Once again, Senator Yerima is in the
news, claiming Islam as the basis for his argument that a girl
automatically transforms into an adult of ‘full age’ once she is
married, with the attendant responsibilities that relate to the
renunciation of citizenship, irrespective of her age or mental capacity.
Because the Senator from Zamfara State has gone public with his
personal comprehension of the Shari’a, it has become necessary to
respond publicly to his utterances.
It should be pointed out, however, that
several media reports on the constitutional review debate at the Senate
give the impression that underage marriage has been endorsed by the
Senate Chambers. Facts are that S.29 of the 1979 Constitution permits a
Nigerian citizen of ‘full age’ to renounce his or her citizenship by
declaration in a prescribed manner, for which purpose ‘full age’ was
stated to be 18 years and above. The subsection also provides that, ‘any
woman who is married shall be deemed to be of full age’. In its current
efforts to review the Constitution, the Senate Committee had determined
that the particular subsection should be deleted, basically because
citizenship has no bearing on gender, as for example, voting, the right
to drive a car, possess a weapon or such similar social interactions
that are evolving or are germane to a democratic Nation. Senator Yerima,
however, vehemently argued (and lobbied) against the removal of the
clause, on the grounds that deleting that clause was against (his
understanding of) Islam. In his understanding, a girl, once married,
automatically assumes the full mental capacity and responsibility to
consciously make the prescribed declaration of renouncing her
citizenship.
This position needs to scrutinized
carefully, against the backdrop of similar positions that obtain under
the Shari’a and in our context, as a Nation. Does it then follow that
the married girl who is below 18, at election time, would be permitted
to vote, or is her not being issued a voters card un-Islamic? Is the
Senate now going to make an exception to that law, permitting her to
vote, or even drive, in accordance with (Senator Yerima’s understanding
of) Islam?
Contrary to the position conveyed by the
Senator from Zamfara, there is certainly no unanimity of positions on
such contemporary matters of social interaction, within Islamic jurists
or the various Schools of Thought. Surely where there is ‘silence in
thetexts’ (i.e primary sources) or lack of unanimity as regards a
particular practice, that opening allows for a society to determine for
itself what is in its best interest (maslaha), in its own context. What
about married Muslim girls who inherit property? Is it not the position
that in some cases, where not considered sufficiently mature (‘sufaha’,
based on Qur’an 4:6), such property remains in the custody of her
guardian, until she grows to be intellectually mature? This would, of
course, depend on her age, mental capacity and the size and nature of
the property. Why does such property not devolve upon her automatically
upon marriage, to deal with it as she wishes,irrespective of her mental
capacity? There definitely appears to be no basis, under the Shari’a,
that would compel a girl to deal with matters of such gravity as
therenunciation of citizenship, merely because she is married. Islam is
certainly not so presumptuous or harsh as to burden her with what she is
mentally and physically incapable of bearing. Her guardian is permitted
to determine the age or stage at which such a child can be entrusted
with such grave responsibilities, the assessment of her mental capacity
being the main determinant.
As a Muslim woman (without pretensions
of scholarship) forever striving for knowledge, research into these
matters has revealed that in matters of social interaction (mu’amalat),
there is a lot of latitude in what is permitted, unless it is expressly
prohibited by a clear text. The rules are certainly not so definitive.
What is also evident is that the ‘best interests of the child’ is a
paramount consideration within Islam, along with the principle of public
good (maslaha or istislah). The operational rules are not defined
(probably deliberately, in my humble view) and the determination of such
issues is best left to the experience, custom and context of the
particular society. The Qur’an provides that the predominant
consideration in matters relating to children would depend on the point
at which they can be said to not be ‘sufaha’ (mentally immature)
anymore, in the context of that particular community.
It is interesting that Senator Yerima
would rather link the weighty and dispassionate subject of citizenship
with his understanding of gender vis a vis his perception of the age of
marriage, rather than with other matters of social interaction, such as
those relating to inheritance rights, driving or even voting. Indeed,
citizenship is a contemporary phenomenon within the Sharia, as in the
early days the concept of citizenship had not been defined and people
traveled across boundaries, without restriction. In a Muslim community,
when matters evolve, it is for scholars or experts in Islamic legal
philosophy-‘Usul-al-Fiqh’- and juristic reasoning (and not even those
solely learned in the Qur’an-‘Mussafirun’, the Fiqh-‘Fuqaha’ or the
Hadith-‘Muhaddithun’), to analyze the issues with a view to arriving at
an appropriate position for the context of that relevant community. In
this particular instance, it is certainly perplexing for the Senator to
insist so categorically that even a married ‘intellectually immature’
girl must be permitted to renounce her citizenship, irrespective of her
mental capacity. The foundation for such a general and sweeping
statement within the Shari’a is difficult to locate.
