By Ibrahim S. Bangura
United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) on Tuesday October 11, 2022 celebrated International Day of the Girl Child.
The celebration aims at discussing the rights of girls and at encouraging them to focus on their future and dreams.
The celebration was themed ‘Girls! Our time is now-our rights, our future’, was attended by some eminent personalities in Sierra Leone; including Liv Elin Indreiten, Deputy Representative UNICEF Sierra Leone; Yvone Aki-Sawyer, Mayor Freetown City Council; Asmaa James, Station Manager Radio Democracy FM 98.9; Marie Bob-Kandeh Chairlady, Sierra Leone Market Women Association etc.
According to Elin Indreiten, the commemoration of the Day started a few years ago to celebrate and encourage girls the world over to step up for their future.
According to her, girls have the tendency to meaningfully and successfully promote the world if they are given the same opportunities accorded boys.
Indreiten added that around the world, girls have more threats of insecurity, more difficult to access education and to escape early pregnancies than boys.
“So, in order to minimize such challenges and improve the status of girls, we celebrate this day. Looking at the statistics in the world now, there are more boys and fewer girls in schools. There are more values in women than in men. Of course, what men can do, women can do it as well. So, they just need the opportunity,” she concluded.
In her statements, Yvone Aki-Sawyer, the Mayor of Freetown, stated that girls and women should have the opportunity of playing any leadership role in the world because they are citizens with equal rights.
She added that many countries had failed because women are excluded from decision making roles.
“I believe that many nations have failed to receive the full benefits of development due to the missing ingredient in their stories, which is women. If there are 22 councils in Sierra Leone, why do we have only 3 women in the position? If there are 132 parliamentary seats in Sierra Leone, why are only 13 held by women when they constitute 51% of the population. Women need to be involved in decision making,” she said.
According to Kadijatu Fuad-Kabia, one of the adolescent upshifters, celebrating girls’ right day was very important to them because it presented an opportunity for them to share their views that they are equally capable of doing what men can do.
She reiterated that in Sierra Leone women are less likely to access education, participate in politics as well as enjoy equal right to financial help.
“Girls are not liabilities; they are not weak people, and they are not inferior people as men always think of them. It is our right to be educated, to be included in politics and to be engaged in development matters in the nation. Women are not to only be in the market places or in the kitchen,” she concluded.