Minister of Education and Training Mokhele Moletsane
Nthatuoa Koeshe/Tokelo Rasephei
THE Ministry of Education and Training is finalising a comprehensive school health and nutrition policy to serve as a guideline on reproductive health, early marriages, unintended pregnancies and gender based violence.
Minister of Education and Training, Mokhele Moletsane, recently said the policy would soon be presented to cabinet for approval.
Mr Moletsane disclosed this during the recent national intergenerational dialogue programme at the Lesotho National Convention Centre in Maseru.
The dialogue was the culmination of three Southern African regional dialogues on issues of reproductive health, early marriage, unintended pregnancies and gender based violence.
Mr Moletsane said in 2013 the ministry affirmed a ministerial commitment on comprehensive health services for adolescents and young people in Eastern and Southern African countries that is now referred to as the ESA Commitment.
In the ESA Commitment, the regional ministers pledged to among other things, ensure that comprehensive sexual education curriculum frameworks were in place and being implemented in each of the 20 countries.
They also pledged to ensure a 50 percent reduction in the number of adolescents who lacked access to friendly sexual and reproductive health services that are equitable, accessible, acceptable, appropriate and effective.
They also committed to eliminating all new HIV infections amongst adolescents between the ages of 10 to 25.
“Accordingly, bulling, exploitation, abuse and violence are not to be tolerated in schools and it is the responsibility of all the school community to ensure a safe learning environment for all,” Moletsane said.
“As a way of engaging with community stakeholders, the ministry is currently developing a manual for capacity building of school boards as a link between the school and the community on prevention and management of school related gender based violence.”
He further said that the policy directed that there should health education which will include menstruation and menstrual hygiene management, sexual and reproductive health including contraception, early and unintended pregnancy, and prevention of mother to child transmission and voluntary medical male circumcision, sexual, physical and emotional abuse.
He also said the collaboration between the ministries of education and training and that of health will be strengthened through this policy, so that some services can be offered in schools as that will help bring services to where young people can easily access them.
“The ministry is working hand in glove with other partners to conduct a situational analysis on the status of pregnancies in our schools,” Mr Moletsane said.
For his part, the United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator and the Resident Representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Lesotho, Salvator Niyonzima, said these issues had an impact on young people’s lives and the country as a whole. He indicated that the dialogues were important in the prevention of high HIV prevalence among women specifically teenage pregnancy in high schools.
“Early pregnancy is an issue in health because young females have children before full development leading to high labour complications,” Mr Niyonzima said, adding that “the dialogue will help to work on the developmental issues such as health and ensuring healthy lives to the adolescents”.
He said investment in quality education that includes comprehensive, life-skills based sexuality education fulfills the right to education while also contributing to the wellbeing and future quality of life should be the main goals for the country.
“Adolescents aged 10 to 24 make up 33 percent of the population in the region. Investment in health and education will, together with the resulting reduction in fertility rates, contribute to the realisation of demographic dividends in the future,” Mr Niyonzima said.
He said education and guidance should be available to adolescents as they transition to becoming young adults. He said most adolescents and young people reported that they were not sexually active until age 18.
He however, explained that the Demographic and Health Survey indicated that a significant number of adolescents have their first sexual experience at an early age of 15 and in many cases do not use any form of protection to prevent pregnancy or sexually transmitted infections.
Mr Niyonzima said young people should be supported to delay sexual activity and ensure that it is voluntary and protected, adding that the dialogue came at an ideal time when young people go through many challenges in their lives.
