SECTION II: GENERAL MEASURES OF IMPLEMENTATION 2.1 Steps Taken in Accordance with the Provisions of the Charter 2.1.1 The Revision of the Constitution in 1995 The revision of the Constitution in 1995 was an attempt to make the supreme law of the country consistent with international and regional instruments ratified by Uganda. These included the CEDAW, 1989, the CRC, 1990 and the African Charter on the Rights of the Child, 1994, among others. Several articles in the Constitution give special protection to vulnerable groups such as children and make it a duty of every citizen to protect these groups from any form of abuse, including sexual abuse5. The Constitution also protects children under the age of sixteen years from social and economic exploitation and hazardous employment 6. This is relevant to the ILO Convention No. 138 on Minimum Age for Employment and ILO Convention No. 182 (1973) on the Worst Forms of Child Labour (1999). This age varies with what is provided by the Convention, which could have arisen because of the need to protect children from work that would deny them education and development. In recognition of the state of Uganda‟s economy and educational infrastructure that necessitates that a child at 14 years can start work for survival for certain reasons, an addendum to the ILO ratification instrument has been prepared and submitted to ILO spelling out 14 years as the minimum for admission to employment in Uganda. A draft National Child Labour policy is in place and other mechanisms to intervene in child labour have been established. 2.1.2 The Children Act, Cap 59 The Children Act was enacted in 1996 as a comprehensive law to deal with all issues relating to children. It, as much as possible draws from the rest of the laws and provides guidance on how to handle children matters when they arise under specific laws. It aims at providing more protection for children. For the many years that the Act has been implemented, law enforcement agencies, probation workers and other development agencies have identified flaws of the Children Act. Government in a bid to provide a safe and healthy environment for children, government has instructed the Uganda Law Reform Commission to review the law, a process that is on-going. Through broad consultative processes with policy makers, implementations, development partners, communities, local administration and children themselves, it is envisaged that the Act will even be more comprehensive on the rights and welfare of children. More information on the Children Act is outlined in the previous section (See 1.4 and 1.7.3). 2.1.3 The Creation of Family and Children’s Courts and Family Protection Units of police Considering the protracted nature of accessing justice in a developing country like Uganda, the Children Act chose to overcome this anomaly for the sake of protection of children from long gruelling court processes that take between many months to years. The Act provides for an alternative to settling cases of children that are of criminal nature, except those which carry the maximum death sentence and civil cases related to only applications concerning childcare and protection such as maintenance cases, or parentage cases. This is the Family and Children‟s Courts (FCC) mentioned in 1.4 in the previous section. Grade II Magistrates in the various districts in Uganda have the jurisdiction to handle cases brought to the FCC. While FCCs are not fully functional in all the districts, plans are underway to institute them in all districts. Working along side FCCs are Child and Family Protection Units offering emergency, preventive and supportive services to child victims of violence. The Units are intended to provide child friendly services addressing violence and abuse as well as 5 6 Article 17(1) Article 34 (4&5) 7