‘Harmonise age definition of a child’
The Ghana National Coalition on the Rights of the Child (GNCRC) has called on the government to, as a matter of urgency, initiate action to harmonise the age definition of a child in all the laws of the country.
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Such a move, it said, would clearly address the contradictions in the age definition of a child and the age at which a person could marry.
The acting National Co-ordinator of the GNCRC, Barima Akwasi Amankwah, made the call when he addressed an end-of-year programme with a section of the media in Accra.
He said “our major challenge as a child rights organisation is the contradicting aspect that makes it liberal for some cultural practices in some parts of the country to be promoted and allow for marriages below the age of 18 years”.
Legal ambiguity
He explained that the 1992 Constitution and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) stated that a child is a person, male or female, below 18 years of age.
He said it was interesting to note that although the law defines a child as a person below the age of 18, the age for consent was 16 years.
“Our recommendation is that the government should reconcile all the different age definitions for marriage in our laws to avoid ambiguity and the opportunity it gives for people to hide behind these discrepancies to promote child marriages,” he urged.
The issue of child marriages, he said, was on the increase having moved from 25.6 per cent in 2006 to 27 per cent in 2011, adding, “our efforts to empower girls in schools should not be thwarted because of early marriages, which lead to a large number of girls dropping out of school and, therefore, denying them of their ultimate dreams.
Ghana has lost its status
On issues regarding the rights of children, he said Ghana used to be a model for Africa, but regrettably, that status had changed.
He said although Ghana had good laws, there were challenges with their enforcement because the various institutions mandated to work in the interest and welfare of children were poorly resourced and, therefore, unable to exercise their mandate.
“It is our firm belief that if these challenges would be adequately addressed, children would better enjoy their rights and a better future where they could achieve their socio-economic potential,” he said.
He added that the coalition started an advocacy with the Parliamentary Select Committee on Gender and the Ministry of Women and Children in 2011/2012, but not much had been achieved, despite those advocacy efforts, indicating that the GNCRC would remain undaunted in its quest to achieve its set goals.
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