Sophia, 21, charges meticais R per sexual encounter , or mt R overnight, which tourists, truckers, businessmen and ordinary men are willing to part with. Sophia is one of many young girls who have had to drop out of high school after being kicked out of their parents' houses for falling pregnant out of wedlock.
Ever since, she has had to earn profits from innumerable sexual encounters to pay her landlord while also raising her 2-year-old daughter. Fernando Mbadze, a father and religious leader of the Igreja Zion Apostolic Union Church of Mozambique in Femento township, Matola, said it is "common practice" for a father to tell her pregnant daughter to leave the house if the child is conceived out of wedlock.
Only a few families can forgive an unmarried girl who brings home a child that has to be supported by her parents," he said. She was given an ultimatum to take her child to its father and come back home or leave the house indefinitely.
My ex-boyfriend refused to take responsibility anyway. I had to find other ways to make a living as I couldn't find a job. Most of the girls Sophia works with are in a similar situation. Their families in Baone town kicked them out when they fell pregnant and they now rent rooms outside Matola town where they live with their children.
Elsa Alfai, spokeswoman for the ministry of women and social affairs, said the tendency of young women to sell their bodies to support their offspring was prevalent in the capital cities of Mozambique's 11 provinces.
