Accra: Ghana has made significant strides in advancing the wellbeing of children, but their priorities need to be more consistently integrated into legislative discussions, budget decisions, oversight processes, and broader national development dialogues. Despite the existing frameworks, many children's needs remain overlooked across key sectors. Children aged 0-19 account for approximately 15.1 million, representing 45% of the national population.
According to Ghana Web, when children's concerns are not fully considered in public decision-making, gaps in protection, services, and opportunities can persist. To address this, the Parliament of Ghana collaborated with UNICEF Ghana and the African Centre for Parliamentary Affairs (ACEPA) to establish the Parliamentary Caucus on Children. This dedicated non-partisan platform aims to champion the rights and wellbeing of children through Parliamentary action, including passing or amending laws that protect, fund, and advocate for children.
The Caucus unites Members of Parliament to enhance the legislative, oversight, budgeting, representation, and public engagement functions of Parliament, ensuring that children's needs are systematically considered across sectors and parliamentary processes. It is expected to promote and protect children's rights through parliamentary action, mainstream children's issues across Parliament's core functions, strengthen advocacy on child rights, and support evidence-informed decision-making and accountability for commitments affecting children.
Key priorities for the Caucus include promoting the integration of child rights into legislation, policies, and budgets; advocating for increased investment in children and social sectors; strengthening oversight of programs and services affecting children; monitoring Ghana's obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child; promoting meaningful and safe child participation in governance; and fostering collaboration among parliamentary committees on cross-cutting child-related issues.
Guided by principles of non-partisanship, the best interests of the child, non-discrimination, equity, child participation, transparency, evidence-informed decision-making, accountability, and child safeguarding, membership will be voluntary and open to Members of Parliament drawn from relevant committees, with balanced representation across political parties, gender, region, as well as urban and rural districts.
The Parliamentary Caucus on Children creates a stronger institutional platform for prioritizing children's issues in national decision-making. By supporting more child-sensitive legislation, stronger oversight, and better budgeting, the Caucus can improve accountability for public resources and ensure that children's rights are more consistently reflected in Parliament's work. It also provides an opportunity to deepen bipartisan action on child wellbeing and amplify the voice of children in governance.
The Parliamentary Caucus on Children is a joint initiative of the Parliament of Ghana, UNICEF Ghana, and the African Centre for Parliamentary Affairs (ACEPA). Its expected outcomes include stronger parliamentary leadership on child rights, increased child-sensitive policy reform, improved oversight of child-focused programs, greater allocation and accountability for public resources benefiting children, enhanced participation of children in governance processes, and stronger collaboration among parliamentary committees.