She said the Ministry had observed that most Day Care centres within the capital city were operating without license, and it was important for them to do so immediately.

The Minister made this observation during a working visit to some randomly selected Day Care Centres in Accra to ensure they were operating within the law.

She said the Ministry of Gender provided licenses for these Day Care Centres through the Social Welfare Departments, “so the visits were to sensitive operators.”

“We are just observing this monitoring exercise to check their licenses and explain to them the processes they need to go through, to be able to operate lawfully.”

Mrs Newman observed that most of the centres visited were not able to show a valid license. “Some of them had theirs expired while others are working without a license. The idea is to ensure that they adhere to the laid down regulations.”

“Out of the ten centers, only two had valid licenses to operate, some had expired ones, but they were still operating. Others did not have at all, and they were specifically asked to close down due to the unsanitary conditions at their premises.”

She appealed to parents to ensure that as they took their children to these centres, they should ensure that the facilities were properly licensed.

“We also noticed that at most of the centres, the little children have been watching TV all day.

According to the UN, there is limited screen time available to them. Being the foundation for children where they start learning, playing together, and writing, we want to ensure that they have the right footing. “

The sector minister said in the Day Care regulations, the use of toys is mentioned for use at that age. Play is one way in which children learn and so when you deprive them of the toys, they do not get the benefit of toys.”

She said the exercise was being piloted in Accra, and once they were able to establish that most of these Centers were operating without licenses, they would create a monitoring system to ensure that this is replicated across the country.

“We also want to ascertain what the bottlenecks are with regard to the licensing and renewal. Because when you register you are given a valid period of one year to renew your license.

Rev. Dr Comfort Asare, Director, Social Welfare Department, said the requirements for operating a Day Care included spacious and airy rooms for the children, play equipment that should be child-friendly, a timetable, menu chat, requisite table designs and chairs.

She said there should also be proper tiling, drawings of fruits, vegetables, animals, body parts on the walls and anything that would help the children learn

“You must also have a license to operate before you do so. It is when you come for licensing that we check your facility to see if you are ready to operate a Day Care. But in our situation, most of them start operating before we fish them out, or people come to report, then we follow up.”

Rev. Asare said everything done for the children should help develop their mentality, social life and cognitive skills so that they would be able to move on in life with ease

“We should also ensure that we do not teach the children above their levels. Children are to learn through play but most of these centres do not have the toys and so are using books to teach the children to read and write. If we do that the children would develop fear for certain subjects later in their lives.”

The centres visited included the Cedar School, Hope of Glory Passion School, Day Spring Montessori, New Princeton School, Mchill Montessori Day Care, Osofo Owuo Memorial School, Genesis Shihijee School, La Neighbourhood Early Childhood Development Center and Teshie Neighbourhood Day Care.