Consultations with Children Affected by Armed Conflict on Accountability for Child... Tender

Procurement Summary

Country : United Kingdom

Summary : Consultations with Children Affected by Armed Conflict on Accountability for Child Rights Violations Committed

Deadline : 17 May 2019

Other Information

Notice Type : Tender

TOT Ref.No.: 32908448

Document Ref. No. :

Competition : ICB

Financier : Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA)

Purchaser Ownership : -

Tender Value : Refer Document

Purchaser's Detail

Purchaser : SAVE THE CHILDREN (SC)
St Vincent House, 30 Orange Street, London, WC2H 7HH, UK Tel: +44 (0)20 3272 0300
United Kingdom
Email :esaro.procurement@savethechildren.org

Tender Details

Tenders are invited for Consultations with Children Affected by Armed Conflict on Accountability for Child Rights Violations Committed.

1. Introduction



Save the Children (SC) is the world's leading independent organization for children. As part of the organisation-s contribution towards ensuring every child attains the right to survival, protection, development and participation, Save the Children has been working with armed forces in Sub-Saharan Africa since 1998 and with the African Union (AU) for the last 10 years to promote the rights of children in conflicts, post-conflict, and protracted political emergency situations. With support from SIDA, Save the Children has worked towards strengthening child protection in African Union peace support operations since 2013. The engagement has borne results that include the development and adoption of a harmonized and standardized curriculum and standards on child protection and child rights which is currently being rolled out by the East African Standby Force (EASF), and troop contributing countries such as Uganda, Senegal and Côte d-Ivoire.



Save the Children in collaboration with partners continues to augment efforts that protect girls and boys in conflict settings. These interventions aim at strengthening the capacity of peace support operations actors to deliver their protection mandate and ensure girls and boys affected by armed conflicts and protracted political disputes enjoy their rights.



The ‘Integrating Child Protection within the African Peace and Security Architecture- (ICPAPSA) project focuses on four key objectives:

a) To enhance the commitment and capacity to prevent and respond to violence against girls and boys within the AU Peace and Security Department (AU PSD), East Africa Standby Force (EASF), ECOWAS Standby Force (ESF), and Member States.

b) To institute and monitor a functional accountability framework on child protection within the AU PSD, EASF, ESF, and troop contributing countries.

c) To increase knowledge, evidence and collective understanding on child rights and child protection issues within peace support operations.

d) To improve participation among girls and boys affected by armed conflict to contribute to decisions and processes of the AU, Regional Mechanisms/Bodies, and Member States.



To achieve this, Save the Children collaborates with stakeholders within the AU, Regional Bodies and Regional Mechanisms in East and West Africa, and National Armed Forces.

CONSULTATIONS WITH CHILDREN AFFECTED BY ARMED CONFLICT ON ACCOUNTABILITY FOR CHILD RIGHTS VIOLATIONS COMMITTED
Terms of Reference

1. Introduction

Save the Children (SC) is the world's leading independent organization for children. As part of the organisation-s contribution towards ensuring every child attains the right to survival, protection, development and participation, Save the Children has been working with armed forces in Sub-Saharan Africa since 1998 and with the African Union (AU) for the last 10 years to promote the rights of children in conflicts, post-conflict, and protracted political emergency situations. With support from SIDA, Save the Children has worked towards strengthening child protection in African Union peace support operations since 2013. The engagement has borne results that include the development and adoption of a harmonized and standardized curriculum and standards on child protection and child rights which is currently being rolled out by the East African Standby Force (EASF), and troop contributing countries such as Uganda, Senegal and Côte d-Ivoire.

Save the Children in collaboration with partners continues to augment efforts that protect girls and boys in conflict settings. These interventions aim at strengthening the capacity of peace support operations actors to deliver their protection mandate and ensure girls and boys affected by armed conflicts and protracted political disputes enjoy their rights.

