FORCED MARRIAGES

I recently learnt that forced marriages are on the rise in Nigeria especially in the northern part of the country.

It has gotten worse to the extent were young girls and ladies are held hostages in their own homes by their own relatives which brings me to the case of Fatimah Shuabu Liman age 20 and Talatu Liman 21. Both victims were brutally beaten and held against their will for as long as 3 months before their cases was brought to the notice of Women’s Rights Advancement and Protection Alternative (WRAPA). Statistics shows that, large percentage of forced marriages occur within the Muslim community.

Another case occurred sometime in January or February which I also read in Punch; A man originally from Niger but has been residing for a while here in Nigeria with his two daughters age 18 and 12; then out of the bloom, he told them they will be getting married in about a months time; to their amazement and those of the people living around them; a marriage ceremony was conducted in the presence of their fathers family and their suitors without their having a say and then bundled off to their grooms houses in Badagry and Ajah. It should be noted that the grooms where not present at their wedding and that both of them live in a room apartment.

The question now is why do some parents force their children into marriage? According to the father of the two girls, he gave them out to marriage because he could not afford to send them to school anymore; secondly,, to avoid letting them get pregnant by neighborhood guys which I will narrow down to poverty but in his case I would say he had other reasons because both grooms are financially in the same category he is which is poor. But in Fatimah and Talatu’s case I will call it greed.

Culled from Punch march 14, 2009, http://www.wrapaifl.org/wrapa.html