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MANZINI – Some pupils in the Manzini Region say they engage in sex for money in order to keep up with the latest trends in fashion.

They said this was the only way they could generate money, because their families could not afford them the lifestyle they fancied.

A study investigating reasons for early sexual debut among in-school youth in the country, reported that its participants (pupils) mentioned that coming from a poor household, either as a result of the death of a parent or breadwinner, or due to their parents being unemployed, forced them to engage in transactional sexual relationships and intergenerational sexual partnerships.

This is despite that in such partnerships it is difficult for them to refuse sex. The report stated that the pupils also mentioned that coming from a child-headed home and staying alone afforded them ample unsupervised time, and that staying in a big house or in one-room flats also put them at risk of early sexul debut.

“It is the poor family background, such as when the parents have died or are not working. We start having relationships early so that we can get money. However, for the person to give me money, I need to have sex with him because I have to satisfy his desires,” said one female participant.

Another purported that peer pressure arising from seeing her friends having fun at nightclubs and returning with cash propelled them to early sexual debut. “(They) tell us that ‘the man just touched me and gave me money, I gave it (had sex) to him just this once in the bushes and got E500. Every day, they will be counting cash and we end up trying it too and find ourselves having sex at a young age,” said another girl.

On the other hand, some of the boys staying alone claimed that their freedom made it easy for them to bring girls to their houses at any time, as there was no person to reprimand them. “You find that we all live in one big house, or rented flats, or staff houses and there is a bathroom and we come across each other along the passages.

“For example, I sometimes see my sister covered only in a towel and my mother coming out of her bedroom wearing her gown only; mind you, I am now a grown-up boy; I will start imagining things and thinking about what I saw. Obviously, I will want to go and experience it somewhere,” reads the report in part.

Parents

It was reported that the participants mentioned that parents did not monitor what they did during their spare time, especially working parents. They supposed that their parents barely had time with them because they either returned late from work every day or were always on their laptops or gadgets, even when they were in the house.

“Some parents don’t care about when the child left home, when they returned, or how many days they have been away. For example, I can report to my parents that I am going to study at my friend’s place, and ask to sleep over there. My parent would not even make a follow-up to confirm if I really went there. At times you find that our parents work in towns, and we live with our grandparents; they don’t monitor us, so we go out and do as we please,” a female participant submitted.