WHY THE LAW HAS FAILED TO END CHILD MARRIAGE 

2020


In 2013 Zimbabwe adopted the amended Constitution. While this is a part of welcomed law reform the problem was that various pieces of legislation did not correspond with this new Constitution (particularly around gender equality in marriage laws, age of consent and child marriage). In 2015, an Inter-Ministerial Taskforce was set up to carry out constitutional alignment. These would be the individuals responsible for the harmonization of different laws with the newly amended constitution. In response to child marriage prevalence in 2016, two women challenged sections of the Marriage Act that made it legal for a child below the age of 18 to be married. In this landmark case Mudzuru & Another v Ministry of Justice, Legal & Parliamentary Affairs (N.O.) & Others (Const. Application No. 79/14, CC 12-15 the Constitutional Court ruled that 

  1. The legal age of marriage is 18. 
  2. Section 22 of the Marriage Act and any other law allowing persons below the age of 18 to marry is inconsistent with the Constitution. 
  3. No person may enter into a marriage or customary law union before the age of 18. In 2017, the House of Assembly began developing the Marriages Bill, in response to this judgment and other gender-related injustices. While this judgment sparked the conversation around child marriage it certainly did not stop it. One would have thought that the protection of vulnerable groups was a priority but it is now 2020 and child marriage has not been criminalized and legislation has not been repealed. Though the official judicial position is that it is prohibited, multiple pieces of legislation continue to perpetuate the crime and provisions that render that decision ineffective



THE CONSTITUTION OF ZIMBABWE, 2013 

Section 26 states that the State must take appropriate measures to ensure that no marriage is entered into without the free and full consent of the intending spouses and children are not pledged in marriage.

Section 78 states that only persons aged 18 and above can found a family. While these sections can be relied on to confirm the legislature’s position on child marriage, there has been very little effort to make any alignment that will challenge the status quo of women and girls in Zimbabwe. 



THE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE ACT 5:16 

Section 3 (1) (l) of the Act lists child marriage as a form of domestic violence and section 4 states that anyone guilty of any offense in the former is liable to a fine and imprisonment. While problematizing child marriage, the Act does not define who a child is at law, neither does it expand further on the definition and penalty that is attached to it. Realistically, this means that it is impossible to prosecute a perpetrator with reliance on this section. It is moot. 



THE MARRIAGES ACT 5:11

Section 3 (1) (l) Section 20 of this Act deals with the marriage of minors. The section allows for a legal guardian to give consent to the marriage of a child below a certain age, and Section 22 states that age to be eighteen for boys and sixteen for girls (a discriminatory and unjustified distinction). While this was declared unconstitutional by the Mudzuru case, this is how the Act currently reads. Additionally, the Act neglects to clearly state an age that marriage to a minor becomes illegal or the criminal liability attached to facilitating or taking part in it. (This will be remedied by the Marriage Bill that has now been in its development stages for four years). 



TERMINATION OF PREGNANCY ACT 

Section 3& 4 of the Act state the limited circumstances under which women in Zimbabwe can terminate a pregnancy. These are: 



  1. Endangerment to the life of the mother
  2. Where there is a serious risk to the mental or physical health of the child
  3. Where the pregnancy is a result of unlawful intercourse namely rape or incest.