Former Deputy Minister for Gender, Women and Social Protection in the erstwhile Mahama administration has joined calls on government to scrap taxes on sanitary pads.
Alexander Kobina Ackon maintained that, the tax is a disincentive to promoting the sexual and reproductive health rights of women and girls in the country.
Mr Ackon was reacting to a documentary about sanitary pads by Adom FM’s Aisha Ibrahim and the impact it is having on the reproductive health on young girls.
Prices of the various sanitary pad brands range between GH¢10 and GH¢50 which is way out of budget for many teenagers.
According to reports, the inability of some girls to buy sanitary pad during menstruation, especially in the rural areas is affecting enrolment and attendance in basic and Senior High Schools (SHS) across the country.
But incessant calls on government to scrap the taxes over the years has fallen on death ears.
Reacting to this on Adom FM’s morning show, Dwaso Nsem, Alexander Kobina Ackon, said scrapping taxes on sanitary pads is the least government can do for women.
In his view, making it difficult for girls to pay pads is “discriminatory” because “it is a primary source of survival”.
The former Deputy Gender Minister bemoaned how after several years of advocacy, taxes on sanitary pads are still not removed.
Mr Ackon appealed to government to put interest on women and girls at heart and make sanitary pads “available and less costly to the people”.