A planned mass wedding for 100 orphans in Nigeria has been cancelled due to widespread public concerns about the welfare of those involved.
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The wedding, which was scheduled for the end of this month, was sponsored by Abdulmalik Sarkindaji, the speaker of the national assembly in Niger State, a largely Muslim region in north-western Nigeria.
It involved orphans who had lost family members during attacks by armed gangs.
Critics raised concerns that some of the girls might be underage or forced to marry for financial gain
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Despite this, the Imams Forum of Niger insisted that the marriage ceremony would go ahead on 24 May and claimed the girls were not underage. The ages of the girls were not immediately known.
Nigeria’s Women’s Affairs Minister, Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, condemned the plan and said she would seek a court injunction to stop the ceremony. Human rights activists in Nigeria have also launched a petition to halt the plan.
In response to the public outrage, Speaker Sarkindaji announced his withdrawal from the ceremony. Some intended brides, who spoke to local media, defended the programme.
Mass weddings are fairly common in the predominantly Muslim parts of northern Nigeria, where religious and cultural norms, such as polygamy, support the practice.
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