Rescue Maasai Girls from Female Genital Mutilation

Just in case you haven't read our prior reports, we will start by explaining that Female Genital Mutilation is still a huge problem in East Africa.

In Kenya, where 100% of our anti-FGM effforts take place, politicians and the media frequently say that this brutal cultural practice is in decline.

While this may be true in small cities, it is absolutely not the case in small villages and certainly not in the countryside where the Maasai generally live. In these areas, FGM is practiced secretly because it is against the law and anyone who is caught doing it will go to jail and have to pay a hefty fine.

10% of girls who are subjected to FGM die either from blood loss just after the cut or during child birth when their wounds reopen and hemorrhage. The majority of girls who survive the cut suffer from both physical and mental complications related to FGM for the rest of their lives.

One of the main problems we are seeing since the criminalization of FGM is that parents are now letting their daughters bleed out instead of taking them to the hospital. Often, the village woman who uses a razor blade to perform FGM has no formal medical training and does not know what to do when a girl bleeds more than usual. In these cases, parents are opting to let their daughters bleed to death because they know they will go to jail if they seek medical help.

So, now that we know parents who subject their daughters to FGM are afraid of jail time and fines, we have a new strategy.

Starting this spring, Maasai school teachers will send flyers home with students that will spell out the legal consequences of FGM. Cease and desist letters will go out to parents who intend to cut and sell their daughters. Even though FGM is practiced secretly, most young girls can see it coming and they will soon have a legal channel to pursue. A letter from our legal team will reduce the high percentage of girls still being secretly cut in rural areas.

Another girl finds her way to our Safe House

Approximately one year ago, a young girl named Sarah ran from her home to her school on the night she was to be cut. She jumped out her bedroom window and ran as quickly as she could to the one place she felt safe: her elementary school. Fortunately, one of her teachers had forgotten her phone at school and found her on the front steps of the school. The teacher in question took Sarah home and let her stay with her for nearly eight months. Four months ago, the teacher reached out to Mary K, the manager of our Safe House and after a two-day period of due dligence by our team, Sarah was picked up and transported to our Safe House.

Sarah's father sent two drunkards to collect Sarah but they were confronted by four club-carrying securtiy guards who ushered them off the property of our safe house. The drunkards never came back.

We quickly found a boarding school that could take in Sarah so she is safe now, learning and making new friends. See Sarah standing next to Naomi, the other young woman who joined us recently. 

"I am so happy to be in school," Sarah told our staff. "I want to protect little girls like me when I grow up."

Thanks for your support!