‘At this age, I don’t want anyone call me mama’, video by KAFA to lobby for a minimum age of marriage

On the World Population Day coinciding on July 11 of each year, KAFA, Enough Violence and Exploitation organization launched yesterday a video highlighting the issue of early marriage in Lebanon in order to pressure for setting up a minimum official age of marriage. The video was produced in collaboration with the United Nations Population Fund, UNFPA, which chose the theme for this year to be ‘Investing in Girls’. The video complements KAFA’s earlier campaign ‘An Archaic Law is not a Serious Law’ launched back in December, 2015, in allusion to the current patriarchal laws regulating personal status which are discriminatory against women and children. Through the above video, KAFA sheds light on the conflicting nature of the notion of ‘legal age’ as perceived by the Lebanese legislator. For while recognizing the ineptitude of girls under 18 years in committing to contractual agreements (obligation of law and contracts), or to drive a car (traffic law), there are no legislations that regulate the age of marriage of girls. As such, a girl under 18 years is disqualified from one perspective, but yet could be eligible to raise a family!! Girls screened in the video tape have demanded setting the minimum age for marriage, particularly in the absence of clear laws that prohibit the marriage of children, and also because personal status provisions are manipulated by confessional systems that seem relaxed and tolerant towards the issue of early marriage. The video ended with the motto, ‘at this age, I don’t want to be called mama’. For her part, the press officer at KAFA, Maya Ammar, presented the solution to the dilemma, which as she maintained, is “to approve and enforce among all religious communities a civil personal status law that sets the age of 18 as the minimum age for marriage,". (Al-Akhbar 12 July 2016)

For more on the video, please refer to the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6q-FK8RWWM ;