If the Huffington Post can cheer this new law, everyone with
any sense should do the same. Everyone, that is, except those who persist in
supporting the Muslim Brotherhood.
At issue is the Egyptian practice of FGM. The term is an
acronym for Female Genital Mutilation. Some insist on calling to female
circumcision, but that is, dare I say, a deceptive euphemism.
Even though the Egyptian government outlawed the practice in
2008, it still persists. Now the Egyptian government is moving toward changing
the law by making FGM a felony, not a misdemeanor.
The Huffington Post reports:
Three
months after a teenager died while undergoing female genital mutilation conducted
by a doctor, Egypt is cracking down on the practice.
The
Egyptian cabinet approved a draft bill on Sunday that would enact a punishment of five to seven years in prison
for anyone who performs FGM, according to Ahram Online. Previously, the
penalty was three months to two years.
The
bill, which still has to be ratified by parliament, raises the penalty
from a misdemeanor to a felony.
“A
strong law is the first step to protecting every girl at risk,” Suad Abu-Dayyeh
of women’s rights organization Equality Now said in a statement to The Huffington
Post. “We have seen some reduction in FGM in Egypt, but at the same time health
professionals and others are still not being held to account for carrying it
out. With a better law, it is now more likely that this can change.”
Female
genital mutilation involves the total or partial removal of, or injury
to, the external female genitalia for no medical benefit, and can
cause bleeding,
infertility or death. The World Health Organization considers it a violation
of women’s rights.
The
practice of FGM has been illegal in Egypt
since 2008, according to the BBC, but it is still widespread.
Egypt
has one of the highest rates of FGM in the world, with 87
percent of women aged 15 to 49 having undergone the procedure,
according to Unicef.
Think about that: 87% of young Egyptian women have been
genitally mutilated.
On several occasions I have remarked that, to do voter
outreach before the 2012 presidential election, the Muslim Brotherhood sent
mobile surgical vans into the poor neighborhoods of Cairo, to make it more
convenient for parents to mutilate their daughters.
Now I have discovered an article from 2012 that described the outreach
program in detail:
In
Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood have offered to circumcise women for a nominal fee
as part of their community services, a move that threatens to reverse decades
of local struggle against the harmful practice argues Mariz Tadros.
Voting
in the Egyptian presidential election is underway and what better way to win
over votes of the poor than through offering badly needed low cost services and
free goods. The Muslim Brotherhood, who have a track record in community
outreach through services and goods, have added a new service for Egyptians:
circumcising girls for a nominal fee. The practice of female genital mutilation
(FGM) or female circumcision as it is popularly called, involves the removal of
the clitoris and part of the labia minora under the pretext that
this will protect a girl’s chastity. FGM, although practiced for thousands of
years, has been on the decline in the past decade thanks to a socially
sensitive and nationwide campaign to show that FGM is neither religiously
prescribed, nor linked to a woman’s moral behaviour. Thanks to the Muslim
Brotherhood and the Salafis, the progress made in eliciting positive social
change on curbing the practice now risks being reversed.
As it happened, the Brothers denied the charge. However, reporter Mariz Tadros found a flyer from the Freedom
and Justice Party, the Brotherhood political party that said otherwise:
The
flyer which has the party’s logo on it says “The Freedom and Justice party in Abou Aziz is honoured to organize the
yearly health clinic which covers all specialisations for a nominal fee of LE 5
for a check up on Friday the 20/4/2012 at the Islamic Institute after Friday
prayers”. This was followed by a list of specialists including surgery,
gynaecology and obstetrics, dentistry, dermatology etc. At the bottom of the
list is a note saying “We receive
cases for circumcision for males and females for LE30 a case”. What is
significant about this flyer is the reference to male and female circumcision
as if the practices were similar, and the fact that these are treated as
medical cases, “operations” to be performed by members of a medical team.
It is
unclear whether the mobile health clinic did actually go ahead with
circumcising the girls. Since the introduction of the law criminalizing the
practice in 2008, the villagers have been circumcising their daughters secretly
with the help of a nurse who visited once a year, in secret, and circumcised
the girls in groups. Hence, it is unlikely that the villagers would readily
admit to the clinic offering FGM as they have collectively been practising it
illegally for a long time. A resident of the Abou Aziz village - who spoke on condition
of anonymity for fear of reprisals - said that the flyer was posted everywhere
in the village, but that immediately after the publicity the flyers
disappeared.
In view
of the political standing of the Muslim Brotherhood and their religious influence
among many Egyptians, there is no denying that the impact of their promotion of
FGM is deep and far reaching. Whether girls were circumcised or not on the 20th of
April is not the point: what is at issue here is their propagation of a
practice that has been proven to be detrimental to women's well being and
bodily integrity.
The article goes into extensive detail. It is filled with
denials and counter denials. To some extent the Mubarak government succeeded in
reducing the practice of FGM. And the Muslim Brotherhood was going to
facilitate its return… or, at least, to offer the option.
3 comments:
Interesting juxtaposition of articles this morning - surely FGM is the ultimate in gender stereotyping?
How did such an ugly, dangerous, and basically useless tradition even get started, much less last for thousands of years, especially since (as Egypt says) it's not even in the Koran.
Funny thing... when the articles call FGM circumcision they are effectively equating it with male circumcision.
As for useless and horrific traditions, consider also the practice of footbinding China-- it lasted for nearly a thousand years.
FGM, terrible and barbaric as it is, is a minor inconvenience compared to suttee.
My favorite comment on multicultural tolerance is atributed to General Napier of the British military in colonial India:
"Be it so. This burning of widows is your custom; prepare the funeral pile. But my nation has also a custom. When men burn women alive we hang them, and confiscate all their property. My carpenters shall therefore erect gibbets on which to hang all concerned when the widow is consumed. Let us all act according to national customs."
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