Lara Malvesí
Barcelona (EFE) with her sisters.
“Without knowing it, I saved the lives of my sisters,” the 31-year-old bank employee today explained to EFE, on the world day against genital mutilation, that in Catalonia, with the largest population of people from countries at risk, It is still practiced clandestinely or on trips to Africa, although it is much more controlled than in the 1990s.
Aicha grew up with no recollection of what happened or of anyone telling her about her mutilation, which she found out about at the age of twenty-four.
“A gynecologist told me in the first cytology I had, which was not until I was twenty-four years old, that I had a mutilation done and I remember that I asked her: and what is that?”
Aicha then understood the reason for her infections and painful periods and searched the internet for a program that would help her rebuild on the doctor’s recommendation. That was how she found the Foundation of Dr. Iván Mañero, the surgeon who would end up operating on her.
«Everything went well and it was after the operating room when I informed my parents that I had been reconstructed. It was the first and last time I discussed this topic with them. Well, my father didn’t comment. My mother only asked me if I was okay, “she says.
«Yes, I have never spoken more about the subject. I have not even asked my mother if it happened to her too, although I am convinced that it did, “she adds.
Asked about how she lives as a thirty-year-old born in Spain, raised with other girls her age of different origins, but a victim of mutilation, she points out that she feels that it is not that they have taken “a piece” of her life, but that they have taken away ” lifetime.
«Nobody asked me before making a decision about my own body. They decided for me”, laments Aicha, who confesses that he has often wondered what would have happened to her if her parents had not emigrated to Spain and she had lived her entire life in Gambia.
“I don’t know what other people’s sexuality is like compared to mine. I can’t compare. I only know if it’s okay for me,” she says.
He stresses that the consequences of the “aberration” of mutilation do not only have to do with the “intimacy” of the woman, but with her health, since it affects the menstrual cycle, vaginal infections, and can lead to complicated deliveries for mother and fetus, among others.
«The origin of this is machismo, because in Africa women always have to be below. If they enjoy it, they don’t want them to. They camouflage it as religion or tradition or culture. No. That is not written anywhere. It’s just machismo. Women do not have decision-making power, they are plants », she denounces.
“Feminism ever in Africa? Impossible!. Something is improving in the big cities, but in the villages it will never arrive », she points out.
With his job and independent life, he feels “happy” with what he has achieved so far and points out that his parents are also “proud”, although they are more “traditional” and miss “other things”.
«My mother tells me, at your age I already had four children. Well, she looks, I don’t », she says between laughs.
In Spain there are 286,343 registered people born in or with nationality from countries where female genital mutilation is practiced, according to data from the Map of female genital mutilation prepared by the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB).
Of these, 80,282 are women, 16.2% more than in 2016, and 18,836 are under 14 years of age, a figure that has increased by 2.4% in the last five years.
Catalonia is, by far, the autonomous community that concentrates the greatest number, followed by Andalusia and Madrid.
Worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that currently more than 200 million women and girls have been subjected to mutilation, considered a violation of human rights.
