As part of the strategies to fight streetism in Ghana, Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Lariba Zuweira Abudu has admonished the public to desist from giving alms to children on the streets.
According to the Minister, the menace is thriving in the country since the public is benevolent enough to give monies to these children roaming on the streets.
Speaking in an interview with Accra-based Citi TV, she disclosed that the menace has been uncovered as a business for syndicates who use most of the children on the streets to dupe the public hence taking advantage of the benevolence of Ghanaians.
She further added that it has also become a lucrative business for some parents who use their children as a means of begging for alms on the streets.
She, therefore, urged the general public to desist from entertaining streetism by offering gifts of money to school children on the streets.
“It is not good to give money to school-going children. Why should I give money to a child who is supposed to be in school? So it is just business as usual. We, as Ghanaians, should also look at the culture of giving. If you don’t give, I don’t give, and after a week, he will leave.
“Let’s stop giving to the young ones. It is not good. If you train a child that way, he will depend on begging for who knows how long. Let him go to school. After a week, if no one gives him anything, he will go back to school. Some parents push their children to beg. They sit under a tree and tell their children to go and beg,” the Minister of Gender, Children and Social Protection advised.
