‘Child marriage; disservice to victims, society’

• Ms. Sahadatu Ali

An Education, Migration and Gender Researcher, Ms Sahadatu Ali, has said that persons who engage in child marriage do a disservice to the victims and the society in general.

“Children should be allowed to learn, develop and enjoy their childhood under the guidance of parents and guardians; they have no business carrying out marital duties, giving birth and raising children,” she said.

Speaking in an interview with The Spectator last Thursday, Ms. Ali who is an advocate against child marriage said she had observed that much needed to be done by parents and the state to tackle the act which constituted a form of abuse against the young ones and deserved more public attention to fight the canker.

“Some argue that it was better to marry off girls at an early age than for them to be engaged in sexual activities. And I say that, if a child is engaged in sexual activities, it is the failure of the parents to guide the child, thus the child should not be punished for the failure of parents,” she said.

She intimated that marrying off children as a means of curbing premarital sex among children was a lazy approach to child nurturing.

“If children are engaged in sexual activities, it is the duty of parents to do the hard work of reorienting and guiding the children, rather than opting for the easiest way out which is child marriage” Ms Ali said.

The Education, Migration and Gender Researcher said she was unhappy that this critical aspect of the issue was not being constantly emphasized by well-meaning Ghanaians.

“They are also at a higher risk of being abused physically, sexually, verbally and financially due to their age and little appreciation of life in general” she said.

Ms. Ali said even among Muslims, where some adherents hid behind the alleged marriage of Prophet Mohammed to a nine years old Aisha to perpetuate child marriage, the practice had become unpopular.

“Some scholars and students of Hadiths had challenged this narration with new evidence revealing that at the time they claimed Aisha was nine years, records showed that her younger siblings were older than nine during the same period. Their argument is that Aisha cannot be younger than her younger siblings,” she disclosed.

She said another school of thought, opposed to the claim that Aisha married at nine years had argued that:

“If the Quran says Prophet Mohanmed was the best example to mankind, and hadith showed that he (the Prophet) refused to give his daughter, Fatima’s hand in marriage at 18 years with the excuse that she was not matured, how could the same person accept to marry a nine years old contrary to his own practice and example,” she questioned.

“There are other schools of thought that have argued against child marriage amongst Muslims, using evidence from the Quran. For example, the Quran says if an orphan is left in your care with property to be handed over to him/her when older, first test them to establish that they are matured before you hand over their property to them and/or marry them off,” she said.

She said the issue of child marriage should be attacked from all angles to ensure that children got the best from society and called on all persons to say no to child marriage. 

From Dzifa Tetteh Tay, Ashaiman.