…teenage pregnancies, environmental degradation in resource rich district
Kudzai Chikiwa
Blistering heat hits from behind a thatched hut in which she sits, making it unbearable for her baby who has been crying for a couple of hours.
Doubled by the heat that has now reached 40 Degrees Celsius this afternoon, the baby is hungry, having had only sour porridge in the morning.
His mother, a 14-year-old, Sibusisiwe Dube* sits in deep sorrow as she pitifully holds her baby.
The teenage mother uses a tattered cloth to wipe sweat from her face as she reaches for a cup of home-made mahewu to feed her baby.
Dube’s heart sinks as she hears voices of her former classmates from Sandawana Primary School as they hop and jump celebrating their final Zimbabwe School Examination Council (Zimsec) examinations.
She recalls how she failed to sit for her exams because she had fallen pregnant.
“Those were my friends; I really miss school. I could not write exams after I fell pregnant with my baby,” she says, with sorrow written all over her face.
Shattered young hope
“My life changed the day l found out l was pregnant. My uncle expelled me from home, and the father of my child denied responsibility of the pregnancy. That is why stay here at my late grandmother’s house with my baby.”
How could she continue with school after falling pregnant? How would she trace the child’s father – a random lithium miner whom she met by her school gate (Sandawana Primary School).
Who was going to take care of her baby when her uncle already called her ‘gora’ (a derogatory name for a child without a known father).
Dube’s sad experiences reflect the struggles of young girls in Sandawana, Mberengwa district of the Midlands province, where adolescent females are sexually exploited, leading to a rise in teenage pregnancies, school dropouts, and low pass rates.
The lithium equation and the just energy transition
Lithium has been mined in the country for a fairly long time but its prominence increased in recent years as the world pushed for more carbon neutral energy sources.
The mineral is an essential resource in the manufacture of electric vehicle batteries and components of solar energy systems. Zimbabwe is currently the largest producer of the mineral in Africa and it ranks number nine in the world.
In Mberengwa, Sandawana Mine is located in Sandawana Valley, an area that houses the second biggest school in the district in terms of enrolment.
Locals claim that it was when lithium mining became more noticeable in the area in 2022 that many existing social problems worsened; and these include pollution, exposure of learners to sexual exploitation, teenage pregnancies, school dropouts and child labour.
Kuvimba Mining House, which is 65 per cent owned by government, took over the old emerald mine in 2019, and in 2022, a lithium rush began, fueling teenage pregnancies as miners pounced on young girls from poor families.
“This is affecting our children. The road to the mine and one popular bar goes through the school gate, and this increases the vulnerability of the children. Miners take advantage of our children’s innocence to impregnate them, and once that happen, they then vanish,” said Louis Danga from Sandawana Valley.
“The El Niño-induced drought made families more food-insecure, and girls more vulnerable to sexual pervasion. Many children go to school on empty stomachs, so once someone brings out a few coins, they fall prey,” Danga said.
Decaying social fabric
A recent report by Zvishavane-Mberengwa Girl Child Empowerment Group reported that in 2023-2024 at least 57 girls from Mberengwa fell pregnant and dropped out of school.
Zvishavane-Mberengwa Girl Child Empowerment Group administrator Mavis Nyandoro said the location of the mine was not good for the rights and safety of children.
“We know that our findings are not even as thorough as we would ideally want; there could be more to it than has been uncovered. From our interviews, we gathered that the girls are impregnated by mine workers who flocked here after the discovery of lithium.
“Is it not good to have people loitering around the school gate, and it’s worse having a bar close by. These people do not care about these girls because most of them are not from Mberengwa.
“If the mining is more important than the school, then the mining company should build another school at a more suitable place so that children can learn in safety,” she said.
Villagers that spoke to EnviroPress complained about the apparent rise in Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs).
“There is a new wave of STIs in this area, and that is a major issue that concerns us a lot,” Munodawafa Ndoro, a local villager.
Other villagers complained about excessive noise due to blasting and the operation of machinery.
Impact on the environment
“They set out blasts anytime and this affects the conduct of lessons at school. It is hard for children to concentrate and that is one of the reasons why we have low pass rates at the school,” said Josiah Ndaba, a headman in the area.
When reached out about her thoughts, former Deputy Prime Minister and women rights activist Thokozani Khupe called for authorities to intervene and make sure that lithium mining did not come at a huge social cost.
“If education is a way to women’s empowerment, how then do we ignore a situation which forces girls to drop out of school. There should be some kind of intervention to make sure that economic activities like mining do not cost the lives and future of our precious girls.
“If we say we have a policy to protect girls below the age of 18, then let us make sure we implement that not just having it on paper,” she said.
In a bid to protect young people from sexual predators and early marriages, President Emmerson Mnangagwa this year signed into law the Criminal Laws Amendment (Protection of Children and Young Persons) Bill, 2024, raising the age of consent from 16 to 18.
