Every girl deserves a second chance after pregnancy

Linda* is only 12 years old but eight months pregnant. On the fateful day, her aunt took her children to her supermarket in Mbarara, and left Linda home to prepare meals for the family. The shamba boy, who looked after her aunt’s livestock raped her. She conceived during her first sexual encounter, which was also painful.

On sensing danger, the aunt fired the shamba boy and sent Linda back to her mother in Kampala.

“She wrongly accused me of sleeping with men,” Linda recalls.

“I think she sensed I was pregnant and she wanted to cover up.”

Abortion

Her mother wanted to terminate the pregnancy but the doctors told her at six months, it was very risky.

Doctors at Wakiso Health Centre IV connected Linda’s mother to Rescue Women Foundation (RWF), a non-profit that rehabilitates teenage mothers and reintegrates them into society.  The hospital bridges the juvenile mothers to RWF. Located in Namusera, on the outskirts of Wakiso town on Hoima Road, the home has two neat bedrooms, furnished with six double-deck beds to accommodate up to 12 girls. 

The heavily pregnant use lower beds. There were also two cribs for the babies. Soon they shall be four.

In the sitting room, the girls practice tailoring, hairdressing, craft making, crocheting, among other skills. In the kitchen outside, they learn cooking and baking under the watch of their matron and other caretakers. These chores break the boredom and distract the girls’ minds from their ordeals. But more importantly, they are a source of income and training for those who prefer vocational studies to formal education.

Positivity

Linda is a child herself. The youngest of the 212 beneficiaries, who have been at this home since 2017. Asked about her thoughts on becoming a mother next month, she reasons like an enlightened adult.

“Pastor tells us that God has a reason why He put babies in our wombs. And that we should always be positive because this is just a stage, not our destination,” she says with confidence.

(Pastor is Edward Ssentamu, a university lecturer, who offers counselling therapy to the girls). 

Nahia’s* story is a combined  irony of a caring stepmother and an abusive father.

“My father harassed us whenever he was home and never provided for the family. My stepmother did not have a job but she tried her best. Sometimes she got food for us from her parents’ home. Sometimes she failed.”

Lack of basic needs

Eventually, Nahia gave in to the temptations of the boy who had become her saviour. “I was desperate for his money because I couldn’t leave my siblings to starve.”

It wasn’t long before she conceived, at 15, in Senior Two. Her boyfriend, in her estimation, 18. The world crumbled on her.

“My stepmother pleaded on my behalf but my father was so bitter with me,” she recalls. “He kicked me out of the home.”

Nahia had no place at her boyfriend. He denied responsibility of her pregnancy.

For days, she went homeless. The biggest amount she had received from her boyfriend was Shs5,000. She had saved Shs15,000, which she used for her transport from Wobulenzi, Luweero to Wakiso District, where her grandmother lived.

Her grandmother would take her case to Wakiso Health Centre, which linked her to RWF since September. Already past her due date, she can’t wait to be a mother.

The genesis

Miriam Nabasirye Kiwummulo, the director of RWF, graduated with a Diploma in Project Planning and Management and a Bachelor’s in Business Administration, majoring in accounts from Makerere University Business School.

Between 2010 and 2015, she worked as a researcher, assistant human resource manager and credit officer at Brac, a credit institution operating in 113 districts in Uganda.

In between, she joined National Evangelisation Teams, a Roman Catholic Christian organisation.

Her interactions with destitute mothers triggered the birth of her foundation.

“I felt the urge to help, especially the teenage mothers through pregnancy, and take them back to school,” Nabasirye recalls the baby steps of the foundation.

“So I started bringing the girls home. But my husband helped me get a home for the pregnant juveniles.”

Now Nabasirye and her husband John Leonard Kyalimpa are the foundation’s main funders with help from friends here and abroad.

Via the RWF website and social media channels, the friends contribute cash or items to rescue needy women in communities.

The day we visited the foundation on January 30, the girls delivered 21 Mama Kits and sachets of diapers to mothers and expectant mothers at Wakiso Health Centre IV.

Call to action

Ben Lunkuse, who was expecting twins told us that she needed three kits but she had struggled to buy even one, which she said costs Shs15,000. Nabasirye says in the early days of the Covid-19 lockdown, the home received more 50 girls but some were referred to other care homes while others were catered for in the same communities that messed them up.

That is why she wishes more organisations join this noble cause to address the overwhelming demand, “Because every girl deserves a second chance after pregnancy.”

The rehab

The foundation takes in a pregnant teenager and keeps her for a month or two after giving birth. Nabasirye says another girl out there is desperately waiting for that bed. The day we visited the facility two more girls were admitted.

“The law does not allow us to be in custody of babies longer than a year,” she adds, alluding to the Child Protection Act.

The baby is given to its mother’s parents or guardians to enable the young mother to return to school. But Nabasirye says 37 babies are in foster homes because their biological families could not guarantee conducive custody.

