{"id":32574,"date":"2021-01-11T22:41:04","date_gmt":"2021-01-11T20:41:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/zimbabwe\/?p=32574"},"modified":"2021-01-11T18:49:28","modified_gmt":"2021-01-11T16:49:28","slug":"zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage","title":{"rendered":"Zim Girl Uses Martial Arts To Warn Against Child Marriage"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press<\/a> – Zimbabwe<\/a>. <\/strong><\/span>AP<\/b> –<\/p>\n

IN Zimbabwe, some girls are forced to marry as young as the age of 10 because of poverty or for traditional or religious reasons.<\/p>\n

One Zimbabwean teenager is using the sport of taekwondo to give girls from a poor community a fighting chance to have a better life. Natsiraishe Maritsa has been a fan of taekwondo since she was very young.<\/p>\n

Taekwondo is a Korean martial art.<\/p>\n

Today, the 17-year-old holds taekwondo lessons outside her parents\u2019 home in the poor settlement of Epworth. The area is about 15 kilometers south of the capital, Harare.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot many people do taekwondo here, so it\u2019s fascinating for the girls, both married and single,\u201d Maritsa said. \u201cI use it to get their attention.\u201d Children as young as four follow her instructions to stretch, kick, strike and punch.<\/p>\n

After class, the group talks about the risks of child marriage.<\/p>\n

Newly married girls led one recent discussion. One by one, they describe extreme abuse they have experienced in their marriages. They describe being raped and being hungry.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not ready for this thing called marriage. We are just too young for it,\u201d Maritsa told The Associated Press. She described her small group as \u201ca safe space\u201d for the girls to share ideas.<\/p>\n

\u201cI use their voices, their challenges, to discourage those young girls not yet married to stay off early sexual activity and marriage,\u201d Maritsa said.<\/p>\n

Zimbabwe law says boys and girls cannot legally marry until they reach the age of 18. That law was passed in 2016. Child marriage, however, is widespread in the southern African nation.<\/p>\n

For some poor families, the reason is an economic one. Marrying off a young daughter means fewer costs. The rights group Girls Not Brides says the bride price paid by husbands of these girls is \u201cused by families as a means of survival.\u201d<\/p>\n

An estimated 30 percent of girls in Zimbabwe are married before they reach 18, the United Nations Children\u2019s Fund says. Rising poverty during the Covid-19 pandemic has increased pressures on families around the world to marry off their young daughters.<\/p>\n

Maritsa\u2019s group is called Vulnerable Underaged People\u2019s Auditorium. She started the project in 2018 after seeing her friends leave school for marriage. She hopes to increase the confidence of both married and unmarried girls through the martial arts lessons and discussions.<\/p>\n

She accepts 15 students in each lesson, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only support I get is from my parents.\u201d After class, her parents usually provide fresh juice and sweets.<\/p>\n

Zimbabwe recently announced a ban on public gatherings. The measure is meant to slow the spread of the coronavirus. The ban has forced Maritsa to suspend her lessons, but she hopes to restart as soon as the country\u2019s lockdown is lifted.<\/p>\n

Maritsa said, \u201cFrom being hopeless, the young mothers feel empowered\u2026being able to use their stories to dissuade other girls from falling into the same trap.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Zimbabwe. AP – IN Zimbabwe, some girls are forced to marry as young as the age of 10 because of poverty or for traditional or religious reasons. One Zimbabwean teenager is using the sport of taekwondo to give girls from a poor community a fighting chance to have a better life. Natsiraishe Maritsa […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":32573,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,35,16,15],"tags":[1493,2189,19],"class_list":["post-32574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-homepage-english","category-sport","category-twitter","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-zimbabwe-2","tag-zimbabwe"],"yoast_head":"\nZim Girl Uses Martial Arts To Warn Against Child Marriage - zimbabwe<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"AP -\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Zim Girl Uses Martial Arts To Warn Against Child Marriage\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"AP -\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"zimbabwe\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-01-11T20:41:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/sites\/14\/2021\/01\/img-5ffc817291050.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"450\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Zim Girl Uses Martial Arts To Warn Against Child Marriage\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-11T20:41:04+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage\"},\"wordCount\":494,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/sites\/14\/2021\/01\/img-5ffc817291050.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Zimbabwe\",\"Zimbabwe\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"homepage-english\",\"sport\",\"twitter\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/zim-girl-uses-martial-arts-to-warn-against-child-marriage\",\"name\":\"Zim Girl Uses Martial Arts To Warn Against Child Marriage - 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