THE laws of the country allow schools, especially public ones, should allow all learners the right to education without unfairly discriminating against them, but no law has intervened in preventing the rate of teenage pregnancy.
Speaking as the numbers were said to exceed 1 500 last year, of girls as young as 13 reportedly being expectant while at school, concerned parents and organisations spoke about the apparent lack of strategies to ensure they understood that it was not right.
Organisations and political formations were up in arms when, last month, a 16-year-old grade 10 learner gave birth in a Limpopo school toilet. While there were calls for schools to constantly be on the lookout for signs they were ready to deliver their babies, others said teachers could not be blamed amidst the high number of pregnant girls they had in their care.
Said a member of Girl Gang Martha Ndlovu, who herself had fallen pregnant at the age of 16 while in grade 9: “No one talks to school girls - and boys, about the pregnancy.”
She said the gap existed as parents would not discuss sex, and schools had no sex education. “It still, at this age, remains taboo for mothers, grandmothers, and other caregivers, to talk to girls about the consequences of engaging in sex.
“Here and there there is information about unprotected sex, but it is not targeted at this audience which is at stake, as no one wants to accept that they do engage in sexual activities.”
Now 23 and having previously been a member of an anti-bullying campaign while at school, Ndlovu said she and others from her school and community group continued working towards lending their support to bullied children and to raise awareness on the harm caused thereof, and they realised that there was a new problem to be tackled.
“The number of young pregnant girls became overwhelmingly high, and everywhere we looked we saw small children either trying to hide growing bumps under their uniforms, or cowering in embarrassment as their uniforms stretch and fail to cover the bulging belly,” she said.
Saying they sat around in a community hall and contemplated how they, as young adults, could assist, in a country where everyone of school-going age needed to attend school. “This in addition to appreciating the need for education and knowing that without it, girls remained stuck in a rut, caring for children while the baby daddies went on to become something.”
The Department of Education, in a 2022 plan of action, noted that the rate of learner pregnancy in South Africa had become a major social, systemic and fiscal challenge, not only for the basic education sector but crucially, for national development in general and for the basic education system in particular.
They said: “It impacts the lives of thousands of young people, often limiting their personal growth, the pursuit of rewarding careers and their ambitions, with incalculable impact on South Africa’s socioeconomic systems.”
Acknowledging their role in partnership with other departments to stabilise and reduce the incidence of learner pregnancy and its adverse effect on the education system, the department said learner pregnancy compromised the planned elimination of gender disparities in education.
“Unintended pregnancy amongst learners is not new to the basic education system but its scale and impact have reached the point where it requires a systemic policy and structured implementation planning,” they said.
The Commission for Gender Equality also noted, at the beginning of the current school term, that the school dropout of adolescent girls during pregnancy and in the postpartum period in selected schools was due to many factors, among them limited knowledge about sexual biology and access to contraception services, fear of stigmatisation, lack of parental involvement, and various socioeconomic factors.
They also spoke of statutory rape, older sex partners, teacher–student sexual relations, and substance abuse. But, Ndlovu and her ilk said, they worried that nothing besides identifying the problem would be done, and they were partnering with schools and social groups, churches and other behavioural structures to raise the alarm.
“There are camps, workshops, a dying breed of girl - and boy, scout assemblies we are reaching out to, to break this chain of sexual misunderstanding,” she said.
Religious gatherings, she said, were proving more receptive and there they got a chance to address young people, answer their questions and emphasise on what they could do to save themselves from a life of burden.
“We are trying to get our own (educational) district office to allow us the platform to go into schools and talk, because for as long as no one addresses the elephant in the room, we are faced with a population of women and their children with ages not tallying, abandoned babies, and the poverty that plagues families," Ndlovu said.
She said a lot of girls, once becoming teenage mothers, were likely to have more babies before they matured and became adults, and before they had the means to sustain their families.
ntando.makhubu@inl.co.za