Pressure against female ‘cut’ up

TRADITIONAL elders from all 13 clans within the Kurya community in Mara Region are teaming up with other anti-gender based violence organisations operating here in a grand initiative envisioned to end the widely condemned practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

The initiative is aimed at sensitising parents and around 2000 mostly underage girls in Tarime and Rorya districts who are exposed to the widely condemned ritual, practised at twoyear interval in turns amongst the clans. FGM is illegal and authorities here are struggling to sanction parents and guardians who coerce hundreds of their school going girl-children to undergo the traditional ritual and later marry them off in return for hefty dowry paid in the form of livestock and money.

The chairman of one of the clans, Mr Sinda Nyangore, told participants attending an FGM eradication event that brought together several organisations dealing with GBVs that “this time around we are determined to bring the notorious practice to an end once and for all.” He said starting next month, they would conduct in-house awareness campaign throughout the region covering lower primary school children as well as incorporating religious leaders.

Mr Nyangore stressed that warnings had been issued, that whoever would not take heed of their directives would face dire consequences, including legal action. “For several years, various clans here have perpetually ignored directives by authorities to stop the vice, as a result of which dozens of girls who are supposed to attend school are made victims, most of whom suffer agonies stemming from childhood marriages.”

Mr Nyangore further explained that one of the drawbacks against the campaign to eradicate FGM was the reluctance by some conservative elements that were reluctant to implement an earlier resolution reached by cultural elders, by conducting the illegal cut during the night to evade law enforcers. He said most elderly women who were brought, used to perform FGM (ngariba) had voluntarily surrendered their razor blades and switched to legally sanctioned income-generating activities. These, he pointed out, uplifted their welfare on a surer and faster rate than the meagre proceeds from performing the cut.

Among the causative agents spearheading FGM that were identified during the gathering here included peer pressure, under which uncircumcised girls were perceived to be a curse. Branded by the derogatory term ‘Irikunene’, they were ridiculed by age mates and faced difficulties to get suitors for marriage. Mwita Nyasibora, the Secretary of the clan elders, said they would cover all communities this time, the thrust being to highlight the consequences of FGM, childhood marriages and early pregnancies.

He pointed out the task was highly tricky and demanding, due to elders who fronted the practices being held in high esteem. “Emphasis will be focused on explaining to the girls what the effects of FGM and sensitising the whole community to shun the two-year cycle rituals, which deprived the desperate girls their natural right to education and well-being”, he said.

According to Valerian Mgani, the programme manager at the Association of eradication of Female genital mutilation (ATFGM), the government should introduce stiff legal actions against the perpetrators of the vices, to serve as deterrents. Each year, ATFGM receives and shelters hundreds of girls who flee from initiation ceremonies and guides them through alternative rites of passage and helping them pursue their studies uninterrupted.