International Day of the Girl Child
The United Nations has celebrated the Girl Child annually on the 11th of October from the year 2012 till date and this year’s theme is; GirlForce: Unscripted and Unstoppable. Here is the charge from UN Secretary-General: “We need to uphold the equal rights, voices and influence of girls in our families, communities and nations. Girls can be powerful agents of change and nothing should keep them from participating fully in all areas of life.”
The truth is, a lot effort has been made towards encouraging and enabling the girl child, nevertheless there is still room for more improvement and we can do better. In some part of our country and the world, a girl is forced into marriage at such an early age, some laws that permits a father to marry his own early-teen daughter are being proposed. Statistics also shows that worldwide and collectively, girls ages 5 to 14 spend over 160 million hours more on household chores than boys of the same age do. According to USAID More than 62 million girls around the world had no access to education, globally one in four girls are married before the age 18. All these may appear as numbers…imagine one of this girls has a name and a close relation of yours, what will your disposition be?
As we celebrate this day, we are thankful for the strides taking to aid the girl child and all the achievements made so far. We also look on with high expectations for a day when all the problems faced by the girl child is solved. Picture how well our homes are because they are managed by a single well-trained girl child who grew up. How much more will our society and economy illuminate if the girl child are given liberal responsibilities at various strategic points. Not excluding the boy child, imagine what our world will look like if the boy child is disciplined and held in the same high standards as the girl child! Our hopes are that this day will cause you to reflect on your immediate environment and spur you on the little changes you can enact. Celebrate the victories achieved so far and light up the emblems that once burned in your heart into a blazing fire! Happy International Day of the Girl Child!