Let’s give up harmful practices

Shocking news of Malawian man hired to have sex with underage girls hit headlines recently. It was only after the journalist exposed the man that President Peter Mutharika’s administration reacted. The man known as ‘hyena’ is hired to sleep with underage girls after their first menstruation through a sexual cleansing ritual called ‘kusasa fumbi’. In the BBC expose, Eric Aniva, a sex worker known in Malawi as a “hyena” admits that he is HIV positive but does not disclose his status to those who hire him. You can imagine these young girls life being cut short because of this harmful practice. They are denied their freedom to education and introduced to sex at a tender age by their seemingly less informed guardians or parents. Limited access to information allows harmful cultural practices like the Malawian case to persist.

To avoid such horrific incidents, harmful cultural practices should be abolished to save our children. Though every culture has important practices, which perpetuate community cohesion, or celebrate life cycle through generations, there are those that interfere with rights of individuals. Culture could be positive if it promotes social cohesion and unity. but those others that erode the physical and psychological health and integrity of individuals, particularly girls and women should be abandoned. There are many harmful practices, which are still going on in the society but are yet to get global attention like female genital mutilation, child marriage, and gender bias because people have decided to remain silent about them. They are equally harmful and have severe impact on women. It is time to change our ways and stop the harmful cultural practices, which infringes on rights of individuals and are harmful to their wellbeing. Let us abandon such practices, which bring shame and disgrace to the whole continent. Community leaders and policy makers should be involved in eradicating these harmful practices from the grassroot levels. Awareness campaigns should be conducted by various governments to denounce harmful cultural practices which damage individual’s integrity and infringes on people’s rights. An individual’s human rights are absolute, and may not be limited by those seeking to invoke culture as a justification for practices which violate international human rights standards.