Mayor in South Africa awards scholarships to virgin women

JOHANNESBURG — A South African mayor has awarded college scholarships to 16 young women for remaining virgins to encourage others to be “pure and focus on school,” her spokesman said Sunday.

The scholarship was introduced this year and has been awarded to young women from the Uthukela district in the eastern KwaZulu-Natal province, mayoral spokesman Jabulani Mkhonza said.

The young women who applied for the scholarships voluntarily stayed virgins and agreed to have regular virginity tests to keep their funding, Uthukela Mayor Dudu Mazibuko told South African talk radio station 702.

South Africa’s department of basic education recorded about 20,000 pregnancies among girls and young women in schools in 2014, with 223 pregnant girls still in primary school, according to the South African Broadcasting Corporation.