USAID/Guinea: Communities Pledge Changes to Improve Health of Young Women

DECEMBER 7, 2006

Communities Pledge Changes to Improve Health of Young Women

Representatives of 150 villages in the Fouta Djalon region of Guinea pledge to discontinue the traditional practices of female genital cutting and early marriage, culminating two years of work by Tostan.

LALYA, Pita Prefecture -- Lamarana Barry this week took a pledge that will forever change the life of her youngest daughter.

In a public declaration that departs from long-standing tradition, Barry joined representatives of 150 communities in renouncing the practices of female genital cutting (FGC) and early, forced marriages of young women.

"Tostan gave us the courage to keep our daughters safe and in school until marriage," said Lamarana Barry, who has seven daughters and two sons.

The pledge follows more than two years of work by Tostan in a USAID-funded project to provide basic education of human rights and responsibilities - including democratic governance, health/hygiene and problem resolution - in an area spanning contiguous, intermarrying villages in three prefectures of the Fouta Djalon region of Guinea.

"Tostan gave us the courage to keep our daughters safe and in school until marriage," said Barry, the mother of two sons and seven daughters - six of whom already have undergone FGC. "My youngest daughter was not circumcised and it will not happen to her."

Various forms of FGC are practiced across Africa. A traditional way of keeping women chaste and eligible for marriage, excision removes part or all of the external labia and clitoris. The most severe form of the practice involves sewing the opening of the vagina to a hole allowing only for the passage of menstrual blood and urine.

Excision can lead to hemorrhage, infection, complications in pregnancy and long-term psychological scarring, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), which estimates that FGC has affected 100 and 140 million girls and women - primarily in 28 African countries - and puts an additional 2 million girls at risk each year.

Layla Baldé reads a French version of the Lalya pledge.

Tostan's aim is not to force communities to abolish FGC, but to encourage the populace to collectively abandon the practice through an informal but comprehensive education program, said Tostan Executive Director Molly Melching. "Our action plan rests primarily on how to make it possible to people to stop [FGC] voluntarily."

The decision by communities in the prefectures of Pita, Labé and Dalaba, with an estimated population of 150,000, was hailed by Pita's prefectoral chief.

"We hail this declaration as the start of a new era: that of a society unencumbered by social obligations affecting the health of the woman and the girl," said Mouctar Banty, continuing: "A society which takes into account and preserves the physical integrity of women in the service of a new hope and to the benefit of future generations."

"The American government and its people support you and continue to support us in our activities in favor of girls," said Jessica Davis Ba, political and economic affairs officer for the U.S. Embassy in Conakry. "We are convinced that the public statement of Lalya will inspire many other Guinean communities.

Dancers celebrate after the pledge to end FGC in 150 villages in the Fouta Djalon region of Guinea.

"Because the small girls of today are the women and the mothers of tomorrow, and the future of this nation, I do not doubt for a moment that the example you have set today will have positive repercussions for a long time to come," Davis Ba said.

Ceremony participants heard a pre-recorded speech from Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-NY, who has visited West Africa and taken an interest in FGC as a human rights issue. "It's my wish that your joyous songs of celebration will resound far beyond the borders of Guinea, that your partnerships will continue to grow, and that we will work together to improve each others' rights and well-being," she said.

While USAID is funding Tostan's activities in three regions of Guinea, Tostan continues to be active in Senegal and Burkina Faso. Since 1997, more than 1,800 villages in Senegal have made 22 public declarations to abandon FGC. Tostan means "breakthrough" in the Senegalese language of Wolof.

Will her daughters uphold the pledge that Lamarana Barry and her fellow villagers took this week? "For sure," she says. "When we are dead, our girls will continue what we started."

Story and photos by Richard Stirba

LAYLA MAOUNDÉ
PUBLIC DECLARATION

"From the administrative regions of Labe and Mamou, meeting today, Dec. 3, 2006, in Lalya Maoundé, regarding the issue of female genital cutting (FGC) and child/forced marriage and considering many reasons, including the following:

"-- The numerous testimonies from girls, women and traditional cutters themselves about the harmful consequences of these practices,
"-- The opinion of religious leaders who emphasize that Islam seeks to protect the human right to health and human dignity, especially that of children and women,
"-- The information received from health professionals and human rights activities

"We have joined together to make the solemn and deliberate decision to put and end to the practices of FGC and child/forced marriage, to guarantee and protect our girl's rights to health, to physical integrity and to ensure their human dignity.

"Our commitment was made possible thanks to the Tostan basic education program, funded through USAID. This program included human rights education, community awareness-raising activities and inter-village meetings among the 150 communities making this declaration.

"We abandon the traditional practices of FGC and child/forced marriage. Nevertheless, we will continue our positive traditions and promote girls' education so they will be able to guarantee, respect and promote the rights of their own children.

"We welcome such a program for our children and we know that our call has already been heard by the Guinean government, religious leaders and our partners for development, who we deeply thank.

"We thank the government of Guinea, USAID, Tostan at this very important moment in our lives."

The following poem was read during the ceremony renouncing FGC:

Why female circumcision?
She is a source of infection.
Why mutilation?
She is a source of complication.
Why kill these flowers
With customs that have no justification?
Why defend this cruelty
When she is responsible for our ill health?
Why retain the rituals
That are but destroyers?
Why safeguard this atrocity
That is but a source of morbidity?

What a lot of sterile women,
Victims of her unsociable customs;
What a lot of women suffering frigidity,
Victims of this pitiless contusion;
What a lot of women suffering from infertility,
Victims of this unwanted lesion.

Oh! female circumcision!
You are a demon for real;
A demon that destroys these young women.
Oh! female circumcision!
You are an ordeal for real;
An ordeal that paralyzes these future mothers.
For nothing but tradition
You destroy their ambition;
For nothing but custom
You leave them with scars of bitterness.