Maybe to start with you could tell me about yourself, your name, and where you come from.
My name is Faduma H. Ismail and I come from Somalia.
You come from Somalia, but you are living here in Bethnal Green now?
Not in Bethnal Green, I work in Bethnal Green but I live in Greenwich.
Do you live here with your family?
Yes.
And who is in your family here?
I have got two children, sisters, cousins, nieces and nephews. We are a big family.
Are they also in Greenwich?
Yes
When did you come to London?
In 1980
What happened in Somalia for you to decide to come?
My ex-husband was working at the public relations office of the government, the political bureau of the government. In the early days of the revolution the changes that the revolutionaries were hoping for were not happening and the government did not keep its promises. There was a lot of nepotism and corruption and many young revolutionary men were disillusioned and they started to question what was happening. Then the killing started. People were taken out of their homes and disappeared, they never came back. My ex-husband was cautioned by the security services, so in order not to be put into jail, or before he disappears, he asked for a scholarship to go to Italy.
So they warned him that he was in danger?
They said to him "you are becoming too revolutionary".
Oh, that’s how they put it
Yes
So they agreed to send him somewhere else?
In fact he arranged it, because before he joined the political bureau he was working in a bank and he asked to go back to his old job and the government allowed him to because they wanted to remove him from the political arena, so they were happy to release him. When he went back to the bank he stayed for a few months and then he arranged for a course in Milan.
Did you move with him to Milan?
No he stayed in Milan for one year but he sent us a letter saying he is not coming back and that I should take precautions and not talk to anybody and leave the country. I was very frightened when I got that letter. I thought that maybe they had opened the letter and I was very scared….
Was that common in those days (to open people’s letters)?
Yes. I was a teacher at the Somali National University. Things were very crazy at that time, people knew what was wrong with the government but nobody questioned it. People were frightened, there were a lot of people that you could not trust, you could not trust your neighbor, you could not trust your students.
What were you teaching?
Biology. I graduated from that university and then I went back to teach there. I was even afraid of my students.
How did that feel to you?
Very frightening because all the time you felt that one day they would come and take you and ask you where he had gone and why he didn’t come back. That was what I was most afraid of. Many of my friends were in the same sort of situation and the whole atmosphere of the university was affected, as if every body was policing each other. You know, everybody was suspicious of each other. The teachers were disillusioned, the students were disillusioned so you didn’t know who to talk to. That was very scary.
Was there anywhere that you felt safe at that time?
No, only with my family. But I couldn’t tell my sister-in-law that we were leaving that night.
So you had to make that decision on your own.
What sort of age were you then Faduma?
In my thirties
And how old were your children
9 and 10
So you made the decision to leave and join your husband in Milan?
He had come to England and had applied for asylum and he told me that if anyone from the UN or anywhere approached me I should tell them that. But the fact that this was written in the letter was also scary.
So how did you arrange to leave?
I just came back from university one night and prepared myself and the children and found a lorry to take us across the land. I couldn’t travel by plane because they would ask me why I was going and I would need a visa and if anybody knew that I was working (for the government) they would ask me if I had got a letter from the government allowing me to go out. So the only way was across the land. On the lorry they asked for my papers and I thought one of the police recognized me. He said to his friend ‘isn’t she a teacher’ but his friend replied, ‘no, she left long ago’…! It was very frightening.
How about the children did they understand what was happening at all?
I told them that we were going to Djibouti and they were happy because my ex-husband’s family comes from Djibouti and they were going to see their relatives but when I told them that they were going to England they were angry. They asked "why are you taking us, why can’t dad come back, we want to stay in Djibouti or go back". I wasn’t sure I would get a visa to London, but as it happened I got it. It was a visitors visa.
So you just turned up here in London?
Yes, he wasn’t sure if we could come. He didn’t even know that we had come to Djibouti because I couldn’t trust anybody, so he was shocked when he saw us, so happy and everyone (his flat mates) was surprised.
You just turned up at his house? What was that like?
He was shocked but he was so happy. He couldn’t believe his eyes. He had been telling other people to meet us in Djibouti to arrange travel for us but they never contacted us. But I was so scared I had to leave before they knew what was happening, before they knew that he had applied for asylum because if anyone from my family or his family had known, then permission to leave would be taken away just like that and I would have been asked to stay.
Did many people leave Somalia at that time?
