The
government of Sierra Leone this week announced the lifting of a ban
preventing visibly pregnant school girls from attending regular school classes.
The decision follows a ruling by the Ecowas court that the government
ban was discriminatory and should be lifted. The
government decision overturns a centuries-long tradition in Sierra
Leone: if a young schoolgirl became visibly pregnant she was quietly removed
from school, usually by joint agreement of parents and school
authorities, until her maternal situation was resolved. Details of the
ruling that apparently prompted the Sierra Leone government decision
were not available from the Ecowas Court website as we prepared this
article. The case was brought before the
Ecowas court by a number of civil society groups including:
(1) Women Against Violence and Exploitation in Society (Waves). Very scanty internet presence. "Partners" are Womankind Worldwide, a UK registered charity that receives money from private donors and the UK government. Samples from its website, "...working to support feminist action at all levels..." and "Making visible: The lived realities of LBTQI+ across Nepal, Uganda and Zimbabwe"
(2)Equality Now. Women's rights organisation founded in 1992 in New York, now with offices on four continents. Unclear whether there is a Sierra Leonean "partner".
(3) Purposeful Sierra Leone: It's unclear whether this group was actually a party to the case, but it has been the most vocal in the aftermath. It is apparently an offshoot of a UK based group of the same name that has received substantial funding from DFID since 2016, with a huge budget still in the pipeline. They declare themselves to be a feminist organisation that is determined to empower the teenage girl.
(4) IHRDA. Based in Gambia, the only one we found with significant African (but not Sierra Leonean) influence. Nonetheless it was cofounded by Julia Harrington Reddy, who is based in the US, was the first executive director and remains on the board. Its sources of funding are unclear from the internet record.
At first glance, and without an iota of legal training, it would seem there were reasonable grounds to challenge in court the locus standi of those who brought this action. Whether the Sierra Leone government actually did this is unclear. At a time when the West is complaining very loudly about alleged Russian influence on its political life, and when Western nations have very strict rules about politicians and political influencers accepting funds from foreign governments, the Sierra Leone government accepts willy nilly all and sundry to come in, set up front organizations and spray funds onto the political scene.
We have long pointed out the pernicious influence of the Western Liberal Establishment. A worldwide liberal movement, funded by Western liberals, seeks to entrench its beliefs around the world. People who describe themselves as feminists form a strong core of this movement; they are inextricably joined by the LBGTQ community. These two groups seek to form common cause with US blacks and black and brown peoples around the world, very much including Africa. This liberal movement is deeply embedded within the United Nations System, including organizations like the UNFPA, and has lately found its way even into the UN Human Development Report. Western conservatives, who could provide serious policy alternatives to liberal dogma within the United Nations System, are for the most part not interested in Africa, where there's not much money to be made, and so the liberals have a field day. The core elements of the liberal agenda are: (1) absolute "gender equality" in all aspects of life. No one quite knows what this means, but liberals must have it anyway. However, the rumor that SDG5 calls for equal height for men and women is untrue! (2) LGBTQ equality including same-sex marriage (3) Women's reproductive rights especially including the right to abortion (4) De-emphasis of religion in state life and policymaking All these issues are contested within the West, but in Africa liberals sense the opportunity to score big victories, and organisations like those mentioned in the Ecowas Court case above and many more are pouring money into poor Africa to influence the debate. As far as the West is concerned, it's not an equal contest.
Often, as in this very case, to
disguise their real mission, these groups will masquerade under the
banner of human rights. Thus, in this case, the issue of allowing
pregnant girls into regular schools was pigeonholed as a human rights
issue rather than simply one of school discipline. Amnesty
International jumped on the bandwagon, intervening in the case as a
friend of the court. It had earlier produced an anecdotal report on the
ban in which it championed a "Right (our
emphasis) to Sexual and Reproductive Health Care Information,
Services and Goods...", including "access to ...contraceptive health
care and safe abortion" for adolescent school children. Amnesty
International also called on the government to provide child care for
the teenage mothers.
