A group of Dominican and international organizations called upon the National Congress yesterday to raise the legal age to 18 for both marriage and civil unions in the country. They noted that together with Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic occupies the number one position in all of Latin America and the Caribbean in the number of minors who are married or in a relationship.
According to 7 Dias online news portal, the NGO Coalition for Infancy is composed of 12 nongovernmental organizations, among them Plan International. The NGOs have presented the initiative called #18NoLess. Their desire to increase the legal marriage age to 18 years without exceptions in the country comes perhaps as a result of recent news reports, particularly in the Diario Libre, which reported that just in the Maternity Hospital La Altagracia in Santo Domingo alone there were more than 4,500 births to mothers who were less than 18 years old.
The NGO says that the Dominican state has the responsibility to protect children and teenagers “against the alarming numbers and different forms of violence.”
Information offered by the coalition indicates that 37% of the young girls and adolescents are married before 18 years of age that places the Dominican Republic “in the regrettable lead position in the region with regard to this issue.”
The NGOs also pointed out many of the recent incidents of sexual abuse of minors by authority figures.
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Terra
27 April 2017
