UPR Sexual Rights Database

National Report:
Para 11) … In 2017, it ratified: the ICCPR, the OP-ICCPR; … the ICESCR;

National Report:
Para 14) … Women are equal to men in rights and duties and are guaranteed full participation in political, economic, social and cultural life, in accordance with the provisions set out in articles 6 and 15 of the Constitution. Consequently, all forms of discrimination are prohibited in Sao Tome and Principe.
Para 16) In order to enforce this constitutional measure, a number of laws and decrees have been introduced containing legal provisions prohibiting all forms of discrimination against and ill-treatment of children. They include: • Act No. 19/2018, the Family Code, which regulates, inter alia, the system of equality between spouses, leadership and representation of the family, the duties of spouses, addresses of family homes, the duty of care between spouses and children and the duty to contribute to family life.
Para 81) Recommendations 108.36, 108.37 and 108.39 essentially call for measures to counter all forms of discrimination and violence against women. Sao Tome and Principe has adopted a series of legislative and other measures to combat this evil, which is taking root in society: • Social Security Act No. 1/90 establishes the right to maternity leave. Women are entitled to 60 days of paid maternity leave, or 75 days in the event of a multiple birth. The Act sets the retirement age for both men and women at 62 years. • Articles 23 and 27 of Social Security Act No. 7/2004 establish the right of self-employed workers to join a social security scheme, thus filling a gap left by Act No. 1/90 and giving a large percentage of women workers in this category (self-employed, informal and domestic workers) the opportunity to join an integrated social protection scheme that provides them with a pension, among other things. • Act No. 6/2012, the Criminal Code, was adopted in order to protect against and prohibit all forms of discrimination and violence against women, ill-treatment and exploitation of minors and subordinates, domestic violence and so on. Articles 129 to 256 of the Code establish penalties for these offences. • Article 242 (2) of Act No. 2/2018, the Civil Service Act and Regulations, establishes the right to maternity leave of 98 days, which may be combined with annual leave and may begin 30 days before the baby is due. • Articles 15 to 22 of Act No. 62/2019, the Labour Code, stipulate that pregnant workers, workers who have recently given birth and breastfeeding workers are prohibited from performing certain activities and establish the principles of gender equality and non-discrimination in the field of employment by defining and expressly prohibiting gender discrimination, among other kinds of discrimination. • Act No. 19/2018, the Family Code, covers all the legal situations that affect families and are addressed in constitutional principles, the CEDAW and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. • Article 4 of Presidential Decree No. 3/2004, ratifying an ILO convention, stipulates that women are entitled to 14 weeks’ maternity leave, from 8 weeks before the birth to 6 weeks after the birth, and that this leave may be combined with annual leave. • It should be noted that, in addition to passing these laws, the Government, with the support of its development partners, has organized training and capacity-building activities for the officials responsible for their application and for members of civil society organizations, in order to raise awareness of their content.

UN Compilation:
Para 13) UNICEF noted the critical situation of women in the country, …
Para 48) The United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women) noted that some progress on women’s rights had been achieved in Sao Tome and Principe. However, work still needed to be done to achieve gender equality. As at February 2019, only 14.5 per cent of Parliament seats were held by women.
Para 49) UN-Women also referred to concerns regarding the proportion of women aged 20– 24 years old who were married or in a union before age 18, the adolescent birth rate, and the proportion of women aged 15–49 years who had reported that they had been subjected to physical and/or sexual violence by a current or former intimate partner in the previous 12 months. Women aged 15–49 years often faced barriers with respect to their sexual and reproductive health and rights.
Para 50) UN-Women further noted that, in Sao Tome and Principe, data was available for only 22.5 per cent of the indicators used to monitor the Sustainable Development Goals from a gender perspective, with gaps in key areas such as unpaid care and domestic work, and for key labour market indicators such as unemployment rate, gender pay gaps and skills in information and communications technology. Many areas, such as gender and poverty, women’s access to assets, including land, physical and sexual harassment, and gender and the environment, lacked comparable methodologies for comprehensive and periodic monitoring. Addressing those gender data gaps was a prerequisite for understanding the situation of women and girls in Sao Tome and Principe and for achieving the gender-related Sustainable Development Goal commitments.
Para 51) ILO stated that, in the economic sphere, it had been found that, although women in Sao Tome and Principe were more active than men, particularly in the informal sector, they still had little economic power, according to a poverty profile study. Accordingly, one of the country’s development challenges was to ensure equal enjoyment for men and women of favourable conditions and opportunities to achieve self-reliance

