Malawi: The Last Girl Standing – How One Teenager Fought Poverty to Stay in School
Duana Muhammad, 17, reveals heartbreaking reality of watching classmates drop out and marry as young as 13 — while she battled on through repeated years and grinding poverty
A remarkable 17-year-old girl from Mangochi has laid bare the brutal barriers facing Malawi’s young people — revealing she was the ONLY girl from her entire year group to make it all the way to Standard 8, after watching virtually every one of her former classmates drop out of school and marry.
Duana Muhammad delivered a powerful and deeply personal account of her educational journey at the 2026 National Youth Summit in Lilongwe, calling on government to tear down the barriers still preventing countless young people — particularly girls — from reaching their full potential.
Muhammad revealed the astonishing scale of the obstacles she personally had to overcome, admitting she was forced to repeat Standard One after first enrolling back in 2016, before poverty struck again, forcing her to repeat Standard Four as well.
Yet despite the repeated setbacks, the determined teenager refused to give up — battling through year after difficult year until she finally reached Standard 8 and sat her long-awaited examinations.
In a stark illustration of the crisis facing Malawi’s girls, Muhammad revealed she was the only girl among her entire group of peers to make it that far, with virtually all of her former classmates having dropped out of school and been married off long before reaching the same milestone.
Despite everything stacked against her, Muhammad hasn’t given up on her extraordinary ambitions, revealing she dreams of one day becoming a doctor.
While praising free education for opening doors that would otherwise have remained firmly shut, Muhammad issued a powerful appeal directly to parents across the country, urging them to encourage their children to stay in school rather than pushing daughters into early marriage.
Her remarkable story landed at this year’s summit, held under the theme “Accelerating Progress: Reflecting on the Impact, Expanding Prospects for Youth Development in Malawi” — serving as a powerful and sobering reminder of just how much work remains to ensure every Malawian child, regardless of gender or circumstance, gets the chance to complete their education.
By Nyasa Times.
