Children‘s rights have been always among the most important subjects in Tunisia, which confirms the value of the child in Tunisia. The situation before was totally different from what we are living in the present, as the country evolves from day to day and which is focusing on improving the right of children with a lot of work and research.

Before gaining independence, Tunisia was colonized by France, which prevented the achievement of real and functional rights, but after independence in 1956 the situation became better on the practical level of children’s rights. This raises the question – What rights that does the state give to children? It is the government’s and parents’ responsibility to guarantee the child dignity, health, care, and education. According to the Article 47 of the Tunisian constitution, “the state must provide all forms of protection to children without discrimination, in accordance with their best interest”. This Article 47 of the amended Tunisian adopted on January 27, 2014, mentions for the first time the guarantee of the Children’s Rights. This success is the result of many efforts and pressures from civil society to ensure that the rights of the child are constitutionalized. The Basic Law thus states that the best interests of the child must take precedence over any decision that concerns him.

As a reminder, Tunisia ratified the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, in 1991, and since June 2008 has lifted all the reservations concerning it. Tunisia promulgated a Child Protection Code in 1995, which is a reference in terms of child protection, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). In this context, several laws have been amended in order to improve the legal and civil situation of the child in the various fields (the CSP – the Penal Code – the law on narcotics – the law relating to the attribution of a patronymic name to abandoned children of unknown parentage …) and promulgated several changes in the existing legislation. However, there is a gap between reality and the legislative framework. This is what Aïa Ghorbel, child specialist at UNICEF, tells us, who mentions a certain number of shortcomings in the application of the law, due to the lack of follow-up, control, coordination and training of managers and child specialists. According to figures published by UNICEF, despite apparent progress, inequalities in access to services and protections for children persist. Thus, the poverty rate remains high. A child is considered poor if they suffer at least one deprivation of one of their fundamental rights (nutrition, health, sanitation, education, housing, water, information, protection against violence). Nationally, 60% of children under 5 are poor, according to the latest child poverty analysis report in Tunisia prepared by UNICEF and the Ministry of Development and International Cooperation. Other figures are alarming, says Aida Ghorbel, such as that of abused children, school dropouts, disparity between regions, or forced child labour and their economic exploitation.

The gap between legal texts and their implementation in practice is exacerbated by the lack of an independent mechanism for monitoring children’s rights. This is underlined by Mehyar Hamadi, General Delegate for Child Protection, who gives details of the difficulties encountered by institutional structures regarding the monitoring of children’s rights and the guarantee of their protection. Starting with the lack of human and material resources made available to child protection delegates, but also the lack of coordination between the family judge and the various social workers, the lack of awareness campaigns, the ineffectiveness of the toll-free number for reporting the various forms of violence suffered by the child. In this regard, the delegate expressed his concern to see the question of the child relegated to the background by the State. According to the official, this is a problem of general awareness which constitutes a real obstacle to the improvement of the condition of childhood in the long term. The creation of an independent mechanism is the only way to improve the mechanisms put in place, the action of which remains incomplete and limited.

The role of civil society is therefore not over. Because a new plea must be organized in favour of the establishment of an independent institution to monitor the rights of the child. A new form of networking between the different NGOs should emerge to counteract the political blockages that prevent the laborious work of civil society from succeeding. The solutions will certainly flow from these new strategies and alliances between the key players in the childhood sector in order to better influence political decision-making.

Finally, the childhood policy will always carry with it these shortcomings which are the result of failures at the level of the State to systematically consider the place of the child for all its development projects.

We can never insist enough on the fact that the child is a subject of rights and not the object that we assist. Limiting the gap between text and practice is, for the State, not a challenge, but an imperative duty. In addition, very important role of the media has raised awareness of the importance of the child with means of communication such as advertising spots, awareness posters and communication with specialists in psychology and sociology are all able to materialize children’s rights in Tunisia. Finally, the rights of the child in Tunisia depend on the collective work of the state and the family and the conscience of the civil society, as they all are responsible to protect and create comfort zones for the children in Tunisia.