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Minister Dokora

Yesterday we published a sad story about over 4 500 minors who dropped out of school countrywide this year due to early child marriages. In the story, Primary and Secondary Education Minister Dr Lazarus Dokora highlighted that the scourge has since extended to boys who also had to drop out of school alongside thousands of girls.This shocking revelation shows that the fight against early child marriages in Zimbabwe is far from over.

What is even more disheartening is the fact that there is an increase in the number of girls who are dropping out of school, despite Government efforts to fight this heinous practice through, among other things, legislation.

While early child marriages could be attributed to poverty and youth delinquency, patriarchal attitudes against the development of the girl child and abuse of the girls by the same people who should be protecting them are worsening this problem.

Media reports show that relatives, religious leaders and other influential community leaders who should be shepherding the hapless girls are actually at the forefront of abusing them, forcing them into early marriages, when they should be in school.

Surely, if 3 650 girls and 251 boys dropped out of school owing to early marriages, who married the more than 3 300 girls, assuming that an equal number of the girls got married to their peers?

It does not need a rocket scientist to conclude that they got married to men, much older than them, with the majority of them being influential community leaders, who should be protecting them from all forms of abuse.

A Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development recently revealed that some Government officials including Members of Parliament are sexual predators who target minors, but continue to walk scot free.

The revelations contained in a report compiled by the Parliamentary committee following public hearings with various stakeholders on the prevalence of child marriages in Mashonaland Central Province, noted that early child marriages were rife, with some Government officials being fingered.

It is sad that the same individuals entrusted with enacting and implementing legislation on early child marriages are among the list of abusers.

That development alone stalls Government efforts to curb the problem of early child marriages, throwing the girl child in a vicious cycle of poverty.

Child marriages stand in the way of the girls’ progress and the statistics that Dr Dokora revealed make sad reading and dampen the efforts that stakeholders across the social and political divides are making to ensure that no girl drops out of school due to early marriages.

Once they are out of school, it is not a secret that the majority of the girls get entangled in a vicious cycle of poverty, reducing their opportunities of having a good life in the future.

Apart from the social stigma they are likely to face, they end up in violent marriages because of the power dynamics within those relationships.

They also experience birth complications and, the practice has been deemed to cause high mortality rates.

Thus the cycle of violence and poverty that begins in girlhood, carries over into womanhood and across generations until the woman dies.

We cannot continue to subject and condemn young and vulnerable girls to a perpetual life of misery, when we should be guiding them towards a better life by protecting them from sexual predators.

They can secure a better future, if they remain in school and are protected from early sexual experiences.

That will only happen if communities take ownership of the problem of early child marriages, by ensuring that they also censure those that prey on young girls.

Communities should take proactive measures to bring to book those perpetuating early child marriages within their midsts.

With legislation backing the prosecution and sentencing of abusers of young girls, early child marriages should be dealt with, once and for all.