BOLGATANGA (GHANA)
Ghana News Agency
August 29, 2021
The Women and Children’s Ministries of the Upper East Ghana Mission of the Seventh-Day Adventist (SDA) Church in Bolgatanga has called for the protection of women and children against all forms of abuse.
According to them, society was seemingly forgetting that abuses against children and women existed and noted that children who were the future leaders of Ghana, suffered various forms of abuses which affected their proper growth and development.
Members of the Ministries in the company of leadership of the Church held placards, sung and danced in procession on major streets within the Bolgatanga Township to draw the attention of the public to various abuses on women and children.
Some of the placards had inscriptions such as “Report any form of abuse to the law enforcement agency,” “Implement laws and policies that promote gender equality,” “Verbal abuse can affect children psychologically,” “Kill violence before violence kills you,” among others.
Speaking to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) after the procession, Mrs Alice Mensah, the Director of the Upper East Ghana Mission, said the SDA Church as part of its activities for the year, reserved the day to raise awareness on abuses on women and children.
She said as women of the Church, they saw the need to remind members of the public and draw attention to the various forms of abuses against women and children in society.
“As women, we have to let the public know the various forms of abuses we and our children go through in the hands of some men in society. Abuses of all forms against women, children and even men are all over the place, and we have to remind people about such acts,” she said.
Mrs Mensah said it was critical as a country to protect the rights of women and children who were the most vulnerable in society, adding that prevention of all forms of abuse against children and women was a shared responsibility.
She said the focus was basically on women and children, “As for the men, most of them are able to prevent themselves from some of the abuses so we don’t really pay much attention to the men.”
Pastor Paul Atibilla, the Executive Secretary of the Upper East Ghana Mission of the SDA Church, said the women and children who participated in the procession, were from the Bolgatanga Central and the Berea branches of the Church, all within the Region.
He said children were gifts and blessings from God, and should be protected and supported to realise their potentials as the future leaders of Ghana.
Pastor Atibilla said young women who graduated from school, struggled to get jobs in most organisations, even though they had the required qualifications and bemoaned the attitudes of some officials who demanded sex from young female graduates before they offered them jobs.
He said God frowned on such acts, and called on persons with such ungodly behaviours to regard females seeking jobs as their sisters, and desist from abusing them sexually.