UNICEF, Lagos government take census of missing children

The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), Lagos State government and various humanitarian bodies will conduct a census of children missing in the aftermath of a recent fire at a munitions dump in Lagos, a UN official said on Friday. UNICEF's spokesman in Nigeria, Batilloi Warritay, told IRIN the census is part of comprehensive child and family tracing efforts that will include collecting data and identifying missing children. Information gathered in the process will be made public through various media to help link lost children with their parents and guardians. "It will assist the efforts of the state government to reunite children who may be held in some police stations and have not been released to their parents or guardians," Warritay said. In addition to UNICEF and the Lagos State government, local non-governmental organisations, Human Development Initiative, Child Lifeline and the Red Cross are also involved in efforts to trace missing children and reunite them with their families. A Nigerian Red Cross official said some 200 children were still unaccounted for, according to the organisation's register of missing persons. "We are not able to say how many of these are actually still missing as many parents and guardians who reported losses do not get back to us when they find the missing persons," he told IRIN. Lagos State Governor Bola Tinubu this week promised substantial rewards for people who return children in their custody since explosions sparked by a fire at a munitions dump at the Ikeja Military Cantonment. More than 1,000 people died in the disaster, most of them women and children who drowned in a canal as they tried to get away from the inferno. "For every child you turn over, we will give you a handsome reward," Tinubu said in an appeal broadcast on local television. Recent media reports suggested that some missing children were being kept against their will and might become victims of child trafficking gangs, most of whose victims are sold to provide cheap labour for plantations and homes, or forced into prostitution. UNICEF has dismissed the speculations as unfounded. "We investigated the story and confirmed it was not correct," Warritay told IRIN "There may have been some resistance in some police stations in handing over children to parents and NGOs who did not come with proper authorisation. But any inference of child trafficking is not correct." He said people, companies, agencies and institutions "gave overwhelming support and goodwill to minimize the humanitarian tragedy in Lagos State at this time."