Source: Champion Newspaper
Recently, precisely February 6, 2012, the International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) was celebrated, during which the UNFPA executive director, Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, announced some encouraging findings in the abandonment of the practice. ROSE MOSES, in this report, takes a look at the harmful practice that endangers the health of young women and girls, especially in Africa

As the world celebrated International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) February 6, encouraging findings by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), showed that social norms and cultural practices are changing, and communities are uniting to protect the rights of girls and women against the harmful tradition.

On the occasion of this year's celebration, it was announced that almost 2,000 communities across Africa abandoned the practice in 2011. This, according to the UNFPA and UNICEF findings, brought the total number of communities renouncing the practice to 8,000 over the last few years, a development the UNFPA Executive Director, Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, described as encouraging.

"These encouraging findings show that social norms and cultural practices are changing, and communities are uniting to protect the rights of girls and women," said Osotimehin, while calling on the global community to join in this critical effort. "Together, we can end FGM/C in one generation and help millions of girls and women to live healthier, fuller lives, and reach their potential."

Commenting on the practice also, Mrs Josephine Effah-Chukwuma, Executive Director, Project Alert on Violence Against Women, a Lagos-based non-governmental organisation that addresses all forms of discrimination against women, said although there is no federal law on Female Genital Mutilation in Nigeria, advocates against the practice presently rely on Section 34(1) (a) of the 1999 Constitution, which states that "no person shall be subjected to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment."

But despite the fact that Nigeria was one of the five countries that sponsored a resolution at the forty-sixth World Health Assembly calling for the eradication of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in all nations, the practice is still very rampant in the country.

Though some states of the federation, including Lagos, Osun, Ondo, Ogun, Ekiti, Bayelsa, Edo, Cross-River and Rivers have enacted FGM laws, implementation of these laws, according to Effah-Chukwuma, has been a huge challenge.

This, to a large extent she said, is because FGM is considered to be a cultural inheritance designed to preserve some traditional values such as religious purification, family honour, protection of virginity, prevention of promiscuity, increasing sexual pleasure for the husband and enhancing fertility.

Others, she further told Daily Champion, are the belief that if the clitoris of an uncircumcised woman touches the head of a baby about to be born, the baby will die; and that if the clitoris is not cut, it will grow downwards, be dirty, and not allow a man enjoy sex.

Effah-Chukwuma however advises that cultural factors should not be used to condone physical, sexual and psychological violence against any person.

"We must not lose sight of the fact that the primary function of culture and tradition is to provide a framework for human well-being. Cultural arguments can never be used to condone physical, sexual and psychological violence against persons, male or female. Moreover, culture is not static, but constantly changing and adapting," she said.

She nonetheless suggested that activities for the elimination of FGM/C should be developed and implemented in a way that is sensitive to the cultural and social background of the communities that practice it, noting that behaviour can change when people understand the hazards of certain practices and when they realize that it is possible to give up harmful practices without giving up meaningful aspects of their culture.

Similarly, some women groups such as Forward Foundation for Women's Health, a Kano-based non-governmental organisation working in the prevention, treatment and rehabilitation of patients of vesico vaginal fistulae (VVF) used the occasion of the International Day of Zero Tolerance to FGM/C to reflect on the high incidence of VVF, a disability also linked to FGM/C.

Simply described as a hole resulting from the breakdown in the tissue between the vaginal wall and the bladder or rectum caused by unrelieved obstructed labour, the consequences of such damage are urinary or faecal incontinence resulting in constant leaking of urine or faeces.

VVF and recto vaginal fistula (RVF) are, no doubt, serious reproductive health issues for women in the developing world with a large proportion of sufferers being young, poor, uneducated rural women, even as the problem has been practically eliminated in developed countries, says Dr Rahmat Mohammed.

Mohammed, who is the founder of Forward Foundation in Nigeria, says although most of VVF/RVF cases in the country are recorded in Northern Nigeria, some are also reported in Cross River and Ebonyi states in the South.

And even as obstructed labour is said to be largely responsible for some cases of maternal deaths in the country, other causes, Daily Champion gathered, include female genital cutting by local midwives to widen the vaginal wall during labour.

According to Mohammed, the social costs of unrelieved obstructed labour and VVF are enormous, including stillborn babies, maternal mortality and social rejection of women who develop VVF that are often abandoned by their husbands.

And as the world focused attention on the harmful practice of FGM/C on the International Day of Zero Tolerance, US Secretary of state, Hillary Rodham Clinton, in a release similarly traced the cultural tolerance to the practice to the faulty beliefs that it is "a good tradition," or a religious requirement or that it ensures "cleanliness" and prevents excessive clitoral growth.

Although the practice is deeply connected to marriage rituals and ideas about protecting virginity and preventing promiscuity, Clinton noted that the harmful tradition is practiced openly in 28 different African countries, as well as secretly in parts of the Middle East, Europe, Australia, and the United States.

According to her, 'Every government has an obligation to protect its citizens from such abuse. As we commemorate International Day of Zero Tolerance and remember those who have been harmed, we reaffirm our commitment to overturning deeply entrenched social norms and abolishing this practice, she said.

Clinton further noted that all women and girls, no matter where they are born or what culture they are raised in, deserve the opportunity to realize their potentials. "We must continue to act to end this affront to women's equality and the rights and dignity of women and girls," she said.

Moreover, she reminded that no religion mandates the procedure, though it occurs across cultures, religions, and continents. "It is performed on girls in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. Even in the United States we are fighting this practice. FGM/C became a federal crime in the United States in 1997, but the procedure persists in some communities," she said.

But over the years, Clinton also confirmed, community advocates have found that when men come to understand the physical and psychological trauma FGM/C causes, they often become effective activists for eradication, including fathers who refuse to allow their daughters to be subject to the procedure. She therefore called on communities to act collectively to abandon the practice so that girls and their families who opt out do not become social outcasts.

