God created marriage but He did not will it for young teenagers. Unfortunately, it has become trendy for adult males to want to marry girls below sixteen years in parts of the developing countries, in particular. What makes the trend worrisome is that many rationale people condone this anomaly. However, we hear that in Tanzania, the authorities have begun to dissolve at least 80 premature and arranged marriages that could have affected girls already selected to join secondary schools next month.
Reports say the 80 would-be wives, victims of premature, arranged marriages were part of the 29,624 children who ought to be enrolling into secondary schools this January after successfully completing seven years of primary education last year.
In Arusha alone, about 15,409 girls are enrolled for secondary education in the New Year. However, around 80 of them could have missed such opportunity if their parents and potential in-laws had succeeded in formalising their ill-founded arranged marriage affairs. Arusha Regional Education Officer, Gift Kyando, told reporters that the 80 girls lined up for early marriages were fished out from records gleaned across the entire region, but that some wards and districts were more notorious for arranged marriages than others, notably, Mwandeti; Oljoro; Musa and Olorieni Wards of Arusha rural district.
Others are Longido and Monduli districts, home to mostly nomadic and cattle grazing pastoralist communities. Apparently, these are the communities where girls seldom get enrolled into secondary schools, fate that would have befallen prospective 2018 candidates as well.
According to Mr. Kyando, “in many of the cases, we discovered that the girls’ parents or guardians had already received ‘fat dowries’ from prospective suitors … traditional ceremonies are what remained before the girls would be handed over as ‘brides’ to their future grooms, mostly men old enough to be their fathers.
Six of the rescued girls have since been taken into special children centres because the authorities realised that the environment surrounding their respective homes was not conducive for further education.
Mr. Kyando is elated because 36 parents or guardians have been arrested in connection with the alleged arranged marriages. “Police officers went around the villages to arrest the offenders … and we do know that more parents and their would-be sons-in-law would be arrested … we also don’t know whether the culprits have been brought to courts or not”. He is happy that the authorities in Tanzania have completely stood up against the ugly situation. Other African countries should emulate this.
