Government commended for its social interventions
Children of Ghana have commended and expressed gratitude to the government for instituting numerous social support services for children’s education and survival.
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This was contained in a speech read on behalf of the children of Ghana by Ms Wilhemina Annan, a pupil of Agona Duakwa Methodist Junior High School, at a forum organised by the District Directorate of the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) to mark the World Day against Child Labour at Agona Duakwa Methodist School.
Ms Annan said it was unfortunate that hundreds of millions of children in the world were engaged in work that deprived them of education, good health, leisure and basic freedom and violated their rights.
She said in Ghana, children were seen in the streets engaging in activities such as menial work, carting of heavy loads and selling.
In the mining, fishing and farming communities, children were made to do all kinds of work at the expense of their education, she said.
Ms Annan said in the home, children were made to carry out all sorts of domestic chores, with some, especially house-helps, waking up very early, working all day long and going to bed late, with some of them even denied food, healthcare and good sleeping places.
The pupils appealed to parents to produce children they could conveniently cater for so that they did not end up giving out their children to serve other people as house-helps whereby they would be made to do hazardous work.
They commended the government for providing the School Feeding Programme, the Capitation Grant, the National Health Insurance Scheme and the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty as interventions to support children and appealed to parents to take advantage of them to improve the lot of their children.
Neenyi Kofi Tagoe, Agona East District Director of the NCCE, described child labour as making a child below the age of 18 years to work beyond his or her strength and at the expense of his or her education.
He said supporting parents to do their work during weekends and holidays could not be regarded as child labour, provided the work was not beyond the child’s strength.
He said it was important for a child to have knowledge about their parents’ work.
The NCCE Director said children must not shun household chores as they served as training for their future lives.
He said the Child Labour Act (Act 560) of 1998 stipulated that the welfare of the child must be paramount to every person.
Neenyi Tagoe cautioned children below the age of 18 to refrain from doing things adults did, such as drinking alcoholic beverages, attending funerals, engaging in sex and using drugs.
Source: GNA