Interesting, this approach is said to have led thousands of communities across Africa to abandon the practice, usually through a public declaration. In other words, communities working together can ensure stronger, healthier futures for girls and young women.

Also describing the practice as a particularly perfidious form of violence against women, Austrian Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister, Michael Spindelegger, said "female genital mutilation is a severe violation of human rights and must be stopped by all available means. She called for efforts to be doubled to eradicate "this archaic custom that puts the health of young women and girls at stake."

Nonetheless, the new report on FGM/C entitled: 'Key Results and Highlights 2011', was issued by the UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme for the Acceleration of the Abandonment of FGM/C. Set up in 2008, the initiative aims to end a practice with serious immediate and long-term health effects that violates girls' and women's human rights.

From the report, about three million girls and women, or some 8,000 girls each day, face the risk of mutilation or cutting. This is in addition to an estimated 130 million to 140 million girls and women that have undergone the procedure, mostly in Africa and some countries in Asia and the Middle East.

That notwithstanding, the new highlights, with support from UNFPA and UNICEF, indicate that efforts against FGM/C yielded encouraging results in 2011. They also note that throughout Africa, more than 18,000 community education sessions were held, with almost 3,000 religious leaders publicly declaring that the rite should end, and over 3,000 media features covering the subject.

Daily Champion learnt that celebrations to voice such declarations were graced by government officials, Muslim Imams, Catholic and Protestant priests, traditional village and clan leaders and thousand others in countries such as Burkina Faso, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Gambia, Senegal, Kenya and Somalia.

Interestingly, while Kenya's parliament has passed a bill prohibiting FGM/C, 13 Sudanese states are said to have launched initiatives to abandon the practice. Also, more than 3,600 families with girls at risk in Egypt are said to have come out against the practice.

In addition, a West African fatwa against cutting was issued by religious leaders from Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Gambia and Egypt.

Admittedly, the UNFPA-UNICEF joint programme on FGM/C speeds change through a culturally sensitive, human rights-based approach that promotes collective abandonment of the practice. The idea is to engage all community groups such as traditional and religious leaders, women, men and young girls in discussing the harms of the practice, while highlighting that it is not a religious requirement. The programme also supports legislation and policies against the practice.

As it were, this reporter, during the 2011 International Conference on Family Planning in Dakar last year, along with10 other senior female journalists from 11 countries, visited two villages of Keur Simbara and Saam Njaay in the state of Thiès, just outside Dakar, the Senegalese capital where the UNFPA-UNICEF formula has recorded tremendous success via the Tostan Community Empowerment Program.

The visit, courtesy of the Population Reference Bureau (PRB), a Washington DC-based international organisation that informs people around the world about population, health, and the environment and empowers them to use that information to advance the well-being of current and future generations, was to witness the lessons and successes in the abandonment of female genital cutting (FGC).

Tostan, a United States non-governmental organisation dedicated to community-led development in Africa, during the visit, provided a graphic picture of how Senegal edges closer to becoming the first African country to fully abandon female genital mutilation/cutting, with younger women supporting the campaigns to change social norms that surround the practice.

As we were welcomed by the villagers who came out in their best attires with an elaborate ceremony featuring drumming, dancing, singing and other forms of entertainments, one of the community's prominent leaders, Demba Diawara, about 70 years of age and an Imam described by Molly Melching, Executive Director of Tostan, as the "the wise man who found the key to ending FGM/C in West Africa," dwelt on the importance of words in communicating ideas.

Diawara, while commenting on importance of words in communicating ideas, especially those that move people towards change, however, reminded change agents on the need to speak with respect, intelligence and courage to their target audience. That way, he explained, they (audience) won't get the feeling of being already 'condemned.'

Tostan in Wolof (the most widely spoken language in the officially French speaking country) means "breakthrough" as well as 'spreading and sharing.' The organisation was initially involved in advocating and planning for education based on the six native languages of Senegal.

Its work later evolved into community-based education and training and by 1995,Tostan would unveil its community-empowerment program, described as "a collective, interactive, community-led approach to development, one in which community members themselves create pathways out of the dire poverty that so adversely affects their health and well-being."

Little wonder therefore that in Keur Simbara, said to be one of the first villages to abandon female genital cutting, we were welcomed with music, skits, and words of wisdom from Diawara, all aimed towards spreading the commitment to abandonment.

It was interesting to note that the village has also become a showcase for solar energy, having sent one of its women to Barefoot College in India for training. The village, also known for its work with a former excisor, who has been retrained as a peanut grower, boasts of a health hut where family planning knowledge and options are dispensed. Most importantly, the personal commitment of Diawara, who has now visited 347 villages to encourage abandonment perhaps, crowns the village with the title of a pacesetter.

As such, the very confident girls of most communities in Senegal now speak about their right to education and to marry later since they are now empowered to make decision concerning their reproductive health, among others.

Indeed, Tostan's work in the village of Malicounda Bambara in the Thiès region, it was gathered actually led to the first declaration to end cutting in that West African country in 1997.

The women had decided to stop the practice to protect the human rights and health of their daughters by going as far as announcing their collective decision. This was indeed a breakthrough for Senegal, where cutting was always considered mandatory for girls to marry.

Unfortunately, neighbouring villages were not on board, so Diawara, the local Imam, had to travel long distance by foot to persuade people that cutting was not in their best interest.

In all, Tostan's method of gradually changing attitudes and behaviour through human-rights platform became the model of change in Senegal, which is committed to abandoning cutting by 2015 with the help of the UNFPA/UNICEF joint programme. It is the same process that Mrs Effah- Chukwuma advocates in Nigeria.

• Nigeria