A law when their forces are not there. We do. Ok and thats why. Theyre mad. And i mean my boss and he with. How when the. No i mean you couldnt buy. In the year 2011 kenya passed a law that basically said that female genital mutilation was illegal despite this its still being practiced across the country and even here way we are in our county and we want to investigate why and id like to begin with selena who is actually a member of this community and an activist this is still happening and i know that the school youre running is also facing this challenge can you talk to me about that from 00 originally so when you said that she doesnt want to go through there could somehow theyre theyre trapped there and they cant find themselves out even if they want to to get out of the situation. Up or were you to quote to know. Who was china who cotta not to misc you want to talk on a while ambo how tuckey like you ever come. Up are you community will not come or your cook it when you visit him and if you buy a new suit. When in him. A month. What is very young oppa. Am rather longer and what it. Meant in the modern way i want to buy your land and get a member and then marry. Gettable when. Me only said that niggle anything get out while im alive i dont need as a book donation. There were none. Were in the man as a real not more under way nicole why mom i never marry whoever not comrade hugh that i wasnt a boy look now we are going to go and i none of them right here now with a mom had her message i have on your ill come back to you and now make it a little bit more personal i know for a fact that you had said to your mother that you didnt want to undergo this right and she forced you to can you talk to us about that. I think for me my mom of course she wanted me to grow up like a normal my say child girl child because my grandmother cut i used to go to watch many girls being circumcised so it was such a traumatic experience for me and i kept telling my mom that its something i never want to go through so she didnt think that my decision or my choice counted so she went ahead and decided for me the event planned as a surprise ceremony and upon coming home from visiting my uncle everything was said and i found a group of women and they dislike me in 1st me and. Its something that has been kind of disturbing me for a long time and sometimes she would talk to eat today to have filler friends about it as a superhero story like i trapped her she didnt know she didnt like it so i decided ok well i think its time to part with my mom after 10 years of thinking about it i have to try and told her then i was like ok you have this society you made them happy im going. This dramatization miras reality and the trauma of an age old a ritual more than 200000000 of women while white have been subjected to female genital mutilation its a tradition that reinforces mens power in Society Girls are still being cut during initiation rituals in the forest without anaesthetic naturally the girls put up a fight so several women rest train them and push them to the ground its not uncommon for the girls to end up with broken bones. And id like to introduce durham because you are from us a bit which is a border town sometimes the girls choose to undergo this ritual how does that work. Im going to tell you my story yes. For me i wasnt forced but i got into it due to be peer peer peer pressure how old were you i was 9 years old and i asked my grandmother that i should go through it i actually told her that i i begged her to go through it yes but what is the purpose of female genital mutilation in your community weve just heard from amala poso here that a woman is considered not whole unless she is mutilated essentially whats the reason they give you our Community Practices a gym to reduce sexual desires in a woman so even if a girl hasnt gone through if jim in my community she is regarded as a prostitute or as a person whos lose yeah yes thats the main reason revenge is energy ok i want to go to syria because youre also a survivor of g. M. Is this something that you also asked for in your community is there a lot of pressure in the village we know each other so we know who and who has gone through of g. M. So for me it was because of the oppression i went through with g. M. When i was 10 years old but because you are a very innocent child and people want you to be clean you go for it but afterwards you start regretting or nobody will is there to answer your questions yeah ok. So normally apostle weve just heard from your daughter that you forced her to get if g. M. Why did you do that. Camilla and not the mother of a young you member of a 1000000 i live in the middle you might not be happy so you mean to tell me that if there was no law against f. G. And you would still practice it. Among some i said i love one. Could then another one then. Than either mum i dont know because i. Doubt theyd let some of them stand. So let me ask the men in this community we have some very good looking morons here dodie come oh no milk you must say one is ok oh im one can buy i had a cattle. Farm and muscular theyre pretty. Going to cook wasnt a community. Youre the closest Government Official to the people of this village and you have a lot to enforce but the people who are around you also your family members they might be the ones practicing it how how how do you enforce it in your own community 1st of all are you against it yeah im very much against it so what is the challenger than forcing because were hearing the apostle here saying if it was not for the risk of being arrested i would still do it the talent we have if they have not if now if you buy it for. Practice so what they do they do it in secret which is a very serious way of being because something. Just so we added then it is it is then the rest of their life and it is again is the law ok so well come back to the to the enforcement a little bit later so just hold on to that thought id like to now speak to them say here because were hearing that the mindset hasnt changed the law is in place but the mindset hasnt changed what do you think it would take to change my. Opinion. Why this thing has