Yes and a lot of my ex-husband’s colleagues went to Addis Ababa to organize themselves as an opposition and some of them died there. They were killed secretly by the police agents. Many prominent politicians were killed in that way. So my ex-husband took the right way. If he had gone to Addis Ababa he would have been killed at that time. 1981, 82, 83. This was the time that the regime was very sensitive.
As far as you are concerned how have things changed since that time in Somalia?
The regime is not there but the way things turned out to be was not the way I would like it to be because so many things happened and more people died. Those people who worked against the government in the early days and who died, they wouldn’t have liked this to happen. The way things have turned out is even worse than before because they have created fear within the communities, each community and tribe fearing each other.
So did the regime encourage the divisions between the tribes, the communities?
Tribalism was used to rule, to be in power. If it wasn’t for that we would not be having all the troubles we are having now.
Can you now visit Somalia?
Yes, since 1990 people could go back but at the same time where to go back to? The country was destroyed and what was created was lawlesness, anarchy, people will kill you so easily because guns are everywhere. So it’s an unsafe country in a kind of free way. When the people were under pressure we didn’t have all this lawlessness. Now they have the guns and the freedom but what have they done with it, they kill each other and it is criminal violence, tribal violence. This is what had been created by the regime to divide and rule. If they didn’t create the pressure people would have looked after the country, but with that kind of pressure, when the pressure was gone ….too much pressure and then everybody thinking they can do what ever they want……. 30 years of that kind of pressure. It’s not a joke it’s a long time, people change.
So many people have had to live in exile because of this, have people gone back?
People are going back but what are they going back to? I don’t know.
So most people who lived in exile during that time have decided to stay where they are?
Yes, because of what’s happening, the violence is not stopping especially in the South and in the East of Somalia and people who feel that no-body is going to listen to them, you know they can’t risk their life. In the North it is relatively peaceful and a lot of NGOs are there, the Americans are on the shores, they are using our ports but what is the country getting out of that? Our roads are not being built, our hospitals are not being built, our schools…. It’s a shambles. But there is food, everybody is eating, people are eating something. They are working here and there but there is no investment, government investment so it’s a kind of limbo. I think that if this continues the violence will start in the North very soon. Something needs to change because now we have got political parties, now we have a kind of a government, which is not recognized. If for example the West wants to help Somaliland, because the rest of Somalia is in turmoil, you have to settle the land, that is a plan. The other parts, for example East Somalia and South Somalia, they will come to their senses because Somaliland has been recognised and they have their legitimate government and a seat in the United Nations. They will stop the violence, I think they will stop the violence because they will feel that they are left out and Somalia has been divided because of them. We have been waiting for them since 1990.
To make peace?
For them to stop fighting, the South to stop fighting and they haven’t stopped. Why in the North, which has created its own government, people have come together and chosen peace rather than war, why can’t they be happy? Now when we need that help and stability, the Amercian fleet is in the region so nobody is going to think about Somalia and now they are using our ports without any permission, and we don’t know what is happening. In the next few years anarchy will start because people haven’t got anything. Everything is in transit, people just trying to feed themselves, they are creating their own little country, but how much will that help, you need government, funded internationally, making their own roads, hospitals, having a strong police force, people who can look after the borders. People are going in and coming out…..
Smuggling?
Smuggling and everything.
From the way you are talking your connection with your home is very strong….
Exactly, everybody is the same. We need stability, recognized internationally. The democracy that the Americans were looking for is us, but they don’t want to see it…
The other day I was listening to the radio about the millions of pounds given to Ethiopia to help the poor people in the East and to build their country. What about us, why is Somalia left out?
Can I ask you to go back to your childhood and when you were younger and your memories of that time.
I don’t mind, my memories of when I was young are good.
Do you come from the North?
Yes
From what area
From Hargeisa area
Is that a rural area
No it’s a city
So your family come from the city, and your parents, what did they do?
My dad when he was young and my family moved from Aden, because he was educated in Aden in a missionary school at that time. He and other young Somalis were working in Aden when the British started to build the cities, infrastructure of Somaliland. Because he was educated in Aden and he spoke fluent English and Arabic and Hindi they asked him if his family could move to Somaliland to build his country. So he went back there and started to work with the public works department.
You say move with his family, so he was married by that time?
Yes, there was only one son then who died when the family moved back to Somaliland. We were nine children, ten with the one who died. Seven sisters and two brothers, three brothers with the eldest who died.
