The Kenya demographic survey (KDS 2014) shows that FGM is reducing. In Kisii community however, it is stubbornly high standing at 84% preference. The Kisii community is literary among the top practitioners of the practice, only third from the more remote Somali (94%) and Samburu (86%). The slow eradication trend among the kisii is worrying because compared these other communities, Kisii is not as remote and is not completely illiterate population. But what is really disturbing among the kisiis also is the fact that the FGM victims are quite young, as young as less than five, even two years old. These cannot resist the cut nor do they know the antiFGM law.
That is why the HFAW women in collaboration with antiFGM Board and Villi Bell Foundation organized this roadshow on June 9th, 2016. The HFAW health and human right promoters took it upon themselves to create antiFGM messages and traversed through the hard to reach places in Nyamira and Kisii Counties. The deep rural areas has seen more resistance to eradication but have also not been sufficiently reached with strong messages. The KDS indicates that there is 9 times chances of a daughter of an uneducated women being cut compared to one whose mother has completed secondary school. Data also indicates that a girl will undergo the cut if her mother has also been cut—96 times chance as much as if the mother is uncircumcised.
The HFAW women discovered that the roadshow is one of the most effective tool in reaching out to hard to reach places. At times they got off the truck and ran and danced with song and were followed by the crowd. Sometimes the women worked with youth who dramatized the messages. Sometimes it was the mere fact that it is the village women doing the messaging, something that has not been seen before. People expect meeting by professionals in boardrooms and wondered how come now the women have taken this mantle themselves, This caused a lot more concern and more interest in listening to the messages. One woman said loud what was in her poster “not to be cut, my choice” and even translated to the kisii language as “Okwaroka yaya.” This was a crowd puller including many men. At one moment the HFAW woman was holding a clip of photo with a girl sitting in her big pool of blood. A man moved closer and asked what this was. “Is this from a cut girl”. The women responded with a “yes”. Several men said they wanted to be registered to join the campaign as they whistled in shock saying “This is completely unacceptable.” On this June 9th we recruited more men to the campaign than we could ever have imagined.
We traversed through over 10 local market places each time met crowds and passed on the messages not just about the effects of FGM but also on the revelation that many women cross the world “do not do this” and that empowered women do not cut the girls. That FGM is criminal offense, that it is antigovernment, that is total abuse of human rights and handicaps a women’s health. That FGM hurts everybody in the community and that it is not allowed in the bible.
We might not have ended FGM in Kisii on one day, indeed this practice is deeply entrenched in people’s minds. Many people do not even know why they practice it other than “it is our culture.” But his day we caused a stir. Something moved. We could not have done this without you, our supporters. How can we forget some of you who have walked with us every step of the way. Melanie, Carol and Lisa, and others, Thank you!
We want to increase momentum. We have done a series of school campaigns and have others planned to happen soon. Targeting the young is a great strategy so the message is received early enough. We also work with community and national leaders. We can speed up process by bringing the message to the community and challenge the many boardroom meetings which are hardly felt at the grassroots. By doing the right things and targeting the community it, giving the community leadership and engaging them directly as we at HFAW are doing. Again, thank you for all your support.
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Dear Friends and Colleagues,
I have considerable excitement in sharing this report. Because of your donation and support, we have been able to continue training women from other countries in our transformative popular education approach.
During the month of February, HFAW was invited by the Lutheran Secretariat in Nairobi to conduct a TOT training entitled “The Lutheran Communion in Central and Eastern Africa (Luccea) ToT Training for Accelerating Abandonment of FGM/Cut” on popular education to over 25 women and youth from over 9 countries in East and Central Africa (Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Eriterea, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Congo and Madagascar. This training was to encourage the abandonment of Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) in these countries.
As you might be aware Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) is a huge problem throughout many countries and tribes in Africa and also in LUCCEA sub-region where for instance in Kenya it is estimated that out of 42 tribes constituting the nation, only 3 tribes do not practice FGM. The effect on the girl (physical, psychological, emotional, social and economic) is devastating on the girl/woman. It is total abuse of human right and completely strips the girls off their dignity.
Therefore, the magnitude of the problem is considerable also in this era where HIV/AIDS is dreaded and attracting a lot of funding but little success in eliminating it. LUCCEA secretariat wanted to find ways of overcoming mere awareness building on the effects of FGM/C but engage strong and new strategies that will end FGM/C. Popular education which has a component of critical conscious raising and whole community participatory engagement and action plans is providing that answer. Thanks to you who continue supporting us we are able to share this new strategy. The strategy leads to a people who are self driven in addressing problems in their communities.
The intensive week of training workshop from February 22 through 28th, 2016 brought together experts and member churches officers committed to end FGM/C who shared experiences and information from various sub-regions countries where FGM is rampant; learned about popular education approaches; brainstormed strategies that will accomplish campaigns that included local government and foreign partners; created powerful and winning action plans; equipped the women and youth with skills to implement the action plans; established a communication and information sharing platform (network and process) that will allow churches to deal with gender justice issues and children rights as well as embraced a human rights framework that will promote justice for all people.
Our use of simple and hands on practical and participatory approaches as well as making the training interactive with fun, exercises, song and games made the participants demand to hear more of popular education. We also made the training dramatic as we made the participants take hands on practice on how to engage others. We were also visual as we shared real life photos and documentaries of what really happens during the so called “circumcision” and engaged participants in critical questions about those photos and documentaries. Participants felt an urgency to do more and quicker to end FGM/C and also felt that this method will work to end the practice in their countries.
" It is an idea whose time has come" said one of the participants from Kenya about popular education and ending FGM.. When we used a simple string to show how communication networks can be simplified to allow continuous sharing of this methods, there was such great learning lessons. "Where has these approach been in the world?." Asked one of the participants from Tanzania.
One Rev from Congo shared that she had previously been given a book on FGM to read but ignored it as she did not think FGM was significant problem of concern to her as she thought it is not rampant in her country. After this trainings she shared that she felt compelled to do something to learn more and combat FGM no matter which country is practicing it.
A woman from Uganda was also shocked by some of the extent of FGM, the dramatic impact it has that no one had ever shared with her till this training. “Now I feel a strong obligation to end FGM whatever it takes.” She said.
There were so many aids which lead to critical discussions including the photo clip of girl who is standing in her pool of blood-Courtesy of Douglas W. Laube, MD and a drama participants worked together to place a stick into a bottle they also learned how to build teamwork and how to create a network of communication with us and themselves—each person is connected to each other during the training and it was expected to happen in real social justice work
The participants made overwhelming requests for plans to HFAW to provide additional trainings. Requests were made for the LUCCEA office to work with us to support implementation of an action plan and additional trainings in specific countries to ensure that each participant took actual actions in their churches as simple as including FGM issue in church programs. LUCCEA office is working to ensure that we do more trainings and support the implementation of the action plans that each participants created to go with to their own countries.
That is why we are proud of your support. We know that little consistent steps lead to significant change. We thank you and encourage you to give us advice as we continue to deepen this work. As we spread the popular education methods we do so with a believe that it will end FGM sooner than expected. We request that you share our work with your friends and relatives and encourage them to support this work. Ones again we thank you for your contributions and sharing of our work so widely.
With gratitude
Grace Mose-Okong’o
We have the pleasure to share with you that during the Month of October 2015, the HFAW health and human rights promoters had a rare opportunity to showcase their work to high level global photographer Richard Lord (www.rlordphoto.com), Thanks to the support from the United Methodist Women International Ministries and you. Women were able to showcase some of their economic activities, outreach activities in the shopping center and early pregnancy interventions at St Anne Academy.
Richard took photos as women did outreach to the people in the shopping center and shared information and brochures on FGM. It is so inspiring to witness the women and men talk to the people at the center on the importance of eradicating female genital mutilation/cutting. Kwamboka, who was one of the women in the shopping center who received information shared that “for a long time I never thought that anyone was able to end FGM in Kisii but now seeing how dedicated the educators are I know it will end.” Kwamboka made a request to join the group and be trained as well. We have a long list of women and men waiting to be trained as health and human rights promoters. This just inspires the women on as Joyce shared…”This work has made me realize how important I am in this village; before this work began I didn’t know that people could listen to me.”
Richard had also a chance to interact with the health and human rights promoters about their interventions around issues of gender based violence and the popular education methods which they use. They also had a chance to showcase their educational skids to the youth at St Annes Academy where they are raising awareness to help the children be aware of the dangers of early pregnancies, and their rights as youth and places to report perpetrators. The health and human rights promoters discussed with the teachers who joined the students and one teacher said “we need you to come back; as you can see the students are very interested.” The school head teacher also expressed interest in health promoters going back to do more. “This issue(early pregnancies) is a crisis, she said.
Richard then interviewed some of the participants in the interventions and said he liked “the women’s enthusiasm in doing this work.” Upon arrival back in US Richard wrote about his experiences with us (the women and HFAW staff) saying that we“… were definitely in the top 5 in my 25 years of doing this work. The depth and insight that you provided are very rare when working with development/health etc agencies.” He shared that the product he is developing from the interactions will be out in July August 2016 and we will definitely share with all of you who have been behind this work.
We are in real need to expand the methods and interventions and deepen our work. We are challenged by our limited resources and we are working very hard to overcome this challenge. Your contributions have made such a huge difference and our partnership with the Methodist Women have been of enormous importance. We want you to know that we value your advice and your contributions. Please Make a donation and talk to your friends, family and networks about HFAW and your role in bringing us this far.
Again, thank you so much for your contributions and support.
Dear Friend,
Due to your support, we are on our way to build a program that is providing lessons to others. I am so humbled to share that in the Month of September 2015 we hosted 8 Central African Women (from Zimbabwe, Congo and Cameroon) who paid HFAW a visit to learn about our popular education approaches.
While they were in Kenya, HFAW staff demonstrated some of our participatory approaches and also made sure to bring the guests to the village to interact with the women and men who have benefitted from the program. Here they saw their economic activities and their own work of intervention of issues in their own communities. The women and men dramatized some of the skids they use in their own work such as in schools and shared their own experience with popular education.
