Findings by CNN reveal that girls as young as 10 years old in Malawi are being sent to sex camps to be initiated.
The girls are taken to the camps where they are taught to have sex and expected to lose their virginity.
The horrifying
practice is not new – it is a time-honoured ritual passed through
generations and the girls are sent by their families to make sure they
are accepted into their communities as adults.
When she was
aged 10 Grace was sent to an initiation camp which took place not far
from her home in Golden Village, where Grace lives with her grandmother.
During her
week-long stay she said she was taught her about respecting her elders
and doing household chores, but also how to have sex by the women that
led the camp who are known as anamkungwi, or ‘key leaders’.
She told a group of journalists visiting Malawi with the United Nations Foundation that the women demonstrated sexual positions and encouraged girls to do ‘sexual cleansing,’ also called kusasa fumbi, which meant they should get rid of their inexperience with sex through practice.
Not all initiation ceremonies in Malawi encourage girls to have sex, as programs and local cultures vary throughoutthe diverse country, which is home to several ethnic groups and languages.
Pockets exist
throughout the country, especially in the south, that teach sexually
explicit content to their youth. Initiations that encourage premarital
sex are practiced among various ethnic groups, including the Yao and
Lomwe, which are based in the south, according to Malawi Human Rights Commission, which is charged with investigating rights violations.
The commission
also reported that girls as young as six have been sent to initiation
camps, where they're taught how to have sex. It condemned the sexual
curriculum for young girls, saying it impinges "on a number of rights of
the girl child such as the right to education, the right to health, and
the right to personal liberty and dignity."
Human rights
groups and researchers have also found instances when a man, nicknamed a
hyena or fisi, has sexual intercourse with newly initiated girls as
part of the rite of passage. Men enter the girls' room, one woman told a
focus group which was held for teens and adults by the Johns Hopkins
University Bloomberg School of Public Health researchers to examine
perspectives on initiation rites.
"They say they want to see whether the girls have really grown up by having sex with them," she was quoted as saying,
In Malawi, over 10% of the population between the ages of 15 and 49 have HIV/AIDS, according to national data.
"There's no
benefit to the sex education," said Mkandawire. "This is harmful to the
girls. This is one of the factors fueling child marriage in Malawi. Why
teach girls this when they're nine or 10 years old?"
Malawi ranks 10th for the highest rate of child marriages in the world, with half of its children married before the age of 18,according to the World Health Organization.
The country also suffers one of the world's highest maternal mortality
rates, according to UNICEF. And 35% of all pregnancies in Malawi come
from teenage mothers.
The younger the
girls, the more they are at risk for pregnancy-related problems such as
fistulas -- a condition that results in leaking urine and feces --
bleeding and other complications.
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