Social Development hosts awareness and education webinar on child trafficking and online violations, 4 Dec

As part of addressing the high prevalence of Gender-Based Violence and Femicide in the country, the Department of Social Development will, in partnership with UNICEF host an educational awareness webinar on Child Trafficking, Cyberbullying, Online and Violation of Children’s Rights on Friday, 04 December, in Pretoria.  

Violence against children and Gender-Based Violence has been declared as the country’s second pandemic, which increased drastically during COVID-19 national lockdown. Although Government has put lockdown measures in place to deal with the spread of COVID-19 pandemic, violence against children has worsened as children are being isolated and confined in the home environment with limited access to support services that were previously available to them before the national lockdown.

Both the lockdown restrictions and a new normal life has intensely exposed children to the digital space, which has advantages and disadvantages on their lives and overall academic progress. These opportunities and the risks need to be considered when developing child online-protection programmes. Furthermore, during the lockdown, more children continue to be exposed to various forms of abuse including violence, abduction, neglect and exploitation. During the national lockdown, South Africa also experienced an increase on children being at risk of being trafficked for different reasons including sexual exploitation, online sexual exploitation and cyber-bullying.

It is against this background that the Department of Social Development and UNICEF has during the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence against Women and Children Campaign, planned an array of activities to create awareness and education on violation of children’s rights.

This campaign takes place annually from 25 November until 10 December, to raise awareness against the scourge of violence on women and children and the theme for this year is; “Women’s Economic Justice for a Non-Violent and Non-Sexist South Africa.”

The target audience for this webinar will be children, parents and caregivers as well as stakeholders within the child protection system and those who are key in the care, protection and well-being of children. The webinar and the physical engagement will be marketed through usage of media platforms and physical interaction with the said target audience, including communities and society at large.

Members of the media are invited to attend and cover the event arranged as follows:

Date: Friday, 04 December 2020
Time: 13h00 – 15h30 
Venue: Manhattan Hotel Pretoria, 247 Scheiding St, Pretoria Central, Pretoria, 0002

MS Teams: Join conversation (microsoft.com)

https://teams.microsoft.com/dl/launcher/launcher.html?url=%2F_%23%2Fl%2Fmeetup-join%2F19%3Ameeting_OWIyZjg5ZmUtZjA5My00YTNhLTgyNjMtZDA1ZGZhZTk1MGI1%40thread.v2%2F0%3Fcontext%3D%257b%2522Tid%2522%253a%252286ff4e0f-6b74-4e27-9994-c3ef68c9bb25%2522%252c%2522Oid%2522%253a%252257b4bf52-65a2-40e5-9f49-6b7b2147e32a%2522%257d%26anon%3Dtrue&type=meetup-join&deeplinkId=b946bc8d-8e84-4bbc-aba6-97c5f105ba78&directDl=true&msLaunch=true&enableMobilePage=true&suppressPrompt=true

Media can RSVP by contacting Ms Nomfundo Xulu-Lentsoane on 066 480 6845 / NomfundoLe@dsd.gov.za or Mr Jaconia Kobue on 063 249 5120 / JaconiaK@dsd.gov.za 

 

Media enquiries may be directed to:
Lumka Oliphant
Cell: 083 484 8067
E-mail: lumkao@dsd.gov.za  

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