Dienstag, 27. Juni 2006

CAMPAIGN AGAINST FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION and OTHER TRADITIONAL PRACTICES THAT ENDANGER THE LIVES OF OUR WOMAN !

Von womanscollective, 01:46

 

Dear  Sisters , Dear Brothers !

This is a blog dedicated to my Nigerian Sister Hanna Edemikpong and all the Sisters who are standing tall by her side  -  in the great task to educate african woman and their families against the cruel and non-humane traditional practices of female genital mutilation and dehumanizing widowhood-rites . Our sisters in Nigeria don't have a website yet , Hanna can only be contacted via the normal post - ways. So, please  :  take 1 moment & read Hanna 's message to all of us :

DEAR SISTERS !

WHERE EVER YOU MAY GO AND WHERE EVER YOU MAY BE  - PLEASE DO NOT FORGET THE AFRICAN WOMAN -

FOR THEY DEPEND ON YOUR ENCOURAGEMENT , INSPIRATION + SUPPORT ;

BECAUSE ACCORDING TO VIRGINIA WOLF :

As a woman I have no country .

As a woman my country is the world !

iNTERViEWwithHANNAH

iNTERViEWmitHANNAH 

 TOGETHER LET'S FIGHT AGAINST THIS HARMFUL PRACTICE  OF FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION ! !  

DEAR  FRIENDS !

This is AN APPRAISAL OF THE CAMPAIGN

LAUNCHED AGAINST FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION

AND OTHER HARMFUL TRADITIONAL PRACTICES

THAT ENDANGER THE LIVES OF OUR WOMAN

When we launched the campaign for the abrogation

of female genital mutilation 1985 in this part of Africa ,

many cynics thought it to be a wild goose chase -

especially when considering the multi-dimensional problems  ,

that lay on our way to success.

A lot of them thought that age long costoms and traditions of the people are always difficult to break , therefore they could not imagine how a small group of woman with very limited recources could change an age long costom.

Others thought that we were western agents that were sponsorored to destroy their cherished culture and tradition , since they believed that circumcision , excision and infibulations diminished the sexual desires of woman and the suturing of the vagina checked prostitution , therefore to campaign against these practises was a way of exposing our woman to western culture and values ....

 As a result ,  we were in many occasions not well recieved by the people .

Moreover , traditional midwives , elderly woman and traditional barbers who made a living from circumcising , mutilating and infibulating young girls and woman were all out to frustrate our campaign since by eradicting the practices , they would be thrown out of their means of livelihood.

Religious bodies such as the Muslims , who regarded the practices as a part of their religious practices , did not welcome our campaign , often times they restricted their woman from attending our seminars and they restricted us from going into their residential areas with public adress system , so that their woman may be shut away from hearing .

Traditionalist house holders who valued the preservation of the virginity of their female children , so that they charge high prices as well as young men who valued the marriage of infibulated girls as those , whose virginity had been preserved and took a special delight in removing the sutures on the vaginal opening of their wives and having sexual intercourse with them on the night of the marriage until blood is stained on their male organs as a proof of breaking their wives' virginity , did not allow us easy access into their traditional homelands or chiefdoms . In some cases they were those who came out to oppose us .

( from Hannah Edemikpong : Memoirs of campaign to central Africa .)

Admittedly some African governments that had condemnation from international community because of bad governance would extend their anger on us and termed us as western agents .

For instance during the brutal military regime of General Abacha of Nigeria  - in which many judicial killings of political and environmental activists viz Ken Saro-wiwa and others and Nigeria was declared a pariah nation  , Abacha therefore barred his fangs on us declaring us as western stooges who were sponsored to destroy the peoples culture .

A letter I wrote to British Magazine about the plights of woman in 1996 earned me a detention by Abacha's agents .  

Inspite of all these problems , which we lack space and time to enumerate , we have achieved much success in our campaign .

In Nigeria we have exerted much pressure and awareness which resulted in the passing of legislations in the following states of the Nigerian Federation abrogating female genital mutilation and other dehumanized practices against woman .

The states are : Cross River , Akwa Iborm , The latest being : Rivers and Ondo . In Ghana our affiliate group succeeded in pressurizing the Ghanain Parliament passed a legislation ,the Criminal law Amendment Act , making it a criminal act for anyone to compel a woman to perform such a dehumanized act .

Likewise in Burkina Faso our affiliated group had lobbied the parliament to criminalize female genital mutilation .

 But nevertheless these strides , the practice may be driven underground and legislations alone cannot achieve a large measure of eradiction .

Even in Britain , France , USA and Canada  - which earlier legislated against these practices - in their countries African emigrants continued daily to mutilate their daughters secretly .

This is why we believe that our continous education of the rural and grassroots woman is the best measure in this regard .

Like Mary Slessor , a Scottish woman , who came to Calabar in 1847 and single handedly used Christian Religion and stopped human sacrifice and the killing of twins and their mothers - 

( Sain Wellman: The White Queen of Calabar Barbour Publishing incorporated . Box 719 Uhrichsville .Oh 44683 USA )

we too believe that the opporturned time female genital mutilation will be consigned into the dustbin of history .

