By Dennis Peprah
Abesim, (Bono), July 17, GNA – The Global Media Foundation (GloMeF) has called for well-coordinated and multi-sectoral approach to tackle growing menace of child labour and trafficking on the Volta Lake.
Mr Raphael Godlove Ahenu, the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of GloMeF, a NGO working to improve the wellbeing of vulnerable people described regretted that many school-going age children were trafficked for exploitative and hazardous labour on the Lake instead of being in school.
Describing the situation as the worst form of human right abuse and dignity, he called for urgent and effective collaboration between relevant state and non-state institutions as well as the civil society community to tackle the menace.
Mr Ahenu made when speaking at a day’s stakeholder’s engagement held at Abesim, near Sunyani which also film-screened a thought-provoking video documentary produced by the GloMef in partnership with University of Bristol, United Kingdom and the Freedom Islands Right and Social Transformation (FIRST), another NGO.
Titled: “Beyond the Nets”, the video documentary highlights some situations of child trafficking and how the victims were being exploited for hazardous work on the Volta Lake.
The video sought to advocate aggressive push to tackle the menace by improving public understanding on child trafficking and labour on the lake.
Mr Ahenu said approximately 21 percent of children aged between five and seven years were involved in child labour, with 14 percent engaged in hazardous work, according to the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS study).
He said: “The problem is most pronounced in rural areas, where nearly one in three children (30.2 percent) are affected, compared to the 12.4 percent in urban areas”, urging the relevant state agencies to be up and take proactive measures to bring the situation under control.
That calls for effective collaboration between the Ministries of Local Government, and the Gender, Children and Social Protection as well as Interior and Education to tackle the menace.
Mr George Yaw Ankamah, the Bono Regional Director of the Department of Children, said: “Children must not only be seen, but must also be heard in society”, and called for a strong protection mechanism for children.
He said child trafficking, forced/early marriage and child labour were serious offence affront to the 1992 Constitution and called for public support to help apprehend and prosecute offenders.
Comparatively, Dr Sam Okyere, a Senior Lecturer at the University of Bristol, UK said: “The Ghanaian child is always brilliant and intelligent” and urged the stakeholders to tackle problems inimical to the holistic growth and development of children in the country.
GNA
Edited by Dennis Peprah/Kenneth Odeng Adade