AFRICA - House Foreign Affairs Committee Democrats

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d. Status of Child Labor Practices and Minimum Age for Employment.—Employers
in the modern wage sector generally respected the legally mandated minimum
employment age of 14 years or 18 years for dangerous jobs or those requiring heavy
manual labor. The law prohibits minors from working more than 7 hours a day and
35 hours a week. Children were engaged in labor in subsistence agriculture, on
plantations, and in informal commerce, sometimes from an early age. Although no
cases of child labor abuses have been prosecuted, the law states that employers can
be fined for employing underage workers.
The Government has not ratified ILO Convention 182 on the worst forms of child
labor.
e. Acceptable Conditions of Work.—Working conditions on many of the cocoa plantations—the
largest wage employment sector—were extremely hard. The legal minimum
wage was $16.50 (150,000 dobras) per month, with an additional stipend of
$2.20 (20,000 dobras) for civil servants. The average salary for plantation workers
did not provide a decent standard of living for a worker and family, and the real
value of their pay was eroded constantly by high rates of inflation. In principle
workers and their families were provided free (but inadequate) housing, rudimentary
education for their children, and health care, as well as the privilege of reduced
prices and credit at the ‘‘company store.’’ These arrangements were intended
to subsidize food and clothing. However, corruption was widespread, and international
lending institutions have criticized the Government for ineffective administration
of these subsidies. Workers often were forced to pay higher prices on the
open market to obtain the goods theoretically provided at a discount as part of their
compensation.
During the 1990s, the Government, with foreign donor assistance, privatized or
redistributed the land in many state-run plantations in an effort to improve work,
pay, and living conditions. While the program redistributed some land, not all of the
newly privatized plantations were successful, particularly because the world price
for cocoa dropped.
As a result of a 1999 salary increase for some civil servants, (such as those working
in the court system, Finance Ministry, Customs, Education Ministry, and Criminal
Investigation Police) government workers in these departments earned up to 400
percent more than their counterparts in the rest of the public sector.
The legal workweek was 40 hours, with 48 consecutive hours mandated for a rest
period, a norm respected in the modern wage sector. The law prescribes basic occupational
health and safety standards. Inspectors from the Ministry of Justice and
Labor were responsible for enforcement of these standards, but their efforts were
ineffective. Employees had the right under the law to leave unsafe working conditions.
f. Trafficking in Persons.—The law prohibits trafficking in persons, and there
were no reports that persons were trafficked to, from, or within the country.
SENEGAL
Senegal is a moderately decentralized republic dominated by a strong presidency.
In March 2000, opposition leader Abdoulaye Wade, backed by a coalition of opposition
parties, became president in an election viewed as both free and fair, albeit
marred by reports of sporadic preelection violence and minor procedural irregularities.
The post-election transition period was free from violence and characterized
by good conduct on the part of all candidates. In a January 2001 referendum, 94
percent of voters accepted the new Constitution, which abolished the Senate, a body
that had no directly elected members. On April 29, 2001, President Wade’s Sopi
(Change) coalition, composed of the Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) and its allies,
won 49.6 percent of the votes cast and gained 89 of 120 seats in the National
Assembly elections, which also were unmarked by violence and judged to be free and
fair. In transparent and orderly local elections held May 12, President Wade’s coalition
gained control of the majority of rural, regional, and city councils. The Government
continued to implement decentralized regional and local administrations. Occasional
fighting continued in the Casamance area in the southern part of the country
between the Government and the secessionist Movement of Democratic Forces
of the Casamance (MFDC). In March 2001, the Government and the MFDC signed
two peace agreements designed to end the 20-year insurgency; however, these agreements
proved ineffective and fighting continued. In August the Government agreed
to hold new peace talks with the two principal rival leaders of the MFDC, and President
Wade met with the two MFDC leaders that month. The Constitution provides
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