National Report:
Para 133) It should be highlighted that these legal measures have been consolidated in the new Criminal Code, which has numerous articles aimed at protecting the rights of children, as set out in international standards, in particular the following: ...
(m) Article 175 on sexual abuse of children;
(n) Article 176 on sexual abuse of adolescents;
(o) Article 177 on sexual acts with adolescents;
(p) Article 178 on homosexual acts with adolescents;
(q) Article 179 on prostitution of minors;
(r) Article 180 on child pornography;

Para 137) The exploitation, sexual violence and prostitution of children are social phenomena which are becoming increasingly important globally and Sao Tome is not exempt. Internal measures have thus been implemented to prevent and combat the development of these phenomena. The measures involve numerous public and private organizations, such as INPG, the Support Centre for Domestic Violence, education centres, social communication and the Association of Women Jurists, in national awareness-raising campaigns to prevent and combat exploitation, sexual violence and child prostitution.

UN Compilation:
Para 13) The CRC welcomed the revision by Sao Tome and Principe of its Penal Code in 2012 to explicitly include provisions on sexual abuse, exploitation of minors and child trafficking ...

National Report:
Para 32) Regarding registration and notaries, the aims are to improve the birth registration process, simplify administrative procedures, registration and notarial practices, decentralize services and review the current fees.
Para 62) … the Government has taken a series of policy, legislative and institutional measures to ensure that children can be registered immediately after birth, free of charge, throughout the country, in accordance with the requirements set out in article 7 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. These measures include the following: • The adoption of the National Permanent Birth Registration Strategy, through Decree No. 45/2009; the strategy comprises a set of measures that include the registration or confirmation of births in all maternity hospitals and wards (in Ayres de Menezes Hospital and in Guadalupe, Neves and São João dos Angolares on the island of Sao Tome and in Manuel Quaresma Dias da Graça Hospital on the island of Principe) and in local register offices. • The issuance of Joint Order No. 04/2017, which establishes that a birth may be registered and the mother’s identity or the child’s characteristics recorded free of charge, provided that the registration takes place within one year of the birth. • The holding of free health and birth registration fairs for all children in all districts of the country on a regular basis by the Directorate General of Registers and Notaries, in collaboration with UNICEF. • The creation of a birth registration unit in the maternity ward of Ayres de Menezes Hospital; the unit is open every day, including on weekends and public holidays. • The introduction of a computerized management system that allows for electronic birth registration at the regional register office and local register offices throughout the country. The proportion of births that are registered is now around 95 per cent, according to the multiple indicator cluster survey conducted by the National Statistics Office in 2014.

UN Compilation:
Para 6) UNICEF stated that, further to advocacy on birth registration conducted at the end of 2016, in early 2017, the ministries responsible for justice and for finance had signed a decree ensuring birth registration free of charge for children up to 1 year of age, replacing the previous policy, under which birth registration had been free of charge only during the first month of a child’s life. UNICEF expected that the new policy would help achieve full birth registration,12 and that the excellent achievements of the country in the area of birth registration could inspire other countries to reach related objectives.

Stakeholder Summary:
Para 8) Just Atonement Inc regretted the lack of data in Sao Tome and Principe, which highly affected the ability to remedy situations of child abuse. It noted, in particular, that data related to birth records, … was sparse.

National Report:
Para 120) The Government has also adopted numerous legislative provisions in the national legal order: ... Act No. 6/2012, which approves the new Criminal Code, defines certain crimes against women and children, in order to accelerate proceedings in respect of them ...

Para 121) In respect of the participation of women in public life, in 2009, the National Assembly adopted a resolution on parity which establishes a quota of 30 per cent for female representation in the Parliament (R74/08/2009).

Para 123) Another noteworthy measure is the implementation of article 4 (on maternity leave) of the Maternity Protection Convention through Presidential Decree No. 3/2004 of 4 February, published in Official Gazette No. 3 on 6 April 2004, which provides that: "A woman to whom this Convention applies shall be entitled to a period of maternity leave of not less than 14 weeks, on production of a medical certificate or other appropriate certification, as determined by national law and practice, stating the presumed date of childbirth." This measure represents an additional achievement in advancing the rights of women and children.