Issue III - Sexual Violence and Abuse Against Children and Adolescent Girls 41. Eswatini is a signatory to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child and also enacted the Children’s Protection and Welfare Act 2012 and the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act 2018. Despite the legislative measures in place, children and adolescent girls are still vulnerable to sexual abuse and exploitation, teenage pregnancy and child marriage. 42. According to a 2018 national study, 48 percent of women and girls between the ages of 13 to 24 reported having experienced some form of sexual violence, with 1 in 3 girls experiencing some form of sexual violence before the age of 18.17 43. Domestic and gender-based violence are among the issues children and adolescent girls face as they stay home during the COVID-19 pandemic. A recent incident of child marriage made headlines where a 15-year-old girl got married in one of the rural areas in the Hhohho region. This may be attributed to the effect of COVID-19 leading to school closures leaving children idle and exposed to such harmful practices. Such incidents, require heightened attention during the pandemic. Those living close to the border areas are at risk of human trafficking and sexual exploitation. The pandemic has also increased children’s vulnerability to exploitation, abuse, neglect and violence by directly affecting their caregivers or causing the loss of their families’ and communities’ livelihoods. 44. COVID-19 has a detrimental impact on stateless persons specifically. Due to children’s inability to access their mother’s nationality in some cases, barriers to women extracting themselves from abusive relationships are increased, a risk that is further exacerbated due to the notable increases in Gender Based Violence globally linked with pandemic lockdowns. 45. In terms of governmental response to the pandemic, COVID-19 relief packages and services were meant for Swazi nationals only. In order to access them, one was required to register through their constituencies (traditional structures) and to present national identity cards, further marginalising stateless persons. Recommendations 46. Based on the above information, the co-submitting organisations urge reviewing States to make the following recommendations to Eswatini: I. Amend the Constitution and Citizenship Act to ensure that women have equal nationality rights as men, in particular, in relation to the acquisition and retention of their own nationality, and the conferral of their nationality on their children and non-national spouses. II. Protect every child’s right to acquire and preserve their nationality and introduce legal safeguards to ensure the right to nationality for otherwise stateless children on the territory. 17 Together for Girls, “Eswatini” overview available at: https://www.togetherforgirls.org/wp-content/uploads/TFG-EswatiniOnePager-10.pdf 9