Young school girls are victims of abuse

| Monday January 17, 2011 00:00

 

For Goitse Buang, 'The society needs to do something about this new scourge. Some irresponsible men in our society have now turned this school going young girls into their soft targets. To irresponsible men, these schools are not necessarily one of the socialization agents but their playing grounds. The helpless young girls are coerced into such useless relationships through gifts such as money, expensive clothes, jewelry and cell phones. We have talked about this for a long time as a society and we need to act to protect these poor girls'.

She is of the view that 'we cannot afford to only focus on the abuse of the girl child during the sixteen days of activism on violence against women and children. This tragedy is happening every day. We therefore have to have very strong intervention strategies to deal with it. Lamenting about it and not coming up with laws and different guidance and counseling approaches that will be aimed at tackling this problem will not help us'.

She argues that 'the fact that these kids have reached the age of sixteen years does not necessarily mean that they can make informed decisions and choices in so far as some spheres of life are concerned. We need as a society to come up with strict laws that will make it a criminal offence for people to fall in love with students who are in primary to secondary schools. We surely have to find a way of protecting these innocent souls'.

Mma Rati maintains that 'secondary school girl students are slowly becoming endangered species in our society.

The society must do something about it. It is very clear that in most cases when cases of pregnancy are recorded, the perpetrator of such deeds would be a grown up individual. The society cannot just watch as these heartless monsters continue to destroy the lives of these innocent souls'.

She feels that, 'the guidance and counselling programmes in schools must be tailored to suit the contemporary challenges of the girl child. The issue of women empowerment should not only target grown up women. We therefore have the moral obligation to start empowering them at an early age'. She says that, 'Women organizations, churches, the family, schools and other organizations should come up with deliberate empowerment and guidance and counseling strategies to deal with this scourge. We need to go beyond just talking about school dropouts but need to try to deal with the root cause of the problem. Laws that are aimed at protecting these kids must be introduced'. A guidance and counselling teacher in one of the Secondary Schools in Francistown who preferred anonymity laments the fact that at times when these poor souls become pregnant they are threatened so that they do not reveal the identity of the responsible father. Sometimes when the issue of pregnancy arises, the young girl is told not to reveal the identity of the man responsible for the pregnancy.

He says that at times the situation is not helped by the fact that some irresponsible parents connive with the perpetrator to have the issue resolved 'amicably'.  'Such arrangements are made without the welfare of the concerned young mother at heart. Whatever arrangements and agreements are arrived at in most cases revolve around protecting the man responsible for the pregnancy and not necessarily the poor victim who does not only have the burden of the child to look after but has also been robbed of her childhood,' he complains.

He decries the fact that, 'After destroying this innocent life through pregnancy the perpetrator usually looks for a different young girl to gratify their sexual desires. To such irresponsible men, these schools girls are more of sex toys than children'.

He is also calling for a law that will punish men who are involved is such barbaric acts. 'We need a legislation that will punish those who are involved in these ungodly practices, and that will protect the girl child. Otherwise history will judge us harshly for failing to protect our young ones. The guidance and counseling campaigns must be intensified so as to sensitize and empower the young girls out there who are confronted with the challenges of having to deal with floods of love proposals from older men,' he says.

Anita Lebengo, a psychology and sociology lecturer at the Institute of Health Sciences believes that 'the society needs to do a lot to empower the young girls. The guidance and counseling programmes for schools need to be designed in a manner that it will empower the young girls to be able to deal with the challenges that are peculiar to them. Interventions strategies need to be aligned to the challenges that the girl child faces in their attempts to pursue their academic life.

'They have to be equipped with ways of dealing with this issue of love proposals from older men which undoubtedly destroys many young lives. Many young girls' dreams in life have been shattered by such relations. The society must also condemn such acts and find ways of shaming and punishing any older man who indulges in such acts'.