Advocates of children’s rights urged the National Assembly on Friday to speedily pass the bill for an act to enact the Child Online Access Protection and Online Violence Against Nigerian Children and for Other Related Matters.

The advocates gave the charge during a media chat on the sideline of a stakeholders’ roundtable held in Abuja.

Recall that a 2018 UNICEF report highlighted that every half a second, a new child goes online, exposing them to significant risks.

According to the report, in Nigeria, this is critical, with reports showing 90 per cent of children face online risks, including cyberbullying, inappropriate content, and exploitation.

The bill, among other things, seeks to protect children against cyber bullying, cyber abuse, cyber extortion and other cyber activities that may impose harm.

To implement the proposed Act, a tax at the rate of 0.02 per cent shall be charged on the assessable profit of a search engine, telecom service provider, artificial intelligence (AI), gaming, streaming and social media app vendor companies registered in Nigeria.

In her remarks, the country director of Lawyers Without Borders in Nigeria, Ms Angela Uzoma, said that the bill directly impacts and affects the lives of Nigerian children of all ages.

According to her, almost all the children in Nigeria, about 90 per cent of them, have access to digital devices, whether at home or in school or through their friends.

She said that the access exposes children to a large range of online harms and violence, and the bill seeks to protect them.

“So every Nigerian, whether you are a biological parent or not, whether you are an aunt or an uncle, whether you are a child or an adult, you should be interested and should support this bill.

“When we talk about online harms that children are exposed to, it ranges from issues around cyberbullying, grooming, child exposure to sexual violence and sexual abuse.

“We have children being groomed; we have children being threatened online. We have children; we have predators pretending to be children and targeting children.

“We have sextortion going on; children are being tricked into exposing intimate parts of their bodies to adults, who are hiding and pretending to be children.

“So everyone in Nigeria should be interested in joining their voices to call on the Nigerian Senate to pass this bill,” she said.

Also speaking, the coordinator of General Unit in the National Assembly, Ms Christiana Eguma, said that the bill seeks online safety for children in this digital age.

She said that many children go online without supervision, with their parents or guardians giving them access to smart devices, which makes them become vulnerable.

Eguma explained that the bill also seeks to ensure Internet platforms take responsibility for preventing child abuse on the various platforms.

“It puts accountability on the platforms themselves so that they can take responsibility for putting down some of these negative things early enough.

“It seeks to ensure that from the parents to the school to the children, everybody is responsible enough to protect children online.

“So the bill seeks to ensure children are protected from the adult and even from their own peers that are bullies, and we are calling on the National Assembly to pass the bill so that the Nigerian children can be protected from all harm,” she said.

In his remarks, Mr Oluwasesan Ifegbesan, an educator, said that all hands must be on deck to ensure the protection of the Nigerian child against online harm.

He said that parents and, indeed, the general public must be vigilant to guide every Nigerian child on the use of the internet and social media. (Nigerian Tribune)