Reformed FGM cutters in Isiolo Central are appealing to well-wishers to help them find alternative means of making a living.
After a door-to-door campaign in the area for a week to persuade FGM cutters to down their tools, Isiolo Women Against Sexual Gender Violence had with them 45 women who were ready to reform.
The community-based organisation offers different types of income-generating ideas to such women such as grocery businesses, enrolling them in women chamas (table banking) and community saccos.
Alice Karoki, a community champion working for the CBO, said the big number of women came as a pleasant and shocking surprise.
“We expected them to come out but we did not expect they would too many for us to handle,” she told the Star on the phone.
Karoki fears the women might go back to the practice, if a solution for them is not found soon.
“These women previously had no other means of livelihood except FGM. That was how they fed their families and paid for their children’s school fees”.
“I feel that if they are not assisted to find alternative ways to make money, they will go back to circumcising girls in the region,” she said.
Karoki said the women made Sh2,000 for every girl they cut. During the school holidays, Karoki said, they could cut over five girls each and make Sh10,000.
“You can see how lucrative the cutting business is in the community. Parents of young girls come looking for these women in their houses to cut their girls. If they can find that the cutters no longer practice this painful act, that can be a good step to ending FGM in Isiolo,” she said.
There have been significant milestones made in Isiolo over the past few years in fighting FGM that risk being rolled back if the women are not helped.
“The fact that these women can stop what they were doing because they realised the pain they inflict on young girls is a show of good faith,” she said.
“I think repaying their good faith would help us in the fight to end FGM in Isiolo county,” she said.
