This video is part of series that explores the establishment and work of Samoa’s national human rights institution. The UK-funded Pacific Commonwealth Equality Project - implemented by SPC’s Regional Rights Resource Team (RRRT) - aims to promote the establishment and strengthening of national human rights institutions in the Pacific. #PacificValuesAndHumanRights
This video is part of series that explores the establishment and work of Samoa’s national human rights institution. The UK-funded Pacific Commonwealth Equality Project - implemented by SPC’s Regional Rights Resource Team (RRRT) - aims to promote the establishment and strengthening of national human rights institutions in the Pacific. #PacificValuesAndHumanRights
This video is part of series that explores the establishment and work of Samoa’s national human rights institution. The UK-funded Pacific Commonwealth Equality Project - implemented by SPC’s Regional Rights Resource Team (RRRT) - aims to promote the establishment and strengthening of national human rights institutions in the Pacific. #PacificValuesAndHumanRights
This video is part of series that explores the establishment and work of Samoa’s national human rights institution. The UK-funded Pacific Commonwealth Equality Project - implemented by SPC’s Regional Rights Resource Team (RRRT) - aims to promote the establishment and strengthening of national human rights institutions in the Pacific. #PacificValuesAndHumanRights
The UK-funded Pacific Commonwealth Equality Project implemented by SPC’s Regional Rights Resource Team (RRRT) aims to increase understanding of the links between Pacific cultural values, faiths and human rights. The ‘vox-pop’s series is a platform for people across the region to explain what human rights mean to them within their national context and how they link to values and faith. #PacificValuesAndHumanRights
Thanks to the positive steps taken by the Care Micronesia Foundation (CMF), a civil society organisation in FSM, the Pohnpei State Legislature changed the age of consent and marriage from 16 to 18 in 2019. This action is a significant step forward for Micronesia and sends a clear signal about the region’s determination to follow the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).
International human rights conventions are an effective way of holding states accountable and serves as a guide for national legislation to safeguard vulnerable groups in our societies. The CRC defines children as being anyone under the age 18. In line with this, the minimum standard age of marriage set by most countries around the world is usually 18.
While some countries in the Pacific have ratified the CRC and, over time, have changed their marriage laws to comply with international human rights treaties, others such as the Federated State of Micronesia (FSM) have only recently taken positive legislative action to protect children from early marriages.
According to Shelyane Lohn, former Manager of CMF, the law change in Pohnpei State was only possible through rigorous lobbying and advocacy in collaboration with churches, public health authorities and local women’s groups.
The Pacific Community’s (SPC) Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division provided support to CMF’s campaign in the form of a grant under the Pacific People Advancing Change (PPAC) project, funded by the Government of Sweden.
The grant directly funded campaign activities and was complemented by advocacy training and mentoring support to help ensure an effective campaign. The campaign activities included a roundtable discussion attended by representatives of Pohnpei State Public Health, the State Legislative Committee on Health, as well as church leaders, traditional leaders, and women’s groups.
“The assistance in the form of a grant provided by SPC’s PPAC project built the capacity of CMF to advocate on this serious issue to the wider public and to important stakeholders and empowered them to lobby the Pohnpei State legislature to make this change in the age of consent a reality,” Lohn said.
“PPAC did a great job in helping us raise the age of consent and marriageable age which opened the eyes of a lot of people in FSM who are slowly adapting to this change.”
Lohn highlighted that the reasons for lobbying for this change in legislation were numerous but the most basic rationale was to ensure that children are protected from early marriages until they are mature and old enough to start their own families. Another reason was to lower the rate of teenage pregnancy which is high in FSM.
She highlighted that the majority of the four states of FSM have set the age of consent and marriage at 16 and, because of this, many young girls were being married to men who were sometimes twice their age.
In most cases, Lohn noted that “Families followed this due to the “assistance” that these men can provide for the girl’s family.”
Early marriage for these ‘child brides’ often means that they are not able to pursue their dreams of higher education and thus are not able to secure work opportunities and become economically empowered.
Being married off at a young age also meant that most young girls became teenage mothers, and this had a lasting impact on their physical wellbeing as well as the health of their babies.
Lohn added that the change in legislation will now provide much-needed protection to children, especially young girls from being married off early and can be used to dissuade families and communities from marrying off their daughters while they are still children.
Lohn said that CMF, as part of this advocacy campaign, managed to establish strong partnerships with the Pohnpei Police, Pohnpei State Government, Pohnpei Women’s Council, and youth and church groups.
While the law change in Pohnpei is certainly an achievement worth celebrating, CMF hopes to continue public education and awareness of this.
