The NGO Coalition on Child Rights (NGO-CCR) has asked government to consider instituting a separate taskforce to spearhead the removal of children from the streets.

The call follows various efforts including ultimatums set by government to remove the children from the streets, which have however proved futile.

For example, on September 18 this year, Minister of Gender Patricia Kaliati gave a 14-day ultimatum to city councils to remove all the children from the streets but until today there is nothing to show for it.

Speaking to YFM, NGO-CCR’s National Coordinator, Henry Machemba attributed the failure to lack of coordination among stakeholders, inadequate resources and lack of capacity among other things.

He said the problem is long overdue and that it is high time government explored other alternatives such as establishing taskforce with well-defined roles, objectives and outputs which will also strengthen the collaboration of stakeholders on the initiative.

“We have sung the song of street connected children for so long, and it is high time we solve the matter once and for all,” Machemba said.

He added; “If we could have a well-established taskforce with properly defined roles to spearhead the issue we could be talking of other things. The taskforce should comprise of different stakeholders and this will help to easily build their capacity and enhance collaboration.”

Since 2012 the country has been fighting to remove all children connected to the streets from the country’s streets.