Finally , we wish to use this opportunity to thank you all for the support that you have given us and for your solidarity with us in our struggle , especially under autocratic regimes , where no human rights exists !

In fact , your efforts and contributions in this regard had not been fruitless .

Many Lifes of female dignity have been saved already !

FOR THIS WE THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF OUR HEARTS !!

YOURS FAITHFULLY ,

Hannah Edemikpong

for WOMAN COLLECTIVE

 HANNAH EDEMIKPONG  , 

box 185 , EKET , AKWA IBOM STATE , 

NIGERIA  , 

WEST AFRICA 

WIDOWHOOD RITES IN AFRICA -

 A DEHUMANIZING TRADITION

According to Hormby's Learners Dictionary , a widow is a woman , who has lost her husband . It is a tragedy which befalls a woman by the death of her husband , as it involves a physical break in the relationship of the woman with her husband and it is seen as the most stressful and devastating thing in life . It is a time that everything should be done to assist widows withstand these emotional and psycholgical trauma , pain and frustration associated with this loss and not to add to her problems , unfortunately the reverse is the case by the African tradition .

Culture demands that the widow undergoes certain traditional mourning rituals before and after the burial of her spouse . These traditional mourning rites expected of the widow is born out of the contention that the widow is impure and contaminated - and thus needs purification .

Some of the mourning rites includes seclusion and general isolation in which the widow is in confinement and all hairs of her body - including her pubic hairs -  and that of her children  are shaved with one razor and the widow disallowed from going to market and farm and talking to  somebody outside the kin family .

The widow is also deprived of personal hygiene and can only wear a dirty cloth - known as sack cloth - throughout the mourning period , which last from three to six months - or sometimes a year .

She must always sit on the floor and eats with unwashed hands and broken plates . If the kin family woman see her attempting secretly to attend to her personal hygiene , she might be whipped , spat upon and scolded that she is attempting to beautify herself so as to attract men and may even accuse her of being responsible for her husband's death , she is required to swear the corpse of her husband that she is innocent and after which drink the corpse's bath water and jump over the grave .

 Throughout the period between 5 am and 6 am  , the widow or widows wake up the family and neighborhood with strenuous early morning wailing and crying for their dead husband recounting to the hearing of neighbors and the entire village what their husband used to do for them .

Since most African marriages are costumary marriages and are therefore polygamous , the wife is the property of the kin family . When her husband dies  the widow must be given to her husbands brother or sometimes to the son of the deceased from an early marriage as the inheritance of the father .

In most traditional African societies the extended and not the nuclear family owns the body of the dead person and exercises complete control over the corpse , so the widow is expected to submit to the dictates of her husbands family .The period offers an opportunity for any member of the husbands family , who has been aggrieved at some point by the widow in the past - to get even . Such persons are free to scold her , for instance on the pretence , that she did not treat the husband well when he was alive . After the burial , the widow is stripped of all their property by the kin family leaving the widow and her children in destitution .

Clinical experience indicate that these are very painful experience for many widows . Starvation , brutality , and untidiness which caracterize the practice cause malnutricion , anemia , rashes , heart disease , mellitus, digestive disorders and even death .

The clean shave of widow and her children together with their public hairs with the same razor as well as inheritance of the widow is a good avenue for HIV/AIDS transmission . The insults , psychological trauma , frustration and hopelessness may lead to suicide . the several other costs and expense associated with fulfilling traditional rites and obligations usually throws the widow into a long lasting debt and penury .

The most disturbing part of this culture is that men are not similarly subjected to such indignities when their wives die . In some culture , like the Bansara people of Cameroon Republic , there is the fear that the spirit of the dead wife may return at night to share the marital bed with him . To avoid this happening , another wife is found for him on the day the wife dies to keep the bereaved husband company .

We ,

as a woman's body has been very concerned with the plight of  African widows and has launched a massive campaign of education in print and electronic media as well as enlightening the communities with public address system against these widowhood practices and their negative health implications .

We need the support of all well meaning persons to enable us reach out to as many grass root woman as possible .

For more information and support please contact :

WOMAN'S COLLECTIVE ,

HANNAH EDEMIKPONG  , 

box 185 , EKET , AKWA IBOM STATE , 

NIGERIA  , 

WEST AFRICA  

        DONATIONS CAN BE SENT THROUGH REGISTERED MAIL OR BANK TRANSFER TO :

HANNAH EDEMIKPONG

A/C NO :  7 6 2 0 0 0 2 7 8 0 9 6 

UNION BANK  OF NIGERIA PLC,

8 GRAPE BILL RD  PMB 031 ,

EKET , AKWA IBOM STATE  ,

NIGERIA ,

WEST AFRICA 

WITH LOVE & SOLIDARITY

from Nina Hagen

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