been practice is because people have been not have not been sensitized well and therefore for for us we have been since the taking the b. Ball on harm caused by female genital mutilation. Sylvia bleeding is there which may cause death injury of the of the me. And the and many more the awful. The only thing to stop this is to create more Awareness Among the communities it is a deadly exercise which im opposed to. Were talking about a humble practice here one of the long term effects of f. G. And what have you had to contend with psychologically ok allow me to see that if jim is not something that ends with the day you have got something that follows you for a lifetime 2 hours after the cut you start shivering you start feeling fever your body temperatures rise so you can contract infections that those are the short times now when we come to the long time after you are no much you are even the mrs coming out is easier challenge another thing is that when you are moderate again you go through a process called if you believe its another to be open then when you are you want to give back and in our community we give but as long as we can so that means after everybody you have to be cut for you to pass the child yes you have 3 children did you have any complications related to f d m when you had to deliver yes when i was giving birth to my 1st daughter i was on labor pains for 3 days and what happened is that the traditional but attendance was a give back at home what cutting me anyhow really so that only the. The child to come out but now again i thought it was over for the 2nd baby i was caught again for that that in fact they didnt was at all and i say i dont want to be cut any more i want to go to a safe place where can deliver well so i saw some caesars coming and i was late what are these for that is i was even better fortunately this is as well also better because i had to go through as easy and delivery thats when he said its all over now the 3 doctors are enough for me i should talk to my community and tell them this should come to an end and for me i am fortunate those complications are talking minor compared to others who have now in blood living with a few still or others are now living with childless dram is this sounding familiar is sounding like something youre also battling with psychologically and are you worried that physically your body might not be able to take a pregnancy. Yes i wanted every single day because 1st of all the day you go through it you will never forget as survivors we never forget the day that you go through after all right were also hearing from all these women who have undergone after g. M. That it does cause complications that its harmful so do you want another one of your daughters to go through that matter i am as. A matter of when im with well i mean my boss and you with your guy and. Then i mean you couldnt buy. Dodi i want to ask you another question because you said that it is cultural you would not marry a woman unless she was cut to not so much. To me like you must say like you cannot. Watch and you must come up who are simba but dont know us him become our morning. Im not talking when i walk away and the local cut of it was and you know matching him. You could. Cook a couple of your product mother not like im watching one wind only to matter to watch it. Yeah im not so clear where he is on that but we were talking about stigma of not going through the cut but theres also a 2nd layer of stigma once youre a survivor how does that work. Well as a survivor there are so many names that you are called 1st of all is this notion that as a survivor. Because you are you know communities say you know sexual desire as you do not have sexual desires so there are people who say that survive us do not have that but. They actually had which is not true it is not true we do have and thats why these are the reasons why survive us are not able to speak up because they are called names if i am told that as a survivor you cannot do this and this therefore i will have that fear of speaking up yeah kaz cause is a success you kate and you might have seen on the 77 percent with the spread do we know enough about if g. M. As the people who are living in the cosmopolitan areas and if theres a disconnect why i think the way were raised were very disconnected from a lot of things that happen culturally in different parts of the country in different parts of the continent then the one thing that im hearing that is a Common Thread amongst all of these conversations is that the value of the woman is is there is no value to a woman from the minute that a girl is born into a family she is automatically. Shes seen as a form of currency and its just its a Material Exchange because if she doesnt cut then it means that she cant be married that means the family cant make any money that also means that the family will be seen as outcasts within their community so a lot of these conversations just sound like very patriarchal conversations where the woman is not valued shes of thing so even with conversations around her health and theres certain things that shes not able to do shes not able to bear children. Theres so many very many Health Issues around s. G. M. A lot of people dont care the value of the woman. Its so low that even when you tell them that women are dying they dont care but do we care enough as a people who are privileged to a large degree do we care enough to create safe spaces so that when the survivors you know survive that were listening to them yes but i feel like a safe space is never enough like whats the next move from there we need to be able to actually physically do something we need to be able to help certain communities im aware that in loiter there is the ritual of the female genital cutting also known as mutilation has been changed the ritual is changed so that the little girl whereas the blue shukra has the women dancing with her shes taken to the what shes laid on the mat but instead of cutting have a pour milk over her volver eliminates the harmful part of it ok n. G. O. S were mentioned catherine i have to come to you because youve been accused of and you know