Of expectant campus girls and absentee fathers

Everyday along the campus streets you are most likely to bump into an expectant lady student not one, not two but several of them going about their daily routines as is expected of a focused student.

Today I stand to celebrate and appreciate these ladies who have got the audacity to walk in public, with their protruding bellies; a confirmation of the aftermath of a 'game' successfully played.

Some are expecting to deliver babies sired by now absentee fathers while others are yet to deliver babies of present and responsible fathers. Either way, I am concerned about the 9-month experience they have to go through. Fact being they are students they have to balance between classwork, prenatal clinic schedule and most important the hostile reception they get from people. Some have been labeled as outcasts and immoral beings not only by friends but also by their own relatives.

These feelings can only be imagined but not desired. The short-run experiences of campus pregnancies are bad, but the long-run experiences are even worse. Imagine this scenario: as your neighbour student in the plot or hostel wakes up early in the dawn to study for exam or cat, the expectant lady is up by 3am to attend to her baby who has already soiled on itself or has had a severe fever overnight. At the end of semester you will sit the same exam and the results grading will not consider the experiences the mother student or expectant student has had to undergo.

They have decided clearly in their minds not to go down that slippery and risky path of termination (abortion) and for this, they are wise and they deserve a pat on their back.

To this end I can conclude that it's a nightmare experience for both a campus expectant lady as well as a student mother. They are sending out a clear message to the absentee fathers out there who have absconded their duties that; a gentleman is not he who sires many babies or impregnates many ladies but he who takes responsibility of the newborn baby and is physically and emotionally present for the mother of the child.