Residents of Asuom in the K Kwaebibirem District of the Eastern Region were thrown into a state of shock when Kwadwo Koranteng, a primary six pupil who impregnated two girls also in primary school committed suicide. Family members told the District Police that on June 11, they returned from the farm and found the 16-year-old hanging in his room with a sponge fastened round his neck. Narrating the story to the Public Agenda, the District Police Commander in charge of Kwaebibirem, ASP Samuel Yeboah, said on the day in question, the family requested the deceased to accompany them to the farm, but he declined, opting to stay at home to wash his clothes. Little did they know that he had some tricks up his sleeves. According to the District Police Commander when the family members returned from the farm they noticed that the young man was nowhere to be found. Sensing something fishy, they tried to open his room, but realized it was securely locked. After a while, they forcible opened it only to find the young man dangling from the roof of his room with saliva oozing from his mouth. ASP Yeboah said the family members who could not bear the sight, reported the case to an uncle who in turn made a report to the police. The District Police Commander said when they interrogated some family members, they were unwilling to explain the possible reasons for the boy taking his own life, since they considered his action as a disgrace to the family. ASP Yeboah said, further investigations by his team revealed that the late Koranteng hanged himself because the families of two girls, (names withheld) on separate occasions informed him that he had impregnated their daughters and that he was going to be a father in some few months. "The inability of the young man to come to terms with the fact that he had impregnated two girls within the same period might have caused him to kill himself', ASP Yeboah suggested. Attempts by Public Agenda to get family members to comment on the death proved futile because they were making feverish arrangements to bury the young man. Teenage pregnancies among school children have been on the rise lately. In the past, it was mainly cases involving adults defiling children that came to the attention of the Women and Juvenile Unit (WAJU), of the Ghana Police Service renamed the Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit (DVVU). That is fast changing, as juveniles are fast learning the trade from adults. In 2005 DVVU reported it was receiving complaints of juveniles defiling juveniles. Children between the ages of 14 and 16 years had begun defiling children in their age group or younger, according to Chief Inspector Ritah Narh, Station Officer of DVVU in Accra. The Station Officer told Public Agenda in an interview that the unit receives two complaints of juvenile defilement every week. She attributed the situation to the general breakdown in moral upbringing, because children are exposed so much to technological advancement, such as watching all kinds of movies/films on television, even at odd hours. Madam Narh explained that out of curiosity, these children are tempted to try or experience whatever they see. "There seem to be lack of parental supervision. Parents, particularly, mothers, are so much concerned about their job or trade that they care little about what happens to their children', she stressed. A t the just ended Basic Education Certificate Examination, several teenage girls across the country were reported pregnant with some failing to turn up for the examinations. The reports said many of the girls were impregnated by their peers. By getting pregnant and dropping from school, such girls have very limited chances to return to the classrooms, let alone learning a vocation. Source: Public Agenda