Sir Frank Peters :
Ugandan Ministry of Education has adopted zero tolerance to schoolteachers who beat children at school and warned offenders they will be sacked and their teaching certificates revoked.
Dr. John Chrysostom Muyingo said the Ministry was ready to ban any teacher found guilty of administering the outlawed corporal punishment
“Beating children is outdated. The government abolished beating in schools because it was one of the major reasons why children drop out of schools. If a teacher is found guilty of beating a child, his or her (practicing) certificate will be cancelled,” Dr. Muyingo warned.
Bangladesh, on the other hand, where corporal punishment is still rife in schools and madrasas and children are shamefully subjected to physical abuse, is to issue all of its schools with anti-corporal punishment posters.
In 2011 Justice Md. Imman Ali and Md. Sheikh Hasan Arif outlawed the inhuman, ineffective, ignorant practice of corporal punishment in schools and madrasas throughout Bangladesh, declaring it to be: ‘cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and a clear violation of a child’s fundamental right to life, liberty and freedom’.
Mongolia
This week Mongolia became the 49th state to prohibit corporal punishment in all settings, including the home, and the first state in Eastern and South Eastern Asia to achieve this reform.
In February 2016, the Mongolian Parliament passed the Law on Child Protection 2016 and the Law on the Rights of Children 2016, which confirm children’s right to protection from all corporal punishment, explicitly prohibit the use of corporal punishment by parents, carers, and others, and put an obligation on parents and other adults caring for and educating children to use non-violent discipline.
“Children have the right to be protected from crime, offences or any forms of violence, physical punishment, psychological abuse, neglect and exploitation in all social settings,” a spokesman said.
“All types of physical and humiliating punishment against children by parents, guardians and third parties who are responsible for care, treatment, guidance and education of children and adolescents, during the upbringing and disciplining faulty behaviours of children are prohibited.
“During educating, upbringing and caring of children, parents, legal guardians, relatives, and teachers shall follow non-violent disciplinary methods,” he added.
Countless studies conducted worldwide have all concluded – without a single exception – that corporal punishment to children is not only totally ineffective, but also extremely damaging. Teachers in Bangladesh who metes out corporal punishment are not only breaking the law, but are arch enemies of the child, family, and state and need to be disciplined.
(Sir Frank Peters is a former newspaper and magazine publisher and editor, a royal goodwill ambassador, humanitarian, human rights activist, and a respected foreign friend of Bangladesh. Three Bangladeshi boys have been named ‘Frank Peters’ in his honour).