ive heard it said and read a couple of times that n. G. O. S a hijacking this conversation but youre not really listening to the people its a 2 sided way because those who are working at the ground really they listen to the people they do sensitized the people they do help the people but help those who are decided that narrow be who are doing nothing they dont come to the ground so its a 2 sided with ok i want to go to sat there for just a little bit you know you come from a community where 9 out of 10 women have been cut what would happen if say somebody got cut today and they went to the Police Station how how how is the law meant to be to work the law is supposed to be there to help the gallows the victims this of all of us but unfortunately most of the time there are a lot of gaps in the law itself because once it was reported that means even the victims will be carted along as witnesses and in most Police Stations we dont have Child Protection sent us Child Protection units we dont have rescue centers in all the counties so that means these gals who are already victims have already suffered. Well again safa another violence will feel like. Maintaining them as witnesses so another issue with the law is that was the girl is caught she did she will automatically drop out of school and all that a lot of challenges how is the Education Sector now helping in the Law Enforcement are they reporting these dollars who are dropping out of school what about the administrative. The chiefs for instance we have a lets lets lets lets ask him actually because you brought him up chief here you are somebody comes to the Police Station and says ive just been forced to go through f g m and weve read some instances where the Police Officers ask them for photos of the thing happening this is not realistic what makes these guys not report the time they got there that being. One of. Their stigmatized with their yeah that is that he that is out he should be. Yeah because. Most of the stations dont have an. Arrest and protection most of the. Tell maybe eyes that go to the trooper to the Police Station so but isnt that why we have so many layers of administration so that if the police if you as a chief is not able to come to this community should you be able to send people to survey. I sent people to survey to there to check no i mean if were saying that the people being circumcised or you know going through f g m a 9 or 10 how will they know to come to report what we do and that probably helped us a lot we collaborate with the church is the village elders and the community applied ok but to to to be fair chief we already know that thats not working its not really working entirely so lets talk about arrests have there been any people arrested in the uk yeah yeah for many even the kids even the chief ok we have achieved have been arrested placing his daughter and have been taken to court. If it is it is an example to other community the way when they feel they have been arrested you do so if youre feeling the they dont breed because they know the law. Is not agreeing with you but i want to come to salina 1st because is this ringing true to you do you feel like you can trust the Police Officers to enforce the law 1st of all we dont have any Police Station in my village yeah so i dont even know how it works with dealing with the police yet chief were being told you dont even have a Police Station here so where would you even begin. In fact we have. Shes saying shes saying in most or in most recently in fact that its no so how do you enforce a law when they enforce those are not that we do try ok so speaking of stakeholders cause. What more can we do as women to work with the women who are still going through this how can we be more active stakeholders i feel like we really need to be able to understand the ways in which different communities are able to absorb information and then use that and take that and find ways to educate women if it means showing them some of the effects of s. G. M. With young girls and the continued effect like sabia said throughout the lives of women and if they are so fixated on around the idea of young girls getting married i feel like it would be if we could use that as a form of education to show them how it affects their marriages in a negative way how it affects childbearing in a negative way because children are such an asset and also just create spaces to actually discuss the vagina the evolve or to actually look at it to talk about women and their experiences be it sexual be it physical to discuss the actual organ itself what can we do better to stop if g. M. A lot of the things that im hearing is set or colored to say here and you know the police post is so far away and so on and so forth and theres so many problems around it but im really curious with what we have and with what is available what can we do to make actual changes and. More precise question is how do we begin to change the mindset of mama who is old and very set in her ways how do we begin to educate or to have conversations with her in a way that she can have a ha moment where shes like actually we need to stop that ok lets ask but here. You know we just ask the question what can we do better because what were doing so far doesnt seem to be working this thing is heard because of the culture and the very deep and rich culture and they believe india. Therefore the only best way. As i have seen to stop. East to have a collection force in between the government there jeeves the d. C. Is the governors the judge come out and say no to end of quote Education Department must also come in to sensitize and make it stop i think if this. Collective cause is done then how traumatic event really the thing is going to stop ok christopher has articulated the knock on effects of after him very clearly education is something that youre very keen on is this the way forward to stop after him do you think i think Girls Education is one of the big the Big Solutions to ending if g. M. And Child Marriage and internet pregnancies because this aid f. G. M. Does not stand as an issue alone and this organisations that are fighting to end if g. M. C