Genital mutilation lives on

PRACTICE: DESPITE BEING BANNED SINCE 2011, FGM IS STILL WIDESPREAD IN RURAL KENYA

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HOPE. Juvenile girls, most from the Maasai community, at the House of Hope, a centre that shelters and educates underage girls.

(AFP)

Maasai women erupted with mocking heckles as a community elder, wrapped in a traditional red blanket, claimed that female genital mutilation had all but stopped in their community in southern Kenya.

The women know that mutilating young girls by removing their clitoris and inner labia - framed as a rite of passage - is still an entrenched practice in some remote villages of Narok county, around three hours from the nearest tarmac road.

One local nurse said about 80% of girls in the area are still affected, despite the practice being made illegal in 2011.

"Why are you telling people that you have stopped, when we have teenage girls coming to the hospital who have been cut?" asked a woman in the crowd, gathered in Entasekera village to discuss the issue.

The women nodded emphatically, while the men sat stone-faced.

Female genital mutilation (FGM) has survived decades of pressure to end it, from British colonialists and later Kenyan and global NGOs.