Media Backgrounder: Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) in Egypt
Introduction
• Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) is one of the most persistent, pervasive and silently endured human rights violations. It has a profound influence on a girl-child’s development throughout her life. The impact of FGM/C on women and girls compromises the enjoyment of human rights including their right to life, to physical integrity, to the highest attainable standard of health, as well as their right to freedom from physical and mental violence. According to a WHO estimate, between 100 and 140 million girls and women in the world have undergone some form of FGM/C.
• Girls also usually undergo the practice without their informed consent depriving them of the opportunity to make independent decisions about their life-styles. It is a practice performed by mothers/families to ‘protect’ them from being shunned by their communities.
• UNICEF recognizes that FGM/C is a global concern. To contribute to the abandonment of FGM/C, UNICEF launched a coordinated effort beginning in 2007 to end FGM/C in African countries , including Egypt, by 2015 – the target year for achieving the Millennium Development Goals .
Legislation on FGM/C in Europe
• The European Parliament adopted a resolution on FGM/C in 2001 which although not legally binding has the potential to prepare the ground for an EU wide FGM/C policy. The resolution calls upon Member States to collaborate to harmonize existing FGM/C legislation and enact new legislation if the existing one is inappropriate. The resolution also requests the European Commission to undertake an awareness campaign directed at legislators/parliamentarians in all EU Member States affected by FGM/C.
• The introduction of legislation in Europe has tended to include one of three responses to FGM/C: the introduction of specific legislation criminalizing the practice (United Kingdom, Sweden and Norway), the modification of existing legislation to make specific reference to this procedure (Italy, Spain, Belgium, Denmark), or the prohibition of FGM/C under existing criminal laws pertaining to physical injury and abuse of minors (Switzerland, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Netherlands).
Scale of the Practice and its Root Causes in Egypt
• In Egypt, studies show that the vast majority of girls and women are cut. According to the 2005 Egypt Demographic and Health Survey (EDHS), among girls between the ages of 15 to 17, 77% have been cut. The percentage of girls already cut may be combined with the percentage of girls whose mother expressed an intention to cut their daughters in the future to provide an estimate of the expected prevalence of circumcision at age 18. The results suggest that the prevalence of FGM/C will decline over time, from a level of around 77 percent among girls age 15-17 to around 60 percent among girls currently under age three .
• FGM/C continues to be practiced for various reasons. It is driven by socio-cultural, psychosexual, chastity, religious and aesthetic or hygienic arguments. Almost all of these are linked to girls’ social status and marriageability and the practice is seen as a necessary step towards womanhood. Girls and women who are not cut suffer stigmatization.
• The growing medicalization of the practice over recent years has been significant. According to the 2005 EDHS, trained medical personnel perform 75% percent of FGM/C. The root causes behind medical practitioners’ performing the practice includes supplementing their income, weak medical education or awareness, and mistaken belief that it is a religious requirement.
Recent Developments in Egypt
• The issue of eradicating FGM/C gained momentum in June 2007 after the tragic death 12-year Badour Shaker during an FGM/C operation in a private clinic near Minya (in Upper Egypt). This was followed in August by a second FGM-related death of a 13-year old in a Nile Delta village in Gharbiya.
• In June the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population issued a decree (271) - closing a loophole in the previous 1996 decree - banning everyone, including health professionals, from performing FGM/C in governmental or non-governmental hospitals/clinics.
• This was followed by action from the Al Azhar Supreme council for Islamic Research - the highest religious authority in Egypt. It issued a statement explaining that FGM/C has no basis in the core Islamic Sharia or any of its partial provisions.
• Dar el Ifta (the authority for issuing Fatwas – legal opinions or ruling issued by esteem Islamic scholars such as the Mufti) - issued a Fatwa condemning FGM/C.
• In June, the First Lady of Egypt Mrs. Suzanne Mubarak announced the planned amendment of the Child Law to include a clause banning FGM/C, as well as covering the rights of children in a comprehensive manner. Mrs. Mubarak also announced the launch of the national campaign to tackle FGM/C “The beginning of the End”.
• The National Council for Childhood and Motherhood (NCCM), the body leading FGM/C abandonment activities in Egypt, has set up a Child Helpline number (24 hr toll free) to answer the queries and concerns of parents and to enable concerned citizens to report any illegal operations. The NCCM also operates and coordinates the “FGM Free Village Model” Project, in collaboration with UNDP, in 120 villages in Upper and Lower Egypt, which aims to support pressure groups against the practice in the villages in order to create an environment conducive to supporting families to eventually abandon the practice. At the national level, the NCCM is working with various line-ministries, UN agencies (UNDP, UNICEF, UNFPA, UNIFEM), and other international and national partners, to mobilize the legal, medical and media communities to overcome the medicalization of the practice, break the media taboos, and lobby for a clear law that criminalizes FGM/C.
UNICEF Egypt Efforts to Support the Abandonment of FGM/C
UNICEF Egypt has, since 2003, intensified its efforts at both national and sub-national level partnering with governmental and non-governmental agencies, as well as international organizations. Its current programme of action on FGM/C is in complete cooperation with the National Council for Childhood and Motherhood (NCCM) and in full coordination with other UN agencies (such as the UNDP, UNFPA, and UNIFEM).
UNICEF supported initiatives against FGM/C aim to contribute to:
1. Supporting the FGM/C community-based abandonment project in 40 communities in four Upper Egypt governorates: Assiut, Sohag, Qena and Minya. The main components of this project include: capacity building of local NGOs, volunteers/‘Positive Deviants’, community leaders; community awareness and dialogue on FGM/C and other issues (hygiene education, rights, and parental education); and monitoring and tracking of girls at risk of FGM/C and their families. It is hoped that this long-term community dialogue will lead to the establishment of FGM/C free villages through the growing social movement that is being created and collectively abandoning the practice. The results of the community-based initiatives show changed intention levels in favour of not cutting the girls or increasingly questioning the practice. Also results in the communities where the project is implemented show that the number of girls at risk of cutting amongst the targeted families has increasingly been ‘saved’.
2. Support NCCM in lobbying efforts aimed towards introducing a clear law criminalizing FGM/C and to increase public support against FGM/C through various communication initiatives.
3. Supporting the Ministry of Health and Population (MOHP), in coordination with the NCCM and other UN agencies, to address the issue of the medicalization of the practice by integrating FGM/C within its in-service training package provided to medical practitioners, and monitoring enforcement mechanisms.
UNICEF’s FGM/C abandonment interventions have been supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Italian National Committee for UNICEF, and its own resources with a total budget of 1,600.000 during 2002-2007.