“The lobbying and advocacy to change the age of consent and marriage has created greater awareness in our students and children. I think the children in our communities and schools now realise that they too have rights that can protect them, and we wish to continue our public education and awareness campaigns until the rate of customary marriages and teenage pregnancies drop,” she added.
-ENDS-
Nukua’lofa (Tonga) – Members of Parliament (MPs) from Tonga’s Legislative Assembly participated in a half day dialogue on human rights and the Denarau Declaration last year where they reaffirmed the importance of understanding human rights and good governance to meet parliamentary obligations.
The event was an opportunity for constructive dialogue, not only on substantive topics such as human rights in the context of climate change, Tongan cultures and faiths, but also on exploring ways to strengthen the national human rights mechanisms, especially through the establishment of National Human Rights Institutions.
As part of his opening remarks at the event, Tonga’s Speaker of the House, Lord Fakafanua highlighted the important role played by parliamentarians and leaders in the realisation of human rights standards as it applies to the context of Tonga.
“Today, we can reflect upon and appreciate human rights, some of which is embedded into our constitution since 1875 by our visionary leaders and which we as leaders and lawmakers of the present have continued to inherit and play an important role of defending human rights of all our people. Together with the support of our own traditional values, and our culture, we can all agree that these human rights will continue to be a cornerstone,” Lord Fakafanua said.
He added that the dialogue was an important opportunity to revisit the commitment made by the Tonga MPs as signatories to the Denarau Declaration.
“As parliamentarians and members of the (Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade), we are often looked upon for our roles in human rights, given our powers to oversee the executive roles in enacting laws, deliberate on our budgets and voice the needs of our constituents, we play critical roles in laying the foundation in fostering an environment that protects our communities, our families, children and anything threatens their human rights,” Lord Fakafanua noted.
Lord Fakafanua stated that the dialogue is of great benefit for the members of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade as they are tasked with the pivotal oversight and role of considering and reporting on matters relating to human rights obligations, international treaties and conventions and required economic policies.
He added that having a standing committee with a specific mandate attests to Tonga’s commitment to promoting human rights and the Legislative Assembly of Tonga will rely heavily on the advice of this committee to enlighten and drive the deliberations in parliament by applying this to human rights matters and just about any matter discussed in the parliament of Tonga.
According to Honourable Saia Piukala, Chair of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, the human rights dialogue helped in learning about the importance of exhausting different human rights mechanisms to protect human rights in the context of Tonga.
“I also learnt that we can adopt and contextualise conventions and treaties to suit each of our respective cultures and traditions,” he added.
Hon. Piukala highlighted that “contextualised approaches is very crucial to our roles in Parliament because it will strategize our approach in terms of working with the executives in the future to rectify international conventions and treaties.”
Another MP highlighted that the dialogue was useful as these types of conversations are important for the region and for leaders to have in order to ensure human rights for all people.
She added that the dialogue brought out a recognition for the need to engage parliamentarians in consultations through other forums and to create more awareness of issues relevant to the implementation of human rights in the Tonga context through legislation.
She also noted that all policies in Tonga should reflect human rights and this is something she will ensure is engrained in the work she does from now onwards as part of the standing committee.
The Dialogue, conducted on 16 July 2021, was organised by the Pacific Community’s (SPC) Human Rights and Social Development Division and supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through the generous support of the American people, with programme funding from the governments of Australia and Sweden.
The event was attended by 11 participants from Tonga’s Legislative Assembly and the Members of the Parliamentary Standing committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence & Trade including the Honorable Rev Dr Pohiva Tu’i’onetoa, Prime Minister & Minister for Foreign Affairs, Lord Fakafanua, Speaker of the House and Honorable Saia Piukala, the Chair of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade.
Dr Stuart Minchin, SPC’s Director General, who officially opened the dialogue highlighted that “Human rights do not exist in isolation and come with responsibilities, in the same way that feveitokai’aki requires mutual respect within Tongan society. Far from being a concept born out of Europe, many of the values of modern-day human rights can be found in our Pacific histories and the values by which we have always lived our everyday lives.”
He added that many people fear that human rights are contrary to and even undermine our Pacific cultures, however at SPC, we believe the opposite to be true.
“We believe that human rights, Pacific culture and faith are complementary and mutually reinforcing … we believe that by strengthening one we inherently strengthen the other, ” Dr Minchin said.
-ENDS
Useful links:
Speech by Dr Stuart Minchin, Director General, SPC at the opening of the Tonga MPs Dialogue on Human Rights, Good Governance and Denarau Declaration: Remarks by SPC DG, Dr Stuart Minchin at the Human Rights & Members of Parliament session - Tonga | The Pacific Community
Media contact:
Kalpana Prasad-Nizarat, Communications Officer, HRSD, Pacific Community (SPC) | email: [email protected]
