Early Child Marriages Must End – ex UN Official.

Dr Agnes Akosua Aidoo, the Former Vice

Chairperson, United Nations Committee on the Right of the Child

has called for an end to early marriages of girls as it did not

only deny them of their childhood, but also increases their risk

to abuse and violence.

She noted that, it also hindered the girls’ ability to

contribute fully to the development of their own children, family,

community and the nation as a whole.

Dr Aidoo said this on Thursday during a roundtable discussion

on the role of the media in the fight against child marriage,

which was organized by the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social

Protection, in collaboration with the UNICEF.

She intimated that globally, 16 million children are married

off annually, with Africa accounting for 14 out of the 20

countries with cases of early marriages in the world.

Dr Aiddo, who is also a former UNICEF Representative to

Tanzania, urged the state to endeavour to protect, respect and

fulfill children’s right to live free of harmful practices and to

survive and develop to their full human potential.

“We should all bear it in mind that marriages of boys and

girls below 18 years do not only violate their human rights, but

also their dignity”, she said.

She said the latest statistics on early marriage which was

conducted in 2011 indicted that, the Upper East, Upper West and

the Northern Regions were the leading regions as far as child

marriage was concerned with the Greater Accra Region taking the

last spot.

Dr Aidoo cited poverty, fear of teenage pregnancy by parents,

and experimentation with sex as some of the reasons which push

parents to give off their children early into marriage.

She called for the development of sustained awareness

creation on the dangers of early marriages, establishment of

measures to eradicate poverty, and the periodic evaluation of

measures put in place to eradicate early marriage, as some of the

means which could help in tackling the canker of child marriage.

“We should also endeavour to empower girls from the

communities to desist from early marriages or to think that the

only way they could survive was to depend on men” she said.

Mrs Dela Sowah, the Deputy Minister, Ministry of Gender,

Children and Social Protection, advised Ghanaians to always seek

the well being of the girl child and desist from giving their

hands in marriage at early ages.

She extolled the role of the media in helping to bring to the

fore the harmful effects of child marriages.

“I know that with the help of the media, we can help bring

about behavioural change and also make our communities a safe

place for our young girls”, she added.

GNA.