Perpetrators of female circumcision in Osun risk jail term

Wife of Osun State Governor, Alhaja Sherifat Aregbesola has warned perpetrators of Female Circumcision and Genital Mutilation, (FGM) to desist from the act or face the full wrath of the law and go to jail.

Addressing a press conference in Osogbo, capital of Osun State, Alhaja Aregbesola lamented that the prevalent rate of

female circumcision in Osun State, according National Demographic Heath Survey was worrisome, saying  urgent attention is required to abolish the practice. She vowed to continue to intensify campaign against the practice.

Alhaja Aregbesola said the rating of Osun state as number one on the hierarchy of the six FGM most endemic states compelled her to champion the intensive advocacy against female circumcision so as to sensitize the people of the state on the dangers and disadvantages of female genital mutilation and discourage the practice.

She noted that the reason adduced by those engaging in removal of the external female genitalia was not tenable and that they were just inflicting unwarranted lifelong trauma on the circumcised females and denying them sexual pleasure simply for cultural belief and tradition.

According to her, “Investigations conducted have revealed that none of the reasons adduced by perpetrators has any link to medical objective in which case the genitals of our female child or woman is just altered for a reason that was not done to save their lives.”

Alhaja Aregbesola said that the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), through a study, has confirmed that the practice of Female Genital Mutilation in the endemic states in Nigeria was only anchor on various traditional beliefs and the social pressure to conform to culture.

Brandishing copies of the law of Osun State that prohibits the practice of FGM in the state, the First Lady said after the on-going campaign and wide spread awareness in all the nooks and crannies of the state, violators would be prosecuted to serve as deterrent to others.

She added that “documented studies have found that the health implications of FGM range from dangerous infections arising from unsanitary conditions in which the practice is carried out to death through severe bleeding as well as pain and trauma as mutilated infants, girls and women face irreversible lifelong health risks among other consequences.”

Alhaja Aregbesola posited that FGM is also a violation of fundamental human rights as it is sometimes carried out at a very young age when there is no possibility of individual’s consent.