February 2, 2015
But this appears not to be the case at the Countryside Children’s Welfare Home, an orphanage with more than 100 children, at Awutu Bawjiase in the Central Region.
At the orphanage, the children are forced to fast, even in the midst of plenty.
It is a sad tale of poor feeding and forced fasting, open sale of donated items, abuse and neglect, wanton pregnancy and abortion and lack of proper health care.
In his latest undercover investigations at the orphanage, the ace investigative journalist, Anas Aremeyaw Anas, and his team, after living in the home for six months, uncovered a home that has been turned into a business venture by its Founder, Mrs Emma Boafo Yeboah, affectionately referred to as Auntie Emma or Mummy in the home.
At the home, the children are made to pose for photo opportunities to receive items from donors, only to be starved behind the walls of the orphanage.
The devil in the orphanage
The investigations, which were carried out in collaboration with the Graphic Communications Group Limited (GCGL) and titled: “‘Care’ less: the devil and the orphanage”, brings back to mind a similar expose at the Osu Children’s Home where abuse and neglect of the children and the looting of donated items were the order of the day.
After the food items donated to the Countryside Children’s Welfare Home have been sold to the public, the children are made to live on a cup of gari, which is poured into their shirts, and uncooked noodles.
Through their own ingenuity, some of the children ground pepper and tomatoes, which they eat with the gari for lunch. For supper, the meal is just a plate of soup, without fish or meat, shared by four children.
The situation is so bad that at one point the investigative team had to buy food for some of the children who were crying because of hunger.
Even worse, some days are declared fasting days and the children are given mango and water at the end of the fast.
“Today is fasting day and everybody is fasting — the whole house,” a caregiver who identified himself as Sylvester announced on one of the fasting days.
However, Auntie Emma painted a picture of the children living in luxury with choices.
“The children are well fed. They eat and we ensure that they are satisfied,” she said.
Sale of items
While the children go hungry in the midst of abundance, Auntie Emma has been accused by some employees of the orphanage of using the home as a money-making machine.
“One day, someone will come to know the truth and it will be dangerous,” an aggrieved employee said.
The Countryside Home has, over the years, benefited from the generosity of individuals and organisations, including Prophet T.B. Joshua of the Synagogue Church of All Nations; the Metropolitan Archbishop of Accra, the Most Rev Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle; a former Black Stars player, John Mensah; Becca, a musician, and the Kumasi Metropolitan Chief Executive, Mr Kojo Bonsu.
Key buildings at the orphanage were put up by institutions such as Regimanuel Gray Estates, the World Health Organisation, Balast Nedam Company Limited and Wirbelwind, a German organisation.
Several of the items donated by those individuals and organisations were sold openly, as Auntie Emma turned the orphanage into a retail shop. She sold almost everything, including bags of rice, gallons of cooking oil, cartons of milk, bales of used clothing, shoes and bags, toothpaste and brushes, biscuits, drinks and toiletries.
In an instance, she gave out some of the shoes and bags out for free to a client, claiming they were not new to entice the client to buy more.
The prices of the items were also reduced to encourage the clients to buy more.
However, to cover her tracks, she claimed what she was doing was barter trade, saying, “Maybe I would need okra, so if you have okra, you bring it. If I need garden eggs, then I barter.”
Pregnancy and abortion
In rather horrifying revelations, students of the Countryside Basic School, which is the educational wing of the home, told the story of how girls were made to undergo abortion after they had been impregnated by their male schoolmates.
A son of Aunty Emma’s was accused of impregnating one of the girls, while a cobbler from Bawjiase was said to have gone to the school to sleep with some of the girls and impregnate them, after which the pregnancies were aborted.
One girl was alleged to have undergone three abortions. In one instance, she was said to have aborted the pregnancy with the help of the female teachers who were referred to as ‘mothers’ in the home
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