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Ghana- Anabel's Situation Today [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-08-20

Anabel was a three-year old girl who was found wandering by herself on the street in front of a hospital by some homeless street children in Buduburam Refugee Camp. They took her to my friend John, who helps people in trouble when he can.

Her mother had gone to the hospital for help with mental issues. She is not a bad woman but she is sometimes irrational and cannot care for her little girl. Drugs are involved, which is sad.

I do not know the details (no one was there to see specifically what happened) but the child was simply left to her own devices when the mother was admitted to the hospital. There is no excuse or justification for this on the part of the hospital staff but it happened.

At any rate, John took the little girl under his protection and arranged for her to stay at a private childcare facility. We have been paying for her care there so that she will not be abandoned and homeless on the streets. God knows there are many her age in Ghana who are.

John and I had a long online conversation about Anabel last night. I learned some new things about the situation and we discussed what we should do. Since I have been talking about Anabel here for some time now I thought I should share some of them.

In the first place, Anabel is staying in what we in the US would probably call a daycare center. Mostly it is a place for parents to leave their children while thy are working. They pick them up in the evenings and take them home with them. They will keep children overnight (or indefinitely, as in Anabel’s case) if the parents provide basics such as toilet paper, etc.

It is private, not associated with a religious organization or a NGO. I do know its name but for privacy reasons I will not give it here.

I will say the people who run it do seem caring and competent. They asked for extra money for Anabel’s fourth birthday so that they could have a little party for her. And when Anabel came down with the measles they cared for her instead of demanding that she be removed, which they well could have.

Right now their concern is schooling. Most of the other children Anabel’s age leave for school in the morning and Anabel is left there by herself.

There is a private school closeby though it is not associated with the daycare center. Its fees are 1200 Cedis each term (about 110 dollars) but right now that is simply more than we can pay. It looks like we may have to find some way to do it, though. The madam running the center is becoming extremely unhappy about it . I don’t blame her. This is for the benefit of Anabel, of course, and she does need to go to school. As always, it is a question of money.

Beyond that, in the longer term this is not an ideal situation for Anabel. John has talked with the mother, whose name is Akusoa, and she has thanked him for what he is doing for her daughter. She is not a monster and she does love Anabel. She is having extreme problems of her own and I believe right now she has gone to some village away from the Accra-Buduburam area.

Ideally we can help Akusoa stabilize her life and she and Anabel can live together again. With drugs and mental illness involved I am not sure that that is possible.

I can see that the daycare center is not an ideal long-term situation because it seems it is not really intended for that purpose. And I don’t want to see Anabel institutionalized in any way. That is not good for a child.

Also of course we have to stay within the boundaries of the law. Ghana has some very strict child trafficking laws and John really does not have the authority to simply force whatever he wants on anyone.

The first thing is to get Anabel in school. But we need to start trying to arrange for something longer-term for her.

Anyway this is the Anabel update for now.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/8/20/2188433/-Ghana-Anabel-s-Situation-Today

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