INTERVIEW: Cutting Off A Woman’s Clitoris To Control Her Sexuality Is Myth- Lola Ibrahim 

Lola Ibrahim is a gender activist and Executive Director of Women Against Violence and Exploitation Foundation (WAVE), a non-profit organization recognized by the United Nations as one of the NGOs under the ECOSOC- Economic and Social Council. 

She comes from a Nigerian family where  Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is a tradition. But as a survivor and a gender activist, she is fighting the violent tradition of cutting girls. 

Education and exposure have made her to see the dangers of cutting girls to stop them from becoming promiscuous and is now devoting her time and energy towards educating young girls to defend their rights.

Her StoptheCut campaign is also educating parents and families of young girls about the damaging health consequences of FGM.

In this interview with THE WHISTLER, she shares some of her experiences in campaigning against FGM in Nigeria.  Excerpts

Tell Us About WAVE

So, basically what we do in WAVE is to campaign against female genital mutilation, sexual and gender-based violence, women’s rights, gender equality, and general issues that tend to affect Nigerian women.

 But of course, our special focus is on FGM and that’s why I started the movement “STOP THE CUT.” This movement is only focusing on the eradication of female genital mutilation because I’m a survivor.

What Does FGM Mean To A Lay Man?

Female Genital Mutilation is any cut, injury, incision, or break you do to the female genital organ for non-medical reasons. And I think basically there are about four types of FGM that we know of, and some people refer to it as female genital cutting. Some call it female circumcision. But in the development sector for us, we do not refer to it as circumcision, it is mutilation, which is against the rights of the girl child or against a woman’s rights because it affects her body. It affects her sexual reactions. It can sometimes even lead to death when there is excessive bleeding when they do it without sterilized sharp objects.

You Said You’re A Survivor Of FGM, Share Your Experience With Us

 My mom cut me when I was, I think, a toddler, less than a year old. My younger sisters too were cut and my mum is also an FGM survivor.

Initially, I didn’t even think FGM was a big deal until I went to the US, and then I saw that they took it even more seriously than we did so I started digging deep and trying to find out what exactly FGM is.

 If you talk to some people about FGM,  they will tell you it’s been stopped but it’s a practice that is still going on.

When I went to the US in 2018, that was when I actually picked up the interest. I saw that it is our problem, and we need to take it seriously and do something about it. So since then, when I came back in 2019, I started campaigning vigorously for an end to female genital mutilation because it’s an issue that affects the girl child and it’s not something that has any benefit.

There are two different things. The circumcision they do for boys is the foreskin that is removed. But for a woman, it’s completely different. They cut off a part of the female genitalia entirely, and in some women, they sew up the entire place and leave just a small hole for her to pee. If you start asking why exactly they do that,  they’ll give you various reasons that does not hold water.

Okay, so for people like me that were cut before we even knew what it was, there is no difference between us and someone that was cut when she was aware, maybe like a six-year-old or 10-year-old.

Can You Share More Experience From Your Campaign?

In the South-south,  I don’t know if you’re familiar with it, young girls 15, 18 willingly come out and allow themselves to be cut because that is when they are eligible for marriage.

In fact, some women, if they’re not cut before they are married, before they give birth when they’re pregnant, they will be cut without any anesthesia, without any hospital wherever. And you can imagine the psychological trauma, the pain you have to go through, cutting yourself at that age when you’re expecting a child? But my point is for someone who was cut when she was a toddler like me, or maybe eight days old, it is still the same and the effect is the same, though it affects some people differently.

What Are The Effects Of FGM?

For some, they might be frigid in bed, and for some, they might have PTSD, while others might have UTI (Urinary tract infections). For some, it can even lead to infections like HIV depending on the object that was used. And then we have the very critical cases of those that get a VVF(Vesicovaginal fistula ) because you know, the person doing it is not trained medical personnel.

VVF is very serious where the woman just keeps passing urine without control, and then she is now faced with double jeopardy because she’s ostracized by the community. I mean, she smells and is no more pleasurable to the husband they cut her for. They caught her to keep her intact for marriage, but now she has VVF, she cannot even stay at home, talk more of looking after the kids.

How Many States Have You Taken Your Campaign To?

Right now, we have about six states where we’re working- Osun, Ondo, Lagos, Niger, Abuja, Akwa Ibom, and Ebonyi . But because of funds, it’s impossible for us to have activities in all of the states. So, most of what we do is to hold webinars and play jingles on the radio but the most effective way that this campaign can reach the grassroots is to get the youth involved. This way they can easily report cases because some people are not even aware that there are laws against FGM. There’s VAP Law, and Child Rights Law.

Don’t You Think Your Campaign Is Against Tradition Of The People?

One thing is for people to understand that we’re not saying culture is bad but that some of the cultures that are passed down from generation to generation that affect the health of women should be discarded. 

Is It  True Ladies That Undergo FGM Are Not Promiscuous?

it’s a myth. So why don’t they cut off their breasts so that they will not be promiscuous?  If they feel that is the most sensitive part of a woman and they cut it off because they don’t want her to be promiscuous, what if that’s not her arousal point? It doesn’t make any sense, it’s just a myth.

It’s still the patriarchal nature of the society we’re living in that continues to objectify the woman which is wrong. The way to control a woman’s sexuality is not by cutting off her clitoris, why not educate me? What makes you think is by shutting down her sexuality completely is the only way to make her not promiscuous, it’s a myth, It doesn’t follow.