‘Don’t ‘sell’ your children’
The Founder of Family Matters Foundation Ghana, a family oriented non-governmental organisation (NGO) that focuses on child rights, safety and protection, Mrs Irene Lorwia-Zakpaa, has advised parents to desist from ‘selling off’ their children to serve as slaves for the rich.
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She said although family separations were caused by a number of reasons, the commonest was low income earners giving their children away in exchange for money and other benefits.
‘‘Sometimes you cannot tell the values or orientations of these people that you give your children to and they end up picking different traits from these people,’’ she said.
Speaking to The Mirror in commemoration of this year’s International Family Day, a day set aside to celebrate the values and importance of families in our society, she said we could not take the role of families in nation building for granted because a nation was made up of people who were brought up by families.
She said since families were the building blocks of society, it was important to ensure that families were kept together so they could pass good values to the younger generation.
‘‘We learn to walk, speak and learn basic courtesies like how to interact with other people from our family, that is why in our cultural setting when a child is seen misbehaving the first question that is asked is: “Whose child is that? Which family does he/she come from?”
Mrs Lorwia-Zakpaa explained that there was also the need to intensify education and training especially in vocational skills to help breadwinners to have a source of income as this would reduce the rate at which people gave their children away.
She pointed out that if there were more avenues for job creation and employment the incidence of family separations would be lessened, people would not have to leave their families and go in search of greener pastures and most importantly children would not be sold out into slavery all in the name of getting bread and butter for the family.
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According to her, parents can make use of the extended family because research has shown that there are several advantages of living with extended family members, saying that they are very important in helping to raise children, support challenged relatives or with financial problems.
‘‘Many grandparents take some primary responsibility for child care, particularly when both parents work. During the day, the grandparents watch the children to make sure that they are alright.
“They also talk to the children when the parents are busy. This also helps the children learn their native language.
“And since the children are well taken care of, both parents are free to work on the farm or take up formal jobs and earn money,’’ she stated.
Mrs Lorwia-Zakpaa said since 2009, her NGO had organised programmes annually to commemorate the Day in Ghana with the support of various stakeholder organisations.
This is to highlight the importance of the family and also to draw attention to the importance the United Nations and the international community attach to families.
Some of the activities for families include family fun-day programmes, conferences and forums where issues that affect families are discussed.