FGM survivors urged to stand up and speak out

They tied her legs to a tree, pressed her chest on the ground and gagged her so she wouldn't scream in pain and cry for help. Then they pulled her legs apart and the traditional cutter went to work.

Sadia Hussein, an anti-FGM activist from Tana River county, was just 10 years old when she was cut.

Hussein, 33, recently launched a book titled The Scars of Female Genital Mutilation to lay bare the realities of what FGM survivors endure.

Before the cut, she was made to believe it would make her complete, clean and accepted in the community, and so she was excited.

"You will be excited because you think it is something to be proud of but later the regret starts and again you cannot come out and really explain what happened," she said. 

When it was time for her to give birth, she struggled in labour for three days because the traditional attendant could not deliver the baby due to her constricted birth canal. 

“I did not have time to bond with my newborn daughter for the first 40 days. My entire body was in pain. I looked at my one-month-old daughter and made a promise that she would never face the circumciser’s cut,” Hussein said.

Speaking to the Star on the phone, she said community beliefs and the realities of FGM survivors are very different. Therefore, activists cannot use the same approach in all communities, different strategies are needed.

"For example, the reasons the Somali community practice FGM are not the same as those of the Akuria people and if you know this, then you know which people to approach in which community and how,” she said.

The survivor said, however, all cultures have a common goal, which is to control women and girls’ sexuality.

"Why are these communities hurting girls when nothing is being controlled? The best approach would be to educate both boys and girls about sex,” she said.

Fatuma Kuno, another FGM survivor from Somalia, was cut twice when she was just seven years old.

Speaking during the recent launch of Sadia's book, she said she still remembers the morning her parents told her she was going to be cut.

"People often ask me how I remember something that happened when I was only seven and I tell them some traumas stay with you for the rest of your life," Kuno said.

"I prepared myself, only to go and find there were razors involved, there was cutting and there was no anaesthesia. The pain was horrible."

A week later, the traditional cutter came to inspect the cut area. She said it was not properly stitched together and she had to be cut again.

Kuno had to be held down by seven women this time, with some sitting on her chest. The pain was more brutal because they inserted thorns in her genitalia. 

"Imagine being in pain and not being able to talk to anybody about it," she said. 

It is important for everyone to tell their stories and work to eliminate FGM, she said.

Kuno works in Somalia to end FGM and she urged authorities to enforce laws and prosecute those performing and abetting FGM.

"We want religious leaders to break their silence because where I work, we are unable to find religious leaders to say ‘no’ to FGM," she said.

Hussein said many women and girls die due to FGM but no one reports deaths because they think FGM is normal and death is an occasional, unfortunate side-effect.

Unicef, the UN children’s fund, says more than one in five girls and women in Kenya have been mutilated. The degree and type of FGM differ by ethnicity and region.

(Edited by V. Graham)