”

“For some, it is their first real home where they are safe and can be the children that God meant them to be.”

Before the 1989 UN Convention, no shelters like the Campus of Hope for child victims and survivors existed in Samoa or any other Pacific Island country.  Before the Convention, the phrase “children's rights” was unheard of and if mentioned, was considered by many to be contrary to local custom and tradition which recognised that while children were “gifts from God” to be cherished, nothing more was required.  

“Many times in our Samoan culture to an extent we hear this saying – children must only be seen and not heard, or you can speak only when you are spoken to.”

A similar situation prevailed throughout the Pacific and in many other parts of the world.  Prior to the Convention, there was no recognition of a child as a rights holder or of children as a group deserving of special attention, care and protection measures.

Notwithstanding previous International Declarations on the rights of children such as those issued in 1924 and 1959, shelters such as the Campus of Hope and other initiatives designed to protect and help children and foster their development were by and large non-existent.  These concepts and principles only became mainstreamed in the Convention whereby commitments were made by all the 196 nations of the World as signatory Parties.   

The CRC represents Promises made to the children of the world including generations yet to come, based on the acceptance and understanding that they require special consideration, care and protection and in the words of the Convention, that they should be permitted to “grow up in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding” and with “peace, dignity, tolerance, freedom, equality and solidarity.”   

To this end children were imbued with certain inalienable rights ranging from the right to life to the right to the highest attainable standard of health (now extended by the CRC General Comment 26 to the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment), to the right to special protection during times of armed conflict, to the right for children or any affected party to bring complaints of a breach of the Convention or its Protocols direct to the Committee on the Rights of the Child in Geneva under the Optional Protocol on a Communications Procedure or ‘OPIC’ as it is commonly styled.

The Convention was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 20 November 1989 and as it celebrates its 35th birthday, the burning question for consideration is whether we the Governments of the Planet have kept our Promises?  There is no doubting the value the CRC has added to the world of children who now enjoy many rights and freedoms not previously available to them.   But there is equally no argument that children today face more challenges, inequities, threats to their survival, wellbeing and very existence than at any previous time in history.   Witness the horror of what is unfolding in Gaza, the Ukraine, Yemen, Sudan and other parts of Africa and the world; the dangers posed to children by the dizzying development of digital space and the Internet; how the voices of children are still not generally or routinely heard on matters affecting them; all overshadowed by the clear and present existential threat of climate change and the effect it is having and will continue to have on the survival and particular needs of children. What good the right to an education when your school has been washed away by floods? How to safeguard a right to health when hospitals lie in the ruins of wartime aggression or because of a super-cyclone, where lies your family environment when your island no longer exists due to rising sea levels?  

The reality is Humanity’s Report Card on the occasion of CRC 35 is full of D's for “desperation” and “despair” and F’s for “failure, failure and more failure.”  Our planet teeters on the verge of a climate collapse, children’s rights are under assault on many fronts, old and new. Historic problems and poor health outcomes, child poverty and malnutrition, forced child marriages, increased child offending (reference should be made to CRC General Comment 24 – ‘Children’s rights in the Child Justice system’ and the dangerous reactionary philosophy of some States in lowering the age of criminal responsibility: for a Pacific example see ‘Australia jailing children as young as 10’ by Annabel Hennessy) , high incarceration and detention rates, child trafficking and the particular problems of refugee and migrant children, the rising tide of sexual exploitation and abuse where in the Pacific, levels have reached pandemic proportions; to name but a few of the many pressing and urgent issues which continue to bedevil and plague mankind.

The shining beacon of light in all of this darkness remains the lofty and inspired aims and aspirations of the Convention as supported by the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the UN Treaty Body System.  A key ingredient however remains the willingness and extent to which the 196 State Parties to the Convention accept, implement and continue to develop their Treaty obligations under the CRC.  While there has been outstanding progress, much more needs and remains to be done.  

The unequivocal message to States and to all going forward must be: Clearly, we must strive to do better if we are to realise the full potential of the Convention and safeguard the well-being and security of not only the children of tomorrow but also the children of today. A redoubling of efforts and a renewed commitment to the Convention and what it stands for needs to occur, perhaps now more so than any other period in our history.

When I think of the road taken by the Convention, the words of the poet continually resound in my mind:

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep

But I have Promises to keep

And miles to go before I sleep

And miles to go before I sleep.”

Justice Vui Clarence Nelson is a Senior Judge in the Supreme Court of Samoa.