NIGERIA: Early marriage adds to socioeconomic woes, NGOs say

KANO Wednesday, November 26, 2008 (IRIN) - Just 26 percent of girls in northern Nigeria make it beyond primary school, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and local NGOs estimate that most of those who leave do so because their families marry them off. In northern Nigeria it is estimated that more than half of girls are married before age 15, according to Mohammed Aliyu Mashi, head of the General Improvement in Persons Initiative (GIOPINI), a Kano-based NGO that has researched early...