Stakeholders, at a community based consultative session on child marriage in the Wa West District, have said the education of girls is the surest way to help reduce child marriages.
The stakeholders said vocational and technical education is the best option for such girls to make them self-employed and supportive to their families.
The stakeholders, comprising traditional rulers, religious leaders, women groups, the youth and basic school children, were at United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) sponsored event on child marriage at Wechia.
The objective of the event was to promote stakeholders consultations/dialogue on child marriage and its consequences for traditional and religious authorities; and to facilitate an interactive session to determine issues associated with child marriages.
Stratcomm Africa, a communications consultancy organisation, is implementing the project.
The stakeholders urged government to place more emphasis on the needs of vocational and technical schools and called for the establishment of such schools in every district.
They also called for the establishment of bye-laws by district assemblies to help forestall child marriages and called on traditional authorities to impose severe penalties on adults who participate in such activities.
The stakeholders said the Livelihood Empowerment against Poverty programme should be mandated to provide for needy girls in schools.
“It is common knowledge that the longer girls stayed in school, the better for them to develop physically, psychologically and economically’, a stakeholder said.
Another stakeholder said the high maternal deaths in the area, could be attributed to child marriages and called for action to ensure that girls in education were allowed to complete their education uninterrupted.
Mr Emmanuel Kentor Adjei, Stratcomm Africa Principal Development Communication Officer, said the consultation with the stakeholders was to identify the roles that they play in child marriage and discuss the customary and traditional factors accounting for child marriages in the society.
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