Hello. My name is Fareedah. Let's talk about female genital cutting in Northern Nigeria.
In our high school Model United Nations class, the teacher and a classmate asked me about female genital mutilation. That was the first time I heard about it. Looking slyly at each other and then looking back at me, they showed me a map on the computer that indicated Nigeria as one of the countries that has FGM cases. I immediately rebuked what they assumed about me, because I never heard of it. I dismissed their suspicions and assured them I knew nothing of it. I even told them that there must have been an error on the website.
Few years later in Nigeria, I learnt that two ethnic groups, the mid-western Bendelites and the north-eastern Shuwas practice FGM. Soon after, I heard that the south-western Yorubas also do it. Then recently, I learnt that the northern Hausas perform something similar, though to a lesser degree compared to the other ethnic groups. I think that many Northern readers will find this surprising just as I did.
Apparently little is known about the Hausa female genital cutting, and I believe this is because it is done to baby girls within the first seven days of birth. A family wanzami, sent by the husband's family, is expected to shave the newborn's head, remove the baby's uvula, and then snip off "something" in the private area. And then no one really talks about it. When I asked around what was "snipped off", I got no specific answer. I found it absurd that women, whom this procedure is done to, do not know what is done to their bodies.
Suffering in Silence
Unfortunately, there is a culture that expects wives, mothers, and daughter-in-laws to be docile and subservient when it comes to decisions about their own children. This is because traditionally the father's side claim to have more rights over children. So in the case where hair shaving, uvulectomy, and clitoridectomy or hymenectomy are concerned, the mother of the newborn has no say. This "stay silent" culture is so deep-rooted that women do not ask about what is done to their bodies, let alone have the courage to challenge the idea.
Because it is twenty-seventeen and the process is archaic to me, and the fact that none of my siblings had the widespread uvulectomy done, I assumed that it was something that happened in the distance past. Visiting a cousin who gave birth few months ago, i asked if they knew anything about genital cuttings. To my dismay, I was told that her daughter was "circumcised". The word they used was kachia, which means circumcision. However, the procedure was not unhooding. It was something else. Something else not clearly known. After grilling them for letting it happen, I learnt that two other younger cousins also let their in-laws decide on snipping their daughters. I partially excused the older ladies in the house, but the new mother was a university graduate, yet she allowed it to happen.
Odd enough, her mother asked the local barber to spare the hair shaving and uvulectomy, but he performed the genital cutting. The step mother who handed over the baby for the procedure said the wanzami explained that it was necessary to prevent the vagina from closing up. Since she had no knowledge of the procedure, she believed him. The new mother's elder sister said had she been around, she would not let them do it. I left the house disgusted and wasted no time in visiting a wanzami's shop to ask about this practice that remains quite covert. The middle-aged local barber owned a barber shop in Kaduna's inner city. It was a locally built room attached to an extended bungalow building, furnished with wooden benches on worn out concrete floor. The small room had wooden circular stools used for washing traditional caps.
