A total of 118 South African women have discovered since the beginning of the month that they had been married without their knowledge, the Home Affairs Department said on Wednesday.
This emerged from a campaign urging women to check their marital status on the department’s records in a bid to curb the problem of fraudulent marriages, the department said in a statement.
The Eastern Cape recorded the highest number of illegal unions for two consecutive weeks — 13 in the first and 14 in the second. The second highest number was reported in the Free State, with a total of 20, followed by the North West with 17, 15 in Mpumalanga, 12 in KwaZulu-Natal and nine in Limpopo.
Only one case was reported in the Northern Cape, and none in Gauteng, the department said.
About 5 000 women have checked their marital status since the start of the department’s campaign. – Sapa