Issue No. 598

The Cost to Somalia’s Children

There are over 7 million malnourished children under the age of 5 in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, according to UNICEF. Somalia’s under-5 mortality rate is some 112 per 1000 live births, more than one in ten. Nearly 70% of Somalis live below the international poverty line; around 1.8 million children are acutely malnourished. Let’s breathe for a moment and let that sink in.

In Somalia and across the Horn of Africa, children are experiencing unprecedented hunger, water scarcity, and armed conflict-related insecurity. Millions are at risk of dying from severe malnutrition. Drought is certainly a leading factor contributing to this dire situation, with families and entire communities losing their livelihoods over the past several years of failed rains. Millions of children and families have been forced to leave their homes in search of food and water, becoming internally displaced persons (IDPs) in their countries, and refugees in neighbouring states. Displaced women and girls are particularly vulnerable to sexual and gender-based violence.

Armed conflict and political instability are also significant factors devastating the lives of Somalia’s children. The youngest are missing safe homes, as well as safe drinking water, regular meals, and adequate medical care. Many of those from 5-15 are without basic education, and their lives are forever impacted by child labour, forced recruitment by non-state armed groups, and violent conflict in their communities.

In Al-Shabaab (AS) controlled areas of southern and central Somalia, children who can attend school have been subject to extremist Islamist curricula. Some 3.85 million children need education in emergencies (EiE) support, 48% of them IDPs. The Federal Government of Somalia plans to recruit and train 3,000 more teachers, an important start but the country’s perennial insecurity and limited resources will undoubtedly continue to hold back educational development. 

While most Somalis support government-led security operations to disrupt AS across their country, children and youth in any village or town in which fighting takes place suffer not only material loss, but psychological trauma. Children are all too often among civilian victims of ground conflict, improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and air attacks. On 6 September, a woman and her two children were killed after AS planted an IED in their home in Eel Laheley in Galgudud to target those returning following the area's liberation by government forces.

As security operations continue, and future stabilisation efforts are considered in areas retaken from AS, basic health care services must include psycho-social support, as well as education, for Somalia’s youth. Ignoring these needs will only lead to further social and political upheaval in the future. Routes into individual indoctrination and militancy are complex and myriad, but there is no doubt that early trauma and exposure to extremist ideology plays a significant role.

Somalia ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 2015, 26 years after it was first adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1989. The Convention outlines dozens of human rights to be protected for every child under age 18. These include the inherent right to life, the right not to be separated from parents, the right to primary and developmental health care, the right to education, the right to protection from economic exploitation, the right to protection from sexual exploitation and abuse, the right to protection in armed conflict, and the right to play.

In addition, countries must take all legislative, administrative, social and other measures to protect children from physical and mental violence, abuse, neglect, maltreatment and exploitation. In reality, however, many of these rights and protections are a distant dream in Somalia. 

Somalia has yet to sign the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child; just one of only 5 AU member states not to have done so to date. The African Charter includes many of the same requirements of the UN Charter, as well as provisions requiring the protection of disabled children, and prohibitions against child marriage and damaging cultural practices, which could be interpreted to include female genital cutting. The country has one of the highest rates globally, with 98% of girls between 5-11 having undergone the most extreme form of cutting, infibulation.

Nationally, the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS) has yet to enact laws prohibiting child abuse, including labour trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation, and recruitment by non-state armed groups. Most children in Somalia in 2023 are at extreme risk of being subjected to physical, social, economic and environmental human rights abuses.

The country faces a particularly extreme youth bulge, with over half of Somalia’s population 18 million under the age of 15, and the median age just over 15. They are coming of age in an ever-warmer world and in a country that, despite some notable progress, remains wracked by violence and displacement. Beyond the gravity of the current situation, it would benefit the FGS, Somalia’s Federal Member States, and all those in positions of authority in the country to consider the future consequences of neglect of today’s children on tomorrow’s society.

The Somali Wire team