By Wesley Kapaya Mwambazi
Assistant Director – Health Care Financing
Ministry of Health | @mohzambia
Child Marriage, which is defined as marriage before the age of 18 years is a practice and a problem that is a widely and culturally accepted in Zambia.
According to the Zambia demographic and health survey of 2013-2014, 31% of Zambian girls are married before the age of 18 years. Child marriage prevalence ranges between 10.3 -44 % across the country with Northern, Muchinga, Luapula and eastern provinces being the worst affected.
Marriage is the ultimate goal for most girls in rural areas and from childhood they are socialized to confine themselves to domestic work in preparation for their future roles as wives. In some communities, when these young girls come of age they undergo initiation ceremonies during which they are taught not only how to take care of themselves but also how to satisfy a man in bed. Parents whose daughters do not get married at an early age get concerned and put pressure on their children while others even seek help from traditional healers to get herbs for their children to use to attract potential suitors.
What are some of the reasons why some communities entertain child marriages?
Girls who lack education or drop out of school are more likely to get into child marriage than those who are in school as they have no other aspiration to pursue and because it is expected of them to do so. Keeping girl children in schools is therefore a protective factor against child marriage.
Preserving the family name and avoiding suffering public shame arising from teenage pregnancy is another reason why some parents marry off girls. Such marriages are arranged quickly before the pregnancy starts showing regardless of whether the girl is ready or willing to become a wife. The school re-entry policy, which parents and young people should be aware about and take advantage of, provides for a girl to be re-admitted into a school of her choice after maternity leave to realize her full academic potential.
Failure to support children with school requisites and to meet daily necessities in some families owing to economic hardships has contributed to child marriage to reduce on the number of mouths to feed and to accrue financial benefits from the bride price paid on the girl child.
Inadequate care of orphans and step children can make young girls seek early marriage as an easy way out to end their suffering in abusive families. Young girls suffer verbal, mental, physical, financial and sexual abuse which push them to seek solace in men who show them love through marriage which is detrimental to their developmental trajectory.
Children who head homes are also vulnerable to early marriage owing to economic hardship.
Despite the fact that child marriage is still tolerated in some communities, it leads to deprivation of childhood and is a form of gender based violence that should be condemned by all well-meaning citizens. Child marriage is child labour as young girls are subjected to doing tedious house chores, satisfying their husbands sexually and experiencing pregnancy which are all very nerve-racking and exhausting undertakings for a child-bride. Community members should be alert and report any form of child abuse/labour to the victim support unit or can call 933, a toll free line to get counselling services and guidance on where help can be obtained from.
Girls who get married at a tender age are condemned to a life cycle of poverty as their prospects of getting a high-paying job are close to impossible.
HIV infection is common among girls married to older and more sexually experienced men and negotiating safer sex is not a topic for discussion in such relationships. Furthermore, owing to differences in power and maturity between young girls and their much older husbands, physical, mental, financial or sexual gender based violence is not uncommon in child marriages.
Medically, owing to immaturity of the birth canal, adolescents are more likely to experience difficulties during child-birth which can also lead to a very serious and embarrassing health condition called fistula. Fistulas which can only be treated through an operation are perforations between the vagina and the rectum that allow feces to leak continuously through the vagina or perforations between the vagina and the urethra that allow urine to leak through the vagina. Young girls have a higher risk of dying during pregnancy and delivery because of poor nutrition which leads to anemia and rupture of the uterus when the baby is too big or not properly positioned in the womb. Delay in accessing emergency health services in the light of economic hardship and preference to delivering at home can also lead to death.
Given the above drivers of and negative outcomes of child marriage it is evident that the scourge can be curtailed through a multi-stakeholder and multi-intervention approach.
