The story of a teen couple in South Sulawesi, Indonesia, highlights yet again Indonesia's child marriage problem. After their parents wouldn’t allow them to marry, a 16-year-old boy and 14-year-old girl ran away from home, Coconuts reports. The boy is identified as AA, while the girl as DA.Both sets of parents claim that they refused to grant their children a wedding because of their young age. They even went as far as banning them from seeing each other. This didn’t work as intended. The young couple ran away for a week, and only came home after the parents agreed to let them marry, according to Nurdiana, the boy's mother."We were shocked upon seeing our underage residents getting married," Iskanda Nusu, head of the Bacukiki subdistrict told local media during a visit to Nurdiana's home. "Apparently, the wedding took place in another regency. We disagreed with the child marriage because it violates the law. But the parents said they were forced to marry the children.”In Indonesia, the fight to end child marriage has been a long one. According to Girls Not Brides, 14 percent of Indonesian girls marry before the age of 18. There are an estimate of 1.4 million child brides in the country, according to UNICEF data—one of the highest population of child brides in the world. Many have tried to get the legal age of marriage in Indonesia to 21 years old.
Watch: Child Marriage in India: Teenage Girls Forced to Marry
Currently, the legal age for marriage is 21 for people who want to be married in the eyes of the state. However, in a religious court, boys can marry at the age of 19 and girls at 16—but marriages between children much younger than this are still a common occurrence. Under Indonesia’s 1975 Marriage Law, marriage that are performed in accordance with religious beliefs is legal. This has given religious courts a loophole to grant child weddings to be executed on a traditional basis.Approximately 375 girls below 18 marry every day in Indonesia, according to UNICEF, and they are more vulnerable to domestic violence because of their age. One such incident that made headlines in Indonesia took place in November, where a 15-year-old girl died after being beaten by her husband, who's a year older.Last December, Indonesia's Constitutional Court ruled that legislators have three years to decide on a new minimum age for girls to marry. Notably, it didn't specify if the change should be an increase or a decrease. Now, in this three-year period, as long as the law and loopholes allow it, underage marriage will sadly continue to happen.
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Watch: Child Marriage in India: Teenage Girls Forced to Marry
Currently, the legal age for marriage is 21 for people who want to be married in the eyes of the state. However, in a religious court, boys can marry at the age of 19 and girls at 16—but marriages between children much younger than this are still a common occurrence. Under Indonesia’s 1975 Marriage Law, marriage that are performed in accordance with religious beliefs is legal. This has given religious courts a loophole to grant child weddings to be executed on a traditional basis.Approximately 375 girls below 18 marry every day in Indonesia, according to UNICEF, and they are more vulnerable to domestic violence because of their age. One such incident that made headlines in Indonesia took place in November, where a 15-year-old girl died after being beaten by her husband, who's a year older.Last December, Indonesia's Constitutional Court ruled that legislators have three years to decide on a new minimum age for girls to marry. Notably, it didn't specify if the change should be an increase or a decrease. Now, in this three-year period, as long as the law and loopholes allow it, underage marriage will sadly continue to happen.