Help communities stand against FGM/C
Today, Amref Health Africa launched a new TV campaign in the UK to raise vital funds for our work.
Across Africa, there is a rollback on progress made to end Female Genital Mutilation or Cutting (FGM/C). Cases of girls being cut are on the rise—driven by the effects of COVID-19, climate change-induced drought and sky-rocketing cost of living. These external factors are causing loss of family livelihoods, making parents turn to another source of income; a dowry from marrying off their daughters.
Meet Jane Nkotai
The new TV campaign features the powerful story of end FGM/C activist Jane Nkotai (pictured here with her sister whom she saved from the cut). Jane is 22 years old and comes from Samai village, in Kajiado County, Kenya.
She explains how external factors have driven up the rates of FGM/C where she is from: “The last three years we haven’t received any rain, so a lot of cattle die. They force girls to undergo the cut so that they will be married off to replace the lost cattle.”
Jane is one of 11 siblings and she knew from a young age that FGM/C was inevitable for her. In fact, it was an event to be celebrated:
“I personally wanted to undergo FGM, because in our family, my aunts and my grandparents, everyone except my mother, all of them are the cutters so that is the way that is the route that all the girls of our family face and we just take it as a normal thing.”
Just a way of life
She had seen her aunts go through the cut of FGM/C, and she witnessed her older sister also undergo the cut at the age of 13. This was a formative moment for Jane, as her sister suffered from infections and became very ill. After recovering she was married as a second wife to a much older man.
Sadly, there are even more serious and destructive consequences of FGM/C. In 2014, Jane and her friend attended an Alternative Rites of Passage ceremony in nearby Rombo. On their return, her friend’s parents forced her to undergo the cut and she died in the process. Jane says, “This is something that remains in my heart, this painful scar that I will never forget.”
By doing that one ARP training… I am changed
When she was 17 years old, Jane attended an Amref-led training session on Alternative Rites of Passage in a nearby village, Iltilal.
“I ran away from our home because my father w[ould] not allow me to attend the ARP. So I just ran away from our home and ran to the ARP training. It was a one-week training and I learned a lot. I came to realise that FGM has no benefit. Then I agree in my heart that I will start from I personally to say no to FGM, to say stop to FGM, and also to teach the other girls.”
The time to say no to FGM/C
When her father told her the time had come for Jane, she ran to the safety of the Nice Place Foundation. There she had safe shelter and an opportunity to continue her education.
Since then, Jane has become an end FGM/C advocate, speaking out in communities across Kajiado against FGM/C:
“I try not only to reach the girls and boys or those who are in school, but also the community. I train the community. I try to talk to parents although it [i]s very hard. But after them witnessing my success and a lot of things that I'm doing, after them seeing all those things, they came to realize that: at least she's making sense. I talk with the chiefs, and also in churches about it. And I was able to train a lot of parents, to talk with a lot of parents and to train very, very many children and youth.”
When we cut a girl, we cut her future short
Jane is one of the thousands of girls who have attended Amref-led training sessions on the negative effects of FGM/C in Kenya. Her work to bring that knowledge back to communities like the one she grew up in is helping to end this horrifying violence.
She says that it is only by changing the beliefs and attitudes of young people and community leaders, that together we can end FGM/C: “I believe that when we cut a girl we also cut her future short. To stop FGM/C you must change people’s mentality. If you train 500 girls, those girls will go back to their homes and [tell their] parents who don't know that FGM/C is a very dangerous thing."
Help stop FGM/C
Donate now, to help champions like Jane stop FGM/C and save girls from a lifetime of pain and trauma.
Images: (banner) Jane Nkotai (c) Amref Health Africa/Wesley Koskei; Jane Nkotai and her sister (c) Amref Health Africa/Wesley Koskei; Jane Nkotai doing school-based training in Kajiado (c) Amref Health Africa/Esther Sweeney
Related Articles
View all
