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The Minister of Interior, Mr. Prosper D.K. Bani has said that government takes combatting human trafficking seriously, hence the appointment of a National Coordinator on Human Trafficking to coordinate the activities of all stakeholders in the fight against human trafficking to address issue.

Mr. Bani disclosed this in a keynote address at the opening ceremony of a three-day investigative journalism workshop on anti-human trafficking and migration issues in Accra. The workshop was organized by the Africa Center for International Law and Accountability (ACILA) and Panos Institute West Africa.

The National Coordinator, Mr. Daniel Julius Avorga, a former Deputy Commissioner of Police and Director of Legal Services of the Ghana Police Service, was appointed by President John Dramani Mahama last week. It is recalled that the US Department of State classified Ghana on the Tier 2 Watch List in its 2014 edition of the “Trafficking in Persons Report”, citing “Ghana as a source, transit and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labour and sex trafficking”

According to Mr. Bani, the National Coordinator is to work with all stakeholders to improve on Ghana’s classification.

Commenting on the essence of the capacity building workshop, Mr. Bani lauded the initiative of the organizers and urged them to develop and deploy a curriculum on migration and anti-human trafficking issues in collaboration with media training institutions and other stakeholders. In an address by Mr. Daniel Sam, National Project Officer in charge of Policy, Migration and Development of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), he said that the IOM was hopeful that the workshop would build the capacity of journalists to promote balanced representation in reporting on migration issues as well as encourage more journalists to develop an interest in covering migration-related issues.

He noted that as the media is increasingly looking to IOM as the source of information on migration-related issues and expertise, the Organization is raising the visibility of its programmes and networking with the local media, as far as possible to strengthen its reputation for knowledge, transparency, and professionalism.