The government of Sierra Leone in all foolishness, led by a dreadlocked Minister of Education (is this allowed in our secondary schools now?) has allowed itself to fall prey to these external, extremist voices. It has allowed itself to be bamboozled in an ideological struggle funded by radical Western feminists. The ban was one of the few sensible decisions taken by the previous APC government, and this overturning is one of the most foolish by the SLPP government. The claim that the govenment decision is led by evidence is absurd. Nothing could be further from the truth. (1) How many girls drop out of school due to pregnancy? No one really knows (2)"These girls are victims of exploitation and rape" How many? What percentage? How many entered into sexual relations quite happily? No one really knows. The claim of exploitation and rape is made so insistently it actually undermines the feminists' argument. In their desperation to show the girls are "innocent" they open the door to the argument that at least some are "guilty". (3) What would be the psychological and academic impact on millions of impressionable school children, boys and girls, who suddenly find themselves sitting in class with visibly pregnant young women and perhaps even suckling mothers? Have any SERIOUS studies been done? The bedrock of learning is discipline. What effect would this have on school discipline? No one knows. (4) "The girls are punished by being deprived of school whilst the boys who impregnated them are allowed to continue. It's not fair. It's ANOTHER gender inequality" The ban is not to punish the pregnant girls - their parents can perhaps do that - but firstly to forestall negative consequences on their peers and secondly to give them an opportunity to care for themselves and their unborn children. The inequality was not imposed by man but by God.
We at natinpasadvantage
have spent considerable time analyzing
comparative performance of the English speaking West African
countries at WASSCE. Nigeria and Ghana have in fact made very
considerable progress in enhancing the academic performance of girls
(allegedly the goal of the feminists above),
bringing it up close to par with their male companions. They certainly
haven't done this by encouraging the girl-child to get pregnant. When
one looks at the very best performers in Anglophone West Africa in
recent years, Ghana has been outstanding, with female
candidates more than holding their own against their male counterparts. Wesley Girls
High School in Cape Coast has produced truly remarkable results
over
the years, incomparably greater than anything that any school in Sierra
Leone has ever achieved. From what we can gather from the internet,
Wesley Girls, like most of their
contemporaries in Ghana in close-cropped hair styles, maintain a highly disciplined regimen:
1. Girls
are visited only on 2nd and 4th Saturdays of every month.
2. Visitors are to be received at the specified areas in the school.
3. Girls are not to sit in cars to entertain visitors.
4. Male visitors must be neatly dressed. Those from High Schools must be in their.prescribed uniforms and their school ties.
5. No eating with visitors during visiting hours.
6. Mobile phones are strictly prohibited
7. Weekday school routine:
What is this telling us? What we should know anyway. That the way to improve the academic performance of Sierra Leone's girls is to increase discipline and supervision in schools, not to weaken it, as this disastrous decision by the Sierra Leone government will do.
(1) Women Against Violence and Exploitation in Society (Waves). Very scanty internet presence. "Partners" are Womankind Worldwide, a UK registered charity that receives money from private donors and the UK government. Samples from its website, "...working to support feminist action at all levels..." and "Making visible: The lived realities of LBTQI+ across Nepal, Uganda and Zimbabwe"
(2)Equality Now. Women's rights organisation founded in 1992 in New York, now with offices on four continents. Unclear whether there is a Sierra Leonean "partner".
(3) Purposeful Sierra Leone: It's unclear whether this group was actually a party to the case, but it has been the most vocal in the aftermath. It is apparently an offshoot of a UK based group of the same name that has received substantial funding from DFID since 2016, with a huge budget still in the pipeline. They declare themselves to be a feminist organisation that is determined to empower the teenage girl.
(4) IHRDA. Based in Gambia, the only one we found with significant African (but not Sierra Leonean) influence. Nonetheless it was cofounded by Julia Harrington Reddy, who is based in the US, was the first executive director and remains on the board. Its sources of funding are unclear from the internet record.
At first glance, and without an iota of legal training, it would seem there were reasonable grounds to challenge in court the locus standi of those who brought this action. Whether the Sierra Leone government actually did this is unclear. At a time when the West is complaining very loudly about alleged Russian influence on its political life, and when Western nations have very strict rules about politicians and political influencers accepting funds from foreign governments, the Sierra Leone government accepts willy nilly all and sundry to come in, set up front organizations and spray funds onto the political scene.
We have long pointed out the pernicious influence of the Western Liberal Establishment. A worldwide liberal movement, funded by Western liberals, seeks to entrench its beliefs around the world. People who describe themselves as feminists form a strong core of this movement; they are inextricably joined by the LBGTQ community. These two groups seek to form common cause with US blacks and black and brown peoples around the world, very much including Africa. This liberal movement is deeply embedded within the United Nations System, including organizations like the UNFPA, and has lately found its way even into the UN Human Development Report. Western conservatives, who could provide serious policy alternatives to liberal dogma within the United Nations System, are for the most part not interested in Africa, where there's not much money to be made, and so the liberals have a field day. The core elements of the liberal agenda are: (1) absolute "gender equality" in all aspects of life. No one quite knows what this means, but liberals must have it anyway. However, the rumor that SDG5 calls for equal height for men and women is untrue! (2) LGBTQ equality including same-sex marriage (3) Women's reproductive rights especially including the right to abortion (4) De-emphasis of religion in state life and policymaking All these issues are contested within the West, but in Africa liberals sense the opportunity to score big victories, and organisations like those mentioned in the Ecowas Court case above and many more are pouring money into poor Africa to influence the debate. As far as the West is concerned, it's not an equal contest.
