At least 9,011 Tanzanian school girls were impregnated between January 2021 and January 2022, the country’s Deputy Minister for Education, Science and Technology Omary Kipanga told parliament in Dodoma last week.
He said out of the 9,011 impregnated school girls, 1,554 were in primary schools and 7,457 were in secondary schools. Kipanga also said 1,692 secondary school girls resumed their classes after giving birth. “The government is still assessing to establish the number of primary school girls that has been reinstated after they had given birth,” he told the House.
Kipanga was responding to Hawa Mchata, a Member of Parliament on women’s special seats, who had pressed the government to reveal the number of impregnated school girls that have been reinstated. Mchata asked the question after President Samia Suluhu Hassan lifted a ban in 2021 on school girls that were discontinued from pursuing their education dreams after getting pregnant.
