The Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MoGCSP) is developing a Human Trafficking National Plan of Action to standardise systems of fighting trafficking by all stakeholders.

The Ministry is also in the process of implementing the Child Protection Compact Agreement signed between Ghana and the United States of America to make the Ministry’s presence felt more in communities to sensitise the public on issues of trafficking.

Madam Victoria Natsu, Acting Executive Secretary of the Human Trafficking and Domestic Violence Secretariat, said this at press conference on the repatriation of 21 trafficked Ghanaian children from South Africa.

She said on the 15th of December, 2015 the Department of Social Development under the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection in collaboration with the International Organisation of Migration (IOM), the Anti-Human Trafficking Unit of the Police Service, the South Africa Embassy and the Human Trafficking Secretariat received 21Ghanaian minors trafficked to Pretoria, South Africa to play football.

This followed a request by the Ministry to the Ghana High Commission in Pretoria and the National Security Co-ordinator to assist in handling a suspected trafficking scheme involving the 21 minors.

Madam Natsu said the request was received on 30th July, 2015, and also contained detailed particulars of the minors including scanned data pages of their Ghanaian passports.

She said the Ministry’s checks revealed that the trafficked children were between the ages of nine and 16 and came from different villages in Sefwi in the Western Region.

They were deceived that they were going to be trained in South Africa and sent to Sweden and America to play football.

“The trafficker convinced the parents/guardians and the chiefs at a durbar where he was given a parcel of land to set up a football academy, parents were convinced to pay huge sums of monies to the trafficker to send the children to South Africa and some parents even sold their land and cocoa farms for their children’s travel to South Africa,” Madam Natsu said.

Madam Natsu said while in South Africa, the children were made to play a few trial matches whiles the trafficker then returned to Ghana under the pretext of recruiting more children but was never seen again.

She said after the expiry of the visas, the South African Department of Social Development rescued the children and sent them to a shelter in Pretoria.

Madam Natsu said the children since their return had been given shelter and taken through various rehabilitation processes by the Ministry whiles the Department of Social Development would do follow-up visits to the communities affected to sensitise the chiefs, opinion leaders and parents to be able to identify potential traffickers.

She said the District Social Development Officers would take over the reintegration of the children to ensure they were enrolled back into school.

She said the Government of Ghana takes a serious view of human trafficking and taking steps to combat the menace hence the passage of the Human Trafficking Legislative Instrument.