Determination from the grassroots
In previous years, Phuoc Son was considered a hot spot for child marriage and incestuous marriage (IMC) in the province. However, through various measures, from propaganda and mobilization to coordinating the education of students at schools, while promoting the role of village and commune cadres, village elders, and prestigious people in preventing child marriage, Phuoc Son has so far basically pushed back this problem.
Mr. Le Quang Trung, Chairman of Phuoc Son District People's Committee, said: Early marriage causes many sad consequences, especially when children of marriage age are often not full and have no worries. Early marriage makes them lose the opportunity to study, work, and have a bright future ahead; moreover, these cases often fall into poor households, parents often pay little attention to them, easily leading to children getting to know each other and then getting pregnant unintentionally.
In order to prevent this situation, the locality has mobilized all its forces from the role of the head, to the relevant departments, branches and organizations in propagating and mobilizing people to understand the consequences of the problem, thereby proactively avoiding it. If in the past, there were up to 40 cases of child marriage, now there are only 17 cases.
The district also assigned the Ethnic Affairs Department to proactively implement projects and programs from the capital of national target programs to promote propaganda and put an end to this problem. Up to now, in addition to training, the Department has implemented many legal competitions such as the Golden Bell, the Magic Hat... in schools.
“Currently, the facilities at schools, especially boarding and semi-boarding schools, are not very good, and some students still live outside. It is also difficult to manage students, especially when they meet and fall in love outside. Therefore, in the coming time, the locality will consider resources to expand the accommodation area for students. Thereby, it will partly facilitate management and limit child marriage,” Mr. Trung shared.
According to Mr. Trung, in recent times, Phuoc Son has also strengthened training and dissemination of policies and laws to the people, propagandists, village elders, village chiefs, prestigious people, etc. to promote the dissemination of laws to the community and residential areas. The district's Ethnic Affairs Department has organized dozens of training courses and distributed thousands of leaflets and handbooks to the people for dissemination.
Mr. Doan Ngoc Binh, Head of the Ethnic Affairs Department of Dong Giang District, said: In recent years, the unit has actively coordinated with departments, branches, sectors and authorities of communes and towns to organize propaganda sessions and training on legal knowledge for the people. Thereby, their awareness has improved, currently in the area there are no more consanguineous marriages, the number of child marriages has decreased significantly.
Over the past year, the Ethnic Affairs Department has coordinated with the District Justice Department, the Ethnic Affairs Department of Quang Nam province and related units to organize propaganda classes, open competitions such as ringing the golden bell, and perform arts with the theme "say no to TH&HNCHT".
Through competitions and performances, we not only create a space for children to have fun after school, but also equip them with a lot of legal knowledge, including preventing child marriage and gender equality.
“The national target program is important in disseminating and popularizing legal knowledge to the people, especially in preventing and combating child marriage. In the coming time, the locality will make efforts to promote propaganda and mobilization to soon prevent and end child marriage in the area,” said Mr. Binh.
Step by step to eliminate child marriage
According to the Ethnic Minorities Committee of Quang Nam province, with the goal of basically preventing the situation of TH&HNCHT by the end of 2025, the province has deployed various forms of propaganda and mobilization, focusing on raising awareness and changing people's behavior, thereby ending this problem.
Implementing the Project to reduce child marriage and child marriage in ethnic minority areas in the period of 2021 - 2025 (Project 498), the Provincial Ethnic Committee has coordinated with mountainous districts to organize 50 training courses on propaganda to reduce child marriage for prestigious people and village heads in Dong Giang, Nam Giang, Bac Tra My, Nam Tra My, Phuoc Son, Hiep Duc districts, with nearly 2,500 participants.
In addition, the Ethnic Committee coordinated with 6 mountainous districts and the provincial Ethnic Minority High School to organize conferences and competitions to learn about the Law on Marriage and Family, and to eliminate child marriage. Coordinated with schools to organize extracurricular activities with contents such as: Life skills education; adolescent reproductive health care; counseling and knowledge support on the consequences of TH&HNCHT and solutions.
In addition, implementing Project 498, in recent years, the Ethnic Committee has also installed 12 propaganda panels in key communes and district centers; screened documentaries on the current situation and solutions to prevent child marriage; distributed more than 15,000 leaflets with propaganda content on the Law on Marriage and Family, the consequences and harms of child marriage... to villages, communes and schools in the area.
In particular, the implementation of the National Target Program on Socio-Economic Development in Ethnic Minority Areas for the 2021-2030 period (National Target Program 1719) has greatly contributed to preventing and repelling child marriage in the province. Accordingly, implementing Sub-Project 2 of Project 9 of the Program, the Provincial Ethnic Committee has closely coordinated with relevant departments, branches and sectors to promote propaganda and dissemination of legal regulations related to marriage and family, child marriage and consanguineous marriage to the people.
During the period of 2022 - 2023, the Ethnic Committee coordinated to implement 30 training conferences for commune and village officials, village elders, prestigious people, school principals, students from grades 6 to 12 in ethnic minority schools, and parents of minor students.
In addition, the Committee coordinated with mountainous districts to organize 140 training courses and knowledge enhancement for nearly 10,000 people; 262 propaganda sessions for more than 42,000 people; distributed nearly 6,500 handbooks and leaflets of all kinds to 4,500 people; organized 105 consultations and interventions on TH&HNCHT for more than 4,000 cases...
Mr. Dang Tan Gian, Deputy Head of the Ethnic Minorities Committee of Quang Nam province, said: The effective implementation of Project 498 for the period 2021 - 2025 and Sub-project 2, Project 9 of the National Target Program 1719 has greatly contributed to reducing TH&HNCHT in the locality. With synchronous and effective solutions along with strengthening propaganda and mobilization work, the awareness of ethnic minorities about the harmful effects of TH&HNCHT in the province has been raised. Thereby, contributing to gradually pushing back this problem, improving the quality of the population and human resources of ethnic minorities in the province.
“In the coming time, the Provincial Ethnic Committee will continue to promote the dissemination, popularization and education of the law, raise legal awareness among cadres, party members and people; enhance the leadership, inspection and supervision role of Party committees and local authorities and promote the role of mass organizations in preventing and combating child marriage and child marriage. Hopefully, with the drastic participation of all levels and sectors, by 2025, Quang Nam will basically end the situation of child marriage,” added Dang Tan Gian, Deputy Head of the Ethnic Committee.
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