The essence, Nabasirye explains, is to ensure baby care does not deter the mother’s return to school.

Prisca’s* mother had taken her daughter for counselling at Wakiso Health Centre when a doctor connected her to RWF.

At eight months, she was told it was too late but Prisca was eventually admitted in June 2020, gave birth to a boy in July, and returned home in September.

“It was relief for us and herself because she was restless in the community,” says the mother, a peasant farmer who also supplies liquid soap to schools in Kakiri, Wakiso District.

“We visited her whenever we could, she liked the environment and embraced the opportunity to right her wrongs.”

Her mother says Prisca’s boyfriend, a 19-year old peasant, offered to marry her but her parents declined because they wanted a better future for their daughter.

Prisca was 17, and had just enrolled in Senior Four, when she conceived. But when she resumes school in March, she will revert to Senior Three.

Yet the project’s most successful story, Nabasirye says, is one of a naughty girl, who was an outcast in her community that no one was surprised when she got pregnant at 13.

“Fortunately, she gave birth, returned to school and she is now in Senior Four. She is among the best and we expect a First Grade.” She added: “Her baby is also doing well.”

Studies attribute various negative effects like a higher maternal mortality rate and fistula to teenage pregnancies because the bodies of young girls are often not ready for pregnancy and childbirth.

The 2017 Uganda Demographic Health Survey, for example, published on the D+C Development and Cooperation website, shows that about four per cent of the country’s girls aged 15 to 19 die of complications during pregnancy or while giving birth.

Aware of these risks, Nabasirye says, the project accords quality healthcare to the girls. 

Bottlenecks

Not that all is success, though. Of the 212 children who have gone through the home’s rehab, since 2017, 136 returned to school, 10 are under prenatal and postnatal care at the home, but seven were married off.

It looks a small fraction but Nabasirye frets at it. “I hate it but what do you do if, after rehabilitation, the girl wants to marry her man?” she says. “Some are forced by their parents or guardians.”

Alarming statistics

According to a survey published in the BioMed Central, United Kingdom-based scientific journal, in August 2020, 25 per cent of girls in Uganda give birth below the age of 18.

Nabasirye says slum girls from Katoogo-Ggaba, Katanga, Bwaise, especially those from single-parent families, are the most vulnerable. “Even Islanders who cannot afford sanitary pads.”

Most of the cases are rapes, defilements while others are incest

involving stepfathers, brothers, and uncles, among other male relatives. Two of the RWF beneficiaries contracted HIV through sexual abuse.

Create boundaries

Nabasirye advises mothers to be friendly to their daughters that enables them to open up immediately when rape or defilement occurs.  She says this gives a chance to interventions such as emergency pills against HIV and pregnancy before 72 hours.

Nabasirye adds that mothers should also create boundaries between girls and the family members of the opposite sex.

“If you won’t spend the night at home, go with your daughters or bring in another elder but don’t leave the girls with their father, brother or uncle alone,” she says.

Pursuit of justice

Losing battle

Rehabilitating the girls without reprimanding their offenders is not enough. Nabasirye says 58 cases have so far been closed with some convictions, while other suspects are on bond. Nabasirye says the shamba man, a 37-year old father of three, who allegedly raped Linda, is remanded at Luzira Prison on charges of rape and defilement until Linda gives birth. The baby will be subjected to a DNA paternity test. Linda’s aunt is also remanded for alleged child neglect and torture.

“But sometimes the victims’ families withdraw interest in cases fearing hate in their communities, something that compromises justice.”

In cases where the offender and the victim are both below 18, both are jailed for up to three months, according to the Children’s Act.

“But because we want to help the girl nurse the pregnancy, we can’t leave her in jail, which means we also have to release the boy,” Nabasirye admits.

To live and love again?

Linda, the 12-year old, who conceived in Primary Six, cannot wait to return to school. “I’m lucky that Aunt Miriam is going to pay my school fees.”

In 12 years, if heaven grants her wishes, Nahia’s first-born will be in Primary Seven. Nahia, now 16, will be a 28-year old nurse.

“With a good job to cater for my child, I shall be able to choose the man I love and trust. And I shall marry and have more children,” she speaks about her future. “I don’t want to be tricked by opportunistic men again,” she asserts. Most girls we talked to share the hope for better lives.

All girls’ names are altered to hide their identities because they are minors.

Key

According to a survey published in the BioMed Central, United Kingdom-based scientific journal, in August 2020, 25 per cent of girls in Uganda give birth below the age of 18.

Nabasirye says slum girls from Katoogo-Ggaba, Katanga, Bwaise, especially those from single-parent families, are the most vulnerable. “Even Islanders who cannot afford sanitary pads.”

Most of the cases are rapes, defilements while others are incest involving stepfathers, brothers, and uncles, among other male relatives.