DEMOCRACY AND POLITICAL GOVERNANCE Ordinance, and the Registration of Customary Marriages Law. The Matrimonial Causes Act regulates the dissolution of marriages, and the 1998 Children's Act criminalises forced marriage. It also fixes the minimum age of marriage at eighteen years. With respect to citizenship rights, Ghana's nationality law has been amended to allow foreigners married to Ghanaians to apply for and acquire Ghanaian citizenship. Ghanaian women married to foreigners can confer citizenship to their spouses. Abduction of girls for marriage is still prevalent, especially in the northern regions, and registration of marriages is not yet fully applicable or acceptable as a necessary requirement. Affirmative action 89. Article 35(6) (b) of the 1992 Constitution provides that the State takes appropriate measures to achieve reasonable gender and regional balance in recruitment and appointment to public office. The government introduced an Affirmative Action Policy in 1998, which includes the directives that 50% of government appointees to District Assemblies should be women and 20% of the District Assembly Common Fund should be spent on poverty programmes that target women. Rights of the disabled, aged and other vulnerable women 90. Article 29 of the 1992 Constitution guarantees the rights of people with disabilities in general, and a directive principle of State policy enjoins the State to promote all other basic human rights and freedoms, including those of the disabled, the aged, children and other vulnerable groups. Women with disabilities are nevertheless among the most vulnerable groups in Ghana, and widows are often subjected to harmful widowhood rites which, though criminalised, are still being practised. Right to education 91. There are no specific laws guaranteeing women's right to education. There is, however, a disparity between the number of boys and girls enrolled in basic education, with the number of boys being substantially higher than that of girls. The CSAR notes that the 2000 Housing Census Population recorded that 54.3% of females who are 15 years and above have never been to school, or are illiterate. This disparity is attributed to various cultural and socio-economic factors, such as parents' attitudes to education; child labour; mothers' attainment in education; and sexual harassment of girls. To rectify the situation, the government has initiated programmes like the Skills Training 39