The public good remains the overriding
consideration in the process of analytical reasoning by those qualified
for the purpose, so long as the deductions are not in direct conflict
with the primary sources of the Shari’a. Therefore, in following
arguments repeatedly canvassed by the Senator, it may be necessary to
examine the context in which we live, to determine what is good, for the
purpose of encouragement and support, and what remains harmful to our
society, to be confronted, discouraged or prohibited by Muslim jurists.
Today the North of Nigeria continues to
throw up Nigeria’s poorest indices on matters relating to healthcare,
nutrition, education, empowerment and productivity. Consequently,
unemployment, insecurity, violence and poverty remain rife in that
region. Statistics have it that 2/3 of the 102 million poor people in
Nigeria live in the North. Extreme poverty in the North translates into
extreme vulnerability to the effects of climate change, food security
and so much more. Incidentally, over half of the women in the North are
married off by the age of 16 and commence childbirth within the first
year of marriage. Also, of the 16 million births by girls below the age
of 18, 9 out of 10 of them are married.
Facts are that nearly half of all the
children under 5 years of age are malnourished in the North East zone,
with women and children in the nutrition ‘high-burden’ States of
Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Sokoto,
Yobe andZamfara suffering the most from malnutrition, wasting and
stunting. This singular factor remains the underlying cause for 53% of
under-5 deaths. If the child is stunted in its first 1000 days, that
condition is irreversible, so the future of these children, and the
larger population, is permanently shortchanged. The health and
nutritional needs of mothers, new-borns and children are closely linked,
with young mothers accounting for a majority of severely malnourished
children.
Multiple health risks arising from child
marriage include the sexual exploitation (including forced sexual
relations) that she is subjected to, as well as limited access to
reproductive health services, despite the real and present danger of
contracting diseases such as HIV/AIDS, STIs (sexually transmitted
diseases) and the debilitating ailment of VVF/RVF (VVF-a tear in the
flesh between the vagina and the urinary passage, usually due to
prolonged labour, resulting in uncontrolled urine or feces in the case
of recto-vaginal fistulae-RVF), including the abandonment that comes
with such ailments. Nigeria, with 2% of the world’s population, has 10%
of VVF patients. Three-quarters of those with VVF/RVF are young girls
who are not yet physically mature but have suffered trauma in their
first pregnancy.
Statistics show that stillbirths and
deaths are 50% more likely in babies born to mothers younger than 18, as
against babies born to mothers above that age. Each day, 144 women die
in childbirth in Nigeria, with the North East alone having 5 times the
global rate of maternal mortality. The lack of information and access to
support ultimately results in psycho-social and emotional consequences,
domestic violence, abandoned (street) children, with the attendant
deprivations of their rights and freedoms, whose wellbeing is severely
compromised. The prevalence of the abuse of the right to the exercise of
divorce by Muslim men has only compounded the situation, leading to so
many negative social deviations such as substance abuse (that has become
so rampant), commercial sex work and the complete loss of values in the
entire family set up.
Many of these adolescents are married
off to men much older than they, and because of the associated power
differentials, this singular factor impedes communication between them,
with the girl having no negotiation skills in crucial decision-making
that may affect her life. Having lost out on these critical life
opportunities, these married adolescents can never aspire to living as
meaningful and productive members of society. Not being able to
participate actively in the community translates to their losing out
completely on benefitting from economic activity and earning a
decentincome. Many of these girls remain excluded from community life,
having been separated from peers and family members by marriage.
Depression sets in. A life of diminished opportunities. The community
loses out completely; the economy cannot improve where half its
population is stuck in this rut.
Child marriage, from available
statistics, ultimately hampers the efforts of these young adolescents
from acquiring an education, as sooner than later, they find it
difficult to combine the onerous responsibilities of being a wife and
mother, with schooling. They drop out, if they have not been removed for
the purpose of marriage, in the first place. Consequently, 70.8% of
young women aged 20-29 in the North West zone are unable to read or
write. Due to the fact that these girls are deprived so early of an
education (including the access to information and knowledge) they
remain bereft of the purchasing power necessary for an adequate diet,
healthcare,skills, or even recourse to support in emergencies, all of
which would enable them rise above the circumstances of abject poverty.
It is paradoxical that Muslims like Senator Yerima would rather their
wives and daughters be treated by female medical personnel if they fall
ill, and yet they are, by continuously advocating for child marriage,
deliberately closing the avenues for girls to aspire to such
professions.
