Culture of giving is cause of child beggars menace in Ghana – Gender Minister

Minister of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Lariba Zuweira Abudu has asked persons who give out money to child beggars on the streets to stop.

She said giving to these children rather encourages them to stay on the streets.

Speaking at a press conference in Accra on Sunday, June 4, she stated that the government has taken steps to remove the children from the streets. These measures include repatriating them to their countries.

“We have done a lot, we did some sweeps, we have gone out there with media to send them out.

“They come from our neighbouring countries and we have engaged the embassies of some of the countries that we think they are coming from, Burkina Faso, Niger and we have even repatriated some of them about 400, they will go and find another way back,” she said.

The Minister added “I always say, why should we give a child of school-going age money? It is business as usual, we also as a country should look at it.

“If a child is 6 years and he is begging, why do you give the child money? If you don’t give today, I don’t give tomorrow, somebody doesn’t give one week they will go back to school.

“So it is the culture, our culture of the way we give to these minors that is why they are on the streets so we should look at it as a country where you don’t give a minor money.”