Girl, 10, tells court how she was duped into early marriage

A 10-year-old girl was married off by her father without her knowledge and taken to a “strange land where she could not trace her parents’ home”, a court heard on Monday.

The girl said she had been told she was being transferred to a school in Nairobi before she was handed over to a man who later turned out to be her “husband”.

“I was going to school last year when my father stopped me. He told me that he wanted to transfer me to another school in Nairobi and asked me to go back home,” she told a court in Kerugoya.

The girl, from Mumbene area at the Coast, was then taken by her father to a woman’s home in Bombolulu where she stayed for three days.

On the third day, her father came back accompanied by a man she did not know and after a lengthy conversation he left.

Minutes later, the stranger asked her to follow him and they boarded a vehicle. “All this time I thought I was being taken to a new school,” she told the court.

The court heard that their final destination was Kiangai village in Kirinyaga County.

In the village, she stayed and slept in the same bed with the man. On the third day, he started making sexual advances and when the girl turned him down, he forcibly had sex with her.

She was sexually abused severally by the man who kept on referring to her as his wife.

The girl was testifying in a case in which Mr James Maina is accused of defiling and subjecting her to early marriage.

Mr Maina is said to have committed the offences between last August and January this year.

The girl said she did not know she had been married off until the man introduced her to his fellow villagers as his wife.

She added that she had to learn to be accustomed with the new home as she could not trace her parents’ place.

Conducive environment

Senior resident magistrate Susan Ndegwa ordered children’s officers to visit her parents’ home to find out whether the environment was conducive for her.

If not, Ms Ndegwa said, the girl should be handed over to a children’s home near her home district where she can continue with her education.

The magistrate further directed the officers to investigate whether the girl was married off by her parents and take appropriate legal measures against them.

The hearing resumes on March 9.