Let’s get FGM out of society – Gender Minister 

Mrs. Otiko Afisa Djaba, Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, has called on all to collaborate effectively with the Ministry to eradicate Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in society.

She said the practice of mutilating any part of the female genital organ was an ancient culture that had no benefit to society as it was an act of torture and brought psychological trauma to the victims.

Mrs. Djaba described FGM as a murderous act that parents should discourage and insisted that the health hazards posed by the act was enormous and should not be encouraged.

The Minister said this while addressing a durbar at Pusiga in the Upper East Region on Female Genital Mutilation organized by the Gender Ministry to educate parents, women and girls about the dangers associated with the practice.

She urged parents and guardians to desist from the act because it was criminal by law and warned perpetrators of the act to put a stop to the practice or risk being prosecuted.

The Minister used the occasion to call on the media, especially those operating in the region to use their medium to educate members of the public to be alert and report any such untoward actions.

Mr Abdulai Jaladeen, Regional Director at the Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), said that the law was very clear on FGM as a criminal offence and a second degree felony which imposed stiffer punishment on offenders.

He said “whosoever exercised, infibulates or otherwise mutilates the whole or any part of the labia minora, labia majora and the clitoris of another person commits an offence and shall be guilty of a second degree felony and liable on conviction to imprisonment of not less than four years and not more than 10 years under section 69A (1) article 29 of 1960.”

Mr Jaladeen said the 1992 constitution indicates under article 26(2) that “all customary practices that dehumanizes or are injurious to the physical and mental well-being of a person are prohibited”, and said FGM was an injurious act to the physical and mental well-being of women and girls in society which made it criminal.

He urged the people to make the practice a thing of the past.

Source: GNA