A man and his two wives have been arrested by the police after allowing their daughter to undergo Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
Confirming the arrest, Kuria East police boss Benjamin Rotich said the police were informed after the cut had already been carried out.
Rotich said that the police who were acting on a tip-off from members of the public were alerted when the family were in the process of celebrating the illegal act in Ntimaru, Kuria East constituency in Migori county.
Rotich said they rescued the girl as he warned those engaging in the outdated cultural tradition that they risk arrest and prosecution.
“We arrested the man and his two wives for allowing the girl to be circumcised in their homestead without alerting the police about illegal activity in their home,” he said.
The police boss said the suspects who are in police custody will help with the police investigations as they seek to arrest more suspects forcing girls to undergo the cut.
More than 35 girls from the area have been rescued, as the Bwirege clan of the Kuria community are conducting the cut.
Susan Mutinde, the chairperson of Gosese, a non-government organization said that the organization is assisting the rescued girls who are being housed at Tarang’anya Girls Boarding School.
Mutinde said the mothers are hiding their daughters at the school for fear that they will be forced to early marriage after being circumcised.
The chairperson said the young girls are being forced into FGM, a situation that has denied many young girls the opportunity to pursue their education.
“We realised we don’t have a rescue center in Migori county and we needed to shelter the victims on meager budget,” Mutinde said.