ABSTRACT
Stakeholders in the fight against modern slavery play a vital role in the socio-economic development of Ghana. Despite stakeholder’s important role in the fight against modern slavery, donors have been a major contributing force in the fight.
This study identifies and discusses the funds received by stakeholders in the course of eliminating modern day slavery. The analysis first reviews the sources of funds for stakeholders by focusing on both external and internal sources. The study then discusses the methods stakeholders use to mobilize funds for their operations. Three methods were identified and they included proposal writing/grant, partnership and social enterprise.
The study sought to determine how stakeholders working on the Lake Volta in Ghana finance their operations such as; investigation, rescue, rehabilitation, reintegration and monitoring etc. A survey research approach is adopted to evaluate donor funds to stakeholders in the fight against modern day slavery on the Lake Volta
Issues such as huge financial gap between what is actually needed to eliminate the menace, stakeholder often than not fail to meet their revenue target for battling modern day slavery and government also fails to commit the right amount it intends to put into the fight against modern day slavery
Some challenges facing stakeholders in the fight against modern slavery, is the methods used to mobilize funds. The study revealed that stakeholders obtained their funding mostly from external donors, governments through their embassies and agencies such Canadian High Commission, United Nation and UNICEF.
CHAPTER ONE
INTR ODUCTI ON
1.1 Backgr ound of the Study
“Slavery existed bef ore m oney or law” (H ochschild, 2005). T o many, slavery is a thing of the past and have n o place in the m odern s ociety. It has been 202 years since the ab oliti on of slavery in the United Kingd om and 144 years since its ab oliti on in the United States. T oday, the menace of slavery has reincarnated itself in the f orm of human trafficking where th ousands of w omen, men and children are s old f or a penny. The Internati onal Lab our Organisati on (IL O) estimates that annual pr ofits generated fr om trafficking of human beings are as high as 32 billi on USD. Human trafficking is regarded as one of transnati onal organised crimes in recent times by the United Nati on and it is rated the sec ond heinous crime in the w orld (Kempad o o et al, 2015; Shelley & Lee, 2007).
Alth ough it is extremely difficult t o estimate the scale of human trafficking crimes, the Internati onal Lab our Organisati on and Walk Free F oundati on rep ort (2018) estimated that, ab out
45.8 milli on pe ople are in f orced lab our and sexual expl oitati on. Acc ording t o Internati onal Lab our Organisati on (IL O), there are at least 2.4 milli on trafficked pers ons at any given time. F orty-tw o percent (42%) of the traffickers are trafficked within their own c ountries with 71% being females and 28% children (United Nati ons Office on Drugs and Crime (UN ODC, 2016)). Human trafficking has increased as high as 200 milli on which is m ore than the entirety of slavery in the Trans-Atlantic slave trade (Free the slaves, 2007).
The rise in human trafficking is as a result of the Macr o and Micr o level risk fact ors. Macr o level risk fact ors that are ass ociated with human trafficking include p overty, ec on omic injustice, natural disasters, gl obalizati on of the c onsumer market, unattached men in c onstructi on operati on,
military installati ons in devel oping c ountries and gl obal sex t ourism (R oby, 2005). Micr o level risk fact ors include family breakd own, p o or family relati on, child abuse and neglect, mental illness and substance abuse am ong parents and h omelessness am ong children (R oby, 2005). Acc ording t o the United Nati ons (U.N.), 6.5 billi on pe ople in the w orld depend on tw o ($2) d ollars per day. This has resulted in substantial increase in the w orld’s slavery t oday because of desperately p o or pe ople living in devel oping and p o or c ountries.
Gl obally, Alliance 87 estimates that there are 152 milli on children in child labour. Ghana is n o excepti on fr om the gl obal gr owing menace of Human Trafficking. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA,2016) estimates that there are ab out 103,300 pe ople inv olved in m odern slavery in Ghana t oday. The expl oitati on of Ghanaians, particularly children, within the c ountry is m ore prevalent than transnati onal trafficking. Ghana Child Lab our Survey rep ort (GCLS, 2003) estimates that there are ab out 2.47 milli on children aged between 5 and 17years wh o are ec on omically active. This is w orst f orm of lab our as stated in the Nati onal Plan Acti on t o eliminate the menace by Child Lab our Unit of Lab our Department of the Ministry of Empl oyment and S ocial Welfare.
Ghanaian b oys and girls are subjected t o being trafficked int o f orced lab our such as fishing, mining, street hawking, begging, and c ommercial sex am ong others. Sex trafficking exist nati onwide but m ost prevalent in the V olta Regi on and is als o gr owing in the Western Regi on, Ghana (Trafficking in Pers on’s rep ort, 2016, United States Department of State). Rep ort by GCLS (2003) sh ows that V olta regi on rec orded the highest child lab our cases with 519,001 trafficked children in the fishing sect or. Sixty-six percent (66%) of the b oys are asked t o dive int o the lake t o disentangle fishing nets, mend nets and spend h ours casting and drawing the net ash ore while fifty-tw o percent (52%) of the girls are engaged in selling, sm oking of fish and used as sex slaves (Tengey & Oguaah, 2002).
In Ghana, the pr oblem of child trafficking is pervasive, as traffickers deceive parents that their children are g oing t o have a better life but rather end up w orking on the V olta Lake with out g oing t o sch o ol. Menial d omestic and w orking on the lake are regarded being n ot hazard ous t o their health and educati on but rather c ontribute t o their inf ormal training activities (Tengey & Oguaah, 2002). There are several islands and villages such as Yeji, Garikr om, Buipe, Accra-T own, Kete Krachie am ong others al ong the V olta Lake which are c onsidered endemic f or child trafficking (Challenging Heights, 2017).
Several eff orts have been made by internati onal organisati ons in partnership with l ocal organisati ons t o eliminate trafficking of children on the V olta Lake of Ghana. Rep ort fr om Challenging Heights (2017) indicates that they have rescued over One Th ousand Seven Hundred (1,700) children fr om the V olta Lake since 2007. Children rescued are fr om Winneba, Apam, and Senya Bereku in Central Regi on; Ada, and Ning o in Greater Accra Regi on am ong others.
Organisati ons such I OM, Engage N ow Africa, Apple am ong others have c ontributed in rescuing trafficked children. The rescued children are rehabilitated f or several m onths bef ore they are reintegrated back with their parents and c ommunities.
A baseline study c onducted by an NG O, “Free the Slaves”, in 20 c ommunities in the V olta and Central Regi ons in August 2016, indicates that s ome c ommunities act as b oth the s ource and destinati on f or trafficking. Acr oss all 20 c ommunities, 35.2% of h ouseh olds c onsisted children wh o had been subjected t o trafficking, 18% had been expl oited primarily in the fishing industry. The rep ort als o sh owed 10% and 1% in d omestic servitude, and early or f orced marriages respectively.
Fr om all indicati ons ab ove, there is n o denial of the fact that slavery exists in our s ocieties t oday. Hence, we must fight the gr owing gl obal menace with n ot just the right c ommitment but the right financial c ommitment.
Statement of the pr oblem
Acc ording t o the Internati onal Lab our Organisati on (IL O, 2017) there are 218 milli on children in child lab our and 22,000 children died thr ough their w ork in Sub-Saharan Africa. The increased cases of human trafficking raise red flags because traffickers ar ound the w orld generate 32 billi on USD (IL O, 2017). Over the years, stakeh olders, b oth internati onal and d omestic, have expressed c oncern over the situati on. The Internati onal Organisati on f or Migrati on has been in partnership with g overnments, the UN and NG O’s t o c ounter human trafficking.
