Ministry to set up database on human trafficking

Daily Graphic, Pg 14. Mon. Feb. 01/10

Story Rebecca Quaicoe-Duho
A national database to record activities on human trafficking across the country is to be established by March, this year.
The project, which is being co-ordinated by the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs and the Rescue Foundation Ghana, is being supported with funding by the British High Commission in Accra.
The database, which will provide a comprehensive research on the phenomenon, will serve as a source of information on human trafficking for planning and implementation of projects aimed at combating human trafficking in the country.
To ensure an effective co-ordination and the gathering of data for the establishment of the database, an 18-member national steering committee, made up of individuals from both government and non-governmental agencies, has been inaugurated to oversee to the compilation of the database in the country.
The objective of the project, among others, is to identify relevant agencies in the area of trafficking in persons for effective collaboration and partnership, as well as to help design an effective referral system that will facilitate victim support and other interventions in tracking trafficking.
The target of the project is to gather information from stakeholders operating in the area of trafficking in persons.
Ghana enacted a Human Trafficking Act (Act 694) in 2005 to proscribe trafficking in persons activities, protect victims and punish perpetrators.
The country was recently graded from a Tier two to a Tier one watch level on a three Tier scale after the passage of the Act, by the Trafficking in Persons Report issued by the United States Department, an authoritative benchmark by institutions, practitioners and interested observers worldwide which assesses 173 countries.
The outgoing Minister for Women and Children’s Affairs, Ms Akua Sena Dansua, who inaugurated the committee, called on Ghanaians to collaborate to ensure that the worrying trend of human trafficking especially among women and children for exploitative purposes, were eradicated from the country.
According to her, the current trend where some traffickers were issuing death treats to rescue officers should not be encouraged, saying that the entire society should help rescue and protect trafficked persons for rehabilitation.
She said MOWAC was committed to the cause for women and children and since these target groups bore the brunt of the phenomenon, “we owe ourselves that duty in creating a safe haven for women, children and the vulnerable in society”.
The First Secretary, Migration Policy, West Africa, of the British Embassy in Accra, Mr Andrew Flemning, said although the country had done a lot in ensuring that the issue of human trafficking was eradicated from the country, there was the need for a lot more to be done if it was to achieve a fully effective response in the area of trafficking in persons.
He called for stiffer punishment for offenders as one form of deterrent, saying that human trafficking was a high profit, low risk international crime which needed to be combated across the world.
The Executive Director of Rescue Foundation Ghana, Mrs Sylvia Hinson-Ekong, in an address said the data, which would be updated regularly, would gather information such as the mechanisms of recruitment, information on trafficking and their collaborators, number of victims, their age, where they come from and their sex, among others, to ensure that the issue was tackled effectively.