by In the sticky heat of a June day in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, groups of young men and women were singing as they walked along the main Sherikat road, on the east bank of the White Nile. Weaving through the slow-moving traffic, the boys carried long sticks and the girls wore colorful beads, skirts and lawsa long piece of cloth tied on the shoulder.
With thousands of other Dinka, one of the largest ethnic groups in South Sudan, they would dance late into the night at the i have (‘take’ in Dinka) a ceremony celebrating the conclusion of a “marriage contest”, the traditional practice in which several men fight for the hand of a marriageable girl.
For months, Marial Garang Jil and Chol Marol Deng, two South Sudanese men in their 40s who come from two different Dinka clans in Jonglei state but now live abroad, have been trying to marry Athiak Dau Riak, a girl who says her mother who is 14 years old.
Athiak’s father, Dau Riak Magany, says she is 19 and consented to the marriage, despite having been in primary school for 8 years (which children usually start at 13) when the marriage negotiations began in March of this year this.
She had no choice, she had to pick one … I don’t think she had a choice not to pick any of these men
Aluel Atem, activist
Her mother, Deborah Kuir Yach, who is now in hiding for her safety while contesting the marriage, says she has proof that her daughter is 14 years old.
The situation may have been a dispute between family members if photos and videos of the meetings were not posted online and quickly shared.
The story of Athiak and his suitors went viral; Athiak has been praised for her height and beauty, and as “the girl at the heart of a historic marriage contest” in publications across Africa.
After the wedding ceremony in June, when she was given as the wife of Col Marol Deng, in payment of 123 cattle, 120m South Sudanese pounds (about $44,000 or £33,000) in cash and a piece of land, she was. was titled “the most expensive bride in South Sudan” in TikTok videos that received thousands of likes.
“There is nothing wrong with this marriage,” her father said at the time. Garang Mayen Riak, Athiak’s cousin who traveled from Canada for the ceremony agreed. “We are an educated family – we cannot force a girl to marry,” he said, adding that he was involved in Dinka traditions. “This marriage is unique, as such contests rarely happen in our modern society. We are proud of it because it reminds us of who we are.”
South Sudan’s Children’s Act of 2008 prohibits early and forced marriage, but according to Unicef, child marriage is “still a common practice” and “recent figures show that 52% of girls. [in South Sudan] married before the age of 18, with some girls being married off as young as 12”.
A report led by the University of Edinburgh on the “bride price” system in South Sudan states that “customary courts often accept menstruation as eligibility criteria for marriage” and that “early marriage is a common practice. daughters as soon as possible”.
Worldwide, 122 million girls are married as children each year, according to another Unicef report. Across sub-Saharan Africa, more than a third of young women were married before the age of 18.
Despite the fact that child marriage is common, Athiak’s case has gripped the country. In the frenzy of social media, people “campaigned” of their choice. Others promoted the wedding as an affirmation of “Dinka culture and identity”, echoing critics who condemned the process as “putting a girl up for auction”.
But the online activity caught the attention of a lawyer, Josephine Adhet Deng, who opened a case against Dau Riak Magany in June, alleging that he allowed the marriage of a minor and asking that Athiak be returned from Kenya, where she was . I was taken shortly after the ceremony.
A Facebook post by her maternal uncle, Daniel Yach, a Canadian citizen, prompted questions about Athiak’s age, who said she was “a minor” and condemned the proposed marriage as a “classic example of pedophilia”.
“I was very surprised because I had not seen Athiak since I left Canada in 2015,” he says in a phone call. “By then she was six years old. Then I saw the posts about the wedding and found out how tall she was.
“But she’s just a child. This little girl is being brainwashed. That’s the craziest stuff ever.”
South Sudanese are proud of their culture and identity… but there are cultural norms that do more harm than good
Sarah Diew Biel, defense manager
When a committee of Athiak’s uncles and father announced that Col Marol Deng was the winner on June 13, they said it was “their choice”.
But that didn’t stop Aluel Atem, a feminist activist from South Sudan. “She had to pick one of them. I don’t think she had a choice not to choose either of these two men,” she says.
Atem describes the arrangement as “something close to a forced marriage”, although Athiak is probably “proud of the fact that the stakes were so high for her marriage price”.
“It’s now a thing for these young girls in Sherikat,” she says. “That’s the attitude: the more a man pays, the better you are. There is status attached to it.”
Sarah Diew Biel, defense manager for the South Sudanese development organisation, Nile Hope, says: “When you go against thousands of people who are saying ‘this marriage is fine’, you become a traitor in the public eye, with a cry [foreigner] mental illness. It’s draining mentally and emotionally.”
Biel works with local organizations and other social workers – as well as the police and the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Welfare – to provide protection for survivors of gender-based violence in South Sudan, including the use of safe houses for girls who escape forced marriages. .
“South Sudanese are very proud of their culture and identity, and so am I, but there are cultural norms that do more harm than good,” she says.
Athiak’s mother tried to stop the wedding. “I tried to tell the family that Athiak should not be married,” she says. “But they all insisted.
“They were looking for the cows. They saw that Athiak will give them that great wealth. When I refused, they separated me from my daughter.”
The day the decision was made that Athiak would marry Chol Marol Deng, “I tried to kill myself,” she says. “And the next day, I decided to run out.”
Yach claims other family members destroyed Athiak’s birth certificate and identification. “They went out with Athiak to make a new age assessment certificate, based on a false date of birth, in my absence,” she says.
A new passport says Athiak was born in 2005, but Yach has an emergency travel document processed by South Sudan’s interior ministry in August 2015, saying Athiak was born in Juba on December 28, 2009.
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Today, Yach is confined to the few square meters of the house where she is hiding, separated from her seven children, with her life on hold. “I don’t know who she’s waiting for,” she says of Athiak.
The lawyer, Adhet Deng, believes that Athiak is probably in Nairobi now with the family of Col Marol Deng, who has returned to Canada, where he is working.
Adhet Deng is waiting for the judges to consider whether the case she filed can go ahead, as it is not clear with ordinary weddings that are “sealed”.
But she says there could be another way: “I told the father and other family members that they should stop this wedding, let Athiak go back to school for at least five years, and decide then do what she wants.”
Athiak has never spoken publicly about the controversy surrounding her marriage. But, on the eve of my celebration in June, she told the Guardian that if the marriage process did not begin, she would rather “study”.
