By: Darroll Allan Tagoe
A drive through the principal streets of Accra, the capital of Ghana reveals an interesting phenomenon which represents the new phase of Accra’s street begging population who are minors or children, some being as young as six (6) years old, sometimes barefooted and wearing very dirty clothes. “The conversion of child street beggars into child street merchants!”. A phase that exposes the hypocrisy of child rights activist, human rights activists either organized being a not for profit, individual or government.
For those who campaign for the right of the child to be in school and in a protective environment, this new phase calls their activism into a lot of questions.
This new phase is one that seems to have converted the minor or child who is seen everyday begging on our major and principal streets whom campaigners argue must be in protective environment, in a classroom getting educated, away from anything that defines Labour or earning into the child street merchant who is now combining street begging with hawking disposable merchandise such as cotton-buds or shoe polishing merchandise.
Whether the street hawking phase is an attempt to hide the begging aspect or blur the picture of hopelessness and gloom it paints, remains a question to be answered later.
In a recent unrelated matter where a traditional priest is alleged to have taken on a wife who is a minor, these individuals and organisation who identify as child rights activist swung into action calling on the conscience of society to condemn such and act, arguing that the child who lives in the confort her parents home must be protected from these individuals who are giving her away in marriage at that age.
Society has seemingly turned a blind eye to the plight of these children who are now being converted from beggars to merchants or hawkers. Is this the case because these children have willingly decided to be on our streets? Whereas the argument can be made for some of these children being brought into Ghana from neighboring countries illegally to beg on the streets of Accra by unscrupulous child abusers, these remain children who needs protecting and indeed must be protected at all cost.
Their handlers who pretend to be parents are often seen laying down under trees or any form of shade away from the hot scorching sun while these vulnerable children labor away, either begging or hawking these disposable merchandise.
Have we lost our commitment to protecting children? Have we suddenly given up on these children? Has our considering these children being foreign blinded our consciences to protect these children? If that is the case indeed, then our immigration service maybe failing the entire nation in their duty to protect our national boarders from entrants who have no business being here.
For a society which has a whole ministry for the protection of women and children with a parliamentary approved budgetary allocation to have seemingly turn a blind eye to such a phenomenon is very much unfortunate.
After all, when all has been said and done, these children some of whom are Ghanaian, represent the future of this great nation. What kind of future then, are we looking for with these children?
GTV’s Breakfast Show’s Darroll Allan Tagoe filed this report after six (6) months of monitoring the activities of these children on Accra’s major and principal streets.
