The Wa Municipal Youth on Board (YoB) coalition, a synergy of youth networks in the Wa Municipality under the aegis of the Youth Opportunity and Transformation in Africa (YOTA), has called on the general public and stakeholders to support its advocacy cause of re-enrolling teenage mothers in school.
The advocacy cause came at the backdrop of the aftereffects arising from the influx of the COVID-19 pandemic including teenage pregnancy and childbirth leading teenage mothers to stay home even as schools resumed.
At a youth forum to unveil its mobilization action plan in Wa on Thursday July 7, 2022, the YoB group stated its intention of mobilizing some 3000 young people to advocate the re-enrollment of at least some 200 teenage mothers who dropped out of school in the municipality following the Coronavirus pandemic.
Miss Rahinatu Haruna, a member of the YoB, told Info Radio in an interview that the group has stipulated January 2023 to meet this goal.
She said the cause is genuine much as it is huge, thus calling on all and sundry to support the cause to a fruitful end.
“And this whole thing is a huge issue, the goal is very big and we want to do this by calling on everyone, youth groups, individuals, all stakeholders involved in this issue to help us in the advocacy,” she indicated.
She added that even though teenage pregnancy has been of concern, the emergence of COVID-19 has further aggravated the menace, necessitating the action by the YoB in the municipality.
Mr James Baba Anabiga, the Speaker of the Upper west Regional Youth Parliament, affirmed his support for the cause while calling other stakeholders to come aboard in support of the initiative.
He intimated that the fact that a girl gets pregnant and has given birth does not mean it should the end of her education.
“In fact, the fact that someone has gotten pregnant, unfortunately, does not mean that is the end of the person’s educational dreams,” Mr Anabiga said.
The Youth Parliament Speaker said the end goal will create a better society where no one is denied education because of a social phenomenon.
The Upper West Regional Manager of the Ghana Red Cross Society, Mr Jeremiah Afako said the cause was long overdue and could not have come at any better time than now, following the return to school post COVID-19.
He commended the youth for the action and expressed willingness in offering any assistance they may need along the processes of executing their plans.
BRIEF
The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 threatened to reverse the hard-earned gains in access to schooling and improved learning in Ghana. Schools in Ghana closed for 10 months, starting in March 2020, when the first cases of COVID-19 were detected in the country.
This situation affected an estimated 9.2 million students in kindergarten, primary, lower, and upper secondary schools, as well as the 0.5 million tertiary education students.
The impact was more severe for disadvantaged children and their families, causing interrupted learning, compromised nutrition, childcare problems, and consequent economic cost to families who could not work.
A total of 694 girls in the Upper West Region returned to school pregnant as of May 2021 when schools reopened after some nine months of lockdown.
Meanwhile, 22,000 pupils across all levels of basic school in the region failed to return to school within the same period, some due to pregnancy.