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The wife of the Vice President, Mrs. Matilda Amissah - Arthur ,has endorsed an initiative aimed at educating disadvantaged head porters and displaced children in the country initiated by the Pamela E. Bridgewater Project.

Mrs. Amissah-Arthur gave the advice on Wednesday when she donated educational materials to some children of head porters numbering about 10 as part of the Pamela Bridgewater project that is aimed at   providing future to head porters through education, advocacy, protection, research etc. so as to shift the cycle of poverty.

The campaign to enroll the head porters, who are commonly referred to as kayayei, is dubbed 'Sponsor Kayayei to School Program'. It is aimed at sponsoring the education of under-aged girls, who have migrated from the northern sectors of the country to the south in search of menial jobs.

The 'Sponsor Kayayei to School Program' would also enroll baby-sitters of wards of kayayei’s and other displaced children, who are left to roam the streets of suburbs in Accra without any hope of ever being educated.

She called on corporate institutions and individuals to join the campaign to give education to the young girls to make them responsible citizens in the future.

  Mrs. Matilda Amissah-Arthur used the occasion to call on the children the country to take their lessons seriously because education is critical and key in nation building.

She called on the head porters to also contribute their widow’s mite as a sense of belonging to the children as others help. She also advised them to put a stop to giving birth at short intervals in other to space the children in order not to burden on them.

The items included a laptops and an undisclosed number of story books, text books, exercise books, to support the children of kayayei  to learn with an undisclosed amount of money to the children .

Mrs. Amissah Arthur advised the children not to allow deprivation to be an obstacle to their education and put in extra effort in learning in order to help add value to their lives.

She urged the children to cultivate the habit of reading, saying “as you read, you learn good values and principles, which can help you, go far”.

She also urged them to dream big in order for them to become responsible and better citizens in the future.

The Second Lady advised the head porters to pay attention to the children of their education, adding that the only way to secure a better future for their children is through education.

The Project Director of the Pamela Bridgewater Project,  Mr Yahaya Alhassan, announced that  by September 2016 work on the (kayayei resettlement  centre, would be ready .He said it  also has a clinic, made available not just for use by kayayei, but by others like the Kejetia market women.

 The Pamela Bridgewater Project, which is concerned with the welfare of female porters, (kayayei) has been in existence for some years now with the aim of helping female porters and their children.