The Regional Commanders at the workshop
Regional Police Commanders have attended a two-day workshop on child trafficking on the Volta Lake and the coastal areas of the country.
The conference, dubbed “Collaborating with law enforcement agencies and other stakeholders in the fight against human trafficking in Ghana,” is a partnership between the Ghana Police Service and the International Justice Mission (IJM), an NGO protecting children against violence.
The Director of Advocacy and Partnerships of IJM, Leonard K. Ackon, in an address at the conference opening, said there was the need for government to assist the Marine Policing Unit of the Ghana Police Service to patrol the Volta Lake as part of efforts to curb child trafficking.
He said this would help deter fishermen from engaging in the illegal activity on the Volta Lake.
It had been estimated that over 50,000 had been trafficked to the Volta Lake and exposed to hazardous fishing jobs, he said; adding that the kids are also made to work for more than eight hours and denied health care.
The situation has improved however, since the police and other stakeholders joined forces to fight the menace.
“We are seeing the results. Ghana has been pushed from the tier-two watch list to tier-two on the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report released in 2018,” he said.
“Currently, we have only an adult shelter for victims of cross border trafficking and that shelter is just for females, but we need to do more as well as help in equipping the social welfare department in other regions to work better,” he added.
The Director General in charge of National Protection Department, COP Patrick Akolgo, who represented the Inspector General of Police, James Oppong Boanuah, said human trafficking was a crime and that a number of children who should rather be protected by adults were trafficked globally.
He said that in Ghana children were mostly trafficked in communities around the Volta Lake and sometimes some parents of the trafficked victims were directly involved.
DCOP Iddi Seidu, Director in charge of Marine Police, Ports and Railways, said the unit was working towards patrolling the Volta Lake to deter fishermen who used children in their work.
He said the unit therefore required support in this direction to be able to effectively roll out this plan to protect the innocent victims on the lake.
The Central Regional Police Commander, DCOP Habiba Twumasi, in a statement, expressed her appreciation to IJM for supporting the police in fighting a crime such as human trafficking.
By Linda Tenyah-Ayettey