CODAC Builds the Capacity of 15 Teenage girls from five Communities after taking part in Mobilising Support training
CODACS’s action plan involved organising a campaign to reduce teenage pregnancy in identified communities within the Talensi and Bongo District in the Upper East Region. This constituted in identifying teenage mothers and assisting in sending them back to school as most of them did not resume school after delivery. The high levels of teenage pregnancies in the region were attributed partly to the fact that most parents paid more attention to educating the male children, with the belief that educating the girl child was a waste of resources.
After the MS training, with support from the German embassy, CODAC built the capacity of 15 teenage girls from five communities on legislative instruments, advocacy, lobbying of skills and conflict management. They leveraged on relationships with traditional authorities, health workers and community radios such as Bongo Community Radio and Rural Radio to provide a platform for the queen mothers and other partners to discuss issues around teenage pregnancy and provide education on sexual reproductive rights.
Forums/clubs were created to sensitize teenagers about health issues and the prevention of teenage pregnancies, accompanied with the development of education materials to respond to negative cultural and societal stereotypes about educating girls.
The LFR training motivated CODAC to monetize their expertise and products through building internal capacities. Through this training, CODAC supported the queen mothers through skill transfer to mobilise resources from various stakeholders. As a result, one of the queen mothers mobilised resources for the construction of a community borehole. This was done in less than a month.
CODAC is however facing challenges in getting the media men to be committed and engaging the traditional council in rallying behind the queen mothers. Working with the queen mothers is also one of the difficulties faced by the organisation as most of them had low self-esteem which was hindering them from communicating effectively through the various channels identified. These queen mothers also had no source of economic empowerment and therefore were unable to put together the resources they would have loved to. The inability to gain visibility due to the absence of a proper documentation and communication strategy greatly contributed to implementation challenges.
In the quest to find solutions to these challenges, WACSI proposed to support CODAC with the adoption of technology products and the development of a communication strategy and action plan and advised that the organisation have a TechSoup package discussion with the Executive Director.
About the author
Mabel is a bilingual Cameroonian and holder of a bachelor's degree in Chemistry from the University of Buea. She is currently awaiting defense for her master's degree in Quality Control and Management. She has gained experience over the years as a volunteer and has worked in some local Non-Governmental Organisations in the domain of community development. She is passionate about empowering young girls.
At WACSI, she works with the Capacity Development unit as the Programme Assistant where she provides support in the facilitation of training sessions.