We were pleased to see the guests capturing some of the lessons they took away with them. “The trip to Kenya was fruitful in that it opened my eyes to new things and ways in which to improve the community through interventions for women. The HFAW methodology of Popular Education is a good one. This is so because it engages everyone and acknowledges that everyone has a part to play, no matter their social ranking. It also builds people from their lived realities, it addresses problems according to the needs presented using the simplest resources thus saving on time and money.” wrote Samantha who is one of the guests.
Samantha added that “As an area of interest, I have identified the area of Cultural practices and sexuality. The experience in Kenya taught me that Africa still has a long way to go in terms of addressing cultural practices that are harmful especially to women and children. An example is that of the Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) practice that is still rampant in some parts of Kenya. In Zimbabwe, in Shamva district, there is a high rate of child marriages and people are comfortable with it… I would like to pursue this topic of cultural practices in my area as I have seen the impact it has on the girl child as well as the children that are born under such conditions.”
“Men can be facilitators in the improvement of the lifestyles of women and children; Women, in whatever circumstances, can be empowered to improve their situations; Projects, when well coordinated, can improve communities as a whole; There is need for the engagement of local authorities in programming” Wrote Grace Musuka who reported on behalf of the team.
I have to share with you what Michael Fonner, one of our staunch supporters, global giving contributer and the only man who attended the first workshop said, “I so very much enjoyed being with you last week during your extremely well lead, informative, enthusiastic, and promising seminar. I told Leslie all about it and she shares my joy at the good and important work you are doing…I think your work in popular education; the kind of empowering education that values every person and arises from the grassroots is powerful and life-giving to the communities that you serve. Leslie and I are grateful to be a small part of what you are doing. We thank you.”
Michael and Leslie, we thank you more and we appreciate that you had time to join us. You are the voice of all our global giving supporters worldwide who won’t have a chance to be with us.
At the end of the exchange the women expressed a strong interest to take the popular education training so that they can bring the methods to their countries. As we speak two of the women are registered to participate in the EPES international school in January 2016 in Chile where HFAW had taken lessons from.
HFAW plans to offer the trainings here in Kenya in the near future as we have seen demand for the program even in our own locations. We won’t stop until we expand to more locations. We are in real need to expand the methods and interventions. We are challenged by our limited resources but have hope that we will overcome this challenge. Please do not hesitate to reach us with ideas on how we can make this a reality. We want you to know that we value your advice and your contributions. Please talk to your friends, family and networks about HFAW and your role in bringing us this far.
Again, thank you so much for your partnership with us.
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Dear Friend,
The first part of the year saw us engaging with advocacy with youth and children issues at Gisebei primary school to combat child, youth abuse, FGM and prevent early pregnancies all reported in previous report.
In May, HFAW CEO, I, was privileged to participate in the Global Women Leadership Network which offers transformative training entitled “The Ripple Effect of Women leaders: From Local Impact to Global Change.” It was a training that not only inspires direction but helped me see blind spots including the hidden invisible rules and assumptions that limit us from helping our staff and stakeholders from achieving our potential. It unfolded mindset and self doubts that slow us down and inhibit us and those who work with us. The training helped unveil how to disengage from these things while opening new possibilities, new thinking about our vision. It showed me how to create a new roadmap. The good thing also is that our coaches are with us for another six months before they send us to the world of work. I came home convinced that HFAW must take a first step of developing its live changing strategic plan. All the way from San Jose to Kenya I kept wondering how HFAW survived three years without a clear and professional strategic plan. To many of you our supporters, Thank you so much for your support. Please know that we carry enormous gratitude in our hearts to you our cheerleaders. We could not have done anything without your support. Through you we raised flight tickets and some remaining fees. Some of you continuously gave us moral support and mentoring especially when things are so tough. Importantly, you are helping my entire HFAW team, health and human rights promoters and myself turn breakdown into breakthroughs!
And now HFAW team is working with a consultant to create a five year strategic plan. This will clarify our focus and help us better engage our local beneficiaries and stakeholders at the local and international levels. We expect even better outcomes and bigger impact in the near future. As we work on this plan our women continue to forge forward with their economic empowerment project. We continue to endorse interest free loan from kiva.org and the women (and men) continue to work on their economic activities. And our advocacy work is underway. We want to train as many people as we can on how to be an intervention in their own communities.
We believe that our model program of employing popular education to combat GBV and other gender issues in the community combined with economic entrepreneurship and leadership from the community itself is very practical. We still want to train more women than the first 30 health and human rights promoters. We therefore appeal to you for your continued support Please reach out to your friends, colleagues and all kinds of well-wishers to help us reach our funding goal of $25,000 and build a movement that will end gender discrimination in Kisii. You helped us earn a spot on global giving, so tax deductive donations will reach us through global giving site. We will keep you well updated on all our progress and achievements. Please visit our website and facebook to see photos of our work portraying the trainings and an additional photo from the GWLN training. Please also review our work with youth and children report. Thank you!
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