Ghana’s early leadership in global human rights history is an achievement that deserves acknowledgement and national pride. On 5th February, 1990, Ghana became the first country in the world to ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), an internationally binding instrument that redefined humanity’s responsibility toward its youngest members. ¹ The decision was not a symbolic gesture. It represented a pledge to reorganise national systems around the principles of child survival, development, protection, and participation. Over the years, Ghana has enacted provisions in the 1992 Constitution, including Article 28, ² and has developed a detailed legislative framework through the Children’s Act 1998 (Act 560). ³ These frameworks express a clear state obligation to safeguard the rights and welfare of children. Despite this well-established legal foundation and Ghana’s early moral leadership, the country remains without a single, specialised national institution dedicated exclusively to children’s rights. This absence has created fragmentation, policy incoherence, limited enforcement, and uneven protection across sectors. A country that led the world in ratifying the CRC now struggles to demonstrate that same leadership in structural implementation.
The historical and administrative evolution of Ghana’s child-protection landscape reveals the root of the current institutional gaps. During President J.A. Kufuor’s administration, the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs was established to mainstream gender and child policy. ⁴ The Ministry’s creation constituted the first attempt to create a formal governmental home for issues affecting women and children. However, this configuration was short-lived. Subsequent administrations restructured the Ministry, eventually renaming and expanding it into the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, with responsibilities spanning women’s empowerment, social welfare, disability inclusion, and child protection.⁵ While this integration may have been administratively efficient, it diluted the specific focus required for children’s rights, resulting in an overstretched Ministry unable to exercise sustained leadership in the child-protection sector.
This pattern of institutional drift is not limited to ministerial structures. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the Ghana Police Service operated the Women and Juvenile Unit (WAJU), a specialised unit responsible for addressing abuse, violence, and juvenile-related offences.⁶ WAJU’s mandate was explicitly gendered and juvenile-oriented, but it eventually transformed into the Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit (DOVVSU), a broader entity responsible for a wide range of domestic and gender-based offences.⁷ While the transition to DOVVSU reflected a more comprehensive understanding of domestic violence, it also diluted the deliberate attention once given to juveniles. The Department of Social Welfare, another key institution responsible for child protection, remains chronically under-resourced, facing staff shortages, logistics constraints, and administrative burdens that prevent it from effectively monitoring children’s homes, foster systems, shelters, and correctional institutions. ⁸ These cumulative shifts have left Ghana without a central body capable of coordinating, monitoring, and enforcing children’s rights nationwide.
The consequences of this fragmentation are predictable and increasingly visible. Without a unified national institution, Ghana struggles with inconsistent monitoring of children’s homes, shelters, and remand facilities. District-level implementation varies widely due to differences in resource availability and institutional commitment. Reporting obligations to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child are frequently delayed, reflecting gaps in national data collection. ⁹ Inter-agency coordination is weak, resulting in parallel systems in education, health, policing, social welfare, and justice. These challenges undermine the objectives of Article 4 of the CRC, which obliges states to adopt effective legislative and administrative measures to implement children’s rights. ¹⁰
The institutional challenges Ghana faces are neither unique nor insurmountable. Countries that have made the most progress in protecting children’s rights have done so by creating specialised national institutions with statutory authority and operational independence. In the United Kingdom, the Children Act 2004 established the Children’s Commissioner for England, an independent statutory office devoted solely to children’s rights. ¹¹ The Commissioner conducts national investigations, publishes reports to Parliament, and has statutory powers to request information from public bodies. This institutional design reflects recognition that children require dedicated advocacy and monitoring beyond what a general ministry can provide.
Canada offers another instructive example. At the federal level, the Canadian Children’s Rights Council functions as a national watchdog, while provinces such as Ontario operate independent Offices of the Child Advocate. ¹² These authorities investigate state institutions, monitor child welfare agencies, and review government policies. Their independence insulates children’s rights from political transitions and ensures continuity in monitoring.
