The Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Agnes Naa Momo Lartey, has revealed that government operations aimed at removing foreign children from the streets have been temporarily suspended because of financial difficulties.
Speaking in Parliament on Wednesday, June 24, the Minister explained that despite the pause, earlier interventions had produced positive results by helping to control the growing number of children living and working on the streets.
“To a large extent, I would say that the measures are working, because without these interventions, you realise that our streets will be flooded, and the dangers that will pose to even the children themselves is something that governments will not be able to bear,” she told the House.
She noted that although the government has not fully solved the problem, the efforts made so far have had a meaningful impact.
“You might say that we are not there yet, we don’t have the perfect situation we desire yet, but I can tell you on authority that the measures are working,” she stated.
Mrs Lartey also admitted that limited funding has made it difficult to carry out the operations regularly and maintain the momentum.
“Sometimes you have resource constraints in doing it as often as you would want to do, to sustain the efforts, but to a large extent, the efforts are indeed working,” she said.
Her comments come as concerns continue to grow over the increasing number of foreign children involved in street begging and other forms of child exploitation in major cities across the country.
