By Elly Mwaghumba
In recent times, we have been astonished by cases of improper conduct among high school students with hundreds being arrested by the police for being found in night clubs contrary to the law. Some other students were even found in a school bus smoking bhang, taking alcohol, and indulging in casual sex.
These incidences should not be taken lightly by the society as they give us a picture of how parents have neglected their key responsibility caretakers of their children – that of bringing up children in the right direction. A child who has been well taken care of and who has been cautioned against such bad baits will always listen to their sixth sense before they join bad company and be part of some un-comely acts.
Such a role is first and foremost the responsibility of parents.
As it is, teachers should not be wholly blamed for bad conduct and poor upbringing among teenagers. After all we took away from them the task of disciplining students when they err. So parents should be double responsible.
But parents have no time with their children. It’s the demands of the modern world, some argue as they put more time to attending to their daily duties and leave none with their offspring.
Most parents, especially in the cities, wake up early in the morning to go to work when perhaps most of the children are asleep only to come up late at night when they are asleep. In this situation it is house maids that have been left with the responsibility of parenting – this in addition to their house hold chores.
While some of the housemaids may have time for the children, and hence help them some never manage at all. After all some of the housemaids are usually too young to even guide themselves, let alone guiding someone else’s child. The result is, a number of children have ended up being abused by the very housemaids.
Then we have the danger of the media and the internet to which teenagers get exposed to, some at a very early age. Reflecting on what Pope Francis acknowledged that the media is responsible for the creation of a certain kind of noise that has been killing human relationship.
As much as media is informative, the Pope cautions against too much consumption of it. Yet children, without the guidance of parents have been consuming it without any kind of rationing. The result is a group of youth who as we have seen in the recent past are destroyed from within.
Well, it is pivotal to know that these little ones are the future of our society and if proper direction is not given to them while they are still young then we will definitely be endangering the future generation and our society at large.
This should be a wake up call for parents to lead the way in effectively ensuring that they bring up their children in the right direction. This is the only way we can be guaranteed of a society with a bright future.
This needs to be put on loud speakers and broadcasted countrywide. When the schools had been closed a couple of months ago due to the strikes, a parent complained to me that “the kids have no discipline, they are wondering the streets and doing funny things. They need to be sent back to school so that they have something to do and focus on. The government should speed this up so they can go back!” As you rightly point out I told her that she was the parent, and the first place they should learn discipline is at home. Strangely, that’s something she hadn’t thought about, it never occurred to her that she was ultimately responsible as the parent. Parents, we are too busy, we need to slow down, make time for our children.