Children honour Mandela, Machel!
Nelson Mandela and his wife Graca Machel from Mozambique have won the Global Friend’s Award.
By Raphael Okello
Nelson Mandela and his wife Graca Machel from Mozambique have won the Global Friend’s Award.
They were voted the winners by 2.4 million children from different parts of the world. The children who voted for them are members of the World’s Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child (WCPRC).
WCPRC is an organisation that was formed in Sweden to fight for the rights of children. Children have a right to go to school, to play, eat food, get clothes, to sleep in a house and to get care from their parents.
But many children are not given these rights. For instance in India and some countries in South America, many children are forced to work in industries and big coffee, sugarcane and tea plantations. That work is supposed to be for adults. In Uganda, Kony’s rebels use children as soldiers.
Stepmothers torture their step children by refusing to give them food and others beat them badly. In Asia children are forced into sex with mature men.
So every year, children all over the world vote for a person they feel has helped to fight for their rights as children. The person who gets the highest votes wins the Global Friend’s Award.
This year, the award was given to Mandela and Machel. Mandela was President of South Africa from 1990 to 1998. But before becoming the president, Mandela was arrested and jailed for 27 years on Robben Island because he wanted blacks and whites in South Africa to be treated the same.
He struggled that black children in South Africa be given the same treatment and equal rights as the white children. Today Mandela still fights to make sure children all over the world are given their rights.
Graça Machel received the prize because she struggled for the right of girls to go to school in Mozambique.
Mandela was very happy. He said, “You children have my support, whether I’m alive or in the grave.â€
All children under 18 in every school can vote for the Global Friends’ Award if their school is a member of WCPRC.
If your school is not a member, your head teacher can visit WCPRC’s website www.childrensworld.org so that you can also vote next year. The good news is that you can also join as an individual.
This year’s prize giving ceremony was held yesterday in Sweden at Gripsholm Castle.
Nelson Mandela and his wife Graca Machel from Mozambique have won the Global Friend’s Award.
They were voted the winners by 2.4 million children from different parts of the world. The children who voted for them are members of the World’s Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child (WCPRC).
WCPRC is an organisation that was formed in Sweden to fight for the rights of children. Children have a right to go to school, to play, eat food, get clothes, to sleep in a house and to get care from their parents.
But many children are not given these rights. For instance in India and some countries in South America, many children are forced to work in industries and big coffee, sugarcane and tea plantations. That work is supposed to be for adults. In Uganda, Kony’s rebels use children as soldiers.
Stepmothers torture their step children by refusing to give them food and others beat them badly. In Asia children are forced into sex with mature men.
So every year, children all over the world vote for a person they feel has helped to fight for their rights as children. The person who gets the highest votes wins the Global Friend’s Award.
This year, the award was given to Mandela and Machel. Mandela was President of South Africa from 1990 to 1998. But before becoming the president, Mandela was arrested and jailed for 27 years on Robben Island because he wanted blacks and whites in South Africa to be treated the same.
He struggled that black children in South Africa be given the same treatment and equal rights as the white children. Today Mandela still fights to make sure children all over the world are given their rights.
Graça Machel received the prize because she struggled for the right of girls to go to school in Mozambique.
Mandela was very happy. He said, “You children have my support, whether I’m alive or in the grave.â€
All children under 18 in every school can vote for the Global Friends’ Award if their school is a member of WCPRC.
If your school is not a member, your head teacher can visit WCPRC’s website www.childrensworld.org so that you can also vote next year. The good news is that you can also join as an individual.
This year’s prize giving ceremony was held yesterday in Sweden at Gripsholm Castle.