According to Mr. John Ato Breboh, Senior Principal Investigator of the Tema Regional Office of the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), domestic slavery cases are on the rise in Ghana.
According to Mr. Breboh, a major issue facing the nation is the habit of individuals travelling to rural and underdeveloped areas to hire youngsters as domestic help under the pretext of providing them with a better life.
He made this disclosure while discussing "Harmful Traditional Practices - Impact on the African Child" on the Ghana News Agency, Tema Industrial News Hub Boardroom Dialogue forum.
He pointed out that domestic servitude was another type of trafficking and demanded that education and sensitization efforts be stepped up since depriving children of an education violated their human rights.
The parents also release these innocent children because of poverty, believing they would have a better future, he added. "It is a new manner of child trafficking. They go to the countryside nicely dressed, and they get children with the pretext that they want to place them into schools in the city."
However, Mr. Breboh noted that "after they arrive in the cities with the children, they are either given to organisations to deal with them at home or for purposes other than sending them to school, and occasionally they experience sexual abuse.
He called the practise of domestic servitude in Ghana as sad and severe, noting that it has been there for a while but has been picking up steam as the country's poverty level deepens.
If nothing significant is done, the situation will persist and the cycle of poverty in those places would get worse, according to Mr. Breboh.
Regarding additional harmful traditional practises, he listed, among others, female genital mutilation, forced marriages, exchange marriages, betrothal, and children raised in witches' colonies as activities that violate Ghana's human rights legislation.
According to Mrs. Elorm Kupomey, an investigator at CHRAJ in Tema, it's time for governments to give concerns pertaining to girls top priority. and provide them the knowledge they need to fight back against some of the actions that violated their human rights.
According to Mrs. Kupomer, in order to achieve the desired results, it is necessary to keep advocating for the education of girls as was done in the past.
The regional manager of Ghana News Agency in Tema, Mr. Francis Ameyibor, stated that persons in positions of responsibility should devise strategies for fusing local norms and practises with universal standards.