During a recently organised symposium held under the theme, care and love for the elderly, at the Banjul City Council hall, she stated: “Ageing is part of life and it is important to target young people to change their attitude towards the elderly. The association was established to complement the effort of government in addressing the growing needs and welfare of the elderly.”
Mrs Jones said the association was founded in 2005 with the aim of creating public awareness on elder abuse, prevention and complements other stakeholder efforts that address the needs of the elderly. She stated that it was urgent to give the abused and neglected elders a global relevance that will attract the attention of all in its society.
“We have to create avenues for better understanding between young people and elders as well as efforts geared towards giving abused and neglected elders in society relevance. Elder abuse by any stretch of definition can be a single or repeated act or lack of appropriate act occurring within a given relationship that may cause harm or distress to an elderly person. This is a serious problem across the globe but it is still widely under-acknowledged and under-reported,” she said.
Mrs Jones added that it is therefore important to recognise that awareness creation is central to our ongoing effort to end this phenomenon. “Some people take this scenario to be verbal or physical but it goes beyond that and we have forms of abuse that are done intentionally and unintentionally to cause pain to an elder. We seek to drive a global conversation on the issue and as well end the culture of silence on abusing the elderly.”
She further revealed plans to facilitate moral learning courses in senior schools especially in region one, and establish ‘youth for elders’ clubs in these schools. “It is also important to train and work closely with professionals on elder abuse as well as families. Youth and other stakeholder partnership are crucial steps that also need to be taken to prevent undesirable consequences that affect the life of the elderly. This will strengthen our effort in breaking through barriers and nurture more love and care for the elderly in society.”
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