3 year old Girl rescued from early marriage

Choma District Commissioner (DC) Bernadette Hamweemba and District Education Board Secretary Mutinta Mubanga rescued the juvenile after a tip-off from Chief Singani.
The named girl is now in the custody of the DEBS’ office where she joined eight other girls equally rescued from early marriages in Choma and will be taken back to school.
Chief Singani, who has been championing the fight against early marriages in his area, was saddened at the increased rate of incest cases among close relatives.
“When this case of two children started, no headman has been present to help resolve this marriage and we can’t educate our subjects against early marriages,” Chief Singani said.
He said it was a taboo for relatives to marry each other, citing the marriage in question in which the girl was man’s niece.
Chief Singani blamed his subjects for allegedly losing traditional values to an extent of allowing relatives to marry each other within family cycles.
And the visibly incensed DC advised parents to counsel their children them on sexual matters, saying children needed to appreciate education and not early marriages.
Ms Hamweemba said children had the potential to transform the living standards of their parents and guardians through education which the Government was promoting.
“As relatives, why should you marry among yourselves? This is incest which is against the law, let’s educate our children on such issues,” she said.
Ms Mubanga called for intervention from various stakeholders to encourage children to value Government’s good education policies to become better citizens.
She said if not checked, early marriages had the potential to destroy the future of the children.
Ms Mubanga said her office had created a boarding house in the district for girls who had become victims of early marriages, before taking them back to school.
And the father of the girl, Phisher Munacholobwe praised the Government for providing a bright future to victims of early marriages, saying his daughter could have lost her desire for education in preference to marriage.