IPNEWS – GRAND CAPE MOUNT CO.- Thirty-five-year-old Nerrisa N. Sangbeh is now seeing tremendous transformation in her life. She sees that her life is improving for the better because of the hands-on skills she has acquired in the program of the Adolescent Girls Dignity Project being implemented by the Promoting Public and Social Development Programs in Health (PPSDPH), with sponsorship from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

Speaking about her life before you enrolled into the program, Narrisa said, “Before this program things were very though. I had my children and there was no supports, no father from anywhere. I was struggling. But after I had gone through the training, I started producing my own beads and started doing business.”

Ms. Sangbeh further stated that the bead business wasn’t bringing in the much needed profits that she sought so badly. That wasn’t the end, however, as the UNFPA’s supports aimed at transforming and empowering the lives of all women and girls were still coming in to the PPSDPH.

“When PPSDPH introduced the making of liquid soaps, I enrolled again and went through the training. I realized that after the training and putting my hands to work in the liquid soap, I started earning more money. It has profit. When I go to Monrovia after buying the materials for making the soap and cholera, I can realize good profits from one set,” she stated smiling.

The self-supported and empowered mother of four children, said the market in Teinii, where PPSDPH conducts the training, became small because she wasn’t the only one producing the commodities. She had to expand and extend her hands to other towns and villages in Tewor District, of which Teinii is the administrative capital. The district, according to the 2008 census, had 27,460 population.

“I now make more profits from my markets; and I am also a teacher helper at one of PPSDPH’s training centers outside Teinii,” Narrisa said as she blushed while thanking UNFPA for the empowerment that she and other women and adolescent girls have gotten.

She spoke to this newspaper on Wednesday, November 16, 2022, following the closing ceremony of PPSDPH’s Adolescent Girls Dignity Project program in Teinii, Grand Cape Mount County, on the borders with Sierra Leone.

While Narrisa is really a true success story for the UNFPA empowerment support to women of Liberia, the truth is she is not the only woman to be so grateful for the level of transformation that is happening in their lives all because of the support from the “Friends of UNFPA.” She was one of 142 young women and adolescent girls who recently graduated with those life-saving skills.

For Ms. Ruth K. Kohar, the sales agent for the trainees and one of the beneficiaries of the PPSDPH skills training program, she said before she had enrolled into the program, she didn’t know how to make beads and the other things that they are now able to fix.

“From the beginning I never knew how to fix these things. But since UNFPA came to Teinii, I can now fix the bracelets. I fix them and get more money. My life has been impacted,” Ms. Kohar said.

Being the salesperson, she told this newspaper the prices for the items begin from L$300 (US$2.00).

The Executive Director for PPSDPH, Mrs. Queenie Kamara Nah, said her organization has been working in Teinii and Senje, another major town, since 2019 and with the support of UNFPA, many adolescent girls and women have been impacted.

“The project is all about promoting adolescent girls dignity. The project has really been successful just looking back from 2019 comparing the level of teenage pregnancy. Looking at the program today, they have done so well and are well informed not only with the sexual reproductive health information we are providing for them,” she stated.

Ms. Nah added that her organization has also transformed the lives of these women with the life-saving skills program.

On the day of the graduation, some of the things that they had made, including angle chains, necklaces, waist beads, ladies’ handbags and foot wears covered in beads of varying colors, colorful earrings, sash of many different colors of beads, etc. They also had pleasant odor liquid soaps and cholera on display.

“We are grateful today to put out 142 adolescent girls and women. The girls are well informed. Their lives have been transformed; you can hear their success stories. Now they know what to do to protect themselves; they know how to access Family Planning commodities because we have helped built the linkages between the community and the health facilities,” the ED of PPSDPH said.

She further stated that during the program, they worked along with the Grand Cape Mount County Health Team; adding: “And today, they can access the Family Planning commodities without them being judged.”

“We want to say thank you to UNFPA, which has been the one behind the support of building this adolescent girls dignity skills training center, through the Ministry of Youth and Sports.”

Representing Ms. Bidisha Pillai, UNFPA Country Resident Representative, Ms. Maybe Garmai Livingstone, National Program Specialist/ARSH, UNFPA, said adolescent and young people are the heart of UNFPA’s works. Ms. Livingstone thanked the chiefs and elders of Tewor District for embracing the works that UNFPA is doing for the women and girls in their district.

“When we came to Teinii, we saw a community that embraces development, to have a community that will give away land. Chief Foday Massaquoi, we want to say thank you; we appreciate you. Your name has gone to New York, USA. So, from the people who are providing the support, they have told me to thank you. They work in so many countries. They have never seen a chief who is willing to give away land free of charge for such a structure to be erected for his children,” Ms. Livingstone said.

The UNFPA National Program Specialist told her audience that UNFPA is a UN agency responsible for delivering a Liberia where every pregnancy is wanted. “It means that before you get pregnant you must have made the choice. It is ‘baby by choice not by chance, not by mistake.’ So, we are promoting Family Planning, including abstinence. We are making sure that we build the capacity of government so that when a woman goes to give birth at the hospital she should have all the requisite treatments, including the person who will help her deliver the baby so that everybody comes from there happy.”

She also told them that UNFPA makes sure that every young person’s potential is fulfilled. “We want to make sure that these young girls will realize their potentials: meaning we want them to go school and graduate. They can become presidents, doctors but they must have babies when they are ready.”