Meet to discuss tackling child marriage
KUALA LUMPUR: Over 500 civil society, youth advocates, government representatives, religious leaders and UN agencies from over 70 countries will meet today at the Girls Not Brides global conference to spearhead discussions on tackling child marriage.
The three-day conference will take place at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre and include workshops and plenary sessions with members from Africa, Europe, the Middle East, the Americas and Asia.
The last global meeting was held in Morocco in 2015, which saw over 250 activists and civil society participants from 63 countries.
“One of our goals is to provide a platform for organisations and individuals to share what works and what doesn’t in terms of tackling child marriage,” said Lakshmi Sundaram, executive director of Girls Not Brides.
“We decided to hold this meeting in Asia as we wanted to bring new organisations from the region to tackle this issue head-on.”
Participants at the conference include Pakistani women’s right activist Tabassum Adnan, 14-year-old activist and founder of Girls United for Human Rights Hadiqa Bashir, and local civil organisation representatives such as Sisters In Islam, Voice of The Children, Sabah Women’s Action-Resource Group and Unicef Malaysia.
“We’re interested to have conversations about areas of work where we don’t yet have a great idea of what’s happening, such as child marriages in the humanitarian context, like in Syrian refugee camps as a result of natural disasters,” said Lakshmi.
Over 50 Malaysian civil society organisations, United Nations agencies and advocates sent a joint press statement last Thursday calling for the government to end child marriages.
Currently, child marriages are permitted under both the Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act and the Islamic Family Law.
Based on the 2000 Malaysian Census data, there were 6,800 girls and 4,600 boys under the age of 15 who were married.
According to the Syariah Judiciary Department of Malaysia, and the National Registration Department, there were 6,246 Muslim child marriage applications and 2,775 cases of non-Muslim child marriages from 2010 to 2015.
“This is an exceptional opportunity for the Malaysian government to make a statement of commitment to make good its pledge in the Harapan Manifesto to introduce a law that sets 18 as the minimum age of marriage,” said Unicef Malaysia representative Marianne Clark-Hattingh.
“From our conversations with the new government, they have repeatedly demonstrated that children’s and women’s welfare is one of their top priorities. We are confident they will translate this pledge in the manifesto into real change for children,” she added.
“There can be no exceptions in child marriages. Besides law reforms, it is important to have outreach and awareness programmes, education campaigns and funding,” said Sisters In Islam communications manager Majidah Hashim.
“We are ready to work with the government on plans, strategies and campaigns to make this happen in Malaysia.”