Zimbabwe Parliament calls for criminalisation of child marriages as 4 500 are forced out of primary school in one year

This is the SADC Model Law, not just on eradicating child marriages but also on protecting children already in marriage because we have victims, people who have married at a tender age. What the SADC Model Law seeks to do is also to protect those already in marriage.  I will explain how the Model Law endeavours to do that.

Mr. Speaker Sir, this model law on eradicating child marriage was adopted in Ezulwini, Swaziland on 3rd June, 2016 at the 39th Plenary Assembly of the SADC Parliamentary Forum.  What I want to highlight is that, this was a unanimous adoption.  All the members of the SADC Parliamentary Forum, men and women alike supported the adoption of this motion.  Another thing which I want to advise Hon. Members is that we, in the SADC region are the pioneers.   This is the first time that a law of this nature has ever been passed, not just in Africa but in the whole world.  I believe that we must congratulate ourselves as a region for being the pioneers on adopting such a model law.

Mr. Speaker Sir, we do not want those efforts to go to waste because this piece of legislation is actually a master-piece for those who are going to read the document and understand what it entails.  I want to commend it and say that this is a brilliant piece of legislation.  What we would like to happen is to have that model to be domesticated so that it becomes part of the legislation in our respective countries.  As of now, the Parliamentary Forum does not have legislative powers.  What it can simply do is to recommend and I believe we have got members of the Executive and members who sit in Cabinet and I notice that some of them are not paying attention.  Dr. Mombeshora, I know that he is a medical doctor; he knows very much some of the harmful effects on girls who get married at an early age.  He knows that they have medical complications because they are not ready at that point in time to give birth.

I know that our Ministers generally are in support of this piece of legislation.  What we would like is for them to put it in practice and have Cabinet adopt it with minor amendments so that it becomes part of our law.  This model law was the product of a highly interactive, iterative – [HON. MEMBERS: Inaudible interjections.] –

THE TEMPORARY SPEAKER (HON. MARUMAHOKO): Order!  Can we have less noise in the House Hon. Members?

 HON. GONESE: It was a product of a very comprehensive, exhaustive and inclusive process.  I would like to say, Hon. Vice President who is also responsible for Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs who is just walking in as I am making this presentation, has been highly supportive and as a matter of fact, he was instrumental on 12th November, 2016 to launch the SADC Model Law at the 40th Plenary Assembly of the SADC Parliamentary Forum, which was held in Harare at the Rainbow Towers.

The Hon. Vice President gave his undertaking that the Government of Zimbabwe is fully supportive of this model law.  What we simply want now is to have a scenario or a situation where with utmost speed, the Government of Zimbabwe proceeds to introduce this model law to Parliament.  As I have already pointed out, the process was very long.  It started in 2014 and the 35th Plenary Assembly in Mauritius where all the Parliamentarians who sit in the SADC Parliamentary Forum agreed that we must embark on a process to develop such a model law.

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