AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) has called on stakeholders to create equal opportunities for the girlchild to strive in the digital world.
The Director, Advocacy Policy and Marketing, AHF-Africa, Kemi Gbadamosi, made the call on Monday in Abuja in commemoration of the 2021 International Day of the Girl-Child (IDGC).
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“Girls need to focus on digitalisation and technology as such will enable them to break boundaries and barriers to make difference in the world.
“When it comes to Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, popularly known as STEM, we have very few women and girls in the sector.
“This is because a lot of times in schools or homes girls are told that STEM is for boys and not girls, and we have seen that such stereotype is wrong.
“We have seen women go to space, we have seen women leading research in science, it is very instrumental that we focus on digitalisation.”
Gbadamosi stressed the need to create laws and policies that allow for the protection of girls as well as the need to abolish practices that constantly discriminate and leave girls behind.
According to her, laws that tackle gender-based violence, issues of rape, social norms or social vices in communities such as child marriage, child labour, that affects the girls should be implemented.
Also speaking at the occasion, Mr Adekunle Balogun-Ashry, who represented the Ministry of Women Affairs, stated that the ministry was aware of the challenges of gender inequality, hence working audaciously to end the menace.
“The ministry is working very hard, we are formulating policies that will trickle down to the local government on girlchild education and gender inequality that we face today.
Oguntimehin Boluwatife, a member of the Barracks Youth Adolescent Network, said an occasion as the IDGC was an opportunity for her to learn more and share ideas.
The 19-year-old’s ambition is to become an aerospace engineer.
The IDGC is commemorated annually on October 11, to celebrate the importance, power and potentials of adolescent girls around the world, as set aside by the United Nations.
