A five-year strategic plan has been launched in Accra to provide all street-children and young persons access to services to grow in a safe and nurturing environment to help them become responsible persons in the society.
Speaking at the launch of the plan, the sector Minister, Ms Dakoa Newman, said that the plan was aimed at addressing the multifaceted challenges faced by street-connected children and young persons, which had become a crisis that demands immediate attention.
She noted that, these children were often overlooked and marginalised, represented the most vulnerable in society as they were victims of circumstance beyond them, adding that, these children’s futures were stolen by poverty, neglect and systematic failures.
The plan dubbed: “Five-Year Strategic Plan on Street-Connected Children and Young Person (2024-2028)” and developed by the Department of Social Welfare under the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MoGCSP), also seeks to empower them through a comprehensive rehabilitation approach.
Local media reports quoted the minister as saying that the United Nations sources (UNICEF, 2019), noted that there are currently more than 150 million street children in the world.
And in Ghana, a survey conducted in 2011 by the Department of Social Welfare, in the Greater Accra Region identified approximately 61,492 individuals under 18 years old engaged in street work. “Of these children, 65 per cent both resided and worked on the streets, with many originating from rural areas and relocating to urban centres,” she noted.
The Minister added that in April 2021, the Ministry of National Security, through a monitoring exercise, identified 94 hotspots across 29 Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies, counting 2,257 children and families on the streets, most of whom were of foreign descent.
She assured that the MoGCSP was committed to creating a country where every child, regardless of their circumstances has the opportunity to thrive.
Furthermore, she said the five-year strategic plan was one of the many initiatives demonstrating the government’s commitment to addressing the situation of street-connected children and young persons in the country.
GIK/APA