THE CHILD RIGHTS ACT IN NIGERIA AND ONLINE CHILD SAFETY

Abstract

The Child Rights Act (CRA) of 2003 fails to address online child safety amidst the evolving digital landscape. Anchored on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACRWC), the CRA provides a comprehensive framework for protecting children’s rights to survival, development, and protection. However, the Act’s lack of specific provisions addressing digital threats such as cyberbullying, online grooming, sexual exploitation, and data privacy violations highlights significant legislative gaps. Through a doctrinal research methodology, this study analyses primary legal sources, including the CRA, Cybercrimes Act of 2015, and international instruments, alongside secondary sources like scholarly articles and reports from organizations such as UNICEF. The findings reveal uneven domestication of the CRA across Nigeria’s 36 states, weak enforcement mechanisms, limited digital literacy, and inadequate institutional coordination as key barriers to ensuring online child safety. A comparative analysis with international best practices, such as the UK’s Online Safety Act, the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and the US’s Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), underscores Nigeria’s lag in adopting child-specific digital protection measures. The study proposes legislative reforms, including the passage of the Child Online Access Protection Bill, nationwide CRA domestication, enhanced institutional capacities, and public awareness campaigns to promote digital literacy. It also recommends integrating digital safety education into school curricula and fostering collaboration with international bodies to combat transnational online child exploitation. This research contributes to the discourse on child protection by advocating for a dynamic, technology-driven legal framework to safeguard Nigerian children in the digital age, while identifying areas for further studies, such as the role of artificial intelligence, gender dimensions, and child participation in online safety policy-making.