PLIGHT OF STREET CHILDREN

The plight of children living on the street of Accra and indeed other part of the world is growing each day.  Some of these children live on the street full time while others may have home they return to at night.

Through the use of various head-counts it is estimated that the city of Accra is home to over 40,0000 street children, this number is increasing at staggering pace.  When the first headcount  was completed by university of Ghana in 1999 there were only 5,000 street children, we are now seeing a second generation of street children ie children of street mothers who are born into street life.

They sleep in abandoned buildings, in tents,  kiosk, at lorry parks and market centers often ignored by people around them,dirty and hungry they live without hope for a better tomorrow, doing what they must do to survive.

They toil in the market selling food or ice water and many serve as porters carrying heavy loads on their heads that seem to defy their fragile neck.  With number of street children increasing everyday   even these jobs are increasingly becoming scarce thus creating hunger among them.

If you ask these children why they are on the street you will  hear stories of abuse, domestic violence, alcoholism and poverty at home.  You might also hear that street life has distinct appeal over home life, there are opportunities to earn their own money and spend it as they wish, you don have to go to school, and you can live according to your own rules.  All these are true for different children on the streets but none provide the complete story.

Girls sometimes escape to a life on the street in the city to avoid being forced into marriage in their villages. Many street children have never attended school or have left school at different stages of education.  More than half of them have not completed primary school.

Even though the society and the church are trying their best to get children off the street, much needs to be done to save the situation because it is these same street children who grow to become hardened criminal raping our women and robbing the society at gun point.