Somalia to ban FGM

Aug 07, 2015

As Somalia continues to make firm strides towards peace, stability and democratic governance, emerging from decades of civil war and strife, the federal government plans to abolish Female Genital Mutilation in the country after it emerged that a worrying number of girls under the age of puberty mee

AMISOM - As Somalia continues to make firm strides towards peace, stability and democratic governance, emerging from decades of civil war and strife, the federal government plans to abolish Female Genital Mutilation in the country after it emerged that a worrying number of girls under the age of puberty meet the knife.

Speaking to the media in the capital Mogadishu, the minister for gender Sahra Mohamed Ali Samatar hinted that there was a bill in the pipeline seeking to ban the practice in the country.

The practice which is seen as a rite of passage in many countries across the world is overwhelmingly practised in the developing world.

In May this year, 18 African countries banned the exercise among them Benin, Mali, Central African republic, Egypt and South Africa.

“Time has come for us to eradicate this disaster of a national proportion in order to save our girls and women,” Sahra said, adding that a bill to be presented to the Federal Parliament was on the making.

If the federal government passes the law, it will follow in the footsteps of Puntland, a federal region in Somalia that banned the practice last year after the top religious leaders passed a Fatwa declaring the exercise as a forbidden practice, saying amputating part of a human body without a medical reason was haraam.

Female Genital Mutilation is also banned in the neighbouring Kenya where the practice can result in a jail term of at least 15 years.

 

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