CHILD LABOUR AND CHILD MARRIAGE PERPETUATE GENDER INEQUALITY

“My mother forced me into early marriage. She did it so my husband could help her with salt and sugar.

During the marriage, my husband frequently beat me. My mother always said I had to get used to that pain because that’s what marriage means,” recalls 15-year-old Lucy.*

Lucy’s husband not only abused her, but also forced her into agricultural labour. ”My husband was forcing me to do work on farms to raise money for the family. Every day I spent the whole day at the farm working,” laments Lucy.

Lucy’s experience not only highlights the widespread cases of child marriage in Malawi, but also the on-going problem of child labour. These two practices are, in some cases mutually reinforcing and disempower women and girls in similar ways, by denying children an education and creating a vicious cycle of inequality.

In Malawi 60% of girls aged between 13 and 18 are married. The Mpherembe district in Mzimba has the highest number of child labour and child marriage cases.

This has recently prompted officials from the Zima Social Welfare Office to hold this year’s Day of African Child commemoration in the Mpherembe.