NGO sensitizes Lagos State community on Female genital mutilation

CEE-HOPE’s Nigeria, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), on Sunday sensitised Oworoshoki community in Lagos on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). Speaking during the sensitisation at the Primary Health Centre, Oworoshoki, Mrs Betty Abah, Founder, CEE-HOPE Nigeria, said that the NGO had an ongoing project on ending FGM in Nigeria.

According to Abah, FGM is a crime not just against women and girls in Nigeria but against humanity. She said that the Violence Against Persons Prohibition (VAPP) Law of 2015 criminalised FGM.

“But incidentally, because we have a major issue with enforcement of laws in Nigeria, female genital mutilation is still rampant in so many communities.

“So, when you talk about female genital mutilation, the removal of the clitoris in order to reduce sexual satisfaction in women is like playing God. Because God put it there and it’s for a reason.

“And then because of cultures which are mostly anti-women, we’ve seen across the developing world, female genital mutilation causes not just a reduction of sexual pleasure in women but also leads to death in so many cases,” she said. Abah said that FGM cases were mostly unreported due to excessive bleeding in women and children.

“People thought this happens in rural areas, in very poor, impoverished and so-called ignorant communities; but it still happens in Lagos -Nigeria’s biggest metropolitan city.

“We are saying that this should not be a reality in 2023 in Lagos, Nigeria… We are in Oworoshoki because it is a community in Lagos where FGM still takes place,” Abah said.

Speaking, Olaoluwa Akinremi, Child Protection Network (CPN) Coordinator, Kosofe Local Government Area, said that local birth attendants do help women to remove their clitoris Akinremi said: “Many of them are doing their own usual practice, but we are out to let them know that it’s something that was against the law.

“You cannot just cut somebody’s clitoris without taking the consent of such person or even if consent has been obtained, you don’t have any right, it’s a crime.” She said that the NGOs were trying to inform local birth attendants that it was a criminal offence, punishable under the law.

Also, Chief Omolara Lasisi, the Olori, Olubori Odunifa Eko community, Oworoshoki, said that the NGO approached the community for sensitisation on FGM. Lasisi said that she was in the programme to help drive home the point among women and local birth attendants that FGM was a crime that could land one in jail.

Speaking, Mrs Aishat Abdul, a victim, said she was circumcised by a local birth attendant in 2003 during a prolonged child delivery labour in Ekiti State. Abdul said after the circumcision, she lost a lot of blood, could not walk for three months and never enjoyed sexual intercourse again. She said she did not know that it was an offence then, adding that she did not prosecute the local birth attendant. She, however, called on women to stop FGM because when a female child got circumcised, life would never be the same again.