Change.org petition started by survivor Jaha Dukureh urges US to commission a report that would update FGM statistics
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US female genital mutilation petition passes 100,000 signatures
Change.org petition started by survivor Jaha Dukureh urges US to commission a report that would update FGM statistics
• Sign the petition to help end FGM in the United States
Jaha Dukureh, a 24-year-old survivor of FGM, created the Change.org petition, which urges the US government to commission a report that would update statistics on the prevalence of women subjected to FGM in the US. It collected its 100,000th signature on Friday afternoon.
“I hope the government listens to all the 100,000 people that have taken their time to sign this petition, to say what we’re asking for is very, very important and it needs to happen,” Dukureh told the Guardian. “So I just really hope they take action as well.”
Her campaign is supported by UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, prominent Muslim cleric and activist Imam Baba Leigh, US congressman Joe Crowley and the Guardian.
“Listening to people and getting them to tell me how this has impacted them, how this has moved them, is just so rewarding, I’m so happy,” Dukureh said.
The petition calls on the federal government to commission research on the prevalence of FGM in the US to enable it create a comprehensive plan to end the practice and provide services to women who have already been subjected to it. The practice was outlawed in the US in 1996, but at least 228,000 women in the US are thought to be affected, according to research from Brigham and Women’s hospital in Boston.
Dukureh hopes her petition will continue to raise awareness of the issue and start a national conversation about the horrors girls in the US and around the world experience.
“By the time [my children] grow up, I hope they won't have to worry about FGM, especially my daughter. I hope she grows up in a world ... where no girls are ever at risk of FGM, and especially not when they were born in America.”
At one point, the petition collected 7,800 signatures in one hour and the signatures come from 131countries, according to Change.org. It was the fastest growing US petition on the site on Thursday, and second fastest growing globally.
“I hope the government listens to all the 100,000 people that have taken their time to sign this petition, to say what we’re asking for is very, very important and it needs to happen,” Dukureh said. “So I just really hope they take action as well.”
Dukureh sought advice on the campaign from Fahma Mohamed, a 17-year-old activist in the UK who led a similar campaign in the country that led education secretary Michael Gove to write to all schools in England and Wales about the horrors of FGM.
Along with the petition, Dukureh is working on community outreach efforts through the group she founded, Safe Hands for Girls. Dukureh is hoping to organize an FGM conference with the group in Atlanta in June.
Over the weekend, the group celebrated the completion of a four bedroom house by Habitat for Humanity for a 27-year-old West African immigrant and FGM survivor. The woman, Naima, approached the group after her husband, who she married in a forced marriage, died last year
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