WUNRN
Ethiopia
- FGM Radio Warnings Reach Rural Nomadic Women
June 27, 2010
Nomadic girls in the
DALLOL,
Ethiopia (WOMENSENEWS)--The schoolmaster at Kursawat, a rural area in the Afar
region of
See
Slideshow, "Afari women trek out from the village Hamed Ela"
"Circumcision is still going on here," Schoolmaster
Kadesang Fasile told Women's eNews. "Most of the Afar are nomads so they
can't be reached through educational broadcasts."
The Afar is a collection of itinerant pastoralist tribes
living in the
There are 500 nomadic households in Fasile's school
district and families often relocate without regard to the school calendar. The
school--the only cement structure in the area, more than one hour away from the
nearest paved road--sees an annual dropout rate of between 20 and 30 percent.
Mothers and fathers in the community, says Fasile, see a cultural threat in
female education.
"If a woman is educated and succeeds, she will live
for herself and that is not permitted," said Fasile. "Here the woman
fetches water."
But harsh gender attitudes are starting to soften in
other pockets of the Afar region.
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At nearby Hamed Ela, a
community where the population is more settled--thanks to work opportunities
for men in adventure tourism and resource extraction--radio broadcasts about
the dangers of female genital mutilation appear to be changing the long-held
custom.
Girls' school attendance is also dramatically higher.
School Mistress Has Better Stats
Khalima Mohamed, age 40, is head mistress at the school
in Hamed Ela, about 200 rough and roadless kilometers away from the Kursawat
school run by Fasile.
Her school has four teachers and 102 schoolchildren
between ages 6 and 15. There are 52 boys and 50 girls attending the school, a
rare case of gender parity in this remote region, best explained by the more
settled life of this community and the presence of a female head teacher.
Every girl in the school has undergone genital
mutilation, Mohamed said. But the practice has decreased for the youngest girls
here due to short radio spots provided to local stations that broadcast to
schools and general audiences.
Nongovernmental groups have been disseminating the public
service announcements as part of a national zero-tolerance campaign since 1995,
but the message took a long time to reach Hamed Ela.
Naedeti--"Let's
Stop It"--produced by the National Service of Radio
"We witnessed circumcised mothers dying during
childbirth," said Mohamed. "The ones who are not circumcised
delivered very easily. So we understood."
See
Slideshow, "Afari women trek out from Hamed Ela"
Even though many Afari men still consider the practice a
religious duty and shun girls who do not undergo it, Mohamed said the youngest
girls in her community are being spared now.
A Vocal Opponent
A vocal local opponent of female genital mutilation is
Aisha Omar, who waved a Women's eNews reporter into her hut when she heard a
journalist was near by.
"During our time it was our culture to circumcise,
we didn't have a choice," Omar told Women's eNews. "But circumcision
is no longer practiced here. Radio and TV told us not to. Now we know the
dangers."
The thin mother of four tackles the taboo topic head-on
in her hut. Female neighbors trickle in and listen wordlessly to her warnings
against female genital mutilation as crossed-armed husbands hover at the
doorway.
The excruciating experience of going through labor and
ongoing health ramifications played a key role in Omar's decision to oppose a
long-standing tradition and not let her two daughters undergo the cutting.
"I experienced the greatest pain when about to give
birth," Omar said. "Now I have kidney problems and pains similar to
yellow fever."
The Eritrean People's Liberation Front--locally known as
Shabiyya--took Omar's husband 10 years ago. She says she survived from
livestock, camels and goats, all sold or eaten over the years with the
exception of a single black and white goat still standing in her garden.
She pins hopes of a brighter future on her daughters'
education.
"If girls grow up educated they will help their
parents and the government," she said. "They will live a better life
than in the past."
Remote Region
Even with the recent improvements here for girls,
however, opportunities still appear limited in a region that the Afar have
fought to keep autonomous from
President Meles Zenawi, who recently won what the
Trucks rigged up for mineral extraction come and go here,
along with camel caravans traveling to collect salt from
Afari women, with their dark skin, golden nose rings and
dramatic color wraps, are a sight rivaling the sun-scorched salt flats and
bubbling sulfur deposits of Dallol,
Banned from boarding vehicles, some travel all day by
foot to fetch water from government-built pumps. The profits of tourism
sidestep them almost entirely.
"All the cash goes to the men," Christos
Michalilidis, who founded Pangeans Safari alongside his wife Liza Andreous,
told Women's eNews.
Adventure tourism mainly puts cash in the hands of
AK-47-armed young men who act as safari escorts. Male village elders also get
paid for scouting out paths through brush, sand dunes, volcanic pebbles and mud
banks created by unseasonal flash floods.
"Tourists give us pens and books, watches and
clothes," said Mohamed, the headmistress. "We are in such a hard
place that we need medication and water too. But nobody speaks to us to know
our needs."
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