WOMEN Affairs minister Sithembiso Nyoni yesterday said government was making strides towards ending sexual abuse of young girls and child marriages.
In a statement, Nyoni said progress has also been made to
bring to book all those involved in the marrying off of a 14-year-old Marange girl,
Memory Machaya, who was impregnated at a very tender age and died last month
while giving birth at an Apostolic sect shrine in Manicaland province.
Nyoni’s statement follows a public outcry over the death of
the pregnant minor, with civic society, women’s groups and the public calling
for the arrest of the perpetrator for rape.
The Women Affairs minister described Machaya’s ordeal as
rape and a situation which needed urgent action from the law enforcement
agents.
She described the practice as “a bad vice which exposes the
girl child and women as a whole, to social ills”.
“The case, however, serves to remind us the scourge of
teenage pregnancies and early child marriages that continue to affect the lives
of thousands of girls in the communities.
“Child marriage is a violation of multiple rights of the
girl child that include denying her rights to education, health and well-being.
It exposes the girl child to gender-based violence (GBV), HIV and other
health-related conditions. It puts the young mother in a cycle of poverty,” she
said.
Nyoni said marrying off young girls also denied them a
chance to contribute to the development of their communities and the country at
large.
She called for inclusive action against the bad practices,
adding that religious institutions and cultures that permitted child marriages
should know that they were outlawed by constitutional provisions which clearly
stipulate the age of marriage as 18.
“I also wish to take this opportunity to encourage our
communities to be vigilant and speak out on cases of GBV, and shun a culture of
silence that continues to damage the very moral and social fabrics. It is this
silence that will destroy our communities.
“With the current COVID-19 prevention and containment
measures, we want to urge communities to be vigilant on GBV. We need to stand
together and fight together and collectively declare zero tolerance to child
marriages,” she said. Nyoni said a team
had been dispatched from her ministry to Marange to assist the Home Affairs
ministry to identify the culprits and bring them to book.
The country continues to experience GBV despite that each
year around November and December, Zimbabwe commemorates 16 days of activism
against GBV. A number of GBV cases have been recorded during the COVID-19
lockdown period. Newsday
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