Feature by Christabel Addo
Accra, Dec. 28, - Adolescents and
young people are entitled to decent livelihoods, however, girls unlike their
male counterparts, face unequal risks and distinctive consequences related to
the vulnerabilities they experience.
Young girls, compared to their
male counterparts are also more likely to drop out of school, to marry at an
early age, and to bear the consequences of poor sexual and reproductive health
outcomes. They are also disproportionally vulnerable to the violations of their
human rights, inadequate reproductive health services, education and subjected
to child marriage, which all limits the realization of their full potentials as
humans.
The causes and drivers of child marriage include religion, education,
geographical location, teenage pregnancy, wealth acquisition, bride wealth
betrothal and family breakdowns and parenting challenges.
The recognition that adolescent
girls and young women face a complex array of issues, led the United Nations
Population Fund’s (UNFPA) Country Office to initiate an in-depth situational
analysis of child marriages in Ghana.
The study reveals that although
all African countries including Ghana were faced with the challenge of child
marriage, which was a harmful traditional practice that robbed girls of their
education, health and future, it was becoming a serious global concern, with
statistics showing an increase in the marginalisation of women and young girls.
Child marriage, according to the
United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), occurred when a person was forced into
a union before the attainment of age 18, and this threatens girls’ lives and
health, and limits their entire future prospects.
In Ghana “one out of five girls
will be married before their 18th birthday”, while 25 per cent of women aged
between 20 and 24 were married or in union before turning 18 years old. Five
per cent of girls were married before age 15, and these were four times more
likely to come from poorer households, with uneducated girls being twice more
likely to marry in their childhood.
It says child marriage often led
to the end of a girl’s opportunity to continue her education and therefore
resulted in persistent poverty.
In developing countries, child
marriage has been associated with teenage pregnancy, pregnancy-related
complications such as preterm delivery, low birth weights, foetal and maternal
mortality, increase in sexually transmitted infections, poverty, high school
dropout rates among girls, gender inequalities, violence within marriages due
to weak enforcement of laws, as well as other serious health-related
complications including fistula.
The UNFPA’s situational analysis
however reveals again that high rates of child marriages in Africa, combined
with a rapid growth of population can have devastating human and development
consequences, and warns that if urgent actions were not taken, the number of
girls married as children will double by 2050. This, it said will make the
continent one of the regions with the highest number of child brides globally.
In its global snapshot of the
situation, the UNFPA reveals that “every two seconds, a girl is married before
she is physically or emotionally matured enough to become a wife or a mother.
Globally, 720 million women alive today were married before their 18th
birthday. Every year, they are joined by another 15 million child brides”. This
means that one in three young women alive today were married as children.
The situation, it says is getting
alarming in Ghana with the country currently recording a 21 per cent national
prevalence rate, which is one of the highest child marriage prevalence rates in
the world.
Ghana’s 1998 Children’s Act (Act
560) and the 1992 Constitution of Ghana however, defines a child as a person
below the age of 18. It however states that by age 18 young persons are
expected to have developed sufficient intellectual, emotional and physical
skills, and resources to fend for themselves as well as to successfully
transition into adulthood. Until then, they require care from adults, support,
guidance and protection. The Act therefore clearly prohibits any person from
forcing a child in be betrothed or be the subject of a dowry transaction or to
be married.
Aside these two documents, there
are several other legal frameworks on Child Marriages which includes the
Domestic Violence Act 2007, (Act 732), Child Ordinance 1951 (Cap 127), The
Marriage of Mohammedans Ordinance, 1951 (Cap129), Matrimonial Causes Act, 1971,
Customary Marriage and Divorce Act (Registration) Law, 1985 (PNDC 112), the
African Charter on the Rights and the Welfare of the Child (ACRWC) and the
Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).
Despite all these data, a study
by the Ghana Statistical Service in 2006 and 2011 showed that 4.4 per cent and
5.8 per cent of women age between 15 and 49 married by exactly 15 years
respectively. In addition to this, among those age 20 and 24, the proportion
who married before turning 18 years was 22 and 21 per cent respectively.
In Ghana, teenage pregnancy is
strongly linked to child marriage and in 2012 alone, there were 750,000
pregnant teenage girls between the ages of 15 and 19 years, and most of these
leads to maternal deaths and various injuries including fistula. Since these
young girls lack the ability, power and knowledge to abstain or negotiate safe
sexual practices, they fall prey to sexually transmitted diseases including HIV
and AIDS.
The study identifies the drivers
and causes of child marriages as the discriminatory cultural and social norms
including gender roles, limited implementation of legal and policy frameworks
to protect adolescents, the inaccessible and low quality of services such as
education, health and social welfare, as well as the limited economic
opportunities for girls.
It suggested that strategies such
as empowering girls with information, skills and support networks including the
provision of safe spaces and girls clubs, provision of information on
Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (ASRH), mobilizing to educate parents
and community members on the consequences of child marriage, as well as offer
economic support and incentives such as the Livelihood Empowerment Against
Poverty (LEAP), for girls and their families.
Madam Otiko Afisah Djaba,
Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, as part of her advocacy to
end child marriages in Ghana, recently toured various parts of the Northern
Region where the problem is more prominent and declared a “Zero tolerance of
Child Marriage”, which is hampering girl child education in these areas.
She said because child marriage
often ended a girl’s opportunity to continue her education, it resulted in the
persistent cycle of poverty, as child brides were denied economic opportunities
that helped lifted them out of this deficiency, and they faced increased risk
of violence throughout their lives due to their vulnerability.
In her interaction with the
Northern Regional House of Chiefs, to garner enough support from the
traditional authorities to minimize the situation, she said there was the need
for a multifaceted approach to tackle the situation. She further urged the
chiefs and the clergy to support government’s quest to end the widespread child
marriage cases in the Region.
“Government is doing its part by
creating legislations. We expect our chiefs and religious leaders to complement
government’s efforts by exposing the perpetrators of child marriage so as to
safeguard the health and development of our young girls,” she said.
According to her, the Ghana
National Household Registry was to establish a single national household
register, which will capture the data of all beneficiaries of social protection
programmes. She called for strengthened collaborations between the
Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assembles (MMDAs), saying “I need the full
cooperation and support of all MMDAs in your Region to enable my Ministry
carryout this programme successfully. In every district, we expect the
assemblies to provide our staff with office space for the period that they will
be working in the districts to gather data and information.”
The Chief of Tamale, Naa Dakpema
Dawuni Alhassan lauded the Minister’s campaign and urged government to strictly
enforce laws on child marriage. “Child marriage is a new thing in Dagbon and
people who indulge in the practice should be made to face the law”.
The UNFPA’s theory of change for
Ghana suggests that for girls to fully enjoy their childhood free from the risk
of marriage, they are to experience “healthier, safer and more empowered life
transitions while in control of their own destiny, including making choices and
decisions about their education, sexuality, relationship formation or marriage
and childbearing”.
It suggests that there must be an
acceleration of action to address child marriage in Ghana by enhancing
investments in and support for married and unmarried girls alike, making
visible the corresponding benefits of this assistance; engaging key actors including
young people as agents of change in catalyzing shifts towards positive gender
norms; increasing political support, resources, policies and frameworks
promoting positive change, and improving data and evidence base.
To end child marriage also requires
the engagement of the media as significant partners in shaping societal
perception and social norms through the transmission of certain messages. The
media’s increased advocacy on the factors fuelling the practice, the subsequent
challenges and the benefits of ending the practice is very important, and must
be encouraged.
GNA
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