1. TACKLING CHILD-MARRIAGE IN GWADU COMMUNITY BY NDUKWE,ROSITA CHINYERE
VOICE OF NIGERIA

2. ISSUE PERSONAL INSECURITY/CHILD ABUSE
‘’PROTECTING THE VITAL CORE OF HUMAN LIVES IN WAYS THAT ENHANCE HUMAN FREEDOM, FULFILLMENT AND FUNDAMENTAL FREEDOM, CONSTITUTE THE ESSENCE OF LIFE AND PROTECTING PEOPLE FROM CRITICAL AND PERVASIVE THREATS AND SITUATIONS’’ (Ogatta, 2002)

3. OBJECTIVES
An intervention on the traumas experienced by teenage girls in Gwadu community who are given out in marriage when their mates(males) are allowing to acquire education.
To address the problems associated with abuse of girl-child rights,
Expose the trauma the girl-child goes through in early marriage in form domestic violence or attendant health conditions of HIV/AIDS and Vesicco Vaginal Fistula which result in early childbirth and circumcision with unsterilized instruments.
To establish the fact that this problem exists and create awareness of this problem and together work with the community to change this status quo.

4. SETTING
GWADU: A REMOTE COMMUNITY IN KADUNA STATE OF NORTH WESTERN NIGERIA.
In most traditional setting as this community in Nigeria, girls are given out in marriage earlier than they should and against their wishes because of prevailing customs that relegate girls to the position of prospective child-factories, house wives and those whose voices are not to be heard in the society.
Consequently, girls in this community are denied basic education, married of to men old enough to be their fathers and left to face problems associated with early childbirth.

5. STAKEHOLDERS FACILITATORS PARTNERS :UNICEF, UN Representatives,
Non Governmental Organizations fighting for girl-Childs rights,
Women activists,
Human Rights bodies and
the Artists

6. PROCESS: Research: - How are girls married out early?
- What does a girl child loose by not being allowed to acquire basic education and what are the attendant health implications of early child birth.
Planning: seeking community based partners
Contact with regional stakeholders and community leaders:
Performances:
Monitoring and evaluation

7. ART FORM
Radio Drama /Dramatised Feature ,will involve the use of the performing art forms like drama, poetry and oratory to drive message home
13 episodes that will begin to run by September
Broadcast station: Voice of Nigeria
THE APPROACH
The ANDERSON APPROACH which stipulates:
Holding up a mirror to society
Saying what people may know but do not dare to articulate
“carry the innocence of the child”… “even have the awkward habit of peering under the clothes of any emperor”

8. AUDIENCES Teenage girls/ Village Heads/,
Religious Leaders( Christian and Muslim Clerics)members ,
School community and
Parents.

9. CONLUSION
Through proper monitoring and evaluation, I will be able to change the existing status quo of giving teen girls out in marriage and sensitize the girl child of her right to quality education and choice of when and who to marry through this project as well make the parents aware of the health hazards girls go through during circumcision and early child delivery.