Tradition v circumcision law

2003-12-08 21:30

Cape Town - Amid a new wave of circumcision deaths and arrests, Eastern Cape traditional leaders continue to reject the province's clampdown on illegal circumcision schools.

Bisho's department of health says seven youths have died in the past three weeks as a result of botched circumcisions; since the beginning of the year 16 youths have had to have their genitals amputated.

The latest death, according to department spokesman Sizwe Kupelo, was in Umtata at the weekend, where an youth died of dehydration and ill-treatment - ironically at a school licensed by the department.

The department has also in the last week "rescued" and hospitalised 97 youths from illegal schools in Pondoland and the Umtata area.

Police working with the department have arrested 30 iincibi, or traditional surgeons, and traditional nurses so far this year for operating without permission.

But traditional leaders are of the opinion that the Eastern Cape's legislation on circumcision was out of line with the Bill of Rights.

"We regard that act as unconstitutional because it infringes on the rights of traditional communities, said the Eastern Cape head of the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa, Mwelo Nonkonyana.

"The involvement of men who are not circumcised themselves, as well as females merely because they are officials of the department of health actually is an affront to our own culture."

Traditional practitioners who perform the operation must have the permission of a medical officer, who must also license each circumcision school.

The act, which provides for fines of up to R10 000, or 10 years jail, also allows for schools to be inspected by department officials.

Nkonyana said Contralesa believed this would allow women and uncircumcised men to meddle in the ritual.

If an uncircumcised man was found near an initiation school "they will detain that person and circumcise him", he said.

The problem with women was compounded by the belief in witchraft, a fear fed by the fact that women had been found naked in the area of circumcision schools.

Traditionally such a woman would be killed "but because of the human rights thing she's detained and she's dealt with in a(nother) way by the people".

Male circumcision was beyond doubt a male issue, he said, just as female initiation rituals were a matter for women.

This week his eldest daughter was turning 21, and she had been undergoing a Pondo initiation.

"Even myself, though I'm a chief, I'll be beaten by the women if I'm found there."

Nonkonyana said the department's practice of closing down illegal schools and sending the youths to hospitals meant those boys would be stigmatised for life for not completing the ritual.

"They call them abadlezana, which means a woman who gives birth in a hospital ward. In other words, he is not a man, he is the equivalent of a woman.

- SAPA