C.E.O Angered By NGO Awareness In High School

C.E.O Angered By Ngo Awareness In Public High School

The C.E.O of the Ministry of Education, Women’s Affairs and Culture (MEWAC), Mr. Viliami Fukofuka has expressed dissatisfaction with an NGO whose work is to end violence against women and children running an awareness program at a Tonga High school assembly. The dissatisfaction was seconded by the Deputy Director of Tonga High, Mr. Peaua Heimuli.

The Tonga High School Principal and and other staff, as a consequence, underwent questioning by the Deputy Director after the newly established NGO – the Women and Children Crisis Centre- ran an awareness program to over 1000 students at the Tonga High School Assembly earlier this week on Tuesday morning.
The WCCC had received an official invitation to conduct an awareness program to be delivered at the school assembly where the WCCC Coordinator, ‘Ofa-Ki-Levuka Guttenbeil-Likiliki, delegated seven of her staff to carry out the awareness session with the school. “We were delighted to receive the invitation because Tonga High School has one of the biggest student rolls in the country. It is also co-ed so capturing an audience of this size on our issue, especially among students, is a valuable opportunity” said Guttenbeil-Likiliki.

The awareness session engaged a group of interactive students who were separated into gendered and senior / junior groups to let them know about the services and support that the WCCC provides and how they as students can access the services.

Following the awareness session which took approximately one hour, the Head Prefect, on behalf of the school announced her sincere gratitude to the WCCC team, exclaiming “this awareness session is so valuable to all of us students and we are so happy that you have shared with us today, although the time is short we hope that you will be able to come back and carry out some more awareness programs with our school.”

WCCC Counselor, Leti Siliva said that “the separation of students into three groups based on gender and senior/primary groups was essential so that we as staff could deliver according to the age bracket and taking into account the Tongan cultural constraints talking to girls and boys at the same time – so we were sensible in our methodology.”
The WCCC performed the awareness in light of the Government of Tonga’s ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) in 1995, which includes:
Article 17 - state parties shall ensure that the child has access to information and material from a diversity of national and international sources, especially those aimed at the promotion of his or her social, spiritual and moral well-being and physical and mental health.

Article 19 - States Parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child.

WCCC Coordinator Guttenbeil-Likiliki points out how important it is that the youth know about services available to them. “Unfortunately, although the informative session was very popular and well received, it may have been our last session with the school and it’s a shame because statistics show that the number of teen age pregnancies, STI’s, family violence, child sexual abuse and sexual assault is continuing to rise and programs such as the one we carried out at Tonga High is so critical and at the same time empowering for the young students to make better decisions about their safety and wellbeing”

She adds “In light of the Convention of the rights of the Child, which Tonga has ratified, the Centre genuinely believes that students of Tonga High, like all students, have a right to be informed - the centre supports the initiative of the THS Principal and his staff to increase the understanding about violence, and applauds them for playing thier part in imporving the safety of thier students".

This is not the first time that Tonga High School has had NGO groups providing awareness during their assembly. The Tonga Family Health Association and Tonga Trust, both of whom have had no problems from administration, have been providing awareness during the school assemblies over the past years.

“Why should the WCCC be treated any differently to other NGOs?” said Guttenbeil-Likiliki.

ends

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