By our reporter 

Katakwi district - Ray Of Hope, a non-governmental organisation operating in katakwi district with support from Action Aid International Uganda, is currently mentoring young adults at school on menstrual hygiene management which is believed to be one of the major cause of girl child school drop out in the district.

According to Barbra Amuge, working as an HIV and gender officer at Ray of Hope, most of the girls drop out of school due to lack of necessities like sanitary pads, underwares, scholastic materials among others according to the period of time she interacted with the girls while doing her work.

"This is their first quarter of carrying out these activities but we also have plans of mentoring and sensitizing the young girls and boys, and supporting the females with sanitary pads so that they stay at school", she explained.

She further noted that the organisation will in the month of July start skilling young girls and boys in the six sub counties of Palam, Ngariam, Omodoi, Toroma, Magoro and Kapujan on how to make reusable sanitary towels unlike the sanitary pads they are supporting girls with are only used once and expensive to rural girls.

Meanwhile, Ms. Betty Ilemukorit, the senior woman teacher Ngariam primary school in Palam sub county decried of low support to girls from schools since many of them wait for the quarterly releases of Universal primary Education (UPE) which in most cases don't come in time.

"This has caused girls from different schools in katakwi to be forced to early pregnancies, marriages, and even death since they still don't have knowledge on how to keep healthy pregnancies', Ilemukorit added.

Another senior woman teacher this website spoke to, Agnes Kebesi from Olupe primary school in Ngariam sub county confessed that, over 200 girls in her school have dropped out due to lack of necessities like sanitary pads.

She further explained that the sub counties of Palam, Ngariam, Magoro, Guyaguya are majorly affected with high number of girls dropping from school as they are lured by boda boda riders and young chapati vendors into sexual abuse in exchange of money that they can use to get basic items like scholastic materials, underwares and sanitary pads.

Betty Angiro, the katakwi district senior probation officer confirmed a case of how a 17 year old teenager lost her life and child to delayed labour pain the previous month.

Angiro added that, young adults in katakwi district have offered themselves to early sex so that they gain as their parents have failed to provide for them.

Florence Achan, a 16 year old P.7 pupil of Ngariam primary school, challenged the government to fulfill it's promise of providing sanitary pads to every girl at school.

"Most of my friends have left school while others contracted HIV/AIDs as a result of looking for basic needs thus making it a threat to girl child in the district but I thank this organisation for supporting us with sanitary pads and mentorship on how to manage hygiene while in our menstrual hours which has been a challenge to most girls",

However, the LC III chairperson of Palam sub county, Martin Egwarat urged the organization to always continuously support young girls with information on sexual reproductive health. 

He noted that, his sub county is on the peak of following-up with the girls that dropped out of school and vowed to charged parents and groom whose children wage married off at a tender age.