'Child Protection Shelter' to fight against child trafficking – Otiko Djaba

Gender, Children, and Social Protection Minister, Otiko Afisah Djaba, has reiterated the government’s position in the fight against child trafficking with the commissioning of Child protection shelter in Madina, a suburb of Accra.

According to her, the rebirth of the Madina shelter is a new beginning of Ghana’s combat against child trafficking.

“Today’s commissioning is a huge milestone that demonstrates Ghana’s commitment under the able leadership of our President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to operationalize this facility to protect our children,” she said.

She added “GHC500,000 has been deposited in the special account opened for HT by the Ministry of Finance. This demonstrates the current Government of Ghana’s political will and commitment to fighting trafficking.”

The Minister further stated that “apart from our achievement in renovating and operationalizing our only state-owned shelter, Ghana also has a success story of moving to Tier Two from the Tier Two watch list in the 2018 TIP report. So, we are killing 2 birds with one stone - the commissioning of the children’s shelter and being taken off the Tier 2 watch list. This is a huge achievement for Ghana.”

Madam Djaba noted that Shelters are key in the protection of victims of trafficking.

“Unfortunately, Ghana for the past 8-years lacked an operational Shelter purposely for rescued victims of trafficking, though the State has residential homes for children.”

Human trafficking according to the Minister is a global tragedy that robs victims of their basic human rights. It is a form of modern-day slavery since the victim has no choice in what he or she does in the trafficking environment.

Victim assistance is aimed at empowering the victim-viewing victims as “persons with minds of their own and potentials but who will need psychosocial support to come out of their difficult circumstances.

“They are not useless. And therefore, shelters must give the best of care to victims.”

The Gender, Children and Social Protection Minister stated that she has been informed that the Madina shelter serves as a shelter for rescued victims prior to 2010 and however, due to lack of qualified staff and logistics, operations were ceased until now.

The Madina shelter was born out if the Child Protection Compact Agreement which was signed in 2015.

Ghana as a country has however fulfilled her part of the Compact Agreement by renovating the staff bungalows and also in the final stages of recruiting qualified staff to give quality care and protection to these children who will be here to seek a reversal of their vulnerability.

The Minister later thanked the President, Nana Akufo-Addo for establishing the human trafficking fund. The interior Minister, Ambrose Dery and the Madina Member of Parliament who is also the Minister of Zongo and Inner-City for the wall and the IOM, Victoria Natsu and Annobea of the HT Secretariat and our special friend Ambassador Robert Jackson for their immersed support.