An international non-governmental organization (NGO), several partners and the local government of Quezon City will pilot a three-year project to fight online sexual abuse of children in five barangays in Quezon City.
The five barangays—Commonwealth, Batasan Hills, Marilag, Tatalon and Escopa 2—were selected to implement the WeProtect Project of Plan International.
According to WeProtect child-protection specialist Renie Martin, they chose the five barangays not because of the prevalence of online-abuse cases, but because the city government under the administration of Mayor Herbert Bautista has worked diligently to make Quezon City a child-friendly city and has been active in supporting their child-protection advocacies in the past.
“The WeProtect project of Global Alliance to End Violence Against Children was hosted by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in 2015 in Abu Dhabi with over 50 countries, including the Philippines, where the model for national response plan was formulated which served as reference for the project. The three key response plans we picked up are victim capability, societal capability and industry capability,” Martin said.
WeProtect is a local implementation of a global project, supported by a £40-million challenge grant over five years from the United Kingdom, and in partnership with the WeProtect Global Alliance to End Violence Against Children. The fund received more than 250 submissions from every region of the world, including the Philippines, highlighting the global scope of the challenge,.
The funded projects will build capacity for child-protective services and law enforcement to ensure that victims receive quality support services, and educate children, families, teachers and other caregivers to better identify and protect children from online risks. Although children have long been exposed to violence and exploitation, the Internet and new technologies have changed the opportunity, scale, form and impact of the abuse of young people everywhere, according to the WeProtect’s statement.
“Globally, children face new dangers that are often poorly understood by policy-makers and the public, and online sexual exploitation and abuse is one of the most urgent of these emerging risks,” the group said.
According to data from the Inter-Agency Council Against Child Pornography (IACACP), there are 124 reported cases of pornography and online child abuse and exploitation of children aged 2 to 17 in 2014.
The role of IACACP is to oversee the importance of Republic Act 9775, or An Act Defining the Crime of Child Pornography, Prescribing Penalties. The overall goal is to eradicate child pornography.
With the three-year WeProtect project, Plan International foresees 15,000 girls, boys, young women and men that is far from the dangers of online sexual exploitation and abuse.