Say Yes for Children Campaign - Global

In an effort to raise awareness and spur action around the 10 points of the Rallying Call pledge, Say Yes for Children involved a combination of printed materials, online information, and community organising of events. In some regions, pre-paid postcards - through the daily newspapers, at schools and local community centres nationwide - were available for those without internet access to make their pledge. In Swaziland, clergy and congregations helped spread awareness of the 10 points of the pledge through sermons and promotional materials. The campaign also made use of musical and artistic events to spread the word. GMC advertised on tee-shirts, which were sold at these events. Advertising was also placed strategically on radio and television programmes in different regions.

There were specific campaign plans implemented in all regions of the world, with different communication strategies, depending on the location. To cite a few examples of the campaign's appoach "in action": In Morocco, teams of boy scouts crisscrossed rural areas on their bicycles stocked with pledge forms and helped mobilise 6 million people in the country to support the campaign. A university professor in Bangladesh inspired his students to collect 10,000 pledges. In Afghanistan, volunteers worked to collect thousands of pledges despite the ongoing war.

The messages of the 'Say Yes for Children' campaign, gathered from local communities and from cyberspace, were presented during the UN Special Session on Children in May 2002. At this New York, NY, USA gathering, a group of children presented the campaign results to Nelson Mandela and Graça Machel. The 10 imperatives that were voted on in the campaign became the basis for 'A World Fit for Children' - the outcome document of the Special Session.

Children, Education, Rights.

According to GMC, more than 94 million people signed up for Say Yes. People in 194 countries around the world signed up to the campaign’s Rallying Call. In Turkey, one in four people voted; in the Republic of Congo, 20% of the population pledged their support; and in China, over 20 million people signed up. According to GMC, the campaign that "inspired an unprecedented grassroots movement which connected children, their parents and their grandparents with families in cities and villages in countries and continents across the world, who joined together to commit themselves to building a world fit for children."