Writer: Nana Kwasi Gyan-Apenteng
Some two weeks ago, teenage pregnancy made a whooping presence in the media and trended social media in the country. Wherever you looked, especially on social media, you could not avoid the bulging figure of 555,575 said to be the number of teenagers who became pregnant over the past five years.
As if we were not aware, the huge size of this number was garlanded with exclamation marks, emojis, smileys and all kinds of social media decorations.
Running deep beneath the surface is the assumption that these half a million teenagers who got pregnant over the past five years have committed a social crime, possibly let down their parents, their communities and worst of all themselves by doing something vile and reprehensible, namely, having sex.
Teenage pregnancy stories in the media often have that subtext of girls stepping out of line, or at best being advised by the great and the good to stay on the narrow path.
However, teenage pregnancy is not just a social or moral issue. It is recognised by international health bodies, including the World Health Organisation as a health issue. According to the United Nations Population Fund, “in the developing countries, more young girls die from pregnancy and childbirth complications”.
In a statement, UNPF Executive Director Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, noted that teenage pregnancy is a development issue “rooted in poverty, gender inequality, violence, child and forced marriage, power imbalance and their male partners, lack of education and the failure of systems and institutions to protect their rights”.
It is the gender inequality and power imbalance with their male partners that is of concern here. Strangely, the “bad girl” narrative appears to suggest that the 555,575 girls all got pregnant by themselves.
When the information about the number of teenage pregnancies was gleefully posted on a WhatsApp platform I am on, I asked if there was any data on the men and boys who made these girls pregnant. At this point, there was a pregnant pause, pardon the pun, and up to now there has not been any answer.
It appears to me that those who compile such data have neglected the compilation of composite data on the other half of the equation. Only once in all of recorded history has there been a claim that a virgin became pregnant without a human male partner and that was not even in the Central Region of Ghana where teenagers are especially fertile. So, the most obvious and indisputable conclusion must be that scattered in the land are men and boys who got these more than half a million teenage girls pregnant. Who and where are they?
Why is there no official information on the fathers of the babies who are born to these teenage mothers? It is possible that traditional and family systems may have had these pregnancies acknowledged although that is far from certain.
And even when the men and boys are made to acknowledge their role, for most of them, that is the end of the matter. The young women have to face the wrath of their families and society and carry what is often considered a shame or even a dark secret for life.
One reason why many young women flock to the cities is to seek anonymity from the stigma that follows them for having become pregnant in their communities.
If indeed there is no official information or data on the men and boys who make teenage girls pregnant, it would be a major failing of our data system and should be corrected immediately.
For one thing, it would provide information on the fathers of the children and this is important for many reasons including their psychological and mental health apart from the obvious financial and social ramifications.
Capturing that information will also alter our collective awareness and response to teenage pregnancy. At the moment, the blame is heaped on the girl and with that come the lectures and sermons delivered to them from infancy. Girls, and later women, are made to carry a burden of guilt from infancy because they get pregnant while boys put their hands in their pockets and swagger around after the act.
This is why in most “respectable” families girls are restricted from having an active social life because they might get pregnant. Ironically, boys are neither lectured nor kept indoors like prisoners. Meanwhile, it is the boys who are left to their own devices with hormones running riot inside them who make girls pregnant.
So, there are two issues here. If we are going to keep data on teenage mothers we must also keep a composite register on their sexual partners. This will provide a more balanced and accurate picture of what is happening in our communities and also share the responsibility equally between the parties.
More importantly, the situation calls not only for moral education but intensive sex education and family planning information. People will have sex; we wish they would wait and do it at the “right time”, but to put it plainly, biology has no moral sense; the antidote to teenage pregnancy is sex education and the provision of condoms and other forms of prevention. We must be pragmatic and practical about these things.
Professor Odehye George Apenteng Goes Home
Today, in the Upstate New York City of Poughkeepsie in the United States of America, the body of the Late Professor George Aduobe Apenteng will be interred at the Poughkeepsie Rural Cemetery, thus ending the earthly presence of one of Ghana’s most accomplished public servants and academics.
In his long career, Professor Apenteng served in many positions at the Bank of Ghana, including as the Principal Economist and Head of Economic Intelligence before he moved to the ECOWAS Fund where his career took him to the top of the ladder as Acting Secretary General.
He served as the Executive Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs from 1998 to 2001 and the following year moved to GIMPA as a Principal Lecturer and Associate Professor.
However, for all his many accomplishments, Odehye Senior Apenteng will be remembered by hundreds of people around the world as the man who influenced their lives at an early age.
In short, to Okuapemman past students of a certain age, George Apenteng was more than the School Prefect he was in 1963 and 1965; he was the erudite and polished gentleman we sought to emulate but never quite made it. He was always ahead of the curve as a gentleman, a scholar and a man whose generosity knew no bounds.
He was a founding student of the school set up by Barrister Opoku Akyeampong on the hills above the Nyaadabi Stream at Akuapem Akropong and became the School Prefect in Form Five (1963) and Sixth Form (1965).
Indeed, he was one of the students who started the sixth form course in the school. Interestingly, he studied a combination of both arts and science student and was comfortable in all areas of studies including classics and languages.
He served as the President and chief mover of the Past Students Association for many years and in later life became the Patron of the North American Branch. He stayed in touch with his large circle of friends, many of whom remained his admirers to the end. Prof George Apenteng will be sorely missed.
Nana Kwasi Gyan-Apenteng
