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Wealthy Somalis flout Kenyan law to have daughters circumcised

The girls are allowed to leave after spending about six weeks recovering. Some are not so lucky. Sankader said she knows of at least one girl who died during the ritual, while others have either fallen into a coma or developed “complex trauma.”

Alternative Ceremonies

The Anti-FGM Board, which is awaiting funding from Kenya’s government, plans to eradicate the practice by educating parents and children about the dangers of female genital mutilation and training officials like the police and district chiefs on why the law should be implemented, Kilimo said in a phone interview.

“We will also urge communities to come up with alternatives to rites-of-passage ceremonies that currently take place,” she said. “There must be another way of affirming to girls that they have come of age instead of subjecting them to the brutality of genital mutilation.”

Advocacy groups like the Wagalla Centre also want stricter laws to enable the authorities to seize the financial assets of people involved in the circumcision business.

Qali Hassan began her practice three decades ago and says her fees are now so high she only serves Somali clients from abroad. Local girls can no longer afford her services.

The 64-year-old mother of eight children currently offers her service out of a six-room structure on the outskirts of Dadaab, a town about 420 kilometers (259 miles) northeast of the capital, Nairobi. The world’s biggest refugee camp, which provides temporary shelter to more than 400,000 Somalis, is located a few miles north of Dadaab.

Sanitation Block

Hassan’s clinic includes an operating theater, waiting rooms for family members and a sanitation block with running water sourced from a solar-powered borehole, she said.

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“The current anti-FGM law is silent on forfeiting properties and proceeds made by the circumcisers and something needs to be done so they can be stripped of this ill-gotten wealth and status in the society,” said Adan Garad, executive director of the Wagalla Centre.

Abdi says even though it’s illegal, she’ll keep practicing.

“Female circumcision within the Somali community is as old as our culture,” she said.

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