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Zimbabwe: Younger girls are becoming pregnant more and more amidst the corona epidemic in Zimbabwe. The reason for this is that there is no legal age for marriage in this country. This is the reason why sex is common here. Schools are closed for a long time due to Kovid, then this problem has become deeper.
There are two laws for marriages in Zimbabwe. One is the Marriage Act and the other is the Traditional Marriage Act. No law specifies what should be the minimum age of marriage for consent of marriage. At the same time, the Traditional Marriage Act allows polygamy. Because of this, this problem became deeper in the Kovid period.
The outbreak of Corona virus has accelerated the matter further. The country with a population of 1.5 crore has been under lockdown since March 2020. For the first 6 months, the schools were completely closed and after that they were reopened in between. Girls in particular were left out and their access to contraceptive drugs and clinics was cut off, leading to rapid pregnancy.
In August 2020, the government changed a law in which the number of pregnant girls in the school increased after they were forbidden to come to school. Later this policy was changed but still such girl students did not return to school.
A new marriage bill which is before the parliament for debate. It allows for the proper making of laws, prohibiting the marriage of anyone under the age of 18, and the prosecution of anyone involved in the marriage of a minor.
In Zimbabwe, about a third of girls are married before the age of 18 and 4 percent of girls are married before the age of 15. They are denied education. The likelihood of sexual violence increases and they are at risk of death or serious injury in childbirth. Poverty is one of the reasons behind child marriages in Zimbabwe where parents often marry off girls at an early age because they have to feed fewer people.
