CDI partners assemblies to combat child trafficking
The Centre for Development Initiative (CDI), is working closely with two municipalities in Greater Accra Region, to deal with the influx of children loitering in the city in search of menial jobs.
The Centre is therefore engaging the Women and Children Committees of the Adenta and Ga East Municipalities through training to equip them with the requisite information and skills to find solution to the problem.
Mr Alexis Danikuu, Executive Director of CDI said at a workshop for members of the subcommittees at the weekend that child trafficking is ongoing in the country, which requires joint effort of stakeholders to stop it.
He said available data suggests that more than 63,000 children sleep on the streets in the region.
Search for money, jobs, parental divorce and death of parents have been classified as the main causes while common health problems associated with streetism are malaria, fever, cold, rashes, infections and headache.
Mr Danikuu said the centre previous engagement with Ghana Private Road Transport Union revealed human trafficking is going on.
He said members of the union described the phenomenon as “human Parcel”, explaining that someone usually at the loading joint pay lorry fare of the victims and gives the driver some units of credit for phone call to another person purported to be a relative waiting to receive them.
Victims of human trafficking and child labour are often from Northern, Upper East, Upper West and Volta Regions to the cities and the cocoa growing areas in search of laborious work and sometimes engage in prostitution and other crimes.
He said some of the children go through ordeals like open sex and smoking with men said to be protecting them against harassment.
But Mr Barnett Quaicoo, Chief of Party, International Development Associate, observed that no one is paying attention to the issue.
He said women and children are more vulnerable and need adequate protection from hazardous activities.
Mr Danikuu said the centre is simply making a contribution towards fighting child trafficking and child labour, however, the ultimate responsibility rests on policy makers and implementers.
The training session, he said, was therefore a platform for participants to gain deeper understanding about emerging trends and concepts on worst forms of child labour and human trafficking.
Mr Danikuu expressed hope that the training would promote the need for more civil society organisations, citizenry and municipal assemblies interface and engender the intense exchanges for the adoption of practical measures in dealing with worst forms of child labour in the two municipalities.
He said it was expected, at the end of the workshop, that the assembly members and specialised committee members would become more empowered to design and adopt policy measures to deal with the challenges.
Source: GNA