The number of children out of school has been reduced to 57 millions, according to official data published by UNESCO.
This particular research about the year 2012, shows that the amount of those children has been smaller than the one in 2010 and 2011, when it was up to 61 millions, whilst the countries that seem to deal with the problem more intensely are, in order, Nigeria, Pakistan, Ethiopia, India, Philippines, Burkina Faso, Kenya, Niger, Yemen and Mali.
International organizations argue that this educational and children’s rights problem can be solved with the charities made by some western merciful donators. At the same time, they consciously hide the fact that the children in those countries do not drop out of school because of personal aversion to education, but out of necessity.
Besides, in countries such as Pakistan, India and Nigeria, children compose the main economic motor of the multinational companies, since they are used as the cheapest labor force entering the productive activity at the age of 6 or 7 years old. That way, it seems hypocritical talking about children who can’t go to school, on the one hand, and not mentioning the reason why it happens, on the other. Not mentioning that those children start working at this early age, so that their exploiters get richer and richer.
We know, on the contrary, that the solution to the problem can only be found in collective claims and organized struggle by the teachers and by the working class.
This is the kind of battle the class trade unions of teachers and the teachers who worry about the future and the present of the next generation, have to fight.
This is the kind of battle we invite you all. The battle for the right of children from all around the world to have access to free public education.
