Sierra Leone ‘reinforces discriminatory policy of excluding pregnant girls from school’ – AI
Freetown, Sierra Leone (PANA) – Sierra Leone’s Ministry of Basic and Senior Secondary Education has announced that pregnant girls can now sit exams but still cannot attend school.
Responding to the news that authorities in Sierra Leone are reinforcing their position that pregnant girls cannot attend school prior to giving birth, Amnesty International (AI) Senior West Africa Campaigner, Marta Colomer, on Wednesday said: “Sierra Leone is a country with a high rate of teenage pregnancy. Yet instead of providing clear sex education in schools and effectively eradicating violence against women and girls, authorities in Sierra Leone are punishing hundreds of pregnant girls by denying them an education.”
Colomer explained that the government’s repeated refusal to allow pregnant girls to attend school is entrenching gender inequality and discrimination. Instead of empowering these girls, government policy risks shaming and blaming them.
“The authorities must immediately lift this ban in line with Sierra Leone’s human rights obligations and allow pregnant school girls to fully enjoy their right to education,” the AI official added.
In maintaining its regressive stance the government used highly pejorative and stereotypical language, stating that pregnant girls should “stay away from schooling during pregnancy because of their inability for effective learning.”
The authorities concluded that it was widely perceived that pregnant girls have the potential to negatively influence their peers to be sexually active and become pregnant.
However, Amnesty International has observed that in so doing the government offered no concrete evidence to support these misleading and harmful allegations.
In June 2019, the rights organisation joined a legal case brought by two non-governmental organisations, Equality Now and WAVES, to challenge the Sierra Leonean government’s ban on pregnant girls attending mainstream schools and sitting exams. The case is pending before the ECOWAS Court of Justice.
-0- PANA AR 17Oct2019
