14 June 2010 | Youth.
Dear Children,
It is a great joy for me to address you today on the occasion of International Children’s Day. As it is customary every year, the whole of Seychelles is dedicating this day to celebrate your childhood, a childhood which allows you to live as children, grow up and blossom with the love and affection of your family, friends, teachers and everyone else around you.
It is the duty of everyone to ensure that our children get the necessary protection from all danger, obtain good advice and learn good values.
The theme of this year’s Children’s Day is Children, preparing for the future. It is important for our society to reflect on how we prepare our children for the future and realize that in whatever we do we are teaching them for the future. We are aware that all that children learn and live today will influence their lives tomorrow.
The importance of giving children a good preparation cannot be overemphasized because they are the foundation of the future. For this reason, it is important that we help them to develop all their potentials, to identify and develop their interests and capabilities in order to have a strong foundation.
Much is said, nowadays, on how children lose their innocence very early because of too much access to information technology and other influences. Parents find it difficult to control the quantity and quality of information which their children have access to. That is why parents ought to know what their children are doing and what they have access to. They need to have a close relationship with their children.
I would like to take the occasion of Children’s Day, to ask parents to seek the happiness of their children, always. Apart from the basic necessities children expect from their parents, they seek love, time and attention. All these are needed to build a strong and good foundation for the future.
It is my great pleasure to wish all children in Seychelles a very happy day. May they spend it full of joy and in the spirit of sharing.
Let us give a special thought to the children who are ill and those who are in difficulty, here in Seychelles and elsewhere in the world.
Happy Children’s Day.