195 people trained in child protection in Wa

The Community Development and Social Welfare Department in the Wa municipality of the Upper West Region has trained 195 persons, on how to protect children against new trends of child abuse and violence against children, like kidnapping and abduction at Wa.

With support from Plan Ghana, the trainees were equipped with knowledge in identifying potential kidnappers, administering first aid to child victims, counseling or guidance to the children, prevent child marriages, defilement, among others on Wednesday.

Speaking to the Ghanaian Times on the essence of the training last Wednesday, the Wa Municipal Child Protection Committee Coordinator, Mr Clement Mol, said the municipality had formed a committee to supervise the work of the local Community Child Protection Teams (CCPT) and also share information among themselves in order to be updated with what each department in the committee was doing at every point in time.

“We have a committee which is made up of the Ghana Education Service, Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DVVSU), the Gender Desk Officer at the municipal assembly, my department, and others all geared towards addressing issues of child abuse so that when DVVSU for instance is dealing with say, a defilement case, the others are aware what has transpired in a particular community,” he stated.

Mr Mol said the CCPT was more particular about recent trends in child abuse like kidnapping, elopement, abduction, school dropout, among others which had become rampant in the country.

“For instance if you go to a community like Kunfabiala, most of the children are either school dropouts or have never been to school. Although the community has no school, there is one in the next community and it is not far, yet they do not attend,” he cited and said all those were some of the issues the committee sought to deal with.

He appealed to caregivers and other stakeholders to support the course of advancing the development of children.

For his part, the District Development Coordinator at Plan Ghana, Mr Kamaldeen Yazeed Iddrisu said his outfit realised the need to support the CCPC with advanced knowledge in order to better protect the child as stated in the child and family, as well as the justice for children policies of Ghana.

FROM LYDIA DARLINGTON FORDJOUR, WA