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ABSTRACT
It is shown that the Child's Rights Act 2003 (CRA) is not a all-cure statute. It provides for age 18 as minimum marriage age, however it is not the statute responsible for marriages in Nigeria. As legislation on age of marriage, it is constitutionally limited in the priority of statutes. It suffers both substantive and territorial restriction in its application. These issues coupled with the lack of uniformity in the age stipulation in many of the federating states regarding customary and Islamic law marriages leave the question of age of marriage presently unresolved in Nigeria and this has caused the issues of child marriage, child betrothal, violence, health challenges, divorce and even eventual death to be on the increase. Statutory examples from other jurisdictions in Africa, Europe and Australia show that states generally prefer a flexible, non-hard-liner approach to the age of marriage question. The study aims at investigating the subject of minimum age for marriage from the point of view of the broadly dual marriage system in Nigeria imposed by the Constitution. It also aims at encouraging behavioral changes, monitoring and evaluating laws and policies, and raising awareness about the negative implications of child marriage. This study finds that while it is possible to use Nigeria's Fundamental Human Rights as contained in Chapter four in the 1999 Constitution and the Child's Right Act and state equivalents to protect children from the vice of child marriage, their usefulness could be limited given that judicial application may be influenced by socio-cultural and religious preconceptions of judges. Child marriage often prevails in customary settings because there is generally an indifferent attitude to the provisions of the law because, unlike statutory marriage, there is complete absence of intervening official assessment of the eligibility of potential celebrants. Finally, this study contributes to knowledge by recommending the device of constitutional stipulation of a uniform minimum age of marriage. Such a stipulation should be made to apply to every type of marriage in Nigeria and provide a watch role for community custodians of customary law. The 55 parties to the 1962 Convention on Consent to Marriage, Minimum Age for Marriage, and Registration of Marriages have agreed to specify a minimum marriage age by statute law‚ to override customary, religious, tribal laws and traditions. When the marriageable age under a law of a religious community is lower than the law of the state, the state law prevails. These would send a positive message that marriage of minors is generally unacceptable. Also, protection for girls who are married against their will should have access to legal support.
