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afrol News, 5 March - A programme, which aims to assist and return to their families more than 1,200 children, "the Fishing Boys," trafficked for forced labour in the Central and Volta regions of Ghana is making good progress. To date, staff from the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) in Yeji and Atebubu districts of Brong Ahafo region have successfully registered 814 children who are currently employed under slave-like conditions in numerous fishing communities established along the shores and on islands scattered on Lake Volta. The victims, mostly boys aged between 5 and 14, are forced to work from dawn to dusk casting and drawing nets. They live separately in cramped thatched roofed huts, are poorly fed, suffer physical abuse and never get paid. Their diet consists mainly of cassava with watery soup, IOM reports. They never eat fish. Because of their poor diet, harsh living and working conditions, many suffer from water born illnesses and experience stunted growth. In one location alone, an island in the middle of Lake Volta, dozens of slave children are marooned in "Accra Town", a fishing settlement with no electricity or running water. In this settlement, IOM had collected testimonies that at least five children have recently drowned trying to release nets caught on the bottom of the lake, the organisation says.
In "Accra Town", the children are employed by local fishermen, locally known as "slave masters". One employer, who has been in the business for 10 years, told IOM he had recently paid 5 million Cedis (US$ 570) for nine children he currently exploits. Another local employer on the island acknowledged exploiting 35 children, though this number could be much higher. According to IOM's Dr. Ernest Taylor, employers are well aware that it is wrong to employ children, but use them because they are "easier to control and obey orders, however dangerous the work." In order to identify slave children and trace their families, IOM staff is carrying out interviews with the employers. So far, 136 one-to-one interviews have been completed in the communities of Tonka, Jakalai, Kadue, Jyatakpo and Blekente, located in the Atebubu and Yeji Districts. - Counselling, training and equipment will soon be made available to fishermen in exchange for the release of the children, the organisation says. "It is hoped that improved equipment and fishing methods will discourage them from employing children in the future." The first family reunification, expected in the coming weeks, was to allow the children to return to school or join vocational training programmes, which will be set up by IOM and its partners. Poverty, which led to the trafficking of the children in the first place, was to be addressed by giving parents access to income generating micro-credit schemes, IOM says. The campaigners continue to run awareness raising activities in the region with the support of the local and traditional authorities. Last Friday, Yeji's Paramount Chief "Nana" Kagberesi called upon all fishermen to release all of the fishing boys, so as not to deprive them of an education or other vocational training opportunities offered by the programme. This programme, implemented with the Ghanaian authorities, the ILO, Catholic Relief Service and the local non-governmental organisation APPLE, aims to return to their families more than 1,200 children who have been trafficked into forced labour. According to IOM, there are a number of factors in Ghanaian society that might explain why child trafficking is on the increase. These include poverty. Many of the parents involved in child trafficking are very poor and are unable to provide for the basic needs of the children, let alone send them to school. Further, there are currently no laws against trafficking in persons in Ghana. Gaps in legal provisions have therefore meant that child traffickers responsible for the worst forms of labour exploitation go unpunished. Finally, it is a common practice that parents give away their children to be looked after by relatives and friends upon request. Children are usually not consulted, nor do they disobey the orders of their parents to go and live with someone they have never seen before. "This is an age-old practice, which, under present economic circumstances, has degenerated into children being sold or mortgaged by their parents under false pretences," IOM says.
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