RISING CASES OF TEENAGE PREGNANCY IN GHANA: THE FYPD PERSPECTIVE BY : JOSEPH TETTEH,FOUNDER,FOUNDATION FOR YOUTH PEACE AND DEVELOPMENT

The recent high numbers of adolescent pregnancy reported in the country might have come as a surprise to many Ghanaians but for some of us who have been involved in youth work for sometime now, and have been following matters relating to the youth with keen interest, we know this was bound to happen.

Indeed if policy makers ,traditional authority, NGOs and other relevant institutions do not introduce serious interventions aimed at reversing the trend, efforts at promoting the physical, social and psychological wellbeing of the Girl child and for that matter empowering the Ghanaian youth in general , will be adversely affected because, facts on the ground indicates that worse figures of adolescent motherhood in the country are yet to be recorded.

In July 2010,the HIV/AIDS and Girl Child Education Unit of my organization introduced a programme called, the Teenage Mothers Education Initiative(TMEI).It is a programme which is intended to encourage Adolescent Mothers in particularly rural areas, to go back to school and pursue education to the highest level. By so doing, we also hope to send a message to the youth and society as whole that the adolescent girl is supposed to be in school and for that matter, it is wrong for an adolescent girl to become pregnant and drop out of school.

In the course of piloting this programme in selected communities in the then Dangme West District , the following facts about adolescent pregnancy in especially the rural parts of Ghana, came to the fore.

A. Culturally we were surprise to know that even in this era of globalization and information technology many Ghanaians ,especially those who are so much attached to the land still place so much premium on child bearing as the most important role of women in society.

In many of the villages we visited for example , we realized that adolescent mothers enjoyed considerable respect ,pride and higher status in society because of the way they were attended to as pregnant girls and subsequently as mothers. After talking to some Junior High School pupils we came to the conclusion that many of the school girls were motivated by the status of the adolescent mothers and actually wished to be in same situation .As a matter of fact , they placed motherhood above education in terms of importance. It was obvious that the attitude of the children was largely a function of the attitude of the wider society, to child bearing.

B. Related to this is ignorance arising from the fact that our culture still frowns on open discussion of sex with children. As some parents we interacted with put it, 'It is not proper to talk about sex with children, you spoil them when you do that'.A woman in her early thirties also said that when you discuss sex children , they begin to behave like adults and therefore tend to be bad- mannered.

There are also those who believed that if you talk to children about sex , they become more promiscuous. Apart from they what they are told in school which we later got to know to be very patchy and uncertain ,children in our communities grow up without any effort at making them aware of the consequences of indulging in early sex.

According to a story told by the head master of the Junior High School of one of the communities we visited, he was surprised to see two pupils of the primary class fondling each other after school has closed behind his bungalow without even making any effort to stop when they saw him. When he asked them what they were doing, the girl had nothing to say but the boy said amidst laughter 'But sir , we were only doing what they do on television?'.

The significance of this statement by this innocent boy is that whereas the mass media and the internet are becoming more potent in exposing children to sex, there is no corresponding effort to direct them as far as its implications are concerned , and how they can be avoided. Many of our youth are having their ambitions destroyed because they are simply not aware of the consequence of pre-marital sex.

A. Thirdly, we realized that many teenage girls are pushed into early sex because they lack basic things like school bag,sandles, mathematical set, decent dress, adequate meals and for those who desired the modern necessities of life ,mobile phones etc.Thus poverty in our communities , is forcing many of our girls into lifestyles that they will under normal circumstances not go into.

Interestingly , some men take advantage of the situation and lure the girls into sex by enticing them with some of the items mentioned in the above. We got to know for example, that one of the adolescent mothers we assisted to go back to school was lured into sex because she wanted shoes from the man who made her pregnant and we believe many examples of this are going on in different parts of the country on daily basis.

B. The near absence of contraceptive among the youth was also identified as a major cause of teenage pregnancy in the communities we visited. Our interactions with the youth brought to the fore a huge disparity in contraceptive use between people in the urban centres, and the rural areas.

It was obvious from the statements of the youth that knowledge of contraceptives is very high but its use is simply not part of their sexual lifestyles and in fact , they do not see how it can become part of their sexual lifestyle in the future. To most of the rural youth, contraceptives were probably made for some category of people who need them and not every body .There were those who argued that it is not in the natural scheme of things for one to cover his genitals with 'rubber' during sexual inter course.And there were still those who believe that one can become impotent by using contraceptives.

Then there was also the issue of affordability. Many of the youth we spoke to were not prepared to buy condoms etc, because they think it is not all that necessary compared to other daily needs. Some few would also like to use condoms but nobody sells them where they are and finally there were those who cannot buy condoms etc because they feel shy to do so.They explained that in small communities such as theirs ,everybody would get to know what they have been doing privately just a day after purchasing condom from a shop,especially if the one selling is a woman.

C. In the light of the above realities, we find it surprising that Government in a bid to widen the tax net has decided to impose tax on condoms. In as much as we are not against efforts at increasing National revenue through widening of the tax net, we are not comfortable with policies which have the potential of derailing youth empowerment efforts, particularly in the forms of reducing adolescent pregnancies and the spread of HIV/AIDS and other STDs.

We believe strongly that as far as efforts at promoting contraceptive use is concerned, explanation offered by Government that the tax policy is targeting only the profit accruing from the sale of condoms is untenable because it can still lead to the following unfavourble situations:

1. It will compel investors to switch to more lucrative businesses, thereby reducing supply of the product.

2. Investors who wish to stay in the business will find a way of passing on the tax component to buyers .This will automatically result in rise in the retail price of the product and discourage an already reluctant users from patronizing it.

3. At any rate, though we are not tax experts we are yet to come to terms with how Government hopes to raise any significant revenue on a product that has a very negligible number of habitual users.

4. Still on Government policy , the Girl Child Education Unit of the Ghana Education Service appear to be without the requisite capacity to ensure that school girls remain focused on their studies, in order to prevent waywardness and for that matter indulgence in social vices including; pre-marital sex.

We are also of the view that the mandate of the unit should be broadened to enable it to visit the communities and counsel parents etc on the importance of Girl child education. We believe this will encourage parents and members of society at large to ensure that adolescent girls stay away from pre-marital sex.

D. Finally, we wish to urge Girl Child centered NGOs not to ignore small effort s been made by individuals and smaller groups to address the problem of adolescent pregnancy in various communities in the country .We believe that such efforts will add up to their own effort at reducing the problem. Absence of support for such initiatives will not only mean a painful end to well intended effort but also great set back to the youth empowerment agenda.

An instance is an adolescent mother we encouraged to return to school under our TMEI programme, and ensured her successful completion of Junior High School. She however could not continue to Senior High School despite the fact that she had good grades in the exams because, all the NGOs we approached to help her at the secondary level did not give any meaningful response. The last time we enquired about her from the headmaster of her former school, we were told that she is carrying another pregnancy.

It is clear therefore , that a lasting solution to the problem of adolescent pregnancy requires a closer look at the myriad of contributing factors and a collective effort by NGOs, Government and all well meaning Ghanaians.

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