Winneba (C/R), June 24, GNA - International Needs, a child centred NGO, has within the past twelve months, withdrawn over 120 children from fishing activities and enrolled them in basic schools and vocational institutes. The children aged between 6 and 17 were from Gomoa Nyanyano, Gomoa Fetteh in the Gomoa East, Mankoadze, Gomoa Abrekum, Gomoa Dago, Munford and Gomoa Akimfo in the Gomoa West and Winneba and Akosua Village in the Effutu Municipality. Rev Walter Pimpong, the Executive Director of the NGO, made this known when the organisation presented some training kits to fifteen of the children from Winneba and Akosua Village to start their various vocational Training in Winneba.

He said some of the skills being undertaken by the children include dressmaking, hairdressing, tailoring and carpentry, adding that they would take between 2 and three years to complete. He said the NGO also paid their apprenticeship training fees of GH¢150 each to the craft masters of the apprentices. Rev Pimpong said the NGO has embarked on a three-year programme to ensure the withdrawal of children from fishing and other child labour activities in nine coastal communities in the Central Region. According to him, after the completion of the programme in 2013 over 300 children were expected to have been withdrawn and enrolled in schools and various vocational skills training centres. The Effutu Municipal chief Executive, Nii Ephraim commended the NGO for their kind gesture and appealed to other NGOs to emulate their example.

He advised parents to stop sending their children to fishing to the detriment of their education. Mr Richmond Mensah, Effutu Municipal Director of the Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), called on District Assemblies at various communities to enact by-laws banning children of school-going age from the beach during school hours.