Address specific needs of children

The Executive Director of Child Rights International, Mr Bright Appiah, has noted that although the President’s State of the Nation Address captured some issues concerning children under broad policy initiatives, it failed to address the specific interventions to address the needs of children.

He said that although programmes such as the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty programme (LEAP), for which government plans to increase the beneficiary families to 100,000 this year, and the introduction of free Senior High School from the 2015-2016 academic year would ultimately benefit children, there was the need to outline concrete steps being taken to address issues regarding children such as child marriage, child abuse and disrespect for the fundamental human rights of children, which had all become national issues.

He said the manner in which all issues were put under broad policies did not bring out the steps being taken by the nation to address issues of children.

He added that “issues concerning children were not ordinary but emergency issues and should be seen as such.”

Mr Appiah said he had also expected President John Mahama to touch on the policy of Child and Family Welfare, which is being worked on by the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection and UNICEF.

Additionally, he said Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) of the state was not really defined and, therefore, corporations were defining their own priorities.

He emphasised the need for the state to redirect CSR to rally support for social interventions.