Early child marriage must end now!

 

From Edmond Gyebi, Tamale

SAVANA Signatures, a Tamale-based NGO working to improve the lives of women and young girls, has appealed to the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Civil Society Organisations, political, traditional and religious leaders as well as the security agencies to join forces to end forced and early marriages, which seemed to affect the future of many teenagers and school going girls in the Northern part of Ghana.

In a statement issued and signed by the Communications Officer of Savana Signatures, Mr. Francis BalikawuNpong in commemoration of the 2017 International Women’s Day celebration, the NGO bemoaned the physical and psychological traumas the young girls suffer when forced into unwanted or early marriages. The 2017 International Women’s Day was under the theme: “Be Bold for Change”.

According to Savana Signatures, majority of the victims of forced and early marriages did not only end their former education or lose their dignity, but are also exposed to HIV/AIDS, Sexually Transmitted Infections, teenage pregnancies and other forms of abuses.

“As an organization working to improve the lives of women and girls, we wish to boldly condemn the practice of forced and early marriages that continue to deny girls the opportunity to go to school and enjoy the basic rights enshrined in the 1992 Constitution of Ghana”.

Even though Ghana was the first country to ratify the United Nations Convention on the rights of the Child which calls for the abolishment of traditional practices harmful or prejudicial to the health of children, the nation still has one of the highest childhood marriages prevalence in the world.

On the national level 25 percent of the females between the ages of 20 and 25 years are married before they turned 18 years old. The UNICEF 2011 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, the Upper East Region alone has a child marriage prevalence of 50%, the highest in the country.

The situation is not any different from the Upper West and Northern Regions. A greater number of girls between 15 and 18 years representing 27 percent entering marriage, often against their will.

The Savana Signatures, therefore, called on the media to intensify their advocacy on the issue of early marriage and save the large number of girls from such practices.

 

 

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  From Edmond Gyebi, Tamale SAVANA Signatures, a Tamale-based NGO working to improve the lives of women and young girls, has appealed to the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Civil Society Organisations, political, traditional and religious leaders as well as the security agencies to join forces to end forced and early marriages, which […]

The post Early child marriage must end now! appeared first on The Chronicle - Ghana News.

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