Norway’s model is equally instructive. Norway created the world’s first Ombudsman for Children in 1981, a decade before the CRC was adopted. ¹³ The Ombudsman is mandated to influence national legislation, conduct investigations, and ensure that children’s voices shape public policy. Norway’s high global ranking in child welfare is partly attributed to this institutional architecture.
African jurisdictions also demonstrate the value of specialised child-focused institutions. Kenya operates the National Council for Children’s Services (NCCS), a statutory body created under the Children Act. ¹⁴ The Council coordinates state and non-state actors, monitors standards across child welfare institutions, and leads the CRC reporting process. Rwanda’s National Commission for Children, established under Law No. 22/2011, coordinates all state efforts relating to children and has improved child protection monitoring, early childhood programmes, and anti-trafficking systems. ¹⁵ These models illustrate that meaningful protection of children requires institutional focus and centralised authority.
With this comparative understanding, the case for a National Agency for Children in Ghana becomes even more compelling. Establishing a single, centralised, statutory institution would ensure that children’s welfare is no longer diluted across ministries with competing priorities. A National Agency for Children would serve as the central authority responsible for implementing the CRC and Act 560, coordinating agencies, conducting inspections, developing national standards for child protection, and leading Ghana’s reporting obligations to international treaty bodies. It would provide continuity across political administrations and ensure that children’s rights are protected regardless of shifting governmental priorities. Such an agency would also rectify administrative inconsistencies across districts and regions by providing a unified policy direction, standardised monitoring procedures, and specialised professional cadres for child protection work.
The legal basis for the establishment of such an agency is firmly grounded in Article 28 of the Constitution, which guarantees every child’s right to protection and obliges the State to safeguard their best interests. ¹⁶ The Children’s Act outlines detailed protection standards that require systematic monitoring and enforcement but does not establish a centralised institution with sufficient authority to ensure compliance. Article 4 of the CRC strengthens the argument by obliging States Parties to adopt institutional measures to actualise children’s rights. ¹⁷ Without a centralised national institution, Ghana’s compliance remains partial and fragmented.
In conclusion, Ghana’s leadership in ratifying the CRC was historic, but the absence of a specialised national institution for children has hindered full implementation. Comparative evidence from Europe, North America, and Africa demonstrates that the most successful child-protection systems are anchored by centralised statutory institutions with exclusive mandates. Establishing a National Agency for Children is therefore not merely a desirable reform; it is a constitutional, legal, developmental, and moral imperative. Ghana possesses the legal foundation, historical legitimacy, and institutional motivation to take this decisive step. If Ghana was the first to ratify the Convention, it should not be the last to build an institutional structure worthy of that leadership.
Footnotes
- UN Treaty Collection, ‘Convention on the Rights of the Child’, Ratification Status (United Nations 1990).
- Constitution of the Republic of Ghana 1992, art 28.
- Children’s Act 1998 (Act 560).
- Republic of Ghana, Executive Instrument Establishing the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs (2001).
- Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection Act, Executive Instrument (2013).
- Ghana Police Service, ‘History of WAJU’ (Internal Archival Document, 1998).
- Domestic Violence Act 2007 (Act 732); Ghana Police Service, DOVVSU Operational Manual (2010).
- Department of Social Welfare, ‘Annual Report’ (2021).
- UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, ‘Concluding Observations: Ghana’ (CRC/C/GHA/CO/3-5, 2015).
- Convention on the Rights of the Child (adopted 20 November 1989, entered into force 2 September 1990) 1577 UNTS 3, art 4.
- Children Act 2004 (UK), Part 1, ss 1–9.
- Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth Act 2007 (Ontario).
- Act relating to the Ombudsman for Children (Norway), No. 5 of 6 March 1981.
- Children Act (Kenya) 2001, Part II.
- National Commission for Children Law (Rwanda), Law No. 22/2011.
- Constitution of the Republic of Ghana 1992, art 28(4).
- CRC, art 4.
By: Gifty Nti Konadu
