This is written for two people. A woman who was married before she was grown, and is now perhaps nineteen, perhaps forty-five, and has never had a place to ask about it. And somebody who knows a girl this is being arranged for right now.
We are going to be careful about the law, because the position in Nigeria is genuinely complicated and anybody who tells you it is simple is not being straight with you.
Where the law stands
The Child’s Rights Act sets eighteen as the age of marriage. It is federal law, and like other federal legislation of that kind it operates in a state according to whether and how that state adopted it. Adoption has not been uniform, and some states have their own child protection laws with different provisions.
Alongside that sit customary and Islamic personal law, which govern most marriages in Nigeria and approach the question differently. And there is a long-running constitutional argument about the point at which a married girl is treated as of age, which has never been fully resolved.
What this means practically: whether a particular marriage was lawful depends on where it happened, when, and under which system — and it is a question for a lawyer who knows that state, not one you can settle by reading. Why the answer varies by state is set out separately.
Two things are clearer and worth holding onto. Sexual violence and physical violence are criminal regardless of marriage or age. And a marriage entered into without genuine consent is capable of being challenged, which is a different question from whether it was lawful at the time.
If it is happening now, to a girl you know
Act early. Once a ceremony has happened and she has been moved, everything becomes considerably harder.
- Tell somebody with authority to act. A head teacher, a clinician, a state ministry of women affairs office, NAPTIP, or a women’s organisation working locally. Do not rely on the family being persuaded.
- Get legal advice immediately. Courts can act quickly where a child is at risk, and being able to say a date has been set changes the urgency.
- Write down what you know. Her age, her date of birth if you have it, who is arranging it, the date, and where.
- Be careful who you tell in the family or community. Warning the wrong person usually results in the date being brought forward or the girl being moved.
- Keep contact with her if you can. Often the only thing that survives is that she knows one adult outside the family who did not think it was fine.
Where this involves a girl being taken to another state or country, treat it as urgent. How family-arranged pressure works covers the wider pattern, including why a journey is the point of greatest risk.
If it already happened to you
Whatever your age now, and however long ago it was, none of what follows requires you to call it anything in particular.
What happened to you was not your decision. A great many women in this position carry a private belief that they agreed, because they did not physically resist, or because they were told it was an honour, or because they were pleased at the time by a dress and a ceremony. A child cannot consent to a marriage. Not resisting is not agreeing.
You are not required to leave. Some women in this position have long marriages, children, and no wish to unpick any of it. Everything below is available whether you stay or go.
The specific losses are worth naming. Education interrupted, usually permanently. No work history. Health consequences from pregnancies that happened far too early — obstetric injury, including fistula, which is treatable and which women live with for years believing it is not. Isolation from anybody your own age. And a marriage to a man who may be twenty or thirty years older, where the imbalance was built in from the first day and never went away.
What can actually be done now
- Health. If you have an injury from childbirth, including leaking urine, treatment exists and it works. Specialist centres do this and it is often free or heavily subsidised. Women live with this for decades believing nothing can be done, which is not true.
- Education. Adult programmes and external examinations exist, and a woman withdrawn from school at thirteen can still sit examinations. What the routes are is set out separately and this is the single most transformative one.
- Documents. Many women married young have no identification at all, which closes almost everything. It is fixable and it is where to start. The order to do it in matters.
- Money of your own. An account in your own name, which for many women in this position would be the first thing they have ever controlled.
- Legal advice about the marriage itself, about children, and about what you are entitled to.
- Somebody your own age. Isolation from peers is one of the deepest costs and one of the easiest to begin fixing.
The children question
Women who married very young often have children who are close to them in age, and a specific worry: that the same thing will happen to a daughter.
It is worth saying that a mother in this position has more influence over that than she thinks, particularly if she has any income of her own and if the daughter is in school. School attendance is the single strongest protective factor there is, and keeping a girl in it is worth more than any argument about custom.
Where you think it is being arranged and you cannot stop it alone, ask for help early, and ask outside the family.
What we do
School fees and education support, including for adults. Health care, including referral for obstetric injury. Documents. Legal advice. And accommodation where a girl or woman needs to be somewhere else.
Nobody will ask you to describe what happened in detail, and nobody will tell you what you should feel about your own marriage. If you want one specific thing — a school place, a clinic, an account — that is a complete request and it is the way most of these conversations start.
Questions people ask
Was my marriage legal?
It depends on the state, the year and which system of law applied, and it is a question for a lawyer who works there rather than one that can be answered generally. What is clear is that violence and sexual violence are criminal regardless, and a marriage without genuine consent can be challenged.
I did not resist. Does that mean I agreed?
No. A child cannot consent to a marriage, and not resisting is not agreeing. Many women carry a private belief that they consented because they were young enough to be pleased by a ceremony.
I have been leaking urine since childbirth. Is anything possible?
Yes. Obstetric fistula is treatable, specialist centres do this work, and it is often free or heavily subsidised. Women live with it for decades believing nothing can be done, and that is not true.
Is it too late to get an education?
No. Adult programmes exist and examinations can be sat as an external candidate. For women withdrawn from school young it is the single most transformative thing available.
A girl I know is being married off next month. What do I do?
Act before the ceremony and tell somebody with authority — a head teacher, a clinician, the state ministry, or a women’s organisation. Be careful who you tell in the family, because warning the wrong person usually brings the date forward.
If you need help now
If you are in immediate danger, call 112. To talk to HealBridge, call or send a message to +2348025170267, or use the form on our contact page. Every page on this site has a Quick Exit button at the top right, and pressing the letter E three times does the same thing.
Before you rely on anything on this page
We publish these articles so that you can understand a subject and work out what to ask for. They are written carefully and in good faith. They are still general information about how things usually work, and not advice about your situation, which we do not know.
- This is not legal advice.
- We are not a law firm. Criminal law in Nigeria is largely a state matter, the VAPP Act applies in a state only if that state adopted it, and statutory, customary and Islamic marriages are governed by different law and different courts. Two people with the same facts can have genuinely different options. Get advice from a lawyer who practises where you live — and if cost is the obstacle, ask us, because arranging that is part of what we do.
- This is not medical advice.
- Nothing here is a diagnosis and nothing here replaces being examined. Do not delay seeing a doctor, nurse or pharmacist because of something you read here, and do not start, stop or change any treatment on the strength of it. If something is time critical, go and be seen.
- This is not counselling, and it is not financial advice.
- Articles about trauma, sleep, money, debt, renting or starting a business describe what commonly helps. They are not therapy and they are not a recommendation about your own money. Speak to a counsellor, a qualified adviser or your own bank about your circumstances.
- It may be out of date, or wrong for where you are.
- Law changes, services close, numbers stop answering and practice varies by state. We correct what we find, and we cannot promise that every page is current on the day you read it. Where we do not have something confirmed, we say so rather than fill the gap.
- Reading this does not make us your lawyer or your doctor.
- No professional relationship is created by reading an article, and we cannot accept liability for decisions taken on the strength of one. What we can do is help you reach somebody who is qualified to advise you, which is what the legal and health parts of our work exist for.
- We cannot promise an outcome, and we cannot make anybody safe.
- A protection order is a piece of paper backed by an enforcement system that is inconsistent. A plan works until the day it does not. Anybody in this field promising safety is selling something, and the promise itself is dangerous because it stops people planning.
Do not let this notice stop you acting. If you are in immediate danger, call 112. If something is medically urgent, go to a hospital — you do not need a police report to be treated. And if you do not know where to start, that is a normal way to begin: use the contact page and we will take it from there.
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