– youth leader hopes skills training will help
Residents of Moraikobe, Mahaicony Creek are concerned about the prevalence of teenage pregnancy and substance abuse in the area especially among school drop-outs who are not engaged in meaningful activities.
They told this newspaper that some of the girls become pregnant from age 13 while there was also a case a few years ago of an 11-year-old giving birth.
According to them, the problem also exists among young women who did not have a chance to excel academically and whose parents do not communicate with them on the issue of teenage pregnancy.
Leader of the youth group Remington Adrian hopes that the opening of a multipurpose centre would help some of these young people to find purpose.
The centre is expected to be in operation by next April and would offer training in cooking, tailoring, joinery, carpentry and computer skills.
Adrian is responsible for the project which was funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) under the social cohesion project.
The project is being supervised by the Saint Francis Community Developers (SFCD), a non-governmental group at Rose Hall, Corentyne which is headed by Alex Foster and is engaged in similar projects.
The building is 85% completed and Adrian called on the government as well as non-government organisations to assist with “equipment for the joinery and cooking as well as computers to execute in the various skills training.”
Residents are thankful that in 2007, Food for the Poor donated items including sewing machines, chairs, agricultural tools and clothing.
Adrian recalled that in 2006 he and another youth from Moraikobe were trained along with other youths from Region Five by UNDP to do proposal writing.
After the training they were expected to go back to the community to hold consultations to identify the major problems affecting the community and seek ways to solve those problems.
The community identified the need for a multipurpose centre to be erected to benefit school drop-outs and disengaged youths so they would have the opportunity to acquire various skills.
Adrian told Stabroek News in a recent interview that the youths – both male and female – are also engaged in consuming alcohol and using drugs from as young as 11 years and can be seen at bottom-house rum shops late at night.
According to him, “The adults would sell the drugs to the youths but they should stop doing that because it is affecting our young people. When they drink from so young they would lose respect for the elders… and the boys would even take advantage of the young girls.”
He said some of the youngsters would even be seen going to parties with their parents. He pointed out too that “the young people do not use the local beverages like piwari, fly and cassiri; they would prefer the bottled alcohol.”
The drug habit is also resulting in the youths engaging in “petty thieving. They would go into farms and steal the produce… It has become an issue for the residents and they always complain to the village council. The captain [Dereck John] would caution them.”
The multipurpose centre, which Adrian said was delayed for various reasons, would not only give the youths an opportunity to enhance their skills but would help to keep them out of trouble and away from negative behaviour.
Adrian was invited to tour eight of SFCD’s groups after UNICEF handed over equipment and supplies to them and launched Community Care Point Project.
He went along, he said “to get ideas from those projects and also to receive assistance from UNDP to acquire more funds to complete the projects.”
He said the community had raised some of the funds and UNDP assisted with a portion but the money for the construction of the building but the funds have “run out.”
Health
He said the medex who recently started operating at the health centre is from out of the area and he would serve at Moraikobe for two weeks and at Mora Point for two weeks.
Besides, “when his time up he would leave and the community would still be without medex. I think the community should identify a local person to be trained as a medex so that person can remain…”
He said too that the area needs a midwife and it also needs persons to be trained to conduct testing for malaria. “Young people would usually go out to the goal mining areas and contract malaria and when they return then they would start get the symptoms.”
He said they would then have to travel through the river for almost 12 hours to seek treatment and by then the person’s condition would worsen and they would have to pay excess money to seek attention.
Sports
Adrian said the area has an active sports club and residents are involved in a wide range of sports including lawn and table tennis, volleyball and inter zone competitions in cricket and football (within the four zones in the area).
The sports club building, he said is very small and cannot accommodate some competitions.
He also made an appeal to the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport to assist in providing equipment and coaching. “We have talented cricketers and athletes and would like them to be exposed so that they can go on to represent the country nationally and internationally,” Adrian said.