The Suhum Municipal Director of Girl Child Education, Patricia Asantewaa Osei, has slammed okada riders in the municipality for impregnating many young girls in the area with impunity.
According to her, the Municipal Education Directorate is worried about the development as many of the girls impregnated have dropped out of school.
She said, the okada riders use free ride and money to entice the young girls into sexual relationships which result in teenage pregnancy.
She emphasized that most of the girls are raped and defiled by these okada riders.
Patricia Asantewaa Osei bemoaned that, some parents end up taking monies from the okada riders when their girls are impregnated therefore refuse to corporate for prosecution of the culprits.
The Municipal Director of Girl Child Education said this at Tetteh Nkwanta, a suburb of the municipality during awareness creation on the menace.
She said ,three(3) Okada riders in the community have impregnated girls in the community and have runaway.
She urged parents to invest in education of their children to empower them break the quagmire of poverty in the family.
Between 2016 and 2020, Eastern region recorded some 56,730 teenage pregnancies.
The report from Ghana Health Service indicates that out of this, 1,528 teenagers were between ages 10 and 14 years while 55,202 were between the ages of 15 and 19 years.
In 2016, the Eastern region recorded 11,968 cases, which represented 14 per cent of the total number of pregnant women that visited the hospital.
It was recorded that about 84,851 pregnant women visited hospitals in the region in 2017. Out of it, some 11,639 pregnant visitors were teenagers.
The figure declined to 11,007 and 10,989 in 2018 and 2019 respectively. In 2020, some 10,865 teenagers also got pregnant.
The region saw a reduction in cases from 2017 to 2020.
Source :Mybrytfmonline/Obed Ansah