And what do you remember about growing up in your family?
It was happy because my dad was working for the government, we all lived in a farm. My Dad was building the government buildings at that time, he was a civil engineer, he was working with a British supervisor with a group of others and then he became an assistant director.
So he was a very successful man.
Yes in 1955 he got an honorary medal from the British government, for his honesty in his work. He came to London in 1958 on a scholarship to study modern architecture. He came back in 1959 and a year later we got independence, and then he died in September 1960.
Oh, so was he quite young when he died?
Yes he was about 40. He had left England when it was winter and he was building a customs/excise building on the border, so he immediately went to look at that and check on the progress of the work. He traveled to Djibouti where it was very hot and to distant outposts by jeep which put him under a lot of pressure and he had a stroke.
That must have been shattering, do you remember that time?
Yes I remember, I wasn’t with him when he died but I heard him on the radio because I was in a boarding school in a city called Burau.
So you weren’t at home when it happened.
Yes, the next day I came home with my younger sister who was also with me at that school.
And how old were you?
About 15 years old.
So what effect did that have on the family?
It was bad, very bad. It was very hard for us all. For the whole country because he was one of the best people who came to Somaliland to build. Most of the offices, the hospitals, the airport, the schools he set up and he was working with the British directly. It was a tragedy. The whole city stopped working because everyone knew him and they all paid their respects.
So how did your family survive after that?
We had that farm. When the land was empty he bought that land and he settled my mum there. When he was building the city I remember my mum used to tell us that she had asked him for a plot in the city. He said ‘I don’t want my children to grow up in the city’, ‘I want you to stay there’. The city was being built so residential areas were plotted out and people were given plots to build but he refused to give us any. He said stay there because the town will move to you. And it did, it has passed us now!
Is there anything there still of your family farm?
Yes my mother is still looking after the farm but the farm is gone and the land is barren now, all the people have moved away from the area. In that area the buildings have not been built again because people are frightened because there were tribal wars and the people from that area moved up into the mountains and they don’t want to build there again because they are not sure what will happen. So that’s why I am saying that we need stability.
You were at boarding school. Was that because there were no schools locally?
No at that time it was the only intermediate and elementary school for girls in Somaliland. It was started in 1954 so in 1955 I was the second lot.
That was the beginning of primary schooling for girls?
Yes, in Somaliland, I don’t know about in the South.
So you were pioneering! Your father was educated, what was his feeling about you and his other daughters?
Yes he was very happy, he wanted all of us to be educated. In the country at that time people were skeptical of education which is from Britain. They thought people are going to be Christians or something like that.
They connected it with missionaries you mean or with colonialism?
No with colonialism. The boys were OK but not the girls. The people were not that keen to educate the girls. You can understand at that time.
So was it a political thing or was it a fear that it would change their role?
Yes, that it would change the girls, they would become westernised.
So your father was quite unusual in his views then?
Yes, very unusual.
And how long did you carry on in school?
All the way up to university. I went to Sudan for four years on a scholarship at secondary school level as there were no secondary schools in Somalia at that time.
And your brothers and sisters?
They went to Somali primary and secondary schools and three went to universities outside Somalia, two to India, and one to America. Some of them went to nursing school and one to teacher training college.
And what about you, your marriage, would you mind talking about that?
Yes, my marriage was normal. I married somebody who I loved.
So it was your choice?
Yes, it was my choice. The young girls at that time who were educated had more choice than the young girls now, especially of my daughter’s age.
Really, in what way?
Because at that time we had so many young educated people working and going out we had the chance to meet. But they don’t have that now. The children have grown up in a different environment with different communities that are not Somalis.
So how do you think that has affected your daughter’s choices now?
She hasn’t got any choice.
In what way?
Because there are not many educated Somali young men at her age. Maybe the younger ones who are twenty now they have more chance, or 18 years old or 17 years old.
How old is your daughter?
She is 32. She is educated here, she came here at the age of 10 years.
It is an interesting thought that in those days your choices were greater than your daughters’ are now. Do you think the communities’ attitudes play a part in that, in making her choices more restricted or does she feel that from the experience of her own life?
What I mean is the number. We had so many young educated men around us. They were the only people who were there. Here you have so many different young people, ethnic minorities and the Somalis are few, so your choice of Somali men is few.
And do Somali girls choose always to marry within the Somali community, is that something that always happens?