The ‘Integrating Child Protection within the African Peace and Security Architecture- (ICPAPSA) project focuses on four key objectives:
a) To enhance the commitment and capacity to prevent and respond to violence against girls and boys within the AU Peace and Security Department (AU PSD), East Africa Standby Force (EASF), ECOWAS Standby Force (ESF), and Member States.
b) To institute and monitor a functional accountability framework on child protection within the AU PSD, EASF, ESF, and troop contributing countries.
c) To increase knowledge, evidence and collective understanding on child rights and child protection issues within peace support operations.
d) To improve participation among girls and boys affected by armed conflict to contribute to decisions and processes of the AU, Regional Mechanisms/Bodies, and Member States.

To achieve this, Save the Children collaborates with stakeholders within the AU, Regional Bodies and Regional Mechanisms in East and West Africa, and National Armed Forces.







2. Context

The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACRWC) entered into force in 1999. This was after AU Member States took a unanimous stance on the applicability of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) to children in Africa on various socio-economic, cultural and developmental diversities.

Like the UNCRC, the ACRWC defines the full spectrum of children-s civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights and the obligations of duty bearers to uphold those rights, the principal duty bearer being the State. The Charter makes it possible for girls and boys to assert their rights through domestic judicial or administrative proceedings. The Charter-s articles are applicable in all contexts including situations of conflict. Article 22 of the Charter is specific to conflicts in stating that no child should participate in armed conflict. The Charter establishes the African Committee for the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACERWC) as the body responsible for monitoring its implementation and ensuring the protection of the rights contained in it. On the definition of a child, the UNCRC defines a child as every human being below the age of 18 years ‘unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier-, where the law referred to in the CRC includes international treaties and domestic legislations specific to children. The ACRWC defines a child more concisely as ‘every human being below the age of 18 years-. This has a significant difference when discussing the age of conscription or engagement in armed forces.
Despite this framework, girls and boys caught in conflict on the continent continue to be subject to rights violations including violence that is both incidental and targeted. As highlighted in the Study on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children in Africa commissioned by the ACERWC, girls and boys living in conflict contexts are more likely to be separated from their families, sexually assaulted, subject to early marriage, maimed, killed, recruited by force, or die early as a result of disease or malnutrition. At the same time, they are less likely to attend school. Girls and boys not only have to live with the physical and psychological scars from their experience but often with social alienation particularly those who have been associated with armed groups or those who have survived sexual violence. Conflict often has different effects on girls and boys. For example, boys are often more vulnerable to recruitment as combatants by armed groups whilst girls are often more vulnerable to sexual violence.

Despite widespread condemnation and mechanisms to hold perpetrators accountable, such grave violations of children-s rights continue. In the annex to the UN Secretary General-s 2014 Report on Children and Armed Conflict listing parties responsible for grave violations against children, armed groups on the continent are overrepresented. 15 of the 28 groups listed are located in Africa, 5 of which are national armed forces.

There is growing intolerance globally and on the continent against acts of violence committed against children in conflict situations and in particular against violence committed by peacekeepers. The UN Secretary General is vociferous in his condemnation and he is exploring ways to end impunity through, for example, naming and shaming countries that fail to take action. His dismissal of the Head of the UN Mission in the Central African Republic following repeated allegations of violations by peacekeepers sent a clear signal. In 2015, the UN Security Council demonstrated its continued engagement on the issue by adopting Resolution 2225. The resolution requested the Secretary General to include in the annexes to his report on children and armed conflict those parties to armed conflict that engage, in contravention of applicable international law, in patterns of abduction of children in situations of armed conflict. In line with the priorities of this Swedish funded project, it also called for mandatory pre-deployment training of peacekeepers on child protection and sexual violence. This will need high-level political commitment that is driven by evidence from grassroots action, which this project would endeavour to undertake.

The AU has taken the issue seriously with the appointment of a Special Envoy to the Chairperson of the AU Commission for Women, Peace and Security. A Special Envoy on Children and Armed Conflict is to be appointed as well following endorsement by the Heads of State and Government during the AU Assembly. The AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) has to date held five open sessions focusing on children associated with armed conflict. It is cooperating with the ACERWC to make Member States more accountable for their implementation of the African Charter.

African troops already form the bulk of peace support troops curren

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