Deprivations of formal and non-formal
education translate, at such an early age, into restrictions on
mobility, domestic burdens, the denial of sundry freedoms in respect of
survival, development and participation, as well as the loss of
adolescent years. Indeed, children of young, uneducated mothers are also
less likely to attain high levels of education, perpetuating cycles of
low literacy and limited livelihood opportunities. Child marriage,
therefore, ultimately deprives societies of the intellectual and
financial/livelihood contributions of girls, and of their offspring. It
is no wonder then that the North continues to portray such poor ratings
in almost all aspects of human endeavour.
As a consequence, MDGs 1 (relating to
eradicating extreme poverty and hunger), 2 (on education), 4 (on
reducing child mortality), 5 (on maternal health), 6 (on combating
diseases) remain unattainable goals (at least in Northern Nigeria), if
we cannot confront the consequences and implications of child marriage.
Evidently, the geography of poverty requires a coherent and urgent
Northern strategy and a solution to the instability that has bedeviled
the region in recent years. Against this background of grim data, we can
ill afford to play politics with the obvious deficiencies in our human
capital. The North, as an intrinsic part of Nigeria needs to improve on
all fronts, to impact positively on Nigeria’s progress and support its
growth. Since child marriage has all these devastating and diminishing
implications, surely checking the increase in the practice can only
trigger and catalyze positive growth, in so many dimensions.
It is certainly not mandatory in Islam
that girls must be married off as minors, so to keep insisting that this
practice must remain sacrosanct, given the background of needs in
Northern Nigeria, is incongruous, even under the Shari’a. Where a
practice is determined to be merely permissible and not mandatory, it is
considered practicable and entirely feasible within Islamic
jurisprudence, to discourage or prohibit it, where it is found to be so
harmful to individuals and to the community. Countries such as Yemen,
Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Somalia and Bangladesh, with majority
or high Muslim populations have set a minimum age for marriage as 18, in
the acknowledgment that there are serious social, physical and mental
health risks associated with child marriages. This progressive step
became necessary, in that these indisputable facts placed a heavy burden
on the accountable and God-fearing leadership in majority Muslim
countries, to protect the vulnerable in their midst.
It is, therefore, not unreasonable to
expect that educated elite and public figures such as Senator Yerima,
being conscious of their grave responsibilities to prohibit harm and to
enjoin good in our own context, should actually discourage this
devaluing and belittling practice of early marriage, in the public good,
for the protection of the vulnerable and the realization of social
benefits. To enable our girls attain their fullest possible potential is
definitely a target that Senator Yerima should also be working
passionately towards, along with the rest of Nigerians who yearn for a
better future.
Indeed, the overriding objectives of the
Sharia include the promotion of human dignity, justice, compassion, the
removal of hardship, the prevention of harm, the realization of the
lawful benefits of the people, and the education of the individual by
inculcating in him a sense of self discipline and restraint, which aims
are by no means exclusive. All else may be adapted to achieve these
ends, which measures may encompass matters of concern not only to law
but also to economic development, administration and politics. For those
that reflect, the hardship that these little girls experience, where
married off and divorced soon after, so wantonly, is certainly
unacceptable within the faith.
Although the fundamentals of faith and
the practical pillars on which they stand remain immutable in principle,
they may be interpreted and justified at the level of implementation in
the exercise of public good. This process must of need be carried out
solely by persons learned and eminently qualified to speak on the
subject matter in question. We must always bear in mind that the
‘appropriation’ of divine authority in religious interpretation is best
left to Scholars learned in Islamic legal philosophy and analytical
reasoning.
Having acquired the requisite knowledge and expertise
(including the capacity to weigh the various views in the particular
sphere of learning in the context of our times), these Jurists would
also need to have imbibed, at the barest minimum, the attributes of
humility, compassion, reflection, wisdom, self-restraint, diligence,
objectivity, along with piety. Our learned Scholars must stand up and be
heard, rather than remain silent on matters that so adversely affect us
as individuals, as a region, a Nation and as members of a global
community, which challenges paradoxically controvert the deeper meaning
and purpose of the Shari’a.
Back to the issue in contention, it is
important to commend the thinking behind the decision to delete the
constitutional clause that seeks to lumber even an ‘intellectually
immature’ girl, where married, with the grave responsibility of the
power to renounce her citizenship, thereby elevating the subject of
citizenship to the level whereby both men and women have similar
responsibilities, without discrimination. It is hoped that ultimately,
members of the Senate would reflect deeply on the implications of their
recent action and revisit their decision to retain the contentious
clause, if only to ensure that every Nigerian citizen of full age,
without distinction, is subjected to similar standards and
responsibilities under the provisions of our Constitution.
Maryam Uwais MFR
Chairperson, Isa Wali Empowerment Initiative, Kano
20th July 2013
Chairperson, Isa Wali Empowerment Initiative, Kano
20th July 2013
Source: Omojuwa.com
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