Why tough laws have little chance of ending girls’ circumcision

For a country struggling to end female genital mutilation (FGM), news that the more informed Kenyans at home and in foreign lands are still circumcising their girls comes as a sharp thorn in the flesh of campaigners.

Many governments globally are worrying that FGM is no longer a practice of the uneducated and the girls are not ‘cut’ by traditional circumcisers.

Kenyans and Somalis living in England, Wales, and France have migrated with the culture and practise circumcision with the help of doctors.

For HIV/Aids campaigners, the use of health workers seems like a step towards the right direction, but for Unicef, medicalisation of circumcision is a step backward.

Circumcision of girls is still common in 28 countries in Africa despite the global ban, according to World Health organisation (WHO). WHO estimates that 100 million to 140 million women have been circumcised and about two million girls are at risk of genital mutilation every year.

In Kenya, FGM rates are high among the Somali at 98 per cent, Kisii at 96 per cent and Maasai at 73 per cent, according to the Anti-FGM Board.

In developed countries like Britain and France, immigrants continue with this cultural belief. One report indicated that last year, about 100,000 women in Britain underwent the illegal operation, with doctors having carried out the procedure on girls as young as 10.

More than 200,000 girls under the age of 15 are believed to be at high risk of FGM in England and Wales, the report indicated.

In a Swedish elementary school, up to 60 girls were discovered to have undergone the ‘cut’ since March, Norrköpings Tidningar newspaper reported.

In one class, all 28 girls had been subjected to the most severe form of genital mutilation where the clitoris and labia are completely removed, and the genitals sewn to leave a small vaginal opening.

About 42,000 women and girls in Sweden are reported to have been subjected to the controversial procedure with 7,000 being less than 10 years old.

A few weeks ago, the UK launched a campaign targeting Kenyans, Somalis and Nigerians as it seeks to discourage FGM and prosecuted a doctor accused of performing the procedure. For Kenyan elite, August and December holidays in rural homes have turned into excuses to circumcise girls.

READ: Anti-FGM campaign targets Kenyans, Somalis in Britain

The world thinks it is making a step forward in the fight against FGM, but it is a step backwards as the most civilised in society continue with this practice called ‘honour violence.’

‘‘Culture is so powerful, it dictates our reasoning, it cannot be exchanged with a trend. It will take a very long to end FGM,’’ said Dr Jared Siso, an anthropology lecturer at University of Nairobi.

Kenya passed the Anti-FGM Bill in 2011 and has been working with governmental and non-governmental groups to end the practice. However, the ban and tougher regulations are not enough to force some communities out of the FGM belief trap.

Some Kenyan young girls still believe they have to be circumcised to fit in society or with their peers.

Some mothers still believe that their uncircumcised girls will not be married, and the men are making the situation worse by shunning these girls. In some communities, men who marry uncircumcised women face the wrath of their mothers.

Dr Siso, also an FGM expert, said Maasai mothers still hold onto the belief that uncircumcised girls add no value to society.

‘‘Six years ago in Maasailand, a church rescued two girls from circumcision. The girls were taken to a boarding school. Upto date, their parents and their siblings have never visited. Their mother told them even if they go back to the village after 10 or 100 years, they will have to circumcised first to fit in the community.’’

Tinah Kwamboka, a teacher and a mother of four children, says she has not decided whether to circumcise her seven-year-old daughter even though she went through it. Circumcision caused her no harm, but she is a Christian now, she says. But whether to circumcise her daughter or not is not up for family debate.

‘‘My mother-in-law will definitely take her grandchild for circumcision soon, but not to a traditional circumciser. There are private clinics that circumcise girls, but secretly,’’ she says.

‘‘They have to be circumcised anyway, otherwise how will we tame their libido?’’ she says. She says her friend circumcised her seven-year-old daughter last December in Kisii.

‘‘A nurse was hired by 11 mothers to circumcise the girls in a small room in one of their homes. After healing, we have a get-together to celebrate. Who will come to your home to ask why you are having a family gathering? This is our culture why should we leave it, but we have to be careful in these times when Aids is common,’’ she says.

Some communities see FGM as a rite of passage into womanhood, others as a matter of hygiene, while for others it is a desire to control sexual arousal outside marriage.

One recurring belief is that uncircumcised girls have an over-active sex drive and are likely to lose their virginity before marriage and become unfaithful after marriage, disgracing the family and becoming a menace to men and the community, notes Kwateng-Kluvitse, an activist in a report on FGM.

A 35-year-old mother of two who lives in Nairobi and works for an international organisation says she was circumcised and that it has had no effect on childbirth or sexual life.

‘‘The Kisii way of circumcision didn’t seem to have such effect on me. I’ve no problems. For childbirth, I have had two normal deliveries with no episiotomy. However, each individual may have unique experiences,’’ she said.

Circumcision of girls has no health benefits, while complications can include severe pain, shock, bleeding, tetanus, sepsis, urine retention, recurrent bladder and urinary tract infections, as well as infertility, increased risk of childbirth complications and newborn deaths and other problems, says the WHO.

Dr Joe Wangwe, a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist says FGM may make normal delivery difficult or impossible depending on amount of tissue cut off and the resultant scarring.

‘‘The scarring reduces the natural elasticity of tissues of the birth canal. Women may also be reluctant to deliver in a health facility after the FGM,’’ Dr Wangwe said.

FGM ranges from cultural practices like pricking or scraping to the extreme, more dangerous forms that involve cutting the clitoris and labia and sewing up the vaginal opening in countries like Djibouti, where according to a UN survey, 83 per cent of women aged 45-49 reported being sewn up.

As the culture continues, some experts argue that perhaps it is time to allow a symbolic cut. The idea that a legalised symbolic cut would be the lesser of two evils is not new and was rejected in Germany and the Netherlands after Somali women requested it as a mark of culture.

In Indonesia, the cutting has died out, according to WHO, but a ritual form persists, which involves a symbolic scratch of the clitoris.

However, Dr Siso says Kenya should not go that way. ‘‘That is a violation of human rights, no one should be allowed to touch anyone’s private part because of a culture or a rite. We shouldn’t even think of symbolic cuts.’’

Dr Wangwe says Kenya should ban all forms of FGM because it is a retrogressive practice that cannot be regulated.

Not even regulation can end FGM, says Dr Siso. Different countries want to end FGM. England launched a helpline and poster campaign in public toilets targeting mothers from Kenyan, Somali and Nigerian communities. Botswana opened a restorative surgery unit to reverse FGM.

An organisation that helps FGM victims obtain restorative surgery seeks to open Kenya’s first repair hospital.

‘‘FGM reversal surgery, which restores functioning, is a powerful deterrent to the barbaric, cruel and dangerous practice of female genital mutilation,” said Nadine Gary, the communication director Clitoraid, which has also set up such a clinic in Botswana.

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