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South Sudan, Chad and Eritrea are the worst African countries to live in as girls, a one-of-a-kind index found on Friday, with researchers warning that the pandemic could hold back efforts to keep girls in school, without work and safe from violence.
The African Child Policy Forum (ACPF) ranked 52 African nations based on the rights and well-being of girls. The research institute has judged governments on several factors including health care, education, and laws and policies that protect girls.
Mauritius, Tunisia, South Africa, Seychelles and Algeria all passed the inaugural “Female Friendship Index,” but an ACPF report says the rankings were determined more by political commitment and responsibility than by economic wealth.
The ACPF said African governments have largely made some progress on girls’ rights, but that most countries are failing, citing issues ranging from malnutrition to early marriage.
The United Nations says 23% of girls on the continent do not attend primary school compared to 19% of boys. Nearly four in 10 girls get married before they turn 18, according to the World Bank.
“Girls across the continent continue to awaken to the daily reality of injustice,” Joan Nyanyuki, executive director of the ACPF, said in a statement. “A whole generation of girls and young women is failing.”
By 2050, Africa will be home to about half a billion girls under 18, according to the ACPF, which said that a lack of investment in young women would result in huge economic losses.
Yet, according to the report, African international and regional laws on human and children’s rights largely ignore the problems of girls.
Advocates said mental health is a growing concern among girls in Africa, who are more likely than boys to attempt suicide, driven by factors such as violence and housework.
The coronavirus pandemic has made girls across the continent more vulnerable to child labor, human trafficking, lack of health care and drop out of school, supporters said.
“We were slowly moving away from this systemic subordination of girls … COVID-19 has completely overturned it,” said Zemdena Abebe, consultant to the Strategic Women’s Initiative in the Horn of Africa (SIHA), a network of organizations from civil society.
“All of us as a society will suffer the consequences of this fallout when it comes to gender equality,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Niger and the Central African Republic recorded other negative results in the index, with Cape Verde, Namibia and Egypt among the countries in first place.
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