Education stakeholders in Loita area, Narok South Sub County have raised concern over the low number of girls who complete secondary school in the area.
Speaking to journalists in Narok town, the stakeholders called on parents to support girl education by encouraging them to remain in school and give them all the necessary support needed.
Loita Ward Member of County Assembly (MCA) Dominic Shuma said he will support girl education by ensuring the needy girls get bursaries as well as championing for improvement of infrastructure in the Girls’ secondary schools in the area.
“We want all the girls who enroll in grade one to complete form four and join tertiary colleges. We know that if we empower girls, we have empowered the whole society,” said the MCA.
Shuma called on the society to shun the retrogressive cultural practice that compromise education like Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), early marriages and teenage pregnancies.
“The girls too have individual responsibility of working hard in school and keeping off from bad friends who influence them to drop out of school. We want our girls to know that they too can make it to be professionals and become important people in the society,” he said.
The head teacher of Emurua OleRai primary school in Loita ward Moses Tumpes also raised concern over the few girls who complete class eight compared to the high number of girls who join class one.
Tumpes reiterated that girls too had a right to education reminding parents that it was criminal to marry off their girls at a tender age.
“We will not relent on advocating for the rights of a girl child. You never know which child is more talented in education. Maybe the girl child will bring more fortunes to your family than the boy child,” he said.
Research conducted by United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and the government of Kenya in 2021 shown that Narok South Sub County had the highest number of out of school children at 10, 580.
The sub county was followed by Narok West sub county at 9, 590 while Narok east sub county had 3680 school going children who are not in school.
By Ann Salaton
