A total of 668 marriages were registered and celebrated at the Cape Coast Metropolitan Assembly (CCMA) last year as against 677 the previous year.

Last year the Assembly reviewed upwards its registration fee from GH¢30.00 for normal marriage registration to GH¢50.00 whiles special marriage process went for between GH¢100.00 and GH¢150.00.

Mr Edward Steele-Dadzie Principal Executive Office in charge of Marriage registry at the CCMA made this known to the Ghana News Agency in an interview on Monday.

He said an amount of GH¢31,000 was realized from the registration of 620 normal marriages which went through 21-day public notices, whiles GH¢6,300.00 was made from 48 special marriages which took less than the 21-day public notice.

From January to Feb 12, 2016, a total of 109 normal marriages had so far been registered with the assembly whilst four special marriages had been registered so far.

Mr Steele-Dadzie said the oldest couple that registered their marriage last year was an 83 year old groom and 75 year old bride and the youngest couple were also 23 year old groom and a 21 year old bride, adding that a Muslim couple, a 43 year old groom and his 19 year old bride also registered their marriage.

According to him, a 72 year old groom and 68 year old bride was the oldest couple that registered their marriage in 2014, whilst the youngest couple were 23 year old groom and a 21 year old bride.

He attributed the reduction in the number of marriage registration in the Metropolis to economic hardships stressing that some people only visited his outfit to make inquiries whiles other keep postponing their registration.

Mr Steele-Dadzie expressed concern about the high rate of divorce cases and urged would –be couples to endeavour to adequately prepare themselves before going into marriage since marriage was a very important institution

He said it was unfortunate that some youth just follow the crowd and rush into marriages without actually understanding its consequences and urged them to always go for marriage counselling to prepare themselves adequately for marriage.

Mr Steele-Dadzie said in some cases churches even help couples to get married but when they are confronted with realities these churches abandon them, compelling them to resort to divorce.

He also mentioned insincerity as well as shirking of responsibilities as some of the causes of divorce in the society.

He regretted the situation where young men were forced to marry girls they impregnate as a recipe for divorce because in some cases the men were psychologically and economically not sound thereby making it very difficult for them to manage their families