10 Oct 2019

Parents have been implored to play their various roles to address moral decay that results in the spread of HIV among children.

Addressing the Kang village leadership as part of the Adolescents and Young People (AYP) interaction roadshows recently, the First Lady, Ms Neo Masisi called for revisiting of old family structures, where everybody played a role in moulding children.

“Let us revisit our culture and use things such as ‘meila’ to mould our kids where possible,” she said.

She said parents should protect children and be exemplary so that they copy the right behaviours.

 The first lady also underscored the need to guard against child exploitation and abuse, especially by close relatives.

She also called on them to report abusers because if unreported, they were likely to continue abusing more children.

Further, Ms Masisi implored parents to build good relationships with their children to build trust, which she noted, would help young people to open up about sexual matters and abuse.

She also called on parents to unite and work hand in hand with the school community to mould the behaviour of children.

She said it was important to teach girls that they should work hard to afford certain lifestyles because gifts obtained in inter-generational relationships resulted in abuse.

For their part, the villagers concurred that culture could be used to mould young people into respectable future leaders. 

One, Ms Keorapetse Seipone said Batswana should introspect and see where they lost it with shaping the children's morals.

She blamed the current moral decay on excessive rights, which she said had diminished the role of culture in the upbringing of children.

Ms Seipone called on parents to put more effort into disciplining their children and fighting anti-social behaviour such as alcohol and drug abuse.

Major General Gobuamang Tlhokwane called for the resuscitation of village structures such as Village Multi-Sectoral AIDS Committee (VMSAC) that could help address such issues at local level.

He said he was disappointed by the low turnout of men, even though they had been cited as perpetrators of sexual exploitation of the youth.

“VMSAC would be effective because it takes the message to strategic places where men usually go in large numbers,”he said.

 

For her part, an adult educator, Ms Shirley Monametsi said children's discipline was the responsibility of both parents and therefore called on the government to ensure that working parents stayed together so that they could both play a role in the upbringing of their children. ENDS