Child Labor and Child Trafficking in Ada
By Katy Donoghue and Elizabeth Adu-Dankwa

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The Ocanseykope Basic School looks over the rapidly eroding seashore of Ada Foah.

While students in brown and orange uniforms learn math, science, and English, other children their age help to pull in large fishing nets. These children work because money is scarce.

 

Victoria Ackwerh, was living with her grandmother, at the age of eight when her mother took her to Akosombo, another fishing village to smoke fish with her.

Victoria was told that she would only be taking a two-year break from school where she had already been noticed for her sharp mind. Instead she spent four years in Aksombo smoking fish every single day, "We didn't rest," Victoria said, eyes downcast, carefully watching her shuffling feet.

Victoria is the oldest of seven children, five of whom are still not in school and are fishing in Akosombo with their mother. Many parents in Ada, like Victoria's, are unable to support their children without forcing them to work.

With seven children and a meager income from being a fishmonger, her mother seemed to have little choice than to ask her eldest daughter to smoke fish every day, even though it hurt her hands, and even when she cried. "Some of my friends were in school and I was smoking fish, I would cry about that," she said, playing with her second hand school uniform.

While Victoria waited for the day she would be sent back to school, a team of researchers at Africa Center for Human Development (ACHD) started to look into the child trafficking problem in Ada and other coastal communities.

Small children prove quite useful in fishing communities. Their petite agile bodies are good for diving and mending fishing nets. They also are two extra hands to help carry water or clean out fish.

James A. Anim, a social worker and reporter at Radio Ada, worked closely with ACHD in Ada. After researching the problem and locating some of the displaced children, mostly through the help of district police, Anim and others set out to bring the children back to their homes and put them in school.

So far they have brought back 101 working children. The center also provided each child with school uniforms and one year of school fees.

Some children, however, completely missed out on their chance of schooling, like Doe Yo Dugoatey. Now, 15 years old, she was taken away at the age of six. Unlike Victoria, Doe Yo was taken away without the consent of her parents.

Her father had agreed to let her stay with a relative's mother in neighboring Kasseh where she was supposed to attend school. However, soon after Doe Yo's arrival in Kasseh, her aunt asked her to accompany her to Accra for shopping. "It was after we got to Accra that my aunt told me we would be going to Cameroon," Doe Yo remembers. "Nobody was aware that I was going,"

Still a small child, and very confused, Doe Yo remembered asking her aunt why she was going to Cameroon and not to school. Her aunt simply replied that Doe Yo shouldn't fear it was just a short trip.

After two weeks of traveling through Nigeria and on a speedboat down a river, Doe Yo and her aunt finally arrived in Cameroon. It proved not to be a short trip. She stayed for eight years, working at her aunt's chop bar care where she swept the floor, fetched water, cooked soup and did other domestic chores. She worked every day.

Doe Yo realized that she was missing her chance to go to school and that she would not be going back to Ghana. Doe Yo was devastated, "I cried for five years," she said.

After three years Doe Yo was able to send a message home through a trader she met who knew her mother. Her mother told Anim, the social worker, who took the matter to the Africa Center for Human Development. The center then reported to the case to the police who sent letters to the Cameroon police.

After receiving the letter from Doe Yo's mother, the station contacted the aunt. Through tears, hastily wiped away from her oversized floral print dress, Doe Yo remembered that that was when her aunt started to beat her.

"She beat her using an iron bar on her," Anim said. Her arms and legs are still covered in burns and marks from wrath of that fiery iron bar.

Dialogue continued between Doe Yo's mother, aunt, and the police. This past year, ACHD stepped in and was able to safely bring Doe Yo back to Ghana.

Returning at the age of fourteen, Doe Yo decided it was too late to start school and is now trying to learn the skills to become a seamstress. She is still looking for the funds to buy a sewing machine.

Currently neither Ada nor the country of Ghana has laws against child trafficking. However, laws against slavery, underage labor, child kidnapping and abduction, GIVE the government legal grounds to prosecute traffickers. Ghana's Children Act prohibits children under age 18 from engaging in hazardous labor, including working at sea and in bars.

In 2004 and funded by the World Bank, Ghana launched a 6 year, 5.1 million dollar Timebound Program aiming to strengthen Ghana's legal framework against the worst kinds of child labor. Ghana is also one of nine West and Central African countries participating in a 3 year project to prevent child trafficking and provide rescue and rehabilitation programs like ACHD did for Victoria and Doe Yo.

Mrs. Marilyn Amponsah, a representative of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, said the Ministry in collaboration with some partners have launched an operation to return children. Some of the partners are the International Office of Migration, the International Labor Organization, the security agencies, chiefs and queen mothers. She added that the ministry has identified poverty as one of the main causes of child trafficking. The Ministry tries to give funds to such women so that they can look after their children.

The other problem is education for the general public on this issue. With the help of people like Anim from Radio Ada, stories of these two girls may help to raise more awareness around child labor issues and put child trafficking penalties into action.