South Sudan Families Still Forced to Sell Girls into Marriage

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South Sudan Families Still Forced to Sell Girls into Marriage

In South Sudan, the arranged marriage of a young girl to an older man often brings the girl's family wealth measured in cows. Some girls bring their families up to 100 cows. Each cow is valued at $1,000.

Girls who are young, healthy and come from good families can bring much more. In 2018, one 17-year-old girl brought in 500 cows, two costly¹ cars and $10,000 in an auction² that made news around the world. She was then married to a man in his 50s.

The auctions³ still happen although South Sudan now has a law requiring girls to be 18 before they are married. The law is often violated.

Activists⁴ who are hoping to change this tradition wanted to bring up the issue of child brides being sold to older men, during a visit from Pope Francis in July.

However, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church canceled the visit earlier in June because he is recovering from a knee operation.

Francis was supposed to visit the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan from July 2 to 7. The Vatican said a new date would be set for the visit.

Jackline Nasiwa is the leader of the Center of Inclusive Governance, Peace and Justice in South Sudan's capital of Juba. She said families must sell their daughters "so they get something to survive."

South Sudan broke away from Sudan in 2011 with the hope of growth and peace, but that has not happened. The new country remains⁵ poor and is still recovering from a civil war that ended in 2018.

Many people are hungry as a result of flooding and other problems brought by climate change. Food prices are increasing after Russia invaded Ukraine in February.

One of the ways families can get money is by selling their daughters.

As a result, the United Nations says South Sudan has the world's fifth-highest number of child marriages. The U.N. says child marriage is a human rights violation⁶ that keeps girls from going to school and is a cause of poverty.

The U.N. children's agency, UNICEF, says that more than 30 percent of South Sudanese girls are pregnant before turning 15.

But some girls are fighting back.

Nyanachiek Madit is 21. She refused to be married to a much older man when she was 17. Her family wanted her to marry because school was too costly.

"I refused," she said. "I didn't accept to get married because I am disabled." Madit said getting an education will help her in the future. Because she was born with a disability, she said, "my education will be my ‘leg' later on."

Her family did not make her get married but did not pay for school.

A child group called Child Bride Solidarity⁷ heard Madit's story and helped her pay for school in Juba. "I am now happy," she said.

The U.N. Population Fund warns that early marriage can cause death. South Sudan has one of the highest maternal⁸ death rates in the world. Over 1,000 women out of every 100,000 who have babies die during childbirth, the organization said.

Chris Oyeyipo of the U.N. Population Fund talked during a Mother's Day event. "You cannot have a healthy mother, you cannot have a happy mother, if you are marrying off your children and making them mothers," he said.

The U.N. wants to end child marriage by 2030. But poor families in South Sudan see marrying off their daughters as a way to survive.

Some families worry that sending girls to school exposes them to other dangers such as sexual assault. But activists who work to end child marriage say the young girls can be raped⁹ by their new husbands.

Aya Benjamin is South Sudan's minister of gender¹⁰, child, and social welfare. As a girl, she saw some of her friends married to older men.

She said, "It is our collective responsibility to make sure our girls are allowed to enjoy their childhood."

She said one of the ways to have a healthy society is to "allow girls to be children, allow them to be themselves, let them grow up and let them go to school and allow them to decide what they want to be in life."

Words in This Story

arranged marriage – n. a marriage in which the husband and wife are chosen for each other by their parents

auction –n. a public sale at which things are sold to the people who offer to pay the most

disabled – adj. having a physical or mental disability

assault – n. a physical attack

allow – v. to permit someone to do some activity

1 costly   

adj.昂贵的，价值高的，豪华的

参考例句：

• It must be very costly to keep up a house like this.维修这么一幢房子一定很昂贵。
• This dictionary is very useful,only it is a bit costly.这本词典很有用，左不过贵了些。

2 auction   

n.拍卖；拍卖会；vt.拍卖

参考例句：

• They've put the contents of their house up for auction.他们把房子里的东西全都拿去拍卖了。
• They bought a new minibus with the proceeds from the auction.他们用拍卖得来的钱买了一辆新面包车。

3 auctions   

n.拍卖，拍卖方式( auction的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• They picked up most of the furniture at auctions in country towns. 他们大部分的家具都是在乡村镇上的拍卖处买的。 来自辞典例句
• Our dealers didn't want these cars, so we had to dump them at auctions. 我们的承销商都不要这些车子，因此我们只好贱价拍卖。 来自辞典例句

4 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

6 violation   

n.违反(行为)，违背(行为)，侵犯

参考例句：

• He roared that was a violation of the rules.他大声说，那是违反规则的。
• He was fined 200 dollars for violation of traffic regulation.他因违反交通规则被罚款200美元。

7 solidarity   

n.团结；休戚相关

参考例句：

• They must preserve their solidarity.他们必须维护他们的团结。
• The solidarity among China's various nationalities is as firm as a rock.中国各族人民之间的团结坚如磐石。

8 maternal   

adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的

参考例句：

• He is my maternal uncle.他是我舅舅。
• The sight of the hopeless little boy aroused her maternal instincts.那个绝望的小男孩的模样唤起了她的母性。

9 raped   

v.以暴力夺取，强夺( rape的过去式和过去分词 )；强奸

参考例句：

• A young woman was brutally raped in her own home. 一名年轻女子在自己家中惨遭强暴。 来自辞典例句
• We got stick together, or we will be having our women raped. 我们得团结一致，不然我们的妻女就会遭到蹂躏。 来自辞典例句

10 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。