Nigeria's Child Brides!

[Historian]

Child Brides By The Thousands
Published: Sunday | June 29, 2014

By the time she ran away, she bore the scars of an abused woman anywhere - a swollen face, a starved body, and, barely a year after her wedding, a divorce. But for Maimuna Abdullahi, it all happened by the time she was 14.

Maimuna is one of thousands of divorced girls in Nigeria, who were forced into marriage and have since run away or been thrown out by their husbands.

They are victims of a belief that girls should get wed rather than educated,

(Continue reading at http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2.../int/int1.html )

[Historian]

Nigeria and Jamaica

While reading this sad article from the Associated Press, I couldn’t help but ponder certain similarities in Jamaica. Of course, in Jamaica women do not normally marry before they are 18 (not even in our East Indian community), but the treatment of many of our young girls in the various poor communities, in particular in the so-called garrisons, surely is similar in some respects to what happens in Nigeria!

Check the daily Ananda Alert for missing children in Jamaica. Note that the majority of missing children and teens are females. Yes, in some cases teens will run away from their homes for various reasons, but I am sure that those are in the minority. Is the sex trade flourishing vibrantly?

I notice that the only issue that gets our local churches up in arms is the matter of homosexuality. Where is the outrage, concern and condemnation of crimes against our young girls, against children in general, and against women in Jamaica?