Worried that her daughters' budding breasts would expose them to the risk of
sexual harassment and even rape, their mother Philomene Moungang started
'ironing' the girls' bosoms with a heated stone.
Cameroonian women demonstrate in Douala, Cameroon, on International
Women's Day in 2002. Geraldine Sirri was only nine years old when her
mother started daily massaging her pre-pubescent breasts with a blazing
hot stone to keep them flat -- and keep men's eyes and hands off her
daughter. One-quarter of all Cameroonian women are said to have been
victims of this painful "breast-ironing," as it is known.
[AFP] |
"I did it to my two girls when they were eight years old. I would take the
grinding stone, heat it in the fire and press it hard on the breasts," Moungang
said.
"They cried and said it was painful. But I explained that it was for their
own good."
"Breast ironing" -- the use of hard or heated objects or other substances to
try to stunt breast growth in girls -- is a traditional practice in West Africa,
experts say.
A new survey has revealed it is shockingly widespread in Cameroon, where one
in four teen-agers are subjected to the traumatic process by relatives, often
hoping to lessen their sexual attractiveness.
"Breast ironing is an age-old practice in Cameroon, as well as in many other
countries in West and Central Africa, including Chad, Togo, Benin,
Guinea-Conakry, just to name a few," said Flavien Ndonko, an anthropologist and
local representative of German development agency GTZ, which sponsored the
survey.
"If society has been silent about it up to now it is because, like other
harmful practices done to women such as female genital mutilation, it was
thought to be good for the girl," said Ndonko.
"Even the victims themselves thought it was good for them."
However, the practice has many side effects, including severe pain and
abscesses, infections, breast cancer, and even the complete disappearance of one
or both breasts.
The survey of more than 5,000 girls and women aged between 10 and 82 from
throughout Cameroon, published last month, estimated that 4 million women in the
central African country have suffered the process.
"You ask me why I did it?" said Moungang. "When I was growing up as a little
girl my mother did it to me just as all other women in the village did it to
their girl children. So I thought it was just good for me to do to my own
children."
The practice is now more common in urban areas than in villages, because
mothers fear their children could be more exposed to sexual abuse in towns and
try to suppress outward signs of sexuality, the survey said.
Its findings have prompted a nationwide campaign to educate mothers about its
dangers and to try to eradicate it. A similar campaign some years ago helped
drastically to reduce rates of female genital mutilation in Cameroon.
"A girl...has to be proud of her breasts because it is natural. It is a gift
from God. Allow the breasts to grow naturally. Do not force them to disappear or
appear," said a leaflet from the campaign.
Moungang said she stopped ironing her daughters' breasts after one girl
developed blisters and abscesses.
"I took her to the hospital and the doctor scolded me and advised never to do
it again because it could ruin my daughter," she said.
The practice is most common in the Christian and animist South of the
country, rather than in the Muslim North and Far North provinces, where only 10
percent of women are affected.
"Massaging the breasts with hot objects is painful, very painful, and can
completely destroy the breasts," said Bessem Ebanga, executive secretary of
women's rights group RENATA, herself a former victim.
"Some girls could be traumatized throughout their lives and their sexual
behavior could be disturbed forever."
For Ndonko, the campaign is a battle to respect the physical integrity of
young girls -- with broader implications for human rights.
"If nothing was done today, tomorrow the very parents may even resolve to
slice off the nose, the mouth or any other part of the girl which they think is
making her attractive to men."
