Daily Dispatch

A responsibility for all of society

ULWALUKO , the traditional Xhosa rite of passage to manhood, should be a process of pride and joy, not only for the youth who embark on this customary journey, but for their families too.

Boys are encouraged to undergo this ancient practice without showing fear or weakness and many prepare themselves to do so willingly and with a sense of great honour. But increasingly, as the winter and summer initiation seasons in the Eastern Cape approach, these are accompanied by a sense of dread and deep concern due to the numerous initiate deaths.

There are strict regulations that govern the rite. Central to these is the well-being of the initiates. However, bogus traditional surgeons and nurses who act out of greed tend to ignore many of the rules and so continue putting the lives of innocent youths at risk.

In 2014 the total death toll for the eight preceding years stood at a whopping 500.

This week, the initiate death toll for this summer season had reached 24.

The lives of most of these initiates have been cut short by botched circumcisions or improper aftercare. Some fatalities are also the result of dehydration as the water intake of initiatives is often cut down in the bush, as noted by cooperative government and traditional affairs (Cogta) provincial spokesman Mamnkeli Ngam this week.

With each fatality the outcry and the calls for urgent intervention grow louder.

Virtually every year the authorities promise to do more to stop the annual cycle of needless deaths. Yet each year scores more youngsters die.

So far this summer, nine bogus surgeons have been arrested and charged with conducting unlawful circumcisions. The arrests mostly followed the boys’ parents opening cases with the police after their sons had been circumcised illegally and without their permission.

While most of the deaths recorded have been in the Chris Hani region, most of the arrests – six of the nine – have been in the King Sabata Dalindyebo municipal area, which includes Mthatha and Mqanduli.

Ngam has said “we want traditional circumcision practitioners to account for each and every death. Nobody must kill initiates and escape arrest”.

He makes a crucial point about accountability. And certainly the arrests and the investigation of 19 inquest dockets to determine if the deaths are to be classified as murder, culpable homicide or due to natural causes demonstrate serious intent on the part of the state.

But the province still faces the challenge of detecting and shutting down illegal initiation schools, which are very often the sites of the worst abuses of the tradition. It is here that boys as young as 11 years are circumcised.

The swifter transgressors are brought to book the faