District leaders want all schools reopened to curb violence against children
"FGM in Amudat District is bigger than COVID-19"
Lonah Cheptilak, 55, lives in Loroo village two and a half kilometres away from the Uganda-Kenya border. She is one of Trailblazers Mentoring Foundation (TMF)’s 75 women role models in Amudat District attached to Loroo Primary School.
Under her mentorship are 20 adolescent girls. Even when she is only a volunteer, she makes the time every once a week to visit the school and check on their progress with education and offer them counselling and guidance.
While violence against women and girls is not new to her, Cheptilak was left speechless when she witnessed a pregnant woman almost lose two daughters on the same day.
Veronica Meyan was 8 months pregnant when she learnt that her late husband’s brother had given away her 11-year-old daughter for marriage in exchange for 27 cows.
“Veronica walked a long distance to his [girl’s uncle] place to ask why he had given out her daughter who was still in school without seeking her permission. The man instead kicked her in the stomach and her baby popped out,” Cheptilak narrates.
Unfortunately, the matter was reported to the police at Loroo Sub County headquarters and no arrest was made. This lends credence to allegations from community members that the police and some local leaders connive with the abusers and perpetrators to frustrate actions gender-based violence cases against women and girls.
According to Sergeant Michael Ewadu, the officer-in-charge of the Child and Family Protection Unit in Amudat District, only five cases of gender-based violence reported in 2021 have been successfully resolved. Twenty-three cases are still being “investigated”.
“This community is very secretive. They conceal information and help perpetrators escape through porous borders into Kenya. If a community member reports collaborates with the police, there is retribution and this cripples our investigations,” Ewadu explained.
Road to the district council
As the age-old adage goes, “if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself”.
Cheptilak knew exactly she needed to fight from the front, not in the shadows. She needed power to bring culprits to account.
She stood for the position of District Councillor for Loroo Sub County – a post she had lost in 2016, but later won by a landslide.
“Being a councillor will not stop me from mentoring girls. It only means that there will not be any more FGM, forced and early child marriages on my watch,”
Cheptilak will also lobby the district and partners to bring a rescue centre in Loroo Sub-County that has gained notoriety for FGM and child marriages. The closest rescue centre – Kalas Girls Primary school is over 70 kilometres away – a distance, she says is unbearable for girls fleeing injustices.
The call for the creation of more rescue centres was echoed by Dorcus Chelain, the Amudat District Vice-Chairperson, whose home is sheltering six girls who can neither be in school nor home.
Chelain admitted a lapse in the enforcement of the Prohibition of Female Genital Mutilation Act, 2010, adding that the COVID-19 pandemic has not helped matters. “We need schools to be opened as soon as possible.
I can authoritatively say that FGM in Amudat is a bigger problem than COVID-19. Students used to find refuge at school. Now some parents are using the closure as an advantage to cut their daughters in gardens,” she said.
She lauded UNICEF Uganda, Irish Aid and TMF for the ‘Go Back to School Campaign’ that brought over 800 students back to school. The Go Back to School campaign is being implemented by TMF with UNICEF support and funding from Irish Aid under the Promoting Access to Quality and Equitable Education for Karamoja Children programme.