In Ivory Coast, trafficking in clitorises of circumcised women

When he was a fetishist, convinced that it would bring him “power”, the Ivorian Moussa Diallo (*) regularly coated himself with an ointment made from the clitoral glans of a circumcised woman reduced to powder.

“I put that on my body and face for three years” every three months or so, “I really wanted to be a great leader”, the fifty-year-old confided to AFP. It was about ten years ago, when he was consulted as a sorcerer and healer around Touba in the northwest of the country.

This case is not unique. In several regions of Côte d'Ivoire, “this organ is used to make love potions, have money or access high political functions”, reports Labe Gneble, director of the National Organization for Children, Women and the Family (ONEF).

Instrument used by former circumcisers near Touba, in the northwest of Côte d'Ivoire, on July 10, 2024 © AFP – Issouf SANOGO

On the clandestine market, its price can exceed the minimum wage (75,000 CFA francs, 114 euros).

In Touba, “we hear that it is highly prized for mystical practices,” confirms police lieutenant N'Guessan Yosso.

After interviews with former fetishists and circumcisers, researchers, NGOs and social workers, AFP was able to establish the existence of trafficking in clitoral glands of excised women transformed into powder and sold for the powers attributed to them.

The origins of this illegal trade are obscure and its scale difficult to estimate. But local actors are convinced that he is one of the obstacles to the fight against excision, which has been banned in Ivory Coast since 1998.

– “Pounded with stones” –

Around Touba, at the time when he was a fetish priest, a figure sometimes considered a traditional doctor, Mr. Diallo was often called upon by circumcisers wishing to be protected from evil spells.

Mory Bamba, an Ivorian Muslim religious leader who fights against female circumcision, holds a fetish used by former circumcisers, near Touba (northwestern Côte d'Ivoire), July 10, 2024 © AFP – Issouf SANOGO

This genital mutilation, most often practiced between childhood and adolescence, can be considered by families as a rite of passage to adulthood or a way to repress a girl's sexuality, explains UNICEF.

Perpetuated for centuries by different religions in West Africa, it constitutes a violation of fundamental rights according to UNICEF. In addition to physical and psychological pain, its consequences are serious and even fatal: sterility, complications in childbirth, infections, bleeding…

In the middle of the forest or in a house, Mr. Diallo accompanied the circumcisers to a sacred place for the occasion of one or several dozen excisions. Close to these women, he could thus obtain the famous powder.

“When they cut the clitoris,” the circumcisers “first dry it for a month or two” and then “pound it with stones,” he describes.

The result is a “black powder” that they sometimes mix with “leaves, roots, bark” or “shea butter.”

Black powder presented as a mixture of human flesh and plants in the village of Kamassela near Touba (northwest of Côte d'Ivoire), July 10, 2024 © AFP – Issouf SANOGO

They can sell it for around “100,000 CFA francs (152 euros) if the girl is a virgin”, “65,000 CFA francs (99 euros) if she has already had children” or barter it for services, continues Mr. Diallo.

According to the man, who now campaigns against FGM, the trafficking continues.

In the village where he lives today, he says he recently obtained a powder from a circumciser. A mixture of human flesh and plants, he says, which AFP was able to observe without being able to have it analyzed. The product is impossible to obtain without a financial transaction.

– “Organ trafficking” –

Depending on the village, the clitorises of young girls and young women are usually buried, thrown into a river or given to their parents, former circumcisers explained to AFP.

But one of them, interviewed in the west of the country on condition of anonymity, confirmed the occult use of clitorises torn from women.

“People pretended to be the girls' parents and left with the clitoris,” she recalled.

Former excision site in the village of Kamassela, near Touba in northwestern Côte d'Ivoire, July 10, 2024 © AFP – Issouf SANOGO

Among these imposters, fetishists who used the organ during “incantations” and then sold it, she claims.

Another accuses fellow sisters of being accomplices. They “gave it to people who did a bad job” for mystical purposes.

Mutilated as a child, Bintou Fofana (*), a thirty-something, recounts how her mother, aware of this trade, explained to her that she had insisted on recovering the removed flesh.

Under Ivorian law, the trade in the glans of the clitoris is “organ trafficking” and “receiving stolen goods” punishable, like excision, by several years in prison and fines, emphasizes lawyer Marie Laurence Didier Zézé.

The police headquarters based in Odienné, which covers five regions in northwestern Ivory Coast, says it has never prosecuted anyone for such trafficking.

“People don't give information about sacred things,” deplores Lieutenant N'Guessan Yosso.

According to residents interviewed in Touba, circumcisers, considered prisoners of evil spirits, are feared and respected.

– “Crazy” –

“The clitoris cannot give powers”, dismisses the gynecologist Jacqueline Chanine based in Abidjan, “it's crazy”.

The practice is nevertheless found in several regions, researchers testify.

Fetishes abandoned by former circumcisers in the village of Kamassela, near Touba (northwest of Côte d'Ivoire), July 10, 2024 © AFP – Issouf SANOGO

Health socio-anthropologist Dieudonné Kouadio was able to see this during work on excision carried out 150 km to the north from Touba, in the town of Odienné.

“I was presented with a box that contained the ablated organ, dried, in the form of a slightly blackish powder,” says this researcher at the University of Bouaké.

He shared this discovery in a study carried out with the Djigui Foundation, a major player in the fight against female genital mutilation in Côte d'Ivoire.

The Ministry of Women, which validated the conclusions of this study published in 2021, did not respond to AFP's requests for a reaction.

In the Denguélé district, which includes Odienné, farmers “buy clitorises. They mix the powder with seeds to improve the production of their fields,” explains Nouho Konaté, a member of the Djigui Foundation who has been collecting information for 16 years. on excision.

During the awareness-raising activities he organizes, Mr. Konaté reveals the existence of this trafficking to the parents of young girls, who are “shot down”.

Further south, in the center-west, women use powdered clitorises as aphrodisiacs, hoping for example to prevent their husbands from being unfaithful, explains criminology doctor Safie Roseline N’da, author with two sociology researchers of a scientific article on the fight against excision published in 2023 which mentions this trafficking.

The three academics also report the use of the blood of excised women to worship gods.

This is not the only occult practice linked to the use of a body part in this country, according to Me Didier Zézé.

“Mysticism has a central dimension in daily life, it affects all spheres of social, professional, romantic and family life,” notes the Canadian anthropologist, Boris Koenig, who is a specialist in occult practices in Ivory Coast, without this generally being “illicit,” he adds.

– “Survivance” –

This trade is “one of the reasons for the survival of female genital mutilation” in Côte d'Ivoire, denounces the Djigui Foundation as well as Onef, an NGO fighting to improve women's living conditions since the 1990s.

The prevalence rate of excision has fallen in the country since it was banned and remains below the West African average (28%), according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development).

But one in five Ivorian women still claims to have undergone genital mutilation and in certain regions of the north, the rate can exceed 50%.

In the places where the former fetish priest Diallo was called, up to “30 women” were excised in one day, he assures. The period from January to March is preferred, when the hot and dry harmattan allows for better healing, he specifies.

In Touba, agents of the only social center in the region note that excision continues clandestinely and remains difficult to assess.

It is hidden behind traditional festivals with no apparent link, they say, evoking the arrival of excisors from neighboring Guinea, located a few kilometers away and where the excision rate exceeds 90%.

(*) Names have been changed.

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