Child marriage! The effect! The way forward

As it is said we will begin to go backward when we are silent to things that matter. Child marriage!  Our generation is constantly in battle with the syndrome... of an increase in child marriages. Everywhere today campaign is being mounted to tackle this disease.

In my country Sierra Leone (west Africa) we have a slogan in our local parlance pikito which means child that is in the age of 16. 

However, some usually say young cucumber is the best. When you hear someone (men) say this just know that he is referring to a child that is below the age of consent.

Notwithstanding, child marriage is the process that occurs where child/children that is below the age of 18 are sent or forced into early marriage. Child marriages today are seen as a global problem in the world over. 

However, in some countries today tough laws are being put in place in other to solve this problem and in helping bring perpetrators to book.

In my perspective, the problem starts mostly with a centralized governing system where all the development of a country has been centered-based, in other words, no decentralized system to drive development that would benefit all. 

Many a time people that are hugely affected are those living in the provinces or Rural areas if I may put it. 

With such centralized development, most people who are in rural areas will look for other options to better themselves. Most time in the rural areas, parents see their children as Borden and commodities. In this case, one option that is best for them is to give the female child or children to marriage to save themselves from poverty.

In most cases, their choosing that option is more than a disaster to them and the country. In this instance, they have chosen poverty over human development. 

To dive deep into this, many children today are unable to achieve their full potential just because of this path (child marriage). Some of the effects we would get if a female(child) is being forced into early marriage could be seen as follows:

1. Unproductive society: in this case, the society would have many of its' women uneducated and unskilled. any society that is taking this drive is heading for doom.

2. Diseases of the unknown. Many unknown diseases will occur as a result of not fully understanding adulthood and the challenges and obstacles that it involves. As such their body are not mature enough to handle pregnancy, which sometimes ends in them having a fistula which is a major illness.

3. Early death: many young girls today that are in marriages today are sent to earlier graves... Then it is supposed to be. Most of these men that are with these children are not well-wishers of these children. Their only aim is to get them pregnant and move on as if it were a game of chance.

Some of the ways to tackle child marriages are as follows: 

1. Decentralized development: when a country's development is being decentralized every citizen would be in an informed position to make the right decision moving forward. If the development is decentralized knowledge would increase and people hope Hope's would not hang on coming to big cities or in the thoughts of giving their female children into early marriage.

2. Invest in human development: when the government starts to venture into human development that is the best thing ever, they would do to solve early marriage. Giving the right education and skills would bring significant change to this problem.

3. Introduced strong laws:  strong laws would help in tackling this problem, especially in situations where children are been forced into early marriage, the minimum sentence for the perpetrator should not be less than 20 years, since a child's future is being given to the dogs.

4. Provide jobs: providing jobs that would help the parents of these children have a place where they can get themselves a better decent income, would ease the burden of saying we are poor we don't have alternative ways to have money to feed the family. Hence, the only option is to give them to marriage.