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More than 100 girls fled villages in Tarime and Serengeti districts in the Mara region for fear of being subjected to female genital mutilation.
The girls are camping in a center run by the Association of Fight Against Female Genital Mutilation (ATFGM) in Masanga, Tarime district.
"We have received 103 girls who have fled female genital mutilation, the majority of them from Tarime and other Serengeti districts," Valerian Mgani, project leader of ATFGM, said on Friday.
December of each year is the season of FGM. The district commissioner of Tarime, Glorious Luoga, went to the Masanga ATFGM center on Friday and warned that not all the perpetrators of FGM would be spared this time.
He insisted that the government would continue to protect girls from FGM and other illegal practices. "It is our responsibility to protect these girls and any parent or guardian involved in FGM will be arrested and brought to justice," Luoga said at the opening of the ATFGM camp in 2018 to girls who were fleeing for fear of being forced to undergo FGM. .
Several girls interviewed after their arrival at the center said they were escaping genital mutilation after discovering that they were planned. "I saw signs of this and I was at risk of female genital mutilation.
That's why I'm at the center ATFGM Masanga. We are asking the government's intervention, "said one of the girls who preferred anonymity, so the number of girls expected to camp in the center will likely increase in the coming days.
FGM is illegal under the laws of the land. Mara is one of five regions of the country and some communities still consider female genital mutilation as an important ritual.
Reports indicate a decrease in the number of female genital mutilation cases in Tarime District following ongoing campaigns to end the government's harmful ritual in collaboration with local and international organizations, but ritual is still practiced in some parts of the region.
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