'I'd rather die': Eleven year old Yemeni girl fights child marriage in viral video

A video which has (till now) garnered five million views on Youtube shows an eleven-year-old Yemeni girl make an impassioned plea for her life and rights after she evaded the child marriage being forced upon her by her parents. Here’s the video:

“I would have had no life, no education,” says young Nada al-Ahdal in the video. “Have they no compassion?” The young girl goes on to say that death would be preferable to being forced into marriage. She also recounts the case of her maternal aunt, a story which shows that often, a forced marriage will lead to a premature death. “My aunt was fifteen years old when she was married off…a year later she poured gasoline over herself and killed herself.” Nada also tells anecdotes of girls who jumped “into the sea” to avoid being married off to much older men. Nada has now been rescued by her uncle. [caption id=“attachment_979091” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  A screengrab from the video. Courtesy Youtube.[/caption] According to NOW News, Nada had been taken in by her uncle when she was three years old. However, her happy life at school was cut short when her parents came back to her with a proposal. “When I heard about the groom, I panicked,” her uncle told NOW News. “Nada was not even 11 years old; she was exactly 10 years and 3 months. I could not allow her to be married off and have her future destroyed, especially since her aunt was forced to marry at 13 and burnt herself. I did all I could to prevent that marriage. I called the groom and told him Nada was no good for him. I told him she did not wear the veil and he asked if things were going to remain like that. I said ‘yes, and I agree because she chose it.’ I also told him that she liked singing and asked if he would remain engaged to her.” The groom then withdrew the proposal, but it was the third suitor which led Nada to approach the Ministry of Interior’s protection department. “Let me realize my dream,” Nada said to NOW News. “I want to go to school, become a star, and help other children. I am not thinking about marriage, I don’t want to now. I want to say to fathers and mother, ‘let us realize our dreams, do not kill them’.”