'End of female slaves era': Kenya's proposed marriage age pends as women reject Iraqi's 9 for girls
Iraqi students celebrate International Women's Day to commemorate the achievements of economic, political and social rights of women.
What you need to know:
- A proposed bill in Iraqi parliament to lower the legal marriage age for girls to just nine years has triggered controversy.
- The bill aims to amend the Personal Status Law that sets the minimum age for marriage at 18.
A 10-year-old girl from Entonet, Kajiado South, was rescued from a forced marriage to a 45-year-old man in July 2019.
Police officers and anti-female genital mutilation (FGM) crusader Dorcas Parit stormed the home of the man and rescued the minor who had been married off by her parents, with the family handed reverse dowry.
Ms Parit said she was informed of the forced marriage by a villager who witnessed the dowry negotiations and she immediately informed the police.
When they arrived at the homestead, the man had already taken off, having got wind of the impending raid. He left the minor alone in the house. Ms Parit lamented increased cases of girls being forced to undergo FGM then married off.
This girl lucky to be rescued. The Kenyan law put the legal age of marriage at 18 for both men and women. Any person who marries a person below the minimum age commits an offence and shall on conviction be liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years or a fine not exceeding Sh1 million, or both.
However, girls in Iraq aged below 18 could soon fail to have an experience like the one that their Kenyan counterpart had several years ago.
A proposed bill in Iraqi parliament to lower the legal marriage age for girls to just nine years has triggered significant controversy. Introduced by the Iraqi Justice ministry, the bill aims to amend the Personal Status Law that sets the minimum age for marriage at 18. The amendment seeks to lower the marriage age for girls to just nine years.
The move has triggered significant controversy and provoked protests across the globe, with women’s rights activists saying it would “legalise child rape”.
The new proposal, which has already had its first reading in the Iraqi parliament, would give religious authorities the power to decide on family affairs, including marriage, divorce and the care of children.
If enacted, it would allow girls as young as nine and boys as young as 15 to marry. This change has raised concerns about increased child marriage and exploitation. Critics argue that it would reverse progress in women's rights and gender equality. Human rights activists have accused supporting lawmakers of acting out of their own “political interests”.
Iraq joins the league of several nations that allow children and younger teenagers to wed. In neighbouring Iran, for example, the minimum age for marriage with parental consent is 13 for girls and 15 for boys. However, for marriage without parental consent, reports say individuals have to be 15 if they are female and 18 if they are male.
Similarly, in Equatorial Guinea and São Tomé and Principe, children can marry at the age of 14 with their parents’ consent but are required to wait until they are 18.
Countries with the lowest age of consent include Nigeria at just 11, followed by Angola and the Philippines at 12, and other countries like South Korea and Japan at 13.
A number of countries in Asia and Africa require individuals to be married before they can legally have sex. These include Libya, Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, all of which are known to be highly conservative on issues around gender and sexuality.
The country with the highest age of consent in the world is Portugal, with age consent set at 21. Women’s and children's rights campaigners in Iraq have protested at the proposal, that if passed, could enshrine sectarianism in family relationships, hand more power in family matters to clerics and open the door for marriage to be legalised for children.
Women's rights organisations have publicly demonstrated against the bill. Last week, a group of activists, including campaigners from the Organisation of Women's Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), gathered in Baghdad's Tahrir Square in opposition to the bill.
They held placards reading "the era of female slaves is over" and "no to the marriage of minors”. Yanar Mohammed, president of OWFI, told journalists in Baghdad that the coordination framework was trying to push the "archaic" laws as a means of distracting from their own failings, including "huge corruption".
"Their most efficient tool for this distraction is to terrorise Iraqi women and civil society with legislation that strips away all the rights that Iraqi women gained in modern times, and force archaic Islamic sharia on them that regard women as bodies for pleasure and breeding, and not as human being[s] with human rights," she said.
Here in Kenya, judges and child welfare organisations are embroiled in a fresh debate on whether to lower the age of consent. In March 2019, the Court of Appeal proposed a law change to lower the age of consent to 16 years.
Three judges, Roselyn Nambuye, Daniel Musinga, and Patrick Kiage, ruled that time was ripe for the country to consider changing the Sexual Offences Act, citing lengthy jail terms imposed on young men convicted of defilement.
They made the observation in a case where they reversed a 15-year sentence slapped on a man who had impregnated a 17-year-old girl.
Proponents say lowering the age of consent will reduce the number of teenage boys convicted and jailed for “defilement” (the abuse of a child in Kenyan law) after consensual sex with a girl. They are concerned that aspects of the Sexual Offences Act conflict with the Children’s Act, and disproportionately punish teenage boys.
The Sexual Offences Act does not make exemptions for any child found guilty of sexual offences. It has no specific provisions on how to deal with a case where two minors are involved. But the Children Act and the Marriage Act are critical in setting the legal framework against child marriage.
Unicef (2023) said that approximately 23 per cent of women aged 20-24 were married before the age of 18. This represented a decrease from previous years, showing progress in the fight against child marriage. The Kenya Demographic and Health Survey (2022) reportedthat child marriage rates were around 22-24 per cent, reflecting similar findings to Unicef’s data.
Currently, the age of consent is 16 in 76 nations around the world. Kenya would be the newest nation to lower the age of consent if the proposed amendment by the judges is implemented. Globally, 12 million girls get married every year before they reach 18.
In Kenya, about 23 per cent of girls are married before their 18th birthday and four per cent married before the age of 15. About 3.0 per cent of boys in Kenya are married before the age of 18.
Child marriage significantly impacts educational attainment. Girls who marry early are less likely to complete their education, which affects their economic opportunities and overall well-being. Kenya has enacted various policies and strategies to combat child marriage, including community-based interventions.
Recent efforts and campaigns have led to a gradual decline in child marriage rates. Areas in Northern Kenya and parts of the Coast have higher prevalence rates compared to urban regions. However, challenges remain, particularly in marginalised communities where traditional practices are more entrenched.
