A new network of Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights (SRHR) promoters has been launched to help lift the voices of rights holders, care givers and people working in SRHR spaces.
The Amplifying Rights Network (ARN) which is a composition of 11 member organizations was launched to at the YWCA compound on Wednesday, November 23, 2022.
Discussing SRHR in Liberia has been an uphill battle many human rights organizations continue to struggle with and SRHR issues or related topics over the years have never been discussed in public spaces or rather considered as taboo topics.
Meanwhile, serving as the keynote speaker, Lakshmi Moore stressed that SRHR issue is not a project or donor funded program, rather it is an essential part of nation building because it is critical to achieving gender equality.
According to Moore, SRHR provides the avenue for women and girls, especially those facing intersection barriers (age, gender, ability, religion, sexual orientation and gender identity) and opportunity to make informed decisions about their sexual health and reproductive rights.
“It is important that the state provides an enabling environment for women and girls to have opportunities to get educated, stay in school especially during their menstrual circle, make choices about when and how they want to get pregnant,” Madam Moore elaborated.
She explained that when SRHR issues are taken seriously by state actors it will enable people plan their families better and be able to access economic opportunities and take on leadership roles in their communities and in national processes.
“That is why we are in a country where we have a very limited number of women in political spaces. SRHR provides us an opportunity to advance gender equality, ensured that everyone has an opportunity to live a dignified and fulfilling life,” she noted.
Officially launching the Network, the Deputy Minister for Gender at the Ministry of Gender Children Social Protection, Alice Johnson Howard, thanked the donors that have been supporting SRHR initiatives and pledged the Ministry’s support and partnership. She said working as a network makes advocacy work easier and better.
She recognized the Network efforts to push SRHR issues and thanked the organizers for recognizing the mandate of the Gender Ministry in promoting women rights issues and encouraged the network to amplify the voice that cannot be heard.
“When we were growing, a lot of things were strange, but this generation has taken up a new dimension. The old people are beginning to understand some of the rights that we were not allowed to talk about,” she added and encouraged the 11 members of the Network to go beyond Monrovia.
For his part, the Director of the National Aids Control Program, Jonathan Flomo pledged the NACP’s support to the Network.
According to him, forming a Network is a good initiative because there are lots of vulnerable people in the communities including adolescent girls and key populations.
“If we want to achieve our global goal we need to have joint partnership; over the past years we have seen lots of stigma and discrimination which make access to SRHR service very difficult,” he acknowledged and pledged the NACP commitment to working with the Network in promoting SRHR Issues.
Making a statement on behalf of the young people, a resident of the Police Academy Community, Courage Taewohn, said young women are greatly affected by the limited or no access to proper sexuality education.
She said though the SRHR policy of 2020 says that one of the mandates of the Government of Liberia is to ensure that adolescents have access to the full range of SRHR leading to the improvement of SRHR of young people; however there are still barriers to improve SRHR access to all young people.
Taewohn said young Liberians particularly adolescent boys and girls face extensive SRHR challenges of high risk of unintended pregnancy, low level of knowledge about SGBV and no option of contraceptive methods.
“The lack of SRHR education information is some of the reasons of the high risky sexual activities, GBV including sexual abuse, rape; sodomy and drugs abuse,” she pointed out.
She stated that over the years several laws and policies were enacted to address the issues of SRHR but the laws that were enacted to help protect women and adolescent girls will not be effective if girls don’t have the power to take charge of the SRHR issues they face.
“On this note, we have come to ask the network members that are already making strive in investing in our rights to make us their direct partners if they want to empower us to speak on our issues and making sure we have timely access to adequate and relevant information on SRHR especially information on how to prevent HIV/STIS and pregnancy,” she noted.
She was candid when she said that girls need to know that they have the rights to say ‘NO’ and that they have the rights to make their own decisions.
She also pointed out that many girls are in situations where they have no options to make informed choices even if they have all the information, therefore as young women they are asking the Network to advocate for change in the situation of poverty and ending impunity for perpetrators of violence against women and girls.
“Many men take advantage of girls because of our poor living condition; most of us lack the support we should have from our parents therefore we are forced to look for our basic needs especially from older men. The young advocate smartly pointed out that this could not be a justification but that was a sad reality,” Taewohn said.
“We end up in relationships that we do not want and we become sexually active when we are very young and not ready, therefore we recommend to the ARN to address the missing links in advocating for the strengthening of the judicial system to make the law enforceable so that adolescent girls in Liberia can live a healthier and dignified life,” she expressed.
Making closing remarks on behalf of the young people, Euphemia Perkins, said the one key thing that plays on young people in Liberia is the access to safe abortion adding, “What we are saying is that abortion care is health care; abortion care is sexual reproductive health care and women and girls should have access to these services.”
She encouraged young people to hold the lawmakers’ feet to the fire by asking them to pass the bill that makes abortion more accessible to young people.
Amplify Rights Network is a network of 11 independent civil society organizations that are amplifying the voices of vulnerable and marginalized person across Liberia, with the purpose to contribute to the advancement of SRHR and promote social justice through evidence based advocacy and accountability by a diverse group of experts for the right holders with the vision to achieve SRHR for all; Report by Siatta Scott Johnson.
