OAfrica, an organisation supporting orphans and the vulnerable, is providing financial support of GH? 117,000 to the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection to resettle the abused children of the Bawjiase Orphanage.
The funds are to enable the Ministry to resettle these mistreated children back into loving and extended families.
Mrs Jacinta Owusuaa Atakora, Manager for Family Support Services, OAfrica, speaking at a press conference in Accra, said the horrific exposure in Anas Aremeywa Anas’ documentary was criminal.
She said the organisation condemned the abuse revealed at the orphanage and had called for the abolition of orphanages in the country by 2020.
She said following previous documentaries by the Ace journalist, the Government, with funding from UNICEF, put in place an impressive multi-sectorial National Action Plan for the orphans and the vulnerable children.
Mrs Atakora, therefore, called on the Government to implement that plan and make sure that the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection and the Department of Social Welfare were properly funded with full budget allocation.
She said there was the need to build their capacity to be able to carry out their important work of caring for the less fortunate and most vulnerable.
Mrs Atakora called on UNICEF and the Orphans and Vulernable Children Committee of the Social Welfare to step up their responsibilities and support the Department of Social Welfare to further close down illegal orphanages and provide support for families.
She said Anas’ documentary titled; “CARE-less” was important because it educated the public on the need for caring for abandoned children in a legal, responsible and loving way.
She said the organisation had been working to support Social Welfare to close unregistered orphanages and promote the importance of family care since 2004.
OAfrica has also supported Care Reform in Ghana by advocating for stricter regulations on orphanages in the hope that these types of institutions would be closed down or used as the last resort.
Mrs Miracle Mensah Damanka, Development Manager, OAfrica, recommended that the Livelihood Empowerment against Poverty be extended to all families willing to take home extended family members from orphanages.
She called for a new data collection exercise on the orphanages to be done by the Social Welfare in partnership with international NGOs, who could provide funding.
Mrs Damanka said abusive orphanage owners needed to be tried and jailed for their crimes, adding that the country needed to ratify the Hague Convention on International Adoption to stop trafficking of children for international adoption.
