Court victory for child brides - call for celebration?

The subject of child marriage has been debated for a long time in global, regional and local arenas amongst states, human rights and children’s activists. Merry has argued that society views the state as the guardian of social justice and likewise that citizens assume that it is the duty of the government to solve problems associated with violence against women and girls (2009:5). The Zimbabwean government showed its commitment to promoting women and children’s rights by ratifying international and regional treaties like the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, which expressly condemns child marriage, and adopting a new Constitution in 2013 that observes children’s rights which were not included in the old Constitution. However, the government’s ‘piecemeal’ reforms which left the existing marriage laws unaligned with the Constitution led former child brides and human rights activists to challenge the constitutionality of the marriage laws in the country. This led to the subsequent landmark ruling of January 2016 ending child marriage. Using a socio-legal perspective, this paper analyses how transnational laws can be translated into the Zimbabwean native context and promote children’s rights particularly ending child marriage.