The Nhanga is a guarded hut where girls are taught how to sexually please their husbands – but now the tradition is being reclaimed by young girls in Zimbabwe
Emilia Randall GAU Writer
15:10, 24 Oct 2025
Now the girls bond by playing football together (Image: AP)
A disturbing ritual once used to groom child brides for “marriage” is now being transformed by young women in Zimbabwe who are rejecting the custom that schooled children in sexually satisfying their adult spouses.
“Nhanga” – a local expression meaning “girls’ bedroom” – was traditionally a female-only environment used to instruct teenage girls in submission. The guarded hut served for “secret, musical rites of passage render young girls eligible for lobolo, bride-price negotiation,” wrote Thomas F. Johnston, in The Secret Music of Nhanga Rites.
He added: “Through song, mime, and mild forms of physical mutilation, the old women overseers of the Nhanga teach initiates how to please the husband sexually, and rehearse them in the duties o f a junior wife: carry water long distances, clear village fireplaces o f ashes, gather firewood, tend the fields, pound maize in the mortar, and show humility to senior co-wives.”
Women and girls sit inside the tent with their mentor(Image: AP)
In Shamva, this custom is being revolutionised, reports the Express. Here, the Nhanga is “a safe space, every girl feels free,” 18-year-old Anita Razo, who joined the group at 14 and now mentors younger girls, told the Associated Press. Within the shelter, guided by a mentor, the girls candidly discuss sexuality, child marriage, teen pregnancy, gender bias, education, economic empowerment, and the law.
The objective is to strengthen girls against child marriage in the nation where one in three girls marries before 18, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund, calling it “a national emergency demanding urgent action”. “Zimbabwe and other African nations have banned child marriage, but destitution, sluggish law enforcement and cultural and religious traditions make it difficult to eliminate it entirely.
Samantha Chidodo was coerced into an abusive marriage at 17 to a man almost 10 years her senior, but now she is 26 and studying her final year of law. “All I wanted was to play and think of my future. Suddenly I had to be a mother and wife,” she revealed at a camp that combined tent sessions with a “girls and goals” football tournament,
“I didn’t even know what to do. I would be dead asleep, oblivious that I needed to breastfeed. A woman next door would take the crying baby, feed him and return him to the sleeping teenage mother,” she explained.
After two years, she departed, but was shunned by her neighbours. With the backing of Rozaria Memorial Trust, she returned to school and became one of the modern Nhanga trailblazers.”
Anita Razo, a 18-year-old girl in Shamva, Zimbabwe(Image: AP)
“Initially, we were only about 20 girls. Almost 90% of us did well, some went to college, others started projects. The community began to see our power, and encouraged their children to join,” she said. “Nhanga is now seen as cool. “
Now more than 200 girls in her village take part with many schools across Zimbabwe adopting the model. Xmas Savanhu, a local village headman, said leaders now enforce rules against early marriage and offenders reported to police and forced to pay a cow as a fine held in trust by the chief for the girl’s education. He said: “This ensures she can return to school without financial worries.”
Enet Tini, a teacher and mentor for girls whose school has adopted this model, said that despite their efforts and government policy, cultural attitudes persist. “The gap that we have lies with the adults. They view pregnancy or child marriage as indiscipline so they think the girls should be punished,” she added. Nyaradzai Gumbonzvanda, deputy executive director at U.N. Women and founder of the Rozaria Memorial Trust, labelled child marriage as “essentially rape and sexual exploitation” and a global issue, but “much higher in Africa.”
“Laws are important … but it is critically essential to reach to the girls themselves, to do the shift in the social norms in our communities,” said Gumbonzvanda, who established Rozaria Memorial Trust in 2007 in memory of her late mother, who was married at 13.
Razo, the young mentor, concurs that the long-term solution should involve the young girls, stating “If we can pressure each other into behaving badly, then we can also influence each other to act positively. “