A GNA feature by Philip Tengzu
Wa, Aug. 30, GNA – On her way from the farm one late evening of a Saturday as the dark set in, Ayuo Dery encountered the most terrifying experience ever in her life that left a lifetime scar, not only on her mind but in her life.
The unexpected and unimaginable experience on that gloomy dark evening had altered Ayuo’s life ambitions and aspirations, a moment of a setback in her life.
Ayuo Dery was defiled in 2021 at the age of 15 by a close associate, her brother’s friend, perhaps his best and closest friend since they went to Ayuo’s parent’s house together, sometimes to eat food she served them.
Ayuo, now 18 years old, told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that it was a day and experience she could never forget, especially when she looked back at the product of that horrible encounter, a child, now about three years old.
How it happened
In a meek and rather sorrowful mood with tears running down her chicks, Ayuo said she never expected the perpetrator, whose name she did not want to mention, could do that to her.
Ayuo Dery is an 18-year-old mother of one from a farming community in the Jirapa Municipality. Her son, the product of the defilement she experienced, is currently about three years old.
“I was returning from the farm; it was getting dark. At one point, I saw someone standing by the roadside and a motorbike parked on the side of the road. The person was wearing a face mask, I asked who that was, but the person didn’t utter a word.
As I walked past, he pushed down the groundnuts I was carrying, drugged me into the bush and had sex with me. In the process of the struggle, I pulled off the mask and realised he was my brother’s friend. That was how I became pregnant,” Ayuo explained in a terrifying and shaking voice.
Ayuo said she informed her mother about the ordeal, but her mother did not believe it because “we used to play” until she became pregnant.
The impact
The situation caused Ayuo, who was in basic 8 (JHS 2) at the time, to drop out of school due to the ridicule and stigma she faced in school as a result of the pregnancy.
“When it happened like that and I was pregnant, anytime I went to school they mocked me, and because of that, I stopped school.
My little sister who was in Primary 6 at that time has just completed Junior High School, and I am still here”, she lamented.
Ayuo told the GNA that her father wanted to marry her off to the man responsible for the pregnancy, but with the support from her mother, she resisted.
She had indicated her willingness to return to school during the next academic year to pursue her dreams and hoped that she would get the financial and psychological support of her father in school.
It is an undeniable fact that teenage pregnancy and child marriage are affront to the fundamental human right of the survivor as the twin menace could cruelly deny the survivors their right to education and development.
Teenage pregnancy cases
The issues of teenage pregnancy and school dropout were not peculiar to Ayuo Dery. Hundreds of girls, particularly in the Upper West Region, went through the same and some are still suffering the impact of it.
For Comfort Dakura (not her real), a Senior High School SHS 3 student from Lambussie, braced the odds and continued her education.
She was one of the few survivors of teenage pregnancy who endured the difficulties associated with pregnancy, childbearing, and education to pursue her life aspirations.
Comfort said her child, also about 3 years old, was with her grandmother while she was in school at the Lambussie Community Day SHS.
The GNA also caught up with Doris Donkor (not her real name) from a rural community in the Jirapa Municipality who dropped out of school this year (2024) at primary 5 to marry.
Doris, now 16 years of age, was rescued from child marriage but she is currently pregnant with a different man, whom she refused to mention the name.
While some parents compelled their girl children to marry for diverse reasons, including poverty and fulfilling cultural norms, Doris told the GNA she was not coerced to marry, it was a self-will to marry without any resistance from her parents.
She had insisted she would not return to school but did not give any reason for that decision.
A data collection exercise by ActionAid Ghana in the Lambussie District, the Jirapa and Sissala East Municipalities in the Upper West Region showed that 84 girls, aged between 14 and 18 years at the basic and SHS levels had been identified as survivors of teenage pregnancy and child marriage in those districts and municipalities.
At the time of filing this report, 28 of them are pregnant, 24 were rescued from child marriages and the remaining 32 girls had given birth while some had returned to school.
Impact of Teenage Pregnancy
Teenage pregnancy had a debilitating impact, not only on the survivor but also on the general society and the government.
To the survivor, teenage pregnancy could result in early/child marriage and in turn truncate her education, cutting short her life aspirations.
In some instances, the predators were left off the hook following family, religious and political influences and cultural or social considerations, while in some instances, the perpetrators were not known or denied responsibility for the act.
Teenage pregnancy and its attendant consequences of early/child marriage and school dropout could lead to the perpetuation of poverty in the family.
That is because the girl child could not acquire any skill that could serve as a steppingstone to escape the rough arms of poverty in that family, which led to the pregnancy.
That, in no mean terms, hampered society’s development, led to an increase in crime rate and exerted financial strain on the government through social intervention support.
Need for counselling
The need for guidance and counselling services for survivors of teenage pregnancy could not be overemphasised.
That is necessary because of the trauma, stigma, criticism, and rejection associated with teenage pregnancy.
The fear of stigma and destructive criticism lead to social exclusion of survivors of teenage pregnancy and sometimes school dropout.
Counselling the survivors would help them build self-confidence to participate actively in social activities including education.
Madam Joyce Salifu Kanton, a Counselor and Psychologist, encouraged survivors of teenage pregnancy and child marriage to see their situations as mistakes and make amends to achieve a brighter future.
She emphasised the need for counselling for parents of survivors of teenage pregnancy for effective reintegration because some parents had sour relationships with their children due to those unfortunate conditions.
Mr Mba Asalma Richard, the Immediate Past Counselor at the SDD University of Business and Integrated Development Studies (UBIDS), stressed the need for social and family support for survivors of teenage pregnancy since social and economic conditions could be the push factors of teenage pregnancy.
He encouraged girls who might find themselves in that condition to “forget about the past and focus on the future, have hope that there is light at the end of the tunnel.”
He also urged them to have plans and targets for their lives which would motivate them to put in their best to meet that target.
The SDGs
It is commonplace knowledge for development practitioners that teenage pregnancy impedes achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 4 and 5, which are related to education and women empowerment.
For instance, target 4.1 of the SDGs mandates member States that were signatories to the Goals to: “By 2030, ensure that all girls and boys complete free, equitable and quality primary and secondary education leading to relevant and effective learning outcomes”.
Targets 5.2 and 5.3 sought to “Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls in the public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation” and “Eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation” by 2030, respectively.
Consequently, the impact of teenage pregnancy could trickle down to perpetuating the poverty cycle within families and communities and its twin sister, hunger, an impediment to the realisation of the SDGs on poverty and hunger eradication.
Target 1.1 of the SDG requires that “By 2030, eradicate extreme poverty for all people everywhere, currently measured as people living on less than $1.25 a day” and target 1.2: “By 2030, reduce at least by half the proportion of men, women and children of all ages living in poverty in all its dimensions according to national definitions”
Also, SDG target 2.1 seeks to end hunger by 2030 and ensure access by all people, particularly the poor and people in vulnerable situations, including infants, to safe, nutritious, and sufficient food all year.
Target 2.2 also seeks to end all forms of malnutrition, including achieving the internationally agreed targets on stunting and wasting in children under 5 years of age, and address the nutritional needs of adolescent girls, pregnant and lactating women, and older persons by 2025.
The twin canker also had a rippling effect on the achievement of other SDG targets since the Goals were inter-related and poverty played a pivotal role in their success or otherwise.
Mitigating the impact
Offering psychological, financial, and other forms of support to teenage pregnancy survivors would prove meaningful in helping them overcome the condition’s potential impact on their life.
In view of that, ActionAid Ghana, as part of its programme interventions in the region, facilitated the guidance and counselling for 57 survivors of teenage pregnancy and child marriage aged between 14 and 18 from the Jirapa, Sissala East and Lambussie Districts to enable them to focus on achieving their life dreams.
The initiative aligned with the organisation’s focal area of advocating zero tolerance for violence against women and girls under Strategic Priority Two (Women’s Rights and Decent Work) of its Country Strategic Paper Seven (CSP VII).
Madam Abiba Nibaradun, the Upper West Regional Manager of AAG, said the intervention would help the survivors overcome their fears, have confidence in themselves and work hard in their studies to achieve their aspirations.
Recommendations
Ending teenage pregnancy and its resultant consequence of child marriage is a collective responsibility.
State institutions mandated to work towards eradicating the menace, development partners and Non-governmental Organisations (NGOs) with an interest in ending teenage pregnancy and child marriage should double their efforts in mitigating the influencing factors of teenage pregnancy and child marriage.
Such interventions could learn precedent from the initiative of ActionAid Ghana by providing financial and material support to survivors of teenage pregnancy and child marriage to return to school and providing vocational skills training to survivors over 18 years.
Rather than coercing a pregnant girl into a matrimonial home, she should be offered the needed psychological support to enable her to overcome the life-threatening challenges associated with that condition.
Effective counselling offers the affected individual, in this case, the teenage pregnancy survivor, the opportunity to voice out her pain which she would otherwise not have been able to express to her family and friends for fear of criticism and self-blame.
Punitive measures at the local level, including deterring bylaws should be enacted by communities and District Assemblies against teenage pregnancy and child marriage.
Perpetrators of the acts should face the full rigours of the law to serve as a deterrent to others.
GNA