Often, as in this very case, to
disguise their real mission, these groups will masquerade under the
banner of human rights. Thus, in this case, the issue of allowing
pregnant girls into regular schools was pigeonholed as a human rights
issue rather than simply one of school discipline. Amnesty
International jumped on the bandwagon, intervening in the case as a
friend of the court. It had earlier produced an anecdotal report on the
ban in which it championed a "Right (our
emphasis) to Sexual and Reproductive Health Care Information,
Services and Goods...", including "access to ...contraceptive health
care and safe abortion" for adolescent school children. Amnesty
International also called on the government to provide child care for
the teenage mothers.The government of Sierra Leone in all foolishness, led by a dreadlocked Minister of Education (is this allowed in our secondary schools now?) has allowed itself to fall prey to these external, extremist voices. It has allowed itself to be bamboozled in an ideological struggle funded by radical Western feminists. The ban was one of the few sensible decisions taken by the previous APC government, and this overturning is one of the most foolish by the SLPP government. The claim that the govenment decision is led by evidence is absurd. Nothing could be further from the truth. (1) How many girls drop out of school due to pregnancy? No one really knows (2)"These girls are victims of exploitation and rape" How many? What percentage? How many entered into sexual relations quite happily? No one really knows. The claim of exploitation and rape is made so insistently it actually undermines the feminists' argument. In their desperation to show the girls are "innocent" they open the door to the argument that at least some are "guilty". (3) What would be the psychological and academic impact on millions of impressionable school children, boys and girls, who suddenly find themselves sitting in class with visibly pregnant young women and perhaps even suckling mothers? Have any SERIOUS studies been done? The bedrock of learning is discipline. What effect would this have on school discipline? No one knows. (4) "The girls are punished by being deprived of school whilst the boys who impregnated them are allowed to continue. It's not fair. It's ANOTHER gender inequality" The ban is not to punish the pregnant girls - their parents can perhaps do that - but firstly to forestall negative consequences on their peers and secondly to give them an opportunity to care for themselves and their unborn children. The inequality was not imposed by man but by God.
We at natinpasadvantage
have spent considerable time analyzing
comparative performance of the English speaking West African
countries at WASSCE. Nigeria and Ghana have in fact made very
considerable progress in enhancing the academic performance of girls
(allegedly the goal of the feminists above),
bringing it up close to par with their male companions. They certainly
haven't done this by encouraging the girl-child to get pregnant. When
one looks at the very best performers in Anglophone West Africa in
recent years, Ghana has been outstanding, with female
candidates more than holding their own against their male counterparts. Wesley Girls
High School in Cape Coast has produced truly remarkable results
over
the years, incomparably greater than anything that any school in Sierra
Leone has ever achieved. From what we can gather from the internet,
Wesley Girls, like most of their
contemporaries in Ghana in close-cropped hair styles, maintain a highly disciplined regimen:2. Visitors are to be received at the specified areas in the school.
3. Girls are not to sit in cars to entertain visitors.
4. Male visitors must be neatly dressed. Those from High Schools must be in their.prescribed uniforms and their school ties.
5. No eating with visitors during visiting hours.
6. Mobile phones are strictly prohibited
7. Weekday school routine:
01. Rising – 5:00 am
02. Working Time – 5:40 am
03. Inspection Time – 6:05 am
04. Morning Assembly – 6:40 am
05. Classes – 7:00 am
06. Breakfast – 8:20 am
07. Classes – 8:45 am
08. Break – 11:25am
09. Classes – 11:40 am
10. Lunch – 2:35pm
11. Rest Hour – (2:55-3:55) pm
12. Co-curricular activities on Tuesdays and Thursdays – 5:00 pm
13. Supper – 6:00 pm
14. Evening Studies – 6:35pm
15. Lights Out – 9:00pm
What is this telling us? What we should know anyway. That the way to improve the academic performance of Sierra Leone's girls is to increase discipline and supervision in schools, not to weaken it, as this disastrous decision by the Sierra Leone government will do.
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