No it doesn’t always happen, but as a parent you always like your children to marry within your community. It’s the culture. We are growing old and you need the support of you family, you need the support of the other family. So although my son has married an English girl, I am close to her, my daughter-in-law, but I don’t know anything much from her parent’s side.
You don’t know her family, feel a part of that?
Exactly, that’s the difference.
Within your community, for your daughter not to be married, is that something that is difficult for her?
Very difficult but she doesn’t care. She has grown up in this country. Just now she is working in Tower Hamlets with young Somali girls, talking to them about health, drugs, eg.khat, and all the problems around health care.
So she’s following your footsteps!
You know I had a biology background, a health background but she studied English Literature and French at University. She couldn’t get a job in journalism.
Is that what she was interested in?
Yes, but she had to go to get a job!
Is the Somali community concentrated in any particular part of London?
Before they were concentrated in East London, because families joined other families but now many people have moved away and many people are coming and settling in different parts of the country.
Are there many Somali’s arriving as new refugees?
Not that many because of the relative peace in the North. There may be from the South and the East because of the war, but I don’t know.
So it is a quite well established community here. Do you find that you have a lot in common with other members of the community?
We are not that different, we all come from Somalia, we all speak Somali.
So your work here, I believe you are an outreach worker for Black Women’s Health and Family Services. Is the outreach work you do here mainly concerned with health issues?
Yes mostly with FGM.
When did you start working on the issue of FGM in your community?
The issue of female circumcision began to be raised in the community in the early 1980s, and that was the time that I got involved. I was employed by FORWARD, the Foundation for Women’s Health, Research and Development. My role was to give information to the community about Female Genital Mutilation; why it is illegal in this country; why it is unnecessary to perform this operation; that it is a very old tradition which is very harmful to the girl, to the mother, in fact to the whole community. London Black Women’s Health and Family Services was also working on the issue, raising the awareness of the community on the health aspects of FGM. I joined Black Women’s Health and Family Services in 1989 when the funding was reduced from FORWARD and four of its workers were made redundant.
Who was funding FORWARD?
The Department of Health. At that time they started to also give funding to Black Women’s Health and Family Services and reduce the funding to FORWARD. Then BWHFS got funding from London Borough of Grants and my job was funded by a grant from them.
So in 1989 you were appointed as an outreach worker and funded specifically to work on FGM with the Somali Community?
Yes.
How did you approach your work at that time, how did you approach the community on the issue of FGM?
The community didn’t know what to believe. They knew that infibulation has always been a problem for women back home and many of them, at that time, believed that it was wrong to circumcise their daughters the old traditional way, by infibulaton.
Because of their experience of it?
Yes and times had changed. They accepted that it is a bad practice that should have stopped a long time ago and that ‘sunna’ is much better. They advocated ‘sunna’, which they believed to be full ‘clitoridectomy’, but actually it is just the pricking the ‘hood’. The people who were advocating ‘sunna’ didn’t always know what it meant, how much is cut, apart from those who had been to, or had contacts in, countries where it is practiced, such as Yemen or Saudi. In fact it was these people who brought the ideas about ‘sunna’ to Somalia.
Was it the men or the women who brought the issue back to Somalia?
It was the women I think. They saw that where circumcision was practiced in Muslim countries, it was ‘sunna’, and so they thought that this was something that was allowed, mistakenly or rightly, by the prophet Mohammed.
I see.
So the campaign started in the early eighties and the 1985 act was passed as the result of work by the women activists in the communities.
But after that, in the early 1990’s there was a great influx of Somali refugees who came because of the war in Somalia and it changed things, changed the priorities. Before, the issue was being discussed in the community. The community was mainly migrants, people who had settled in the country for various reasons. But when the refugees came over they came with many problems; social problems, health problems, medical problems, all kinds of problems. So organizations and communities, especially those like BWHFS, had to try and address some of those needs which meant working with people at every level. You have to gain the trust of the community first, especially when the community is new and you want to introduce a new concept about things that are precious to them. FGM especially is something personal, something traditional. When they come here they need advice and many other things, but if you immediately bring up the issue and say ‘don’t circumcise your daughters’ they will wonder who you are, what is happening. They would ask ‘have we come here to change our ways of life?’ People might question what your motive is. So you work with them on their day to day problems, like social services, benefits, immigration problems, finding a school for their children, housing and everything. It is not right to bring up a tradition, speak against the things that they love, immediately before settling them emotionally. You must try to help them, be seen as somebody who is helping them, working for them and then after a while you will be able to talk to them on many health issues and FGM can be one of them. But you cannot bring this issue up out of the blue.
