Theme of this year's Children's Week: You Need Someone to Love

6. 10. 2008

Theme of this year’s Children’s Week: You Need Someone to Love “Let’s listen to children and do more for every one of them, for their self-respect and positive self-image. Let’s strengthen their voice in the family and in society. State institutions can and must do more to safeguard the rights of children which are codified in the Constitution, the conventions and the laws. They can’t hold their own tousled heads. That can be done only by the people who really love them,” wrote Human Rights Ombudsman Dr. Zdenka Čebašek-Travnik and President of the Slovenian Friends of Youth Association in the official statement for Children’s Week, the theme of which for this year is You Need Someone to Love. The statement was presented at a press conference today.

The Association and satellite members of the Slovenian Friends of Youth Association, along with schools, daycare centers and other institutions will be holding a range of performances, creativity workshops, conferences, round tables and other events on the theme of You Need Someone to Love. The SFYA also presented the results of the Wink at the Sun fund-raising campaign, which they carried out in cooperation with Lek, a Sandoz company. In ten years, Wink at the Sun has made it possible for 6300 children to enjoy free holidays. They also presented to the public an analysis of calls to the TOM telephone number, which is called by children and youths more than 40,000 times a year.

Franc Hočevar, SFYA President: “At this year’s Children’s Parliament the young people through a secret ballot selected the topic of Love and Sex for discussion at the 19th Children’s Parliament, and the somewhat broader title of this year’s Children’s Week also stems from their decision. Thus through the official statement and various activities we would like to point out that not all children in our country grow up in a happy, understanding and loving environment. We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that many children still live in families that are in extremely reduced social circumstances, and many even with a wealth of material goods do not have a happy childhood. Our TOM telephone receives calls from close to 100 children every year who are in so much trouble that they are even thinking about committing suicide.”