Valentine’s day celebration is observed on February 14, every year across the globe. It is a day set aside to show affection and love to all and sundry. Some people even use the opportunity to reach out to prison inmates, orphans and widows. Others also organise street parties for homeless and street children.

The celebration is no more about showcasing genuine love in recent times. This could be seen in the numerous shortage of condoms in most pharmacy shops in the build-up to the celebration.

Some youth have decided to change its rhythm just to suit their interest.

This brings me to what many young girls go through in the hands of married men and boys all in the name of Valentine. It has become as though a license to fornicate anytime it approaches. More often than not, young men and women experience what is termed as ‘broken heart’ in the process.

This generation has a long way to go because, it will interest you to know that, there are few young people who are virgins today. It doesn’t emanate from lack of parental control or broken homes to an extent. It’s simply the rate at which the social media teaches nudity each and every now and then.

The question is ‘where is the control mechanism’? There are many beautiful ladies I see every day who wouldn’t engage in any sexual encounter with men.

This is because they know their worth. However, their counterparts from the slay queen fraternity see immorality as a way to amass wealth within the shortest possible time.

In view of this, they constantly engage in mannerism to achieve this aim.

Many succeed in the process whereas others also end up being used for rituals. But does this deter other members of the slay queen fraternity to desist from this act? Hell no! The trend continues and it’s become a norm to engage in sexual promiscuity in my country today. When this continues, our Covid-19 cases will increase because no one sanitizes his or her partner before, during and after the session.

The fate of many young girls with potentials of becoming first ladies, lawyers, doctors, judges among others miss this glory on Val’s day. What a shame? Their target men see them as object of satisfaction and not wife materials. As such, they use and dump them as garbage. However, the tradition continues with new crop of slay queens.

Many of these potential wife materials shout in ecstasy and agony in anticipation to be in the good books of their supposed clients. Some claim married men pay well as compared to their young fiancés.

Just like every item has an expiry date so shall slay queens expire. I humbly plead with the youth reading this piece of mine to desist from sexual promiscuity. It doesn’t pay. Instead, work towards achieving a life for yourself. I’m sad because even as I continue to write, a lot of young girls will still ignore this admonition and shout in ecstasy and agony on Val’s day. It saddens my heart because people will still ignore the Covid-19 protocols and our cases will rise after Val’s day.

Again, boys and married men who have the intent of destroying destinies on Val’s day must rescind that decision and help these young girls wholeheartedly. You can see them through a trade or education without demanding anything in return.

Let’s adhere strictly to the COVID-19 protocols. Ghana needs you alive.
The author, Stephen Bernard Donkor won the African Journalists for Economic Opportunity Training (AJEOT-2018) Best Story of the Year and a GIJ Student.

Writer’s email: sbdonkorjunior@gmail.com