A child abuse specialist, Mrs Maryam Enyiazu, said on Monday that Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, Ebonyi and Imo topped the list of states with highest cases of female genital mutilation in the country.
Enyiazu, a specialist with United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF), made this known at a “Media Partnership towards Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting Abandonment in Nigeria’’ in Osogbo, the Osun State capital.
According to her, genital mutilation or female circumcision was prevalent in southern parts of the country than the northern part.
She said that states in the South-West accounted for 56.9 per cent of the cases while the South-East accounted for 40.8 per cent.
North-Central, she stated, recorded 9.6 per cent of the cases, North-East, 1.3 per cent; North-West, 0.4 per cent and South-South, 34.7 per cent.
The expert added that Infibulations, which is the total removal of the clitoris and stitching of the vagina to allow small hole for urination, was the most common in Nasarawa with 22 per cent, Kaduna, 21 per cent and Bayelsa, 20 per cent
She disclosed the practice was higher among women whose mothers were circumcised, adding that “the higher the level of education of a woman, the less her daughter’s chance of being mutilated’’.
According to her, female genital mutilation constitutes a violation of the right of a girl child and women as they are susceptible to lots of health complications.
In her contribution, Ms Doune Porter, UNICEF’s Chief of Communication, said that Nigeria was number three of countries with high prevalence rate of genital mutilation in the world.
Porter said the country came after Egypt and Ethiopia, with close to 20 million Nigeria girls and women having their genitalia mutilated.
She said UNICEF and other stakeholders were determined to end the practice in Nigeria, explaining that the health implication of the practice on the girl child and women were enormous.
Also speaking, Prof. Modupe Onadeko, National President, Inter-African Committee on Female Genital Mutilation, called for stiffer punishment for persons caught circumcising a girl or any form of genital mutilation in the country.
She said that the call would deter people from mutilating female genitals.
She appealed to state governments to domesticate Violence against Persons (Prohibition Act) 2015 (VAPP).
“Until we make a scapegoat out of these people still practicing female genital mutilation, they will not take the matter serious,” Onadeko said.
She said that her committee would continue to educate parents and traditional circumcisers on the dangers associated with the practice.
