In South Sudan, some children know the price of a sack of charcoal before they know the periodic table. Some can negotiate with customers before they can confidently read a textbook. Some learn how to survive before they are given the chance to discover what they might become.
We often call this child labour.
I think of it differently.
I think child labour is the theft of time.
Not just time spent working, but time stolen from learning, playing, imagining, and dreaming. Time that should belong to childhood.
As the world marks the World Day Against Child Labour, I join millions of children around the globe in raising a red card against child labour.
To me, the red card is for stolen mornings.
For classrooms exchanged for markets.
For school uniforms that have replaced burdens.
For childhoods interrupted before they have the chance to unfold.
Across our country, many children carry responsibilities that belong to adults. Some work to support their families. Some work because poverty leaves few alternatives. Others work because displacement, conflict, climate shocks, and economic hardship have narrowed their choices before they have even had the chance to make them.
Yet I believe the greatest tragedy of child labour is not simply that children work.
It is that children are forced to grow up too soon.
There is a question I have never heard enough adults ask:
What happens to a country when its children become adults too early?
What happens when childhood is spent worrying about income instead of imagination?
What happens when survival becomes more important than education?
What happens when dreams are postponed year after year until they quietly disappear?
These may sound like questions about children.
But they are really questions about the future of our nation.
In the Children's Parliament, I have listened to children from different communities speak about their hopes for the future.
What strikes me most is that children rarely dream small.
They talk about becoming doctors, teachers, pilots, artists, entrepreneurs, and leaders.
The problem is not a lack of ambition.
The problem is that too many children are forced to carry adult burdens before they have the chance to pursue those dreams.
Childhood is supposed to be the one time in life when your biggest concern is growing, learning, and discovering who you are.
When that time is taken away, it cannot be returned.
That is why child labour is not only about work.
It is about childhood interrupted.
Today, I raise a red card for every stolen childhood.
For every child whose dreams have been delayed by circumstances beyond their control.
For every child who still believes that their future can be greater than their present.
Because childhood is not something we can give back later.
Once it is gone, it is gone.
That is why every child deserves the time to learn, to play, to imagine, and simply to be a child.
By Agot Alier Garang
Deputy Speaker, Children's Parliament of South Sudan
