12-year campaign reduces female circumcision

The government of Burkina Faso has launched a nationwide survey to find out just how successful its 12-year campaign against female circumcision has been and the first results are mighty encouraging. In 1992, when the campaign against female genital mutilation (FMG) was launched, two thirds of all women in this poor landlocked country suffered the ritual cutting out of their clitoris around the age of puberty. Often other wounds were inflicted and sometimes the vulva was partially sewn up, leaving just enough room for urine and menstrual blood to pass. However, first results from the latest national survey show that in some areas of Burkina Faso the proportion of girls subjected to FMG has fallen to just one or two percent. The National Committee to Combat the Practice of Circumcision (CNLPE), has so far reported the results from six of Burkina Faso's 45 provinces. These show that female circumcision has been almost wiped out in some parts of the country. However, the ritual remains common in many poor, remote conservative and staunchly Muslim villages, even though the custom was outlawed in 1996. Those practicing FMG now face up to three years in jail and a fine of $1,500. And those responsible for inflicting wounds that lead to death by bleeding or other medical complications can be jailed for up to 10 years. Sanguie province in the west had 51 percent circumcision rate at the start of the campaign, but the survey showed that in 12 years this has plummeted to just one percent. In Ziro province, in the west, the number of girls subjected to circumcision has dropped from 77 percent to 2.0 percent. And in Mohoun in the south, it has fallen from 75.2 percent to 3.1 percent. In staunchly Muslim Oudalan, near the northern frontier with Mali, the circumcision rate is down from 97.9 percent to 12.9 percent. "After 12 years of intense lobbying, sensitization and training we are seeing a big reduction in numbers undergoing FGM. The figures speak for themselves," Hortense Palm, the permanent secretary of CNLPE said. "We think that some provinces are lagging behind, but a close look at them shows that people there have taken irreversible steps to give up a practice that has no root in religious books nor in traditions," she added. But even in remote rural areas, where traditions die hard, progress has been made. In Nayala in the northwest only one girl in every 200 escaped the knife 12 years ago. But today only one in three girls in the province still endures the pain, the bleeding, the loss of sexual pleasure and the risk of serious health damage involved in FMG. At the launch of the government's campaign in 1992, the national circumcision rate was 66.35 percent. CNLPE officials said a new much lower national figure should emerge in the coming weeks. The CNLPE includes traditional chiefs and religious leaders at both the national and provincial levels of the organisation. "For a long time there has been a misunderstanding of Islam's teaching about female circumcision," said Imam El hadj Adama Sakande, a member of the Center for Studies, Research and Islamic Training (CERFI). "Some religious leaders thought out of ignorance that it was in the Koran...But investigations have shown that it is a social practice that existed before Islam and tolerated by it," he added. Sakande said that although religious leaders have not spoken out directly against the practice in mosques, Islam has at least broken some "barriers" by urging militants to respect women's physical integrity. He noted that fundamentalist Islamic countries such as Iran and Saudi Arabia do not practice FGM. "Such behaviour in these countries and other Arab countries helps to change attitudes here, where the topic is a very sensitive one and needs to be addressed implicitly," Sakande said. Most schools in Burkina Faso teach that circumcision is wrong and dangerous as part of the standard curriculum.