Anti Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) policy makers and crusaders have identified Gusii region as a hot spot for the retrogressive cultural practice and predicted 2022 as the year of its near eradication.
Authorities in Kisii and Nyamira counties released annual reports describing the rite of passage as ‘violence’ against the girl-child which should be acted upon.
Speaking at a Muungano Gender Forum lobby workshop in Kisii town, Billy Adera, Nyamira South Children’s Officer decried lack of reports on the illegal activity from stakeholders.
This was despite the fact that the girl-child was in urgent need of counseling, medication or protection from the practice’s perpetrators, he observed.
Adera called for effective and collective tackling of the harmful practice through partnership with International Solidarity Foundation and the Anti FGM board.
Kisii county ‘minister’ for Culture and Sports, Duke Mainga hinted underway plans to form an anti FGM network and fund to tackle the practice which had been medicalized.
According to Mainga, the efforts were geared towards supporting president Uhuru Kenyatta’s call that the rite be eradicated by 2022 by intensifying public awareness creation at the grass-root among others.