CDE Observations finales: Ghana, 2015
Published: 9/Juin/2015
Source: UN Committee on the Rights of the Child
CRC/C/GHA/CO/3-5
[pas disponible en francais]
Concluding observations on the combined third to fifth periodic reports of Ghana
Birth registration
29. While noting the significant progress in improving birth registration coverage from 17 percent in 2002 to about 58 percent in 2014, the Committee reiterates its concerns (CRC/C/GHA/CO/2, para. 32) about the many challenges faced by the State party such as understaffing and inadequate funding and about the difficulties in ensuring, particularly, the birth registration of children in rural areas as well as of asylum-seeking and refugee
children.
30. The Committee reiterates its previous recommendations (CRC/C/GHA/CO/2, para. 32) and recommends that the State party:
(a) Implement the recommendations of the “Birth Registration bottleneck analysis”;
(b) Enter into a formal partnership and collaboration agreement between the Birth and Death Registry and the Ghana Health Service;
(c) Allocate sufficient funds for the strengthening of birth registration initiatives;
(d) Extend free birth registration and issuance of certificates for, at least, children under five years of age;
(e) Strengthen and expand mobile birth registration to reach universal coverage, particularly, for registration of children in rural areas, asylum-seeking and refugee children, and those who have never been registered;
(f) Amend the Refugee Law (1992) to ensure that recognized refugee children born outside the State party can be issued with substitute birth certificates;
(g) Increase public awareness about the importance of birth registration and the process by which children are registered.
Nationality
31. While welcoming the additional information provided by the State party during the dialogue, the Committee is concerned that nationality at birth is not granted to children born on the territory of the State party who would otherwise be stateless.
32. The Committee recommends that the State party:
(a) Review the 2000 Ghanaian Citizenship Act and other relevant legislation relating to nationality to bring them into line with international standards on prevention, reduction and protection of stateless children;
(b) Conduct a statelessness mapping study in order to better prevent and address the protection of stateless children or children at risk of statelessness;
(c) Consider acceding to the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Statelessness Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
Download conclusions on UN OHCHR website.