4.3. Challenges and Gaps 5. WEST AFRICA .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 207

the Constitution, rather than 16 for girls, as laid out in the Marriages Act 1964. Since this ruling, there has been a push to align all legislation with this decision.1535 In Botswana, a judge ruled in 2010 that marital rape violated women’s rights,1536 even though it is not yet criminalised by law.1537

4.3. Challenges and Gaps

VAW and harmful practices persist in the Southern African region, despite legal, policy and institutional reforms implemented during the AWD. First, while all countries reviewed have sexual harassment laws, these laws are confined to the workplace, except for in Eswatini, Malawi and Zambia.

Second, not all Southern African countries have implemented laws criminalising marital rape. Moreover, customary law often does not recognise marital rape. In countries where marital rape is a criminal offence, victims often encounter challenges when seeking justice. For example, in Zimbabwe, a husband may not be prosecuted for raping his wife unless the attorney general has authorised the prosecution,1538 which adds an extra layer of bureaucracy to an effective and expeditious remedy.

Third, although countries in the region set the age of marriage at 18 years, many allow exceptions whereby parental consent or public authority can waive the minimum age requirement. In some countries, the age of marriage is inconsistent across different laws. A significant challenge to elimination of child marriage lies in laws governing customary and some religious marriages. In the different Southern African countries, various pieces of legislation specify different ages of consent. In Eswatini, traditional forced arranged marriages continue to occur as the relevant constitutional provisions are not fully enforced legally or administratively as of 2019.1539

Fourth, firmly held cultural and religious views hinder the adoption, implementation and enforcement of legislative, policy and institutional reforms on VAW and harmful practices. Cultural norms that are tolerant of harmful practices such as marital rape or wife-beating account for high levels of domestic violence at the hands of intimate partners. Often, fear of breaking social taboos and cultures of victim-blaming and consequential silence lead to underreporting of cases of violence.

Institutional reforms to curb and eliminate VAW are taking place in several countries. For the most part, these services are constrained by lack of resources and of well-trained personnel. As a result, CSOs augment the work of government by providing counselling, rehabilitation and shelters for survivors of SGBV.