Time to end child marriages

 

If the women, family and community development ministry will not do its utmost to protect children and ban child marriages, who should we turn to for help?

Both the minister, Rina Harun,and her deputy, Siti Zailah Mohd Yusoff, should step down for failing to empower women and banning child marriages.

Are both Rina and Siti Zailah mothers? Would they give their consent for their own young daughters or grand-daughters to be married off to older men?

On March 22, the ministry said in a parliamentary reply that it had no plans to ban underage marriage, because there were more pressing issues to be addressed.

The reply simply mirrored the statement made by Islamic affairs minister Idris Ahmad in December last year that Jakim would not raise the legal marriage age for Muslims to 18 because most of the states rejected the proposal.

Last week, many Malaysians were full of praise when Hakimah Mohd Yusoff was installed as the first woman head of Jakim. So, does Hakimah have a different view on child marriages, and will she be one of the few women in a position of authority who understand the seriousness of banning such unions?

Politicians like plantation industries and commodities minister Zuraida Kamaruddin, who is also the president of the Council of Malaysian Women Political Leaders (Comwel), praised Hakimah’s appointment, while others said history had been made.

However, in a patriarchal and misogynistic society like Malaysia, most Malay women progress to the next stage of their career or undertaking only after the men who wield power approve.

History will only be created when Jakim bans child marriages. That is when we achieve an important milestone. In today’s heavily politicised society, appointing women as heads of an organisation is merely to fill quotas.

Siti Zailah upset a lot of Malaysians with her suggestion that husbands can gently beat their wives to improve their marriage. Did Rina censure her deputy?

Do Rina, Siti Zailah and some men still think that it is the men’s religious right to marry underage girls?

Do they not realise that child marriages inflict a tremendous physical and emotional toll on young girls? Many are married off because of poverty, tradition and family pressure. They are deprived of their basic right to an education. Pregnancy at a young age almost always creates health risks.

Why should irresponsible fathers, especially those with huge families, allow their underage daughters to marry? In most cases, the man is old enough to be her father or grandfather. Why should the child be exchanged, purely as a means for her father to get his family out of poverty?

Surely, it is education that would have taught a father with a huge family that if he had practised birth control, he would not end up in this poverty trap. Education would have taught him that children need quality life. They should have enough nutritious food to help them grow healthily. They should be clothed and have a roof over their heads. They will not be deprived of medicine should they fall ill.

How many families have we read about whose children are starving, who are not sent to school, who help their own families in low paying jobs like washing dishes, just because their parents do not see the value of an education?

The education ministry should produce statistics on school dropouts and list the reasons why parents end their education prematurely. One of the reasons is that they do not think schooling is of benefit to the family.

Surely it is education that will give the woman and her family financial freedom. A child who is married off may be divorced within a few years, when her husband tires of her and seeks another younger wife. Who will support her, and her young children, if she has any?

The girl will not be much older than her own children. As she would have left school to be a wife and mother, she would have lacked an education to help her get a decent paying job. She will have no proper skills either. If she were to seek employment, she can only get menial jobs. Another problem is that she must find decent child care while she goes to work.

Child marriages are not restricted to Muslims. They are a common phenomenon in the rubber estates of Negeri Sembilan, where 12-year-old girls are married off with or without their parents’ consent

According to the 2000 census, 11,400 children below the age of 15 were married – 6,800 girls and 4,600 boys. Of the 6,800 girls, 2,450 (36%) were Malay, 1,550 (22.8%) non-Malay Bumiputera, 1,600 (23.2%) Chinese, 600 (9%) Indian and 600 (9%) other races.

Why doesn’t Rina and her peers table a special motion in Parliament to debate the issue of child marriages? Loopholes in the law should be plugged. The legalised abuse of children should be stopped. Or is Parliament impotent when it comes to the rights of women and children?

Is the ministry not aware that child marriages amount to state-sanctioned paedophilia? - FMT

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not reflect those of MMKtT.