Stakeholders receive training on child protection
A Five-Day stakeholders’ workshop to equip key extension officers with skills to enable them to engage community members on child protection programmes has opened in Accra.
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It is being organised by the Department of Community Development (DCD), with the support of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).
Participants in the workshop were drawn from institutions including the Department of Social Welfare and Community Development, the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE), the Labour Department and staff of five metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies (MMDAs) in the Greater Accra Region, as well as some NGOs.
The participating MMDAs are Accra Metro, Ga South, Ga West, Shai Osudoku and Ningo Prampram.
MMDAs
The Greater Accra Regional Minister, Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo, in a speech read on his behalf by his Deputy, Nii Djangmah Vanderpuye, to open the training programme, explained that the five districts were selected to participate in the programme because incidences of child labour, child trafficking and teenage pregnancy had been recorded in those districts.
He, therefore, asked the participants to take the training programme seriously and encouraged them to make the best they could of it to enable them to engage their communities effectively on the issues outlined.
Child protection
The Greater Accra Regional Director of the DCD, Ms Rose Assan, announced that a team led by the officials from the department, had developed a manual and a tools kit to be used for a child protection awareness project nationwide.
She indicated that in the past, the country’s child protection system had been designed alongside some values of western culture, for which reason it had not adequately and efficiently addressed child protection issues in the country.
“This is due to the foreign features, which are not appropriate for the current needs of the country,” Ms Assan said and stressed that every child protection system should reflect the different cultures, values and resources of beneficiaries, if it was to work
Besides, Ms Assan said, “many Ghanaians have expressed the need for the development of a child protection policy for the country.