In wake of allegations that a teenaged Berbice girl had been duped by an overseas-based Guyanese into an arranged wedding last week that the groom promptly repudiated, police and religious leaders are moving to address the issue.
B Division Commander Stephen Merai
B Division Commander, Assistant Police Commissioner Stephen Merai, said he is to seek advice from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions to charge parents who are guilty of arranging marriages for children under the legal age of consent. He said there is a scourge of sexual allegations from minors emanating from arranged marriages across Regions Five and Six.
Merai revealed that the Number 78 Village, Corriverton parents of the teenager are alleging that she had been assaulted by her arranged groom, and this is only one of the many cases police have had to deal with. Merai said that, daily, the police throughout West and East Coast Berbice are contacted with similar allegations. However, the entire truth is often not told. He added that parents are “part of the skulduggery”, because they arrange marriages and when those arrangements run awry they make allegations of rape and assault to the police.
He said that the police are very concerned, especially since females as young as 13 years old are forced into arranged marriages, all in the name of ‘tradition’. In these cases, the police can act and charge the ‘grooms’, since it is against the law to engage in sexual relations with a minor. However, Merai said that for those over the legal age of consent, it is difficult to prosecute the men involved unless the females allege physical or sexual assault.
While prosecuting the responsible parents will help to deter other parents from marrying off their underage children, it cannot eliminate the problem entirely, Merai said. “It is a sensitive thing, (and) you have to know how to deal with it.”
He said the police have to find a way to ensure the matters are reported and ensure justice is served. The DPP’s Office will advise on the next step in this direction.
Currently, there are three separate cases of arranged weddings going awry in Rosignol, and Corentyne respectively, West and East Coast of Berbice. These are engaging the attention of the police. However, these are not isolated cases; other areas where the phenomenon of child marriages is common include communities between Numbers 48 and 70 Villages, Corentyne, he said.
An official from the Child Protection Agency in Berbice said there is an alarming number of reports about child marriages, most of which reach the department through the police, the court, and concerned community members. The official added that most of the brides are between the ages of 14 and 16. In 2007, after a controversial case of a 13-year-old female getting married to a 23-year-old male from Essequibo, the Human Services Ministry had announced an investigation into child marriages. Permanent Secretary of the Human Services Ministry, Trevor Thomas, at that time, had said that the practice is a cultural one which appears to be in conflict with the law. When contacted, though, Thomas could not offer any information on the findings of that report.
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