By Foday Moriba Conteh
After a long drawn wrangling side by side with series of advocacy it has been finally resolved that pregnant girls in Sierra Leone must attend school. This came in the wake of a recent ministerial statement to overturn with immediate effect the ban on pregnant girls attending schools. This was disclosed by Marta Colomer, Amnesty International’s Acting Deputy Regional Director for West and Central Africa who said:
“Today we have cause to celebrate as thousands of pregnant girls across Sierra Leone will be allowed back into classes nationwide when schools reopen after COVID-19.
This inherently discriminatory ban which was formalized for almost five years now has already deprived too many young women of their right to education, and the choice as to what future they want for themselves. It has now rightly been consigned to the history books.
Marta Colomer, Amnesty International’s Acting Deputy Regional Director for West and Central Africa. “This inherently discriminatory ban which was formalized for almost five years now has already deprived too many young women of their right to education, and the choice as to what future they want for themselves. It has now rightly been consigned to the history books.
“Indeed, pregnant girls are given back their dignity and we welcome the government announcement to overturn with immediate effect the ban on them attending school. It’s a victory for all those who campaigned tirelessly to make such a great change happen.
“We now hope that authorities in Sierra Leone will develop strategies to address the negative societal attitudes and stigmatization that pregnant girls have been facing for years. This decision gives also hope to other pregnant girls in Africa who have been stigmatized, discriminated against and, in some countries, also banned from school.”
The background to the this sudden transpiration could be sum up as thus:
The Minister of Basic and Senior Secondary Education issued a statement announcing that the 2010 Government decision preventing pregnant girls from attending school and sitting exams has been overturned with immediate effect. It said it should be replaced by two new policies focused on the ‘Radical Inclusion’ and ‘Comprehensive Safety’ of all children in the education system.
It went on to state that President Julius Maada Bio made it clear that his ‘New Direction’ Government makes decisions based on both evidence and constitutional due process.
Furthering that on 12 December 2019 the regional Economic Community of West African States’ (ECOWAS) Community Court of Justice ruled that the ban should be revoked. It revealed that the case challenging the ban was brought by Sierra Leonean NGO (WAVES) in partnership with Equality Now and the Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa (IHRDA) and Amnesty International intervened as an amicus curiae (“friend of the court”).
The organization previously documented how the ban put the rights of thousands of girls under threat. The ban was formally issued in April 2015 during the Ebola crisis. Due to Ebola, there was a sharp increase in teenage pregnancies.
