Woman, 20, commits suicide over forced marriage
What you need to know:
- The victim was reportedly forced to get married and the traditional approach of marriage was being followed; whereby the boy came, gave her Shs300,000 to ask for her hand in marriage.
A 20-year-old woman was found dead after hanging herself in her grass-thatched house in Agweng Sub County, Lira District.
Her body was discovered a day after she had been initiated into a traditional marriage against her will.
The victim was reportedly forced to get married and the traditional approach of marriage was being followed; whereby the boy came, gave her Shs300,000 to ask for her hand in marriage.
Before she decided to end it all, her would-be husband's family members were waiting the next time to return to her home and add some money so that the girl could be taken to the boy’s home and begin living as husband and wife.
A child rights organization, Youth at Work Development Initiative (YAWODI), said the girl tried to resist but lost the battle since there was no one on her side.
“Being a young girl of 20 years who did not have resources, probably she did not have a telephone to call anybody…. maybe she didn’t have the money maybe to say let me board a Boda Boda or anything like that and I go to my aunt’s place or go to somebody to seek refuge and help. She didn’t have the capacity, she didn’t have economic empowerment to save her life or to save her education,” Dr Isaac Orech, YAWODI Executive Director said. Sadly, the boy’s family came back to claim their money a day after her death.
“So, in this case, you see the girl child has not been protected, the girl child has remained vulnerable even in the house of her parents and so this is where YAWODI is coming in to say there is more to save than to just lose a life like that,” Dr Orech said.
Child marriages and teenage pregnancies are widespread in rural areas of Lango Sub-region just like in many other rural areas in Uganda.
A report by Communication for Development Foundation Uganda (CDFU), an NGO, showed that 23,549 teenage girls visited health facilities in the Lango Sub-region for antenatal care services in a period of eight months.
The survey showed that adolescent girls were impregnated between January and August in 2020. Lango comprises Alebtong, Amolatar, Apac, Dokolo, Kole, Kwania, Lira, Oyam, and Otuke districts.
This sexual violence is increasingly threatening the right and access to education by affecting supply, demand, and quality of education in the education sector.
Negative gender norms, poor parenting coupled with greed for dowry are partly to blame for the increasing teenage pregnancies.
Other factors include poverty and ignorance, peer pressure, breakdown in social protection and safety nets.
