About BASICS
Paving the Road Towards a Better Future
BASICS is a safe haven Day Centre based at Chorkor, a poor, deprived suburb in Accra, for children in the surrounding fishing communities where schooling and teenage pregnancies are a problem and increase daily due to poverty and ignorance. The children attending the Centre range in age from 6 to 24 years.
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They are a mixture of street kids, and deprived and abused children living in appalling conditions on the streets and beaches of Chorkor. Many are also victims of child labor.
Most want to go to school but do not have the means or any practical and emotional support to do so.
At least 100 children visit the safe haven each day for assistance with their homework and for private tutoring. They also participate in extracurricular activities including computer training, sewing, music and dance, cooking, art, poetry, sports, drama and film making among other activities.
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The team at Nana’s House provides support and encouragement to the children to keep attending school on a regular basis to break the cycle of illiteracy, child labour, teenage pregnancy and poverty in their lives.
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The house itself (that our past fundraising has helped to build) is a three-storey facility comprising a computer lab, a sewing room, a home economics and catering kitchen, a library and a music studio.
About the Children
Truancy and absenteeism are major problems. Truancy is very high among children in most poor areas of Ghana. Market days and Fridays especially, register very low turn outs of school children in impoverished areas. Truancy and absenteeism is not limited to only school children but also teachers. The large proportion of female school dropouts is attributed to teenage pregnancy and lack of motivation.
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When it becomes necessary for a child to make a living by doing odd jobs, going to school becomes only a dream. It is the right of every Ghanaian child to have free compulsory basic education. The denial of basic education is an infringement of a child's basic human rights.
Many children meet only 25% of their dietary requirements. Their low calorie intake and malnutrition have grave consequences and include stunting, kwashiorkor, diminished intellectual development or death. Protein rich farm and animal products like milk, beans, groundnuts and eggs are denied to children.
Many Ghanaian children do not have access to adequate food and nutrition although they may be residing with their parents or guardians. The situation is worse for children who are not under parental or guardian care, especially street children. Many girls end up as maids and are made to work around the clock. They have little or no time to play or interact with other children.
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They are denied education and are subjected to hunger, even though in most cases they prepare the meals.
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Many children who are abused suffer emotional and psychological trauma. They may end up as delinquents in the streets of the major cities of Ghana.
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Pat Wilkins and Allotey Bruce Konuah of BASICS International
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