Pretoria - Women in law enforcement and emergency services yesterday devoted time to teaching girl pupils at Refithlile Pele Primary School in Soshanguve about safety and manners to become women of integrity.
The initiative, to bring inspiring women in public service to inspire and engage girls at the Soshanguve Block TT school, was spearheaded by the Gauteng Traffic Police Department.
Deputy director Gauteng Traffic Police, Mmapitso Mothibedi, led the group, which included members of the Tshwane Metro Police, SAPS, Emergency Services and Tshwane Crime Prevention Unit.
Mothibedi said they had selected to come to the school because, through consultation with the teachers, they had identified there were challenges faced by the pupils in their homes, such as drug abuse, some pupils came from underprivileged homes, and some did not attend school consistently, while others disrespected educators.
“We then decided that we should come to the school and talk to these children, particularly girl children, as it is Women’s Month, so we could inspire them and encourage them to become great role models
“We want them to be inspired and motivated to learn from an early age to protect themselves and to also conduct themselves in a fashion that is going to be inspiring to other girls younger than them.
“We want these children to be protected and to feel safe in their community all the time. We want them to not have to experience crimes against children and any forms of gender-based violence.
“We have already engaged the nearest police station (in Rosslyn) to assist us and deploy patrollers to and around this school on a regular bases. We know there is an issue of drugs in schools and we want to curb that. We will come back after three months to see if things have changed, or how else could we be of service to the school.”
School deputy principal Onica Cheze said the entire staff was proud to have had the presence of women in various fields of public service, especially law enforcement, who were able to talk to the girls about safety.
“We are grateful that they also donated sanitary pads to 100 girls in need.
“This means a great deal to us and the girls truly appreciate that. It was great to have them engage our girls and teach them about sexual violence and sexual harassment.”
Pretoria News