Senegal - Universal Periodic Review

UPR 31, November 5, 2018
Recommendations by Canada

Recommendations

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Thank you, Mr. President. Canada welcomes Senegal’s efforts to achieve gender parity in the National Assembly, and for the creation of gender units in all of its ministries.

Canada recommends that Senegal:

1. Align its laws with the African Union’s Maputo Protocol, which Senegal ratified in December 2004, to protect the reproductive rights of women by authorising medical abortion in cases of sexual assault, rape, incest, and where the continued pregnancy endangers the mental and physical health of the mother or the life of the mother or the foetus.
2. Take steps to ensure that the Senagalese Human Rights Committee complies with all of the Paris Principles, including by providing it with adequate funding and ensuring guarantees of independence and pluralism.
3. Protect the rights of LGBTI persons, provide training for police officers on the rights of LGBTI persons and end arbitrary arrests and detention based on actual or perceived sexual orientation.
4. Take immediate measures to end the exploitation of children and their forced labour, bring to justice those responsible for forced begging by talibé children.

Canada commends Senegal for its law against female genital mutilation and its efforts to stop child and early forced marriages, and urges Senegal to ensure that laws protecting girls are enforced.

Background

According to UPR Info, a non-profit, non-governmental organization that tracks the UPR process, Senegal received 285 recommendations in the first two review cycles, of which 221 were accepted (an acceptance rate of 76%). Canada’s previous recommendations related to justice and women’s rights were accepted by Senegal.

Renowned for its religious tolerance and peaceful and democratic transitions of power, Senegal plays a positive and constructive role in the international arena. The Government of Senegal has taken several steps in recent years to strengthen democratic, women’s, and social rights. It revised its constitution in 2016 to include a five-year presidential term renewable once and created 15 seats in its National Assembly for its diaspora. Senegal also institutionalized gender units in all of its ministries. Senegal’s strong defence of the International Criminal Court is to be commended.

Despite many positive steps, challenges remain. The nomination of a prominent member of a political party at the head of the Senegalese Human Rights Committee has been criticized by many NGOs as going against how such bodies conform to international standards defined in the Paris Principles. While Senegal has ratified the Maputo Protocol, medicalized abortion continues to be restricted to cases where the mother’s life is in danger and, according to the Coalition Right Here Right Now, remains a long and difficult process that puts the lives of women in danger. According to the same coalition, infanticide is the second leading cause for incarceration for women in prisons in Senegal. Violence and discrimination against women remain far too common and underreported. The responses of state authorities, including the police, are often inadequate. Many NGOs report that LGBTI people continue to face discrimination and violence due to their sexual orientation or gender identity.

According to Human Rights Watch and other NGOs, an estimated 50,000 children attend residential Quranic schools. A number of these children are subjected to forced begging, abuse and exploitation. They are denied basic health care and deprived of their right to education in Senegal. The implementation of a program by the Government to protect these children from abuse has so far proved to be unsuccessful.