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Inside March 22, 2018 .qxp_Layout 1 3/21/18 9:12 PM Page 3 •The refugee camps offer those seeking sex easy access to children The Rohingya children trafficked for sex GIRLS IN their early teens are being trafficked into prostitution in Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh, a BBC News investigation has found. Foreigners seeking sex can easily gain access to children who have fled conflict in Myanmar and now face a new threat. "Women came with a van. They asked me, if I'd go with them." After accepting their help, she was bundled into a car, with the promise of safe passage to a new life. Instead she was taken to the nearest city, Cox's Bazar. "Not long after that they brought two boys to me. They showed me a knife and punched me in my tummy and beat me because I wasn't cooperating. Then the boys raped me. I wasn't willing to have sex but they kept going." A BBC team alongside the Foundation Sentinel, a nonprofit group established to train and assist law enforcement agencies combating child exploitation, headed to Bangladesh to investigate the networks behind the trade we had heard so much about. BBC DAILY HERITAGE THURSDAY, MARCH 22, 2018 WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH Sarkozy faces more questioning in Gaddafi funding FRANCE’S NICOLAS Sarkozy faced a second day of questioning on Wednesday by investigators looking into allegations that his 2007 election campaign had received funds from late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Sarkozy, president from 2007 to 2012, was seen by a Reuters photographer leaving his home in Paris with his lawyer in a car, then entering the offices of investigators who had placed him in custody and started questioning him on Tuesday. That start of a second day of questioning was confirmed by a second source close to the inquiry who said the session started at 8 a.m. local time. Neither Sarkozy nor his lawyers have commented publicly about the latest development in an inquiry that began five years ago. But the 63-yearold has in the past called the allegations “grotesque” and a “manipulation”. The judicial inquiry began in 2013 after the French news website Mediapart published assertions by a Franco-Lebanese businessman, Ziad Takieddine, that he had transferred 5 million euros ($6 million) from Gaddafi’s former intelligence chief Abdullah Senussi to Sarkozy’s campaign chief. Reuters Congo govt to open talks about new mining code DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC of Congo said it would open talks on Friday with mining companies about implementing some of the most contentious provisions in a new mining code that hikes taxes and royalties in the face of objections from industry. President Joseph Kabila signed the new code earlier this month, replacing the previous 2002 law. Foreign investors in Congo, which include Glencore, Randgold, China Molybdenum and Ivanhoe, •Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy enters his car as he leaves his house in Paris said it would scare off investment and violate existing agreements. In a meeting before he signed the code, Kabila assured the companies their concerns would be discussed in follow-up talks to draft regulations for the sector. Mines Minister Martin Kabwelulu told reporters on Wednesday that the talks with major companies present in Congo, which is Africa’s top copper producer and mines more than half the world’s cobalt, would begin on Friday at 0900 GMT. According to a work plan Kabwelulu sent to the companies, the negotiations will be divided into six “pillars” running from March 16 to April 24, with a preliminary draft of the regulations to be completed by May 2. Government officials have already begun work on pillar 1. The regulations must be adopted by the government within 90 days of the code’s signing - on June 7. Reuters World news in 4 stories •Some of the newly-released Dapchi schoolgirls are pictured in Jumbam village, Yobe State Militants free scores of abducted Nigerian schoolgirls ISLAMIST MILITANTS drove scores of kidnapped Nigerian schoolgirls back into the town where they had been captured a month ago and abruptly set them free on Wednesday. The captors gave no reason for their release, but Nigeria denied that a ransom had been paid. Several of the girls said some of their friends had died in captivity and one was still being held. The fighters from the Boko Haram group, some shouting ‘God is greatest’, drove the girls back into the northeast town of Dapchi in a line of trucks in the morning, dropped them off then left, witnesses told Reuters. “I don’t know why they brought us back but they said because we are children of Muslims,” one of the freed girls, Khadija Grema, told Reuters. Aliyu Maina, reunited with his 13-year-old daughter, said the fighters “stopped and blocked the road, they didn’t talk to anybody, they didn’t greet anybody.” “They said people should make space for people to recognize their children and I got my child.” Reuters •Democratic Republic of Congo's President Joseph Kabila addresses a news conference
WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH YESTERDAY, THE Government of Ghana through the Ministry of Defence told us (Ghanaians) and the world at large that it cannot back out of the controversial military agreement with the United States of America. Despite public outcry and protests from the minority that government is selling our country’s sovereignty to the United States, government is saying we cannot back out of the said deal. So, in whose interest is this agreement going to serve? The government of the day? Or the minority in Parliament or the entire 29 plus million Ghanaians? In his press conference yesterday, the Defence Minister, Dominic Nitiwul, said Ghana cannot back out DAILY HERITAGE THURSDAY, MARCH 22, 2018 Editorial Let do things the right way! of the agreement due to previous agreements signed between Ghana and US. “We have already signed a 1998 agreement, we have signed the 2015 agreement and we have already caught ourselves in this net and we cannot back out because this is just a combination of the two agreements,” the Bimbilla MP stated. According to him, the US is not setting up a military base in Ghana, but it is only a partnership between the two countries. “The United States has not requested, nor does it plan to establish a military base or bases in Ghana,” a statement by the US Embassy in Ghana. We at the DAILY HERITAGE believe that in politics there are positive measures that are used to provide checks and balances, especially in a democratic state like Ghana. We want to urge the lawmakers and the policy makers to be fair and firm with us as Ghanaians and be truthful to us at all times. Our leaders especially and all public-spirited Ghanaians owe our nation some level of responsibility and must at all times defend it against the oppressor. But, it appears that the system of Democracy we are practising here is all about blaming one party or another, leaving the subject matter unattended to. We want our policy makers to be proactive and demonstrate maturity and leadership. We want our parliamentarians to be 05 honest with us by giving us the best deals that would help us grow. Our lawmakers and government officials would be hailed best if, for instance, those in opposition will be bold and honest enough to tell us that deals by the opponents are best and need to be supported. In a similar way, should those in government come out to criticise their own policies and decisions they think would not help us a country, we will hail them. This is the kind of leadership we want, not the type that borders on jumping onto the bandwagon in which case those in leadership positions or their opponents are joined or supported by their followers no matter what. 2018 is my action year — Krowor MP • READ FROM PAGE 2 • Francis Abban, host of the ‘Morning Starr’ (4th right), flanked by a team of on-air presenters and backroom staff to present the cheque to officials of the Centre Starr FM donates to Korle-Bu Cardio unit GHANA’S FASTEST- GROWING radio station, Starr 103.5FM, has donated GH¢69, 000 to the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital’s Cardiothoracic Centre. The amount was raised through the station’s Heartbeat Project launched in February, encouraging listeners and wellwishers to contribute to help patients with chronic heart diseases pay for heart surgeries. Listeners contributed via mobile money while others called in to the station’s programmes to pledge to a campaign which was originally meant to raise Gh¢50, 000 to support the Cardiothoracic Centre to save lives of persons with heartrelated diseases. After a successful month-long fund raising and awareness creation, the host of the ‘Morning Starr’, Francis Abban, led a team of on-air presenters and backroom staff to present the cheque to officials of the centre. The Director of the Cardiothoracic Centre, Dr. Lawrence Siriboe, who received the donation on behalf of the outfit, expressed gratitude to Starr 103.5FM for taking the initiative. “I wish to express the gratitude of the Centre and the numerous patients we have to Starr FM. You promised and you’ve more than delivered,” Dr Siriboe stated. He added: “We thank all those who donated and God replenish it. No amount is too small. I wish that people will continue to be benevolent and this shouldn’t be the end because on a daily basis we keep getting more patients.” About 80% of the heart cases reported at the Centre involve children protect the residents, at least. We have already written to the Urban Roads Department, so they have also come round to inspect the drain. What we have to do is to push for the construction of the storm drain immediately. “It is a project that I want to do this particular this. Last year we were able to capture it in our budget so it’s already there. What we have to do is to ensure that the contract is awarded for the construction,” she explained. While calling on the constituency to be all involving, she said, “Before the dredging is done for the construction to take place, we will engage with the residents to be part of it, educate them and let them know why they should not be dumping solid waste in the drain.” Sports complex Touching on the construction of a sports complex in the constituency, the MP said land for the construction had been secured and a sod-cutting ceremony would be performed to mark the commencement of the project immediately. The complex, she said, would be situated at the Nungua Royal Height School area, a development that has led to the MP donating bags of cement, gravels and trips of sand for the construction of a bridge for easy access to the demarcated area for the complex. "We are going to construct a Sports Complex at Nungua because we have had a lot of footballers here, we have had many athletes here, so what it means is that we have the talents here and we need to develop them. We don’t have a place for the youth to recognise as a playing centre so we are coming to build one," she earlier told the paper. Support Nungua police The MP, as part of her effort to strengthen the existing bond with the police, has donated 10 gold acrylic paint, five Azar paint filler, eight pieces of Leyland gross finish, 12 gallons of turpentine, a set of sand paper, a 43-inch LED television set and an undisclosed amount to the Kpeshie Divisional Police Command.
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