Empowering women: interventions. Nigeria: new law to end FGM

In March 1994, a Nigerian woman fighting to spare her young daughters from circumcision was saved from deportation from the US by a judge who called the practice cruel, painful and dangerous. Female Circumcision or Genital Mutilation has been a custom in male-dominated African societies to prevent promiscuity among women, reduce their sex urge and enhance their fertility and fecundity. The mutilation ranges from clitoridectomy (cuts in the clitoris) to infibulation (removal of the labia and sewing up most of the vagina). These practices that operated traditionally or in hospitals, are condemned in most parts of the world. In 1993, the WHO vowed to fight female circumcision, which has claimed the life of tens of thousands of women and subjected, and still subjects millions of others to suffering. In Nigeria, the Military Government is due to sign a new law that will end the practice. Indeed, parents who circumcise their daughters could face seven years imprisonment. This law is from legislation that is designed to improve health care for children in Nigeria.