A female traditional ruler has taken a very drastic step to discourage child marriages within her domain.
Inkosi Kachindamoto
A Malawian female traditional leader, Inkosi Kachindamoto, has reportedly taken it upon herself to discourage the prevalence of child marriages within her constituency.
Nyasa Times reports that Kachindamoto has annulled about 330 child marriages, sending the parties involved, sometimes both parties to school.
Kachindamoto applied the country’s new laws regarding child marriage, in this solo act. It will be recalled that in April, President Peter Mutharika signed into a law a ban on child marriage, setting the minimum age requirement for marriage in the country at 18.
Speaking about the development, she said: “I have terminated 330 marriages of which 175 were girl-wives and 155 were boy-fathers, I wanted them to go to school and that has worked. I don’t want youthful marriages, they must go to school…no child should be found loitering at home or doing household chores during school time."
It is popular knowledge that Malawi has one of the highest incidents of child marriage in the world with statistics proving that 1 in 2 girls get married before the age of 18.
The practice is closely linked to poverty where, in the rural areas, girls are married off to improve their families’ financial situations.