The Entebbe Rotary Club president Mr Arthur Byara has called for a mindset change amongst parents and communities towards teenage mothers from discriminating them over the pregnancy, and rather empower them with skills to support their reintegration back into society after delivery.
“As part of the community, ours is to do a mindset change, it is not only about castigating parents for what has gone wrong, because some of the cases here are terrible, but if we have a mindset change, even when a girl gets pregnant, we would like for them to come back into the community and be accepted” he said.
He added, “Just because a mother is pregnant at 13 does not mean she’s not productive, these are people who are going to change our societies”.
Mr Byara made the remarks while handing over donations from the Rotary Club of Entebbe to teenage mothers undergoing care at the Wamukisa Youth Centre on Wednesday, in Katabi Town Council, Wakiso district.
“Rotary believes in bringing hope to our communities, not only did we bring scholastic materials, sanitary kits, but we have also given them hope by skilling them, we believe in this being sustainable. It is not only about the donation, but it is also about what we can do in our communities, these are our mothers” he said.
Mr Byara said skilling the young mothers will enable them care for themselves and the child after birth instead of being sent away from their homes and communities due to shame.
“Our community needs to come and support such centres, we need to have a mindset change. We no longer stigmatise these teenage mothers, but support them as part of us” he said.
Mr Byara said the club intends to have a long-term global grant with Wamukisa that will scale up their care for teenage mothers for more than 10 years.
The Wamukisa centre manager Ms Esther Lugolobi, said when pregnant girls receive skills in areas like hair dressing, making liquid soap, tailoring among other things, it enables them to take care of themselves and the child after leaving the centre.
“Parents should first of all ensure we protect our children by keeping them in school, but even if a girl gets pregnant, don’t chase them away from home, the child may have made a mistake, but they need to go through that mistake with the support of the parents, if you scare them too much, they will abort the pregnancy and can possibly die during that process, which will only devastate you” she said.
She added, “When they arrive here, we counsel them but also teach them different skills that can help them earn a living when they leave here between two to three months after delivery, and we take them back to their homes” she said.
Ms Lugolobi however, reveals that at times they find difficulties since there are some cases in which it’s either the father or family member who impregnated the girl.
“In that case we find alternative care, we separate the child from the mother and retain the girl here attaining skills until when they are ready to go” she said.
Canon Ruth Muyinda Monday, a board member for Wamukisa said the centre which is currently at it’s capacity of 32 mothers, is faced with an increasing demand for care from shunned away teenage mothers.
“The demand is a lot out there, we just cut off the numbers due to capacity but if you wanted to reach 100, you can. That means we have a problem in the country, if we have these ones here and many more still waiting out there. I think we need God’s guidance for this country” she said.
