WOWAP’s Efforts Againts FGM Gains Vital Results -

By STAFF REPORTER

Concerted efforts by the gender-based activists to stamp out a negative wave of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) towards women and adolescent girls in the country’s rural communties is continuing to fetch postive results.

Female genital mutilation (FGM) comprises all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.

Speaking over the weekend in Merya ward of Singida rural district of Singida region, the coordinator of WOmen WAke UP (WOWAP), Nasra Suleiman, said there has been a significant awareness over the effect of the gender-based violence (GBV) practices among many communities in rural areas.

She was speaking to this publication in the sideline of a tailor-made public campaign to educate the residents in the area over the effects of mutilating the young girls and women.

Working in sync with the local government officers, she expressed that the non-governmental organisation (NGO) has been succesifully running diverse campaigns against FGM practices in most of the country’s rural areas, saying the campaigns was attaining meaningful results.

“Since its inception in 1996, WOWAP have been holding positive public campaigns in several rural communities where the practices are rampant with an eye to educate the perpetrator over the need to shun away from entertaining the gender-based malpractices, and the responses are good,” Suleiman said.

The coordinator detailed that experience has proved that the poor practices are vastly being propelled by presence of poor traditions and local belief among most families in rural communities.

“The reasons why young women and girls undergo FGM in some communities in Tanzania are deeply rooted in traditional culture and driven by constructed social norms and values,” she added.

Statistics show that prevalence of FGM varies greatly across the different regions of Tanzania, whereby the regions with the highest prevalence include Manyara (57.7 percent of women aged 15-49), Dodoma (46.7 pc), Arusha (41pc), Mara (32pc) and Singida 30.9 pecent.

Established in 1996, WOmen WAke UP (WOWAP) is a voluntary, non-governmental organisation (NGO) which is fighting against female genital mutilation (FGM) in Tanzania.

The organisation trains community-based leaders or change agents who encourage dialogue within communities and mobilise support from religious leaders, teachers, and ward and village government officials to fight for the elimination of FGM.

WOWAP is determined to be a catalyst of change toward women’s full participation in social and economic issues, and promoting a positive attitude toward women and children through cultural means and consciousness-raising.

The project was initiated in the three villages in the Kondoa district of Tanzania – Mombose, Makorongo, and Donsee – reaching approximately 8,000 people.