Wa, July 27, GNA – Madam Abiba Nibaradun, Programme Officer, ActionAid-Ghana, has appealed to traditional authorities to report issues of child marriage to the police without delay.
She said the importance of reporting such issues far outweighs the consequences of any threat of hatred from anybody, adding that “child marriage issues are becoming alarming in the district”.
Madam Abiba made the appeal during a meeting with some chiefs, religious and opinion leaders in Jirapa on child marriage.
The appeal came after the participants revealed that in some typical traditional settings a man could hate another for life if the person dare report him to the police on matters that would bring shame and disgrace to his family.
“If you report perpetrators of acts such as child marriage, teenage pregnancies, defilement, rape, abduction among others that have the potential of bringing shame and disgrace to their families there would be a long standing hatred between the families involved”, the participants said.
They said because of this, people would rather prefer to resolve such issues among themselves at home without resorting to the police.
Madam Abiba said child marriage was increasingly becoming an issue of concern in the Jirapa District and more needs to be done to curb the situation.
She said we were amazed to note during a visit that at the Tampala community, seven girls were taken out of school for marriage.
Madam Abiba appealed to chiefs and opinion leaders to refuse to be part of any child marriage ceremony as a way of voicing their concern and discouraging people from the practice.
Dr Richard Wodah-Seme, Medical Director of the Jirapa Saint Joseph Hospital, said a total of seven girls aged 10 – 14 years were pregnant between the period of January 2015 to June 2016.
He said another 419 girls aged 15 – 19 years were pregnant within the same period bringing the total number of teenage pregnancies recorded at the hospital to 426.
He said total deliveries for the same period were eight for 10 – 14 years and 432 for 15 – 19 years bringing the total teenage deliveries at the hospital to 440.
Dr Wodah-Seme said what it meant was that for every 100 pregnant women who came to the hospital, 14 per cent of them were teenagers.
Again, he added that for every 100 women who delivered at the hospital 16 per cent were children.
He said these 426 girls who got pregnant were forced to drop out of school and forced into marriage very unprepared.