Conflict in South Sudan linked to rise in number of young girls forced to marry

Nyakuma, 17, is from Nyal, where 71 per cent of girls get married before they turn 18 CREDIT: NOURA NYAL/EMILY GALE/OXFAM

More than two thirds of girls living in South Sudan’s conflict zones ^[1]are married before they turn 18, according to a report exposing the rate of child marriage in the world’s youngest state.

While the minimum legal age of marriage in South Sudan^[2] is 18, the breakdown of the rule of law during the last five years of conflict has meant that girls as young as 12 are being forced to marry. 

Before the conflict, which began just 18 months after the country gained independence in 2011, national statistics estimated that 45 per cent of girls under 18 were married. 

But according to research from Oxfam in Nyal^[3], a town bordering some of the most brutal and intense fighting, today 71 per cent of girls are married before the age of 18. Of these, 10 per cent were married by the time they were 15. 

“Early forced marriage predates the current crisis but the conflict has shifted the way that child marriage is perceived,” said Elysia Buchanan, policy adviser to Oxfam in South Sudan and lead author of the report.

“Early marriage is fueled particularly by rising poverty and the loss of livelihood; people feel they have no choice but to marry off their daughters to receive a dowry," she said.

References

1. ^{^} South Sudan’s conflict zones  (www.telegraph.co.uk)
2. ^{^} South Sudan (www.telegraph.co.uk)
3. ^{^} research from Oxfam in Nyal (oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com)