No fewer than 1000 church girls are to be taken out from the streets of Cross River State by a Non Governmental Organization (NGO).
In an interactive session with newsmen in Calabar on the issue, the Executive Director of the NGO (Church Girl Foundation), Gedah Etefia, reeled out the foundation’s plan to improve the lots of the Girl Child in the state.
Etafia stated that the NGO was poised to lift talented girls living in abject poverty through life mentorship and skill acquisition program to allow the girls become self-sustaining and reliant after they would have been picked by the NGO.
She said that after receiving the training, the girls would know how to unlock the potentials inherent in them.
According to Etefia, the training and mentorship will help to empower, correct and educate the girl child through mentorship, skill acquisition, awareness campaigns, seminars/workshops, and also enable them develop events, programs and platforms to help them  promote their skills, values, styles and patterns.
According to her, “the major challenge facing the girl is the lack of growth and mentorship. Most of the challenges the girl child faces is the absence of mentorship, particularly for the girl who grew up in church.
“Our motivation is the discovery that there are several challenges facing the Church Girl. We have several people who preach to church girls but there is really no one who comes close to them to hear what their challenges are and how they can surmount those challenges.
“The Church girl has dreams and does not know how to accomplish them. The few who dare to try back out after many failed attempts because of the lack of mentorship and no support. A small number of them succeed but only after compromising standards and most times never return to church for fear of being judged or ignored,” she said.

Friday Nwagbara