According to UNFPA, one in every five girls is married before the age of 18. Mostly developing countries are affected with Zimbabwe included where about 33% of the girls are married before the age of 18 and 12% are married before the age of 15. One in three girls is married before the age of 18 years.
In Zimbabwe and other developing countries girls get married at a young age due to various reasons with poverty, cultural and religious practices being the most dominant. Many girls cannot afford an education therefore are left out of school being more vulnerable to many forms of gender based violence.
Many of the reasons that lead to child marriages range from cultural practices such as ‘chigadzamapfihwa’ where a young girl forced to marry into the deceased family of her sister or aunt.
Mostly the men they are compelled to marry are very much older than them enough to be their fathers.
Zimbabwe has put in place different legislative instruments in order to curb child marriages guaranteeing girl child legal rights. These legal frameworks include the Marriage Bill stating that the minimum legal age of marriage is 18 years but it has not been signed into law yet.
Human Rights activist, Nyaradzo Mashayamombe said, “The government has been promising a child marriage legislation that enforces the law on perpetrators and offenders but it has been five years since the new constitution was put in place, but nothing has materialized as of yet.”
She said there was lack of political will considering the high prevalence of child marriages particularly in rural areas.
Mashayamombe commented that overcoming child marriages requires a multi-pronged approach that ensures all Zimbabweans play their role effectively.
“Laws alone mean nothing, the government through the police should ensure that the anti-child marriages law is enforced,” said Kumbirai Kahiya from GWEN Trust.
United Nations Population Fund contends that child marriages are a violation of human rights.
Some girls are married off due to economic burdens where their lobola is used as a means of survival for the family. In other situations, girls from poor families are married off to rich families for survival purposes.
In some of the religious societies, men are encouraged to marry young girls to prevent them from engaging in premarital sex.
In addition, some religious sects still practise virginity tests and when a girl is no longer a virgin is shamed in the church and forced to marry an elderly person because she is “tainted” and not “suitable” for a young man. If a girl engages in premarital sex she is sometimes forced to marry that boyfriend in order to mitigate the “shame” brought to the family and the church.
UNICEF in their research say that atleast 74% of teenage pregnancies are caused by date rape, where a girl is forced into their sexual debute by they boyfriend, and they never report this as rape because usually people will know them as a couple, hence girls are not empowered with the truth that rape is rape despite the fact that one is in a relationship with the person.
Some girls who fall pregnant choose to enter into a customary marriage with the fear that their family would abuse them for engaging in premarital sex and failure to follow their teachings.
On November 18, 2017, Zimbabweans went on to march against the then government. Some felt it was the defining moment and some felt was like the Independence Day. Those who are passionate of advocating for girl child rights were part of the march anticipating that change of government would result in changes to legislation subsequently protecting the girl child from child marriages.
Ironically nothing tangible has materialized so far except for the Marriage Bill that is taking ages to become law.
According to UNPF, “Zimbabwe is one of the four southern African countries with the highest rates of girl child marriages.”
Early child marriages have remained very common in Zimbabwe despite the Constitutional Court declaring the practice illegal last year.
In 2016, the United Nations child Rights Committee urged Zimbabwe to establish an effective monitoring system to assess progress towards the ending of child marriage.By Letwin Mazara
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