Child activist urges Gov’t to ensure Gender Ministry reflects its name

Mr Emanuel Kwame Mensah has called on the government to ensure that the new Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MGCSP) reflect its name.

He said many Ghanaians were worried when the President announced the renaming of the Ministry for Women and Children’s Affairs (MOWAC) because it is obvious that changing the names of Ministries does not necessarily imply an improvement in the delivery of their mandate.

Mr Mensah, a Programme Officer of the International Labour Office’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour in West Africa, made the call in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Friday.

He said Ghana had witnessed renaming of Ministries such as the Ministry of Manpower, Youth and Employment changed to Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare, Ministry of Information (MOI) becoming Ministry of Information and National Orientation and back again to MOI, among others.

He said a change in name of a particular Ministry must also reflect a shift in thinking regarding government policy and programming.

Mr Mensah said moving away from focussing on “women” to “gender” would result in understanding the sound theoretical underpinnings that had occasioned a paradigm shift in the policy and practice of countries whose social development frameworks had narrowed the gap between women and men in the wielding of resources.

He said the creation of MOWAC promoted the misconception that it was only for women and children, that women, as opposed to men, had so many problems that a whole ministry needed to be created for them.

He said MOWAC was a good starting point that was the ice-breaker that translated a long advocacy for improving the welfare of (Ghanaian/African) women into practical policy, programming and action.

Mr Mensah said a proper understanding of gender would immediately gel with the need to harmonize the resources that are committed to the development of children.

He said in order to improve the wellbeing of children the government must direct a chunk of the resources towards the provision of facilities for them.

Mr Mensah said the government must address issues that affect the welfare of children such as child labour, child abuse and primitive cultural practices that hinder children’s development.

He said the “Social Protection” part of MGCSP is a critical aspect of social development; therefore, the new ministry must ensure the creation and sustaining of safety net for the vulnerable and the less privileged in society.

“The combination of the three huge blocks of Gender, Children and Social Protection into one composite is an indication that framers of the idea recognize the high synergy that can be harnessed from such a triploid,” Mr Mensah said.