People become defensive?
Very defensive and suspicious of your intentions.
So, BWHFS applied for different projects to cater for the needs of the community. We now have many projects, for example the Outreach and Development Project and the Health and Advocacy Project. In this project a worker was employed to support people in their contacts with the health services, making appointments for them, escorting them to the GP or the hospital. We also set up the Xaanano Young Girls Project. Young girls, were getting involved in so many things, especially after school, drugs and other mischievous things, so we employed a person who could organize outings, activities for them.
What age group are you talking about?
From 15, teenagers. We also have the Young People’s Development Project, which is mainly for young men working on the same issues. We have the Somali Project for Education and Training for those refugees who cannot get a job.
You run the training programmes?
Yes, here in this centre, we have computers and trainers here. We have got two people who work in schools on exclusions and other things, and an ESOL and Counseling Project. We also have a Basic Skills Project for literacy and numeracy and have set up the Somali Elderly Women’s Support and Lunch Club.
We organized this club to minimize the isolation that many older Somali women experience, as many of them do not like to leave their homes. They come here and they socialize with women from different parts of Somalia, they talk about what is happening back home or here. We talk to them while they have their lunch, which is provided by the Social Services. We have counseling sessions with them where we discuss the issue of FGM and you cannot imagine the experiences that they have had and they have witnessed when they were back home or when they were younger. Of course some of them might be sad when people talk of abandoning the practice, but many of them understand and they know that infibulation is very bad. But if you say that even ‘sunna’ is not acceptable they look at you as if you are crazy. They say ‘how can you abandon this, there must be something’. They say that they should practice ‘sunna’ so that the girls will be clean, ‘halal’. They feel that an uncircumcised girl is dirty but if you tell them that in fact infibulation is not clean, it is covering the inner parts with all the dirt and the residue of urine and blood, they agree with you. They think of the cut of the flesh of the clitoris as the equivalent to male circumcision. And they cannot imagine somebody going without a circumcision, it is not ‘halal’. But some of the women talk about some of the religious men who have been saying that female circumcision is ‘harram’. So you get different ideas from different people. They learn from each other, at the same time you learn from them, and they also learn from us.
When you tell them, for example, that FGM is not practiced in Saudi Arabia, that not a single girl has been circumcised there, they believe you and they can also tell you about other countries. They come from different backgrounds and have grown up and lived in different countries before they came here. They have got a lot of experience.
In the young girls’ project we talk about sexual health in general and then FGM as part of that. We also talk about HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. Female Circumcision is very important for that group. We give them sessions on FGM and they have got their own answers, like the old women and they have got their own experience. They will tell you how they were circumcised, when they were circumcised. And of course, the ones who are not circumcised do not talk about it.
They won’t admit it?
No they won’t admit it in a group. But if one or two girls talk together they can talk about it, they can admit it to each other. Those girls who have grown up together in this country trust each other, they came when they were very young. But in a group they know that there are others who came from Somalia recently so they can’t talk in front of them and say that they haven’t been circumcised.
So even with that age group of girls it would still be shameful not to have been circumcised?
Yes, unless they are the same group who grew up together in this country.
Is it you impression that by that age, 15, most of the girls have been circumcised?
Yes, most of them, especially those who came from Somalia.
And that would have happened there not here?
Yes.
When we are running our courses, like the Somali Women Taking Care of Business Project, we also talk about FGM.
So you bring it in to every other program?
Yes we do. We have set up traditional dance and drama for young girls and we have also organized a play around that issue about two years ago.
We have a Home Based Literacy Project in which we are partners with Tower Hamlets College. We go to young mothers who cannot go out and join colleges. So they have got tutors from the college and we are the ones who co-ordinate the work. My responsibility is to plan sessions on sexual health for those people. I have designed information packs about HIV/AIDS and FGM.
So does the home tutor talk about these issues with the young women, or is it you or your co-workers?
Most of the time it is me. What I do is go to them, make an assessment of their needs and then after a while because they know me, I introduce the teachers to them in their homes, then we become aquainted. Then I ask them if I can come and talk to them about sexual health, about HIV/AIDS and then within that I talk about FGM. I ask them ‘are you circumcising your daughters?’ because they have got babies and if the babies are girls I have to talk about them. I ask them if they know it is illegal here and so on. We have a friendly kind of chat but at the same time the information is being introduced gradually to them.
Do you have the impression that this is a new issue for them to think about?
Some of them are aware but for example they don’t know about the laws and so on. Some of them want to circumcise their daughters and they ask me what is the alternative? I say that the alternative is to leave them alone because this is wrong and it is very harmful and at the same time it is an old fashioned practice and it is not in the Koran. The most important thing that they need to hear is that it is not in the Koran.
Then they feel that they have permission not to do it?
Exactly.
At what age are girls being ‘circumcised’ here?
Nobody will tell you.
Do you have any idea, can you guess?
No you can’t. You suspect things but you don’t know exactly what is happening. But I am sure 100% that most of those people who want to circumcise their children take them out to do it.
Really, so they would go to Somalia or somewhere else?
Yes, Somalia or somewhere else. That’s what has been happening.
Is this for ‘sunna’ or for infibulation?
For ‘sunna’, most of the time for ‘sunna’. Unless, when they get there, the grandmothers, you know the older women, insist on it. It depends also on the intelligence of the mother. If the mother is receptive to new ideas she will say ‘no’. If the mother is uneducated and she is not a person who is receptive to new ideas, the grandmother will say ‘oh let me bring the circumciser over’ and then she will do it all to the girl, that can happen.
We shouldn’t assume that this issue is something that is very easy to understand.
For who to understand?
For everybody, because people have been doing this for generations and it will take time and a lot of effort, a lot of giving out information, again and again and again. People can change, but a few leaflets and one or two visits is not enough.
Do you think that working with the older women as you do in your lunch club has an effect, since it is often the older women in the family who insist on the circumcision taking place?
I think that it can contribute a lot to the discussion of whether a child is going to be circumcised or not in the family. Because mothers’ have a big say and a lot depends on whether the mother is educated or enlightened. Some people are not educated but they can change easily, they think about things. Other people are not that intelligent and clever and they will listen to an old woman. Its an attitude, and people’s attitudes are different.
So you have to be sensitive to that person and how to work with them.
Exactly. What I would say is that people are going to change, but the way they are going to change is not easy and they need consistency. They need to have people talking to them all the time about their health in general, their problems in general.
To put it in a context?
Exactly. They need to be educated, because this is about an attitude so you have to change the attitude gradually by developing the person themselves, the mother, the grandmother. If you produce laws you haven’t changed anything. The law cannot change any thing. It will create fear and people will run away.
If you are talking to people, if you say that FGM is illegal in this country does that make any difference to them?
It is more effective to talk about why it is not a good idea to practice FGM but in fact you do have the chance to talk to them about the legitimacy, the value of this practice. But when it comes to a family deciding on the future of their child, you are not there. It is up to them.
And the law is not there either.
Yes, the law is not there. So what can change these people, the mothers, the fathers, is giving them more information and the information should also be coming from those places that they are taking their children to, like Somalia. Unless the issue is discussed openly in the countries in which it is being practiced the change will be slow. It will be quicker if there is a campaign going on back home, in Somalia, in West Africa. We should start from the root so that when people go back they will listen to the radio, they will watch the TV, they will listen to their ministers, they will listen to the religious people. If the campaign is started it will be easier for people to change because they won’t stick to something that the whole nation is against.
What is the role of the religious people in the Somali Community here, do you work with them?
The people who listen to the religious people are getting mixed messages. Some are saying that we should practice ‘sunna’, some say we have to touch the girl but not cut. Some say ‘no’ the practice is ‘harram’. Most of those saying this are the young people who are becoming more religious, looking at the way they live, trying to be good Muslims without being fanatics. You know people are being labeled fanatics without people even knowing anything about them. Young menor young girls who feel that they should learn more about their religion are being labeled as fanatic. This is wrong and it will damage our community. These people are really the ones who are helping our campaign, who are saying we should stop. In every religion, when you study you will see things in a different way. So these are good men who are practicing the religion in the right way and they are the ones who are giving the right message.
I was thinking about the young girls in your project. When they talk about their experience of FGM do they talk about the health problems they may have suffered as a result and do you offer support for these health problems?
Yes, they will get support. When a girl talks about the problems she has we make an appointment for her with the clinic, the Well Woman African clinic which is run by midwives who are really aware of the issue. If it is a problem that can be solved by the midwife that is OK otherwise a consultant is involved.
Do you work with the local health professionals to make them aware?
They know. The local medical professionals know because they always come across circumcised women. They know what to do, especially in London, central London, the midwives and the obstetricians have been attending seminars organized by FORWARD and BWHAFS and other organizations. Those people that I come in contact with are aware, but if they need to know more, for example about the background of the person and how they can help them, we can help them. We always advise these professionals to have an interpreter, especially a woman, available all the time for these women because it is the language barrier that causes a lot of problems.
I am also interested to ask about the men in the community. Do you work with young men, with older men on FGM. Do they have a role in this?
Yes they have a role. Whenever we have these workshops, especially sexual health workshops, we talk to them about FGM. The problem is in our community women’s issues are completely separate, are not discussed by men, and I think in all Muslim communities it is the same. The issues that concern the female genital organs are something secret to the woman. Although women are being circumcised, especially infibulated, to ensure that they are a virgin for their husbands, even this is not true. You can have extra-marital activities or relationships with infibulation.
But the men are very important. Here the men understand what is happening, what is being discussed on the TV and in the newspapers but back home the men don’t. So for example, if a man without knowledge marries a girl who is not circumcised, it will be a shock to him. Maybe he would need an explanation, we don’t know. But somebody who is enlightened, who knows what is happening, who has read about the issue and why a woman should not be circumcised, he wouldn’t mind.
This is why I am saying that this should be discussed in the countries at the root of the problem. In the schools, especially in the schools, so that boys as well as girls will grow up with that information. So that every boy will feel that it is OK to marry a girl who is not circumcised. But if the child has grown up in a society where virginity means infibulation, then it will be very hard to change things.
So that is what it is about for men, about virginity?
What it has been about, especially there in Somalia.
The information we have to give here is information on not taking them back to be circumcised, because as far as I know they are not circumcising their children here. The information we should be able to give is that even in Somalia people are not circumcising their children because that is what they need to hear. But if they are not sure that what I am saying is right and when they go there, everything is normal, everybody is circumcising their daughters, they will not listen to our arguments.
I think the campaign that started especially in this country in the early eighties is gaining momentum and there are signs of success but we have to build on that success by more awareness and outreach work and more work with the policy makers.
Here?
Here. This country can make an impact on what’s happening there. A policy maker here can even go to Somalia and visit and talk to the government, so co-operation is very important. Laws are fine but they should come from a consensus. It should be the end of the process, not the beginning.
So this new amendment…
That is what I am referring to, because if you don’t know how far the information has reached in the community, if you have no information on what is happening if you haven’t met the community themselves, the people, you don’t know how to plan a program for them.
Is that what has happened?
Yes. Maybe somebody has come to the policy makers and told them something but we don’t know where it has come from and on what basis it has been put forward. We know that children are going and coming back. OK fine. The policy makers could come to the community and say if you go out, for example, you could lose your right to come back, things like that. If you go there and circumcise your daughter you will be in trouble. People should know that first, before the law comes in. But they don’t know and when they bring back their children who have been circumcised, what is going to happen?
Do you think it is practical, how could it be enforced?
No, I don’t know. That is one of the things I cannot understand and I don’t really like people being harassed, becoming criminals. So before they get into that sort of trouble they have to have the information.
And also if the punishment for the parents is imprisonment, then what happens to the children?
What happens to the children – they are lost. It is about protecting the children but protection is not only one way, there are so many ways that children need protection. We have to protect the child and also the family and the community. So how can we find that balance?
Before we stop Faduma is there anything else you would like to say?
Yes I would like to say three things to Womankind:
1. The issue of FGM and forced marriage is not simple and that the education of young girls about FGM should be included in the work.
2. There needs to be more funding for more organizations to be set up in Somalia, especially in Somaliland. An office there to co-ordinate what all the agencies are doing. Maybe some funds can be diverted from Kenya or Ethiopia.
3. Maybe Womankind could play a role in linking the different diaspora communities and the different Somali communities in London, some kind of umbrella to co-ordinate the work. More outreach workers are needed.
OK I’ll pass those thoughts on! I just want to thank you Faduma for giving me so much of your very precious time and for sharing so much about your history and the issues that are important to your community. It has been truly fascinating for me.
Jo Pettitt
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