12/12/2024
People’s Alliance for Reproductive Health Advocacy (PARHA)
C/o Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law (CARL-SL)
19 Pultney Street, Freetown, Sierra Leone
Mobile: +1(614) 384-1787 / +232-78-682524 / +232-76-672841
Email: [email protected]
Press Statement
Freetown, Thursday 12th December 2024
CALL TO ACTION – The People’s Alliance for Reproductive Health Advocacy (PARHA) urges the Government of Sierra Leone to speedily enact the Safe Motherhood and Reproductive Health Care (SMRH) Bill 2024
A great milestone towards improving maternal and reproductive health outcomes in Sierra Leone has been accomplished with the approval and gazetting of the Safe Motherhood and Reproductive Health Care (SMRH) Bill 2024 by the Cabinet of Sierra Leone and Law Officers Department respectively. The Bill, when passed into law, will provide a legal framework for the protection and advancement of safe motherhood and reproductive health rights, and standards for healthcare services and ensuring the right to make informed decisions regarding reproductive health. With cabinet approval secured, the next phase of our advocacy seeks to further educate members of the public about the content and benefits of the Bill, and garner their support for its passage and enactment.
Since July 2018, the PARHA has collaboratively been working with the Ministry of Health & Sanitation (MoHS) and other development partners to ensure the enactment of the SMRH Bill. Through countrywide multi-stakeholders consultations, town hall meetings and media engagements (radio, TV, print and social media) PARHA succeeded in garnering public support from chiefdom, district and regional stakeholders for passage of the Bill by signing several communiques which were submitted as supporting documents to seek Cabinet approval and conclusion on both the Cabinet Paper and draft Bill respectively.
During the nationwide campaigns, the outreach team of the PARHA conducted awareness education on key SRHR-related government of Sierra Leone laws, policies, strategies, guidelines, frameworks and plans. The team also discussed key SRHR issues including teenage/adolescent pregnancy, maternal mortality, s*xual and gender-based violence (SGBV), s*x education, sharing data mixed with human-interest stories – using values clarification and attitudes transformation (VCAT) sessions to get individuals reflect on societal myths and realities of life around the issues – to be able to make informed decisions.
On July 1, 2022, HE President Brig. Rtd. Dr. Julius Maada Wonie Bio in his closing statement at the 10th Africa Conference on Sexual Health Rights (ACSHR) pledged his administration’s commitment to ensuring enactment of the SMRH Bill:
“My government has unanimously approved a safe motherhood bill that will include a range of critical provisions to ensure the health and dignity of all girls and women of reproductive age in this country.” HE President Brig. Rtd., Dr. Julius Maada Wonie Bio.
On page 23 of the “THE NEW DIRECTION: CONSOLIDATING GAINS AND ACCELERATING TRANSFORMATION” dubbed “People’s Manifesto 2023”, the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party (SLPP) made a commitment to “Expand access to and improve the quality of primary healthcare services”. Further, the manifesto clearly states that the SLPP government commits to “implement the Safe Motherhood and Reproductive Healthcare Act to reduce Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) from 443 to less than 100 per 100,000 live births”. At the launch of the People’s Manifesto 2023, the President publicly announced that His government would ensure enactment of the SMRH Bill. Thankfully, Cabinet of Sierra Leone has approved the SMRH Bill 2024, which the Law Officers Department has also gazetted, and is now awaiting parliamentary deliberations and passage.
We recognise that gazetting the SMRH Bill 2024 is a step in the right direction to addressing gaps among key health indicators. In spite of these positive developments, we would like to continually challenge the Government of Sierra Leone to do more in addressing the gaps in accessing s*xual and reproductive health services in the country. In particular, we urge the government to do more in fulfilling its international and national commitments to protect women and girls by ensuring a review of discriminatory laws and policies militating against women and girls’ access to s*xual and reproductive health services.
SRHR is an essential human right and a corner stone of gender equality. Promoting and protecting SRH and Rights is crucial to engendering the wellbeing of all people and in enabling them to contribute to the overall development of their communities and societies. Also, realizing reproductive health means that people are able to have a responsible, satisfying and safe s*x life and that they have the ability to reproduce as well as the liberty to choose if, when and how often to do so.
PARHA believes that failure to accelerate implementation of reproductive and particularly women and girls’ rights will weaken not only health and human rights, but also efforts to ease poverty, secure equitable social, economic and environmental development and achieve social justice. Collective action and shared responsibility is critical to making a positive difference for women and girls in accessing s*xual and reproductive health services and is ultimately beneficial for all.
Our Challenge to the Government of Sierra Leone is to:
- Uphold H.E. President Brig. Rtd. Dr. Julius Maada Wonie Bio’s commitment made at the 10th Africa Conference on Sexual Health Rights (ACSHR) on July 1, 2022 by enacting the SMRH Bill 2024.
- Uphold the SLPP’s commitment in their People’s Manifesto by ensuring the passage of the SMRH Bill 2024 into law.
- Break the chain of gender inequality against adolescent pregnancies that result from r**e, s*xual pe*******on and in**st through decriminalizing the termination of such unwanted and unintended pregnancies by repealing sections 58 and 59 of the 1861 Offences against the Persons’ Act, and subsection 1 (b) & (c) of Paragraph 35 of the Pharmacy & Drugs Act 2001 through enacting the SMRH Bill 2024.
The PARHA Coalition comprises over 60 Civil Society Organisations and individual advocates working to ensure that sound policy, institutional and legal environment is provided to improve the reproductive health status of particularly young women, girls, and other vulnerable sections of the population in Sierra Leone. We pledge to stand by and with our women and girls in this fight to “promote, protect and safeguard their Sexual Reproductive Health Rights”.
For further enquiry, please contact Augusta Grace Yonga, Advocacy and Communications Officer, PARHA via +232-88-785334 or [email protected].
THE END!
