Story by Tichaona Kurewa
The government is developing a comprehensive Child Online Safety Policy, expected to be finalised by the first quarter of the new year.
The policy is meant to create a safe online environment for children and adolescents, addressing concerns around cyber-bullying, online grooming, exposure to harmful content, and data privacy violations.
The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information Communication Technology, Postal and Courier Services, Dr Beaullah Chirume indicated that a public consultation process has since been instituted to gather information from various stakeholders on the proposed policy.
“My minister is very young, driving the entire ICT transformation process. We think that we want to take on board young people who have very sharp minds who can actually develop applications for us and innovate to come up with new and better ways of doing things using ICTs. We are not leaving anyone behind, even women in the rural areas and people living with disabilities, we want them to be included.
“Right now we are coming up with a child online policy so that as we deploy ICTs in the primary, secondary schools, universities, and as people have more and more access, our children are protected and they use ICTs for the good,” said Dr Chirume.
Zimbabwe has made significant progress on child protection issues, including the recent adoption of legislation criminalising child sexual exploitation, facilitating birth registration and the roll-out of a child-friendly justice system.
