Amandala has been informed that the 1st Annual State of the Nation Conference will be held starting Monday, November 14, 2011, under the theme Coordinating the Child Protection System: Building Protective Environments.
The 3-day conference will be held at the Belize Biltmore Plaza in Belize City, and will engage both adults and children.
An invitation letter sent to us by Mrs. Pearl Stuart, Executive Director of the National Committee for Families and Children (NCFC) says: “The mandate of the NCFC calls for us to champion the issues of children by advocating for the necessary changes in legislation and policies6 to ensure that they protect all children.”
One change that Belizeans have been calling for is the mandatory registration of convicted sex offenders in an official registry.
In an online poll Amandala carried out earlier this year, we asked: Do you think the Belize government should require the public registration and listing of sex offenders? 93% of respondents said YES, whereas the remaining 7% said NO.
The mandatory registration of sex offenders will require changes in Belizean law. The US as well as the UK has instituted this system. In the recent months, we have reported on multiple cases of sex offenders who sought refuge here in Belize.
In international news earlier this week, a UK religious education teacher, Kathryn Roach, 24, was given a 6-month suspended sentence at Bolton Crown Court, just this Monday, for sending over 200 explicit text messages to a 14-year-old student. She reportedly pleaded guilty to a charge of “inciting a child to engage in sexual activity by a person in a position of trust,” after which the judge banned her from ever working with children again and ordering her to sign into the sexual offenders’ register.
In a study funded by the US Department of Justice and executed with the Medical University of South Carolina, Evaluating the Effectiveness of Sex Offender Registration and Notification Policies for Reducing Sexual Violence against Women (Sept. 2010), authors Elizabeth J. Letourneau, Ph.D., Jill S. Levenson, Ph.D., Dipankar Bandyopadhyay, Ph.D., Debajyoti Sinha, Ph.D., and Kevin S. Armstrong, found that, “A significant deterrent effect was noted after 1995, the year that South Carolina first implemented sex offender registration and notification (SORN). An approximately 11% reduction in first-time sex crime arrests was found in the post-SORN period (1995-2005) relative to the pre-SORN period (1990-1994).”
Whereas several Belizeans have called for mandatory registrations, which could be introduced into Belize’s Child Protection System, we understand that there is no stated intention to discuss this at the November 14-16 conference—although the floor will be open for input from stakeholders.
The conference is a collaborative effort of the NCFC, the Ministry of Human Development and Social Transformation, the Special Envoy for Women and Children, Youth for the Future, and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
The stakeholders intend to start off by looking at priority actions on coordinating the Child Protection System.
On day 2, the consultation will engage children to identify how they can best participate in advocating for their rights in a framework of responsibility and respect.
On day 3, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition will join key stakeholders in signing off on a list of priority actions identified during the conference.
Organizers note that this year, the international community celebrates the 23rd year of the Convention on the Rights of a Child (CRC) – and there is a call to return to CRC fundamentals.
“Additionally, the recent onslaught against the children of Belize has resulted in public outcry for those responsible for protecting the rights of children to amplify their efforts,” organizers add, in the conference overview. “This heightened awareness has revealed the gaps in the system and the special measures in place to restore justice and dignity to the affected children and their families.”