In the Philippines, the Child Marriage Prohibition Act came into effect on Thursday, January 6, 2022, and provides for imprisonment for anyone who marries someone under the age of 18 or arranges or celebrates such a wedding.
In the Philippines, one in six girls is married before the age of 18, according to Plan International, a coalition of NGOs fighting against these early marriages. The law which entered into force on Thursday considers child marriage as an abuse which “ degrades, degrades and demeans the intrinsic worth and dignity of the child “.
A person who marries a child now faces 12 years in prison. The same penalty may apply in the event of cohabitation or for having organized or celebrated such a union. According to the Philippine government, the law complies with international conventions on the rights of women and children.
A one-year adaptation period
However, the text provides for a period of adaptation of one year which is aimed at several communities in the Philippines, in particular its Muslim and indigenous minorities, where engagements and child marriages are relatively frequent. The authorities in Manila explain that the transition must make it possible to “ to convince »The communities in question.
The Philippines, a predominantly Catholic country, has a large Muslim minority who live mainly in the south of the country, in the Muslim Autonomous Region of the southern island of Mindanao. A 1977 law allows Filipino Muslims to marry when they reach puberty, set for women on the date of their first period.
Child marriage on the decline around the world
The Plan International group, which campaigned for the passage of the Child Marriage Act, ranks the Philippines 12th in the world for the number of child marriages concluded on its soil.
According to estimates by Unicef, 500 million women and girls currently alive in the world have been married in childhood. Recent data, however, indicates that child marriage is generally on the decline across the world.