Child marriages must stop

Tatenda Makombe
The Day of the African Child has been used as an opportunity to focus on the injustices African children face and on the actions we all need to take to ensure children realise their rights.

The commemorations for this year’s Day of the African Child were held on July 19 under the theme ‘Ending Child Marriages in Africa’. The theme represents a well-timed clarion call to all Africans to end a time honoured practice that devastates the lives of millions of girls across the continent.

Article 1 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), child marriage refers to any marriage of a child younger than 18 years old. While it is worthy observing that child marriage can happen to both sexes, it disproportionately affects girls.

Child marriage is now widely recognised as a violation of children’s rights and a direct form of discrimination against girls who are often deprived of their basic rights to health, education, development and equality.

According to a 2014 UNICEF Report on the state of children, in every two seconds, a girl is married before she is physically or emotionally mature enough to become a wife or a mother.

Globally, 720 million women alive today were married before their 18th birthday and annually, they are joined by another 15 million child brides — the equivalent of the entire population of Mali or Zimbabwe.

he same UNICEF report claims that in Zimbabwe 4 percent of the children get married before age 15 whilst 31 percent get married by the time they turn 18 years.

In spite of the existence of laws prohibiting child marriages most of these matrimonial arrangements often occur in poor, rural communities.

In these communities where child marriage is practised, girls are not valued as much as boys and as such they are seen as a financial burden.

The writer interviewed some primary school heads from rural areas in Manicaland and all of them confirmed that every year a number of Grade Seven girls leave the Grade Seven exam room headed to their husbands’ homes.

It is sad to note that some parents support child marriages. One head teacher I interviewed mentioned a case of a girl he and his staff tried to help at his school.

According to the head teacher they reported the matter to the police and when the police interrogated the parents on the whereabouts of their daughter, they claimed the girl was living with an uncle and denied they had married her off.

Child marriage robs girls of their education, their health and their future.

Once married, the child bride is more likely to be a victim of domestic violence and suffer health complications associated with early sexual activity and childbearing.

According to a research done by the International Centre for the Research on Women (ICRW) girls younger than 15 are five times more likely to die in childbirth than women in their 20s, consequently, pregnancy is consistently among the leading causes of death for girls aged between 15 and 19 years.

Child brides often face a higher risk of contracting HIV because they often marry an older man with more sexual experience such that girls aged 15-19 are two to six times more likely to contract HIV than boys of the same age in Africa.

Our own local case studies indicate that quite a generous percentage of single mothers are girls who were married at a tender age.

It is sad to note that most of these single mothers face difficulties in trying to fend for their children, most of them end up indulging in health risky activities such as prostitution.

Child marriage does not only affect the child, but also has negative implications on the economy, because millions of girls miss the skills, knowledge and employment prospects that would enable them to lift their family out of poverty and contribute to the country’s development.

It is instructive to realise that child marriages have also hindered Africa’s efforts to achieve six of the eight millennium development goals.

Because of child marriages Africa will find it difficult to eliminate extreme poverty, achieve universal primary education, promote gender equality, reduce child mortality, improve maternal health and combat HIV and AIDS.

That’s why it is so crucial that we tackle child marriage.

It requires a multi-sectoral approach to combat child marriages. Families and communities have to be mobilised as agents of change whilst the government has to continue in its quest to end the practice.

Traditional chiefs in Zimbabwe can also take a cue from a Malawian Chief (Inkosi Kachindado) reported ‘In This Africa’, who annulled 300 child marriages and send the affected children back to school.

The challenge is for us all. We must have a zero tolerance to child marriages we should all stand up for healthy and educated children.