NGO cites child marriage causes

By NATION REPORTER

POVERTY and Long distance to schools are some of the major factors contributing to child marriage in Zambia, the Musokotwane Compassion Mission Zambia (MCMZ) has said.

The MCMZ, a Zambian non-profit organisation, said high poverty levels and long distances covered by children to access schools in the rural parts of the country were at the centre of the problem of child marriage in Zambia.

Speaking during a live BBC Focus on Africa programme on May 3, MCMZ executive director Genious Musokotwane said rural girls and boys covered long distances to access education and as result ended up as child brides and grooms.

Musokotwane was speaking when he featured alongside Ministry of Gender assistant director Ms Chinyama during a live interview on BBC’s Focus on Africa.

“Young people in Zambia are doing something about this problem of child marriages seeing that it has a direct impact on victims and the community they live in,” he said.

Mr Musokotwane said it was this situation that triggered his quest to end child marriages by effecting positive change in society.

He said he therefore founded MCMZ at 16 years as a platform to work with others and inspire sustainable breakthroughs in the fight against child marriages in the rural parts of Southern Zambia.

He said having gone through the problem of covering long distances and crossing two rivers to access school when he was 12 years old in a rural setup, he saw many of his fellow pupils end up as child brides.

This, is reiterated, forced him to take up the fight against child marriage at a tender age.

Mr Musokotwane further said that his organisation was working with traditional leaders, the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Home Affairs and media houses, among other key stakeholders, to fight against child marriage.

He said his organisation had carried out successful operations which had seen many girls rescued from child marriage even provided them with shelter, basic needs and education sponsorship.

“You see, you and I understand the 18 years of age definition of a child but this is different for a granny in the village where I come from because there, traditional rites are used to determine who is a child hence people ignorantly marry off children, and sometimes the definition is defeated by circumstances surrounding a child,” Mr Musokotwane said.

He explained that despite a staggering child marriage prevalence of 31 percent, the MCMZ was working hard to transform lives of retrieved child brides.

This was in return helping the Zambian government achieve the National Strategy on Ending Child Marriages adopted in the year 2016, he added.