FREETOWN - Some 800 women in the Sierra Leone town of Kailahun have paraded
in
favour of genital mutilation and told donors opposed to the practice to
keep
their money, demonstrators and witnesses said.
Women wearing colourful beads and adorned with seashells chanted songs in
the
local dialect that warned authorities and foreign organisations against
"any
attempt to take away our traditional ritual."
Kailahun is a dusty town about 300 kilometres east of Freetown, in a part
of
the west African country regarded by human rights groups as the heartland
of
female genital mutilation (FGM).
The United Nations World Health Organisation says FGM - the partial or
total
removal of the external female genitalia and related injury - is recorded
in
28 African nations and opposes the practice on medical grounds.
The traditional Bondo Society organised the rally as a "show of strength",
said executive member Mamie Banya. "Any organisation that has accepted
funds
from overseas donors to wage war against FGM is fighting a losing battle.
Let
donors keep their money, we will keep our culture."
A group called the National Emancipation for Progress has led workshops
and
seminars to have FGM banned in Sierra Leone, but faces opposition from
people
who hold the practice is harmless, promotes marital fidelity and is in
tune
with religious values.
"We have inherited this culture over 100 years ago and it has made us
women be
responsible housewives to our husbands," one demonstrator in the noisy
march
told AFP by telephone.
Another demonstrator, teacher Sally Kwapika, said "we love FGM as a
culture in
the past, today and tomorrow. I am appealing to the president that if he
wants
us to stop sup****ting him, let him advocate for an end to FGM."
Asked how the Bondo Society would respond if the Freetown government
outlawed
the practice like several others in Africa, Banya said: "We will become
uncontrollable. Past governments have not interfered directly in our
society.
Why only now?"
http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=720318
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop
uk
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