THE great strides made by Zimbabwe in empowering the girl-child is testimony of the country’s commitment to promoting a key component of national development.
The girl-child matters.
She represents life.
She is life.
This is why our country has seized the initiative in opening avenues for her prosperity.
We will not go back on the commitments made to uplifting the girl-child and our record speaks for itself.
We have done so well to create opportunities for the development of the girl-child.
We need to consolidate those gains through coming up with other innovations and interventions to uplift the girl-child.
With statistics from ZIMSTATS (2012) showing that there are 1,5 million girls in the country, here is a constituency that requires attention.
And our Constitution guarantees the rights of the girl-child through gender equality.
There are several milestones that have been made by Government.
These include; the Constitution of Zimbabwe which protects the right of children, including the girl-child; the introduction of BEAM to assist vulnerable children with their education and 52 percent of the beneficiaries being girls. The setting up of a Cabinet Inter-Ministerial Committee on Rape in 2014.
The same year the country launched the Girls and Young Women Empowerment Framework, which is anchored on five strategic areas of intervention namely; Education, Economic empowerment, Reproductive health rights, Safety and protection and Leadership development.
The Framework was designed to articulate national commitment to protecting and empowering girls and young women in Zimbabwe.
Among other things, the Framework recognises that empowering girls and young women contributes to the transformation of the country’s economic future as well as the development of our people.
The Framework is anchored on several international and regional human rights instruments that provide for gender equality and empowerment of women and girls such as the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).
In the same vein, we now have women taking a leading role in national development.
Our Cabinet has a significant number of women in it.
Recently, 18-year-old Maud Chifamba made history by becoming the youngest graduate at the University of Zimbabwe.
This should be applauded given that according to a United Nations Millennium Development Goals Progress Report for 2012, only 43 percent females are enrolled at universities.
We have so many women in farming, mining and business, to mention but a few.
The doors for prosperity are wide open for the majority in the country.
Despite all the milestones, there remains a number of challenges confronting the girl-child.
There are nearly 600 million girls aged 10 to 19 in the world today, each with limitless individual potential.
However, currently 70 percent of the 130 million out of school youths are girls, 82 million girls in developing countries aged 10-17 will be married before their 18th birthday.
In Zimbabwe, according to the 2014 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey conducted by ZIMSTATS and UNICEF, 24,5 percent of Zimbabwean girls under 18 are married.
There are various factors such as poverty, gender-based violence, early marriages, unplanned teenage pregnancies, human trafficking, sexual exploitation, forced labour and sadly, the burden of hostile religious and traditional beliefs.
We need to harness the progressive instruments crafted by Government to uplift the girl-child in order for us to continue with on our national development trajectory.
The girl-child is forever vulnerable to the prowling selfish men who see her as easy prey for sexual exploitation.
The prevailing harsh economic environment makes it possible for these predators to latch on to these helpless girls.
Measures must be put in place to ensure the girl-child is cushioned from these marauding vultures and other challenges.