VI. ASSISTANCE TO CHILDREN

For child protection, the tools are there. International treaties have been ratified. There is a progressive family code and national legislation. Angola incorporated the guiding principles on the internally displaced into national law. The government must follow through on its statements and live up to its commitments and to its people.

-Child Rights Consultant, November 26, 2002.

Rebuilding a country that was plagued by almost four decades of continuous conflict will be an enormous challenge. Much of Angola's infrastructure lies in ruins with schools, health centers, and homes destroyed and countless lives lost. Millions of Angolans will need to resettle into communities, forgive their neighbors, and pick up the pieces of their lives. Careful planning by the government and increases in social services are needed to create a stable future for the people. In addition, Angola is obligated under international convention to progressively achieve compulsory and free primary education for all and the highest attainable standard of health.

In contrast to many countries in Africa, Angola has the means to deliver on its obligations. Angola has sizeable oil reserves and could produce as much oil as Kuwait within the next decade. The government is heavily reliant on oil revenues which bring in more than three billion U.S. dollars each year, accounting for roughly 75 percent of overall government revenues and nearly 30 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).⁶⁶ With abundant diamond and other mineral deposits, a peaceful Angola means that the extraction of these resources can provide additional revenues to the government and ultimately to its people.

Little was spent on health and education in the last four years of the conflict. While expenditures in these two areas were given priority by the parliament in December 2002, much depends on how much of an increase will be allotted by the government and delivered to the provinces.⁶⁷ Of concern is the fact that the IMF determined that 908 million U.S. dollars or just under 10 percent of GDP could not be accounted for in 2001. More troubling still perhaps is that the IMF was unable to determine how much was spent on health and education in that the same year because the government was either unwilling or unable to make that data available. However, for the years 1997 to 2000, the IMF reported that spending on health and education averaged approximately 4 percent of GDP while, in the same period, the average amount unaccounted for was approximately 12 percent of GDP.⁶⁸

With the majority of the population of Angola under the age of eighteen, government investments in children-school, health care, tracing programs, rehabilitation-must be given priority. Programs that help former child soldiers must be established to provide opportunity to those who fought for their country. These programs though, must be tailored to the needs of the communities where these children will live. Inclusive programs that provide for social rehabilitation and community cohesion provide the best solution to peaceful integration for former child combatants.

Some partial assistance for rehabilitation of child soldiers has been provided by international agencies working in the field. The International Committee of the Red Cross is tracing and reuniting separated children with their families. The Spanish Red Cross has designed programs to provide some technical training and assistance to child soldiers in a few provinces. The Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict appointed a child protection advisor to work with the Angolan government in 2002 for a six-month period.

A meeting held in late December 2002 in Luanda on Child Protection Strategies was a positive step for children in Angola. Organized with members from the Ministry of Social Welfare (Ministério da Assistência e Reinserção Social, MINARS), U.N. agencies, local and international NGOs, and civil society actors, the groups met and discussed, among other things, the need for the rehabilitation of child soldiers. Such action around issues related to child protection that bring together different child rights actors was identified as instrumental in the establishment of programs for child soldiers after the Lusaka Protocol.⁶⁹

A roundtable discussion held in March 2003 and a commitment by partners for its implementation followed up the earlier protection meeting. A strategy of community rehabilitation and family reunification was declared preferable to a formal child demobilization program that identified boys and girls as soldiers where "labeling child soldiers and providing them with demobilization benefit packages leads to stigmatization within their community."⁷⁰ Such an emphasis on family and community-based rehabilitation and avoiding negative stigma for the long-term is essential for former child soldiers and their communities. But it risks failing to identify former girls and boys who bore arms and overlooking their special needs because there are no planned programs tailored to their specific rehabilitation requirements.

In speaking on the gathering areas, a UNICEF employee stated, "Within the camps all children, not just underage soldiers have received counseling."⁷¹ Yet the former child soldiers interviewed for this report, both boys and girls in some of the most accessible gathering areas, were unanimous in stating that as of December 2002, they had never received any counseling. In her report on lessons learned for demobilization of child soldiers and drawing from past examples including Angola, Beth Verhey argues that in any demobilization process, "the special needs of child soldiers in demobilization programs [are] vital."⁷² Her views have been summarized in other works on best practices for conflict prevention and reconstruction as well. "Child soldiers generally want to be recognized and included in formal demobilization programs. When they are excluded, resentment and a sense of abandonment lead some to return to violence as a way of improving their lives. For others, recognition plays an important protection role. . .to protect themselves from re-recruitment"⁷³ The 1996 United Nations Study on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children, Report of the Expert of the Secretary-General, Ms. Graça Machel, also recommends the formal recognition of child combatants. "Official acknowledgement of children's part in a war is a vital step. . .without this recognition, there can be no effective planning or programming."⁷⁴ These opinions, based on past examples from Angola and other countries, call into question the applicability of the current rehabilitation strategy.

The World Bank is proposing a U.S. $180 million initiative to assist and reintegrate into their communities former UNITA and FAA combatants. Known as the Angolan Demobilization and Reintegration Program (ADRP), this initiative includes a U.S. $33 million grant approved by the bank in March 2003.⁷⁵ While the ADRP specifies that underage combatants will receive assistance in trauma counseling and psychosocial care, it makes no reference as to how these children will be identified nor any reference to girl soldiers. In the ADRP Technical Annex, the bank has recognized that because child soldiers have not been registered in the gathering areas, the proposed number of beneficiaries is unknown. Identifying child soldiers in the gathering and transit areas before they close and following their progress outside of the camps may be the only way that these children will be sure to receive intended future assistance. Equally problematic is the assertion in the technical annex that "The FAA has assumed primary responsibility for the demobilization process. . . .and has been responsible for registering, screening and issuing military identity cards to ex-combatants to be demobilized."⁷⁶ Boy and girl combatants, however, were left out of the demobilization process and relying solely on the FAA as the implementing partner for demobilization risks that they will be left out again.

The necessary elements to create and sustain programs for former child soldiers are present in Angola. A larger percentage of funding from the current World Bank initiative and grant could be channeled to assist child combatants. The organized child protection group could provide the needed technical and professional assistance to correctly implement programs. Such a scenario, however, can only work with a strong commitment by the government. Investment in children and their communities by the government is required to balance the needs of child soldiers with that of all children and vulnerable groups in Angola.

⁶⁶ International Monetary Fund, Angola: Recent Economic Developments, IMF Staff Country Report Number 00/111, August 2000; International Monetary Fund, Angola: Staff Report for the Article IV Consultation, March 18, 2002, pp. 28-33, (copy on file at Human Rights Watch).

⁶⁷ Angola Press Agency, 2003 State Budget Passed, December 19, 2002 [online]. http://allafrica.com/angola/200212190593.html (retrieved December 20, 2002).

⁶⁸ International Monetary Fund, Angola: Staff Report, pp. 28-33.

⁶⁹ Angola Press Agency, Child Protection Strategies Meeting Continues, December 17, 2002 [online], http://allafrica.com/angola/200212170632.html (December 20, 2002).

⁷⁰ United Nation's Children's Fund News Notes, "A New Phase in Action for Separated Children and Child Soldiers in Angola," Luanda, Angola, March 7, 2003.

⁷¹ Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN), "Angola: Reintegration of Child Soldiers Underway," January 15, 2003.

⁷² Verhey, Beth, "Child Soldiers Preventing, Demobilizing and Reintegrating," November 2001, p. 7.

⁷³ Conflict Prevention and Reconstruction Unit, Social Development Department, "Child Soldiers: Prevention, Demobilization and Reintegration," Environmentally and Socially Sustainable Development Network of the World Bank, May 2002, p. 2.

⁷⁴ United Nations, Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Children Impact of Armed Conflict on Children, (New York: United Nations Publication, August 26, 1996), A/51/306, p. 19.

⁷⁵ The World Bank, Technical Annex for a Proposed Grant of SDR 24 Million (US$ 33 Million Equivalent) to the Republic of Angola for an Angola Emergency Demobilization and Reintegration Project, (Document of the World Bank: Report No. T7580-ANG, March 7, 2003), p. 37.

⁷⁶ Ibid., pp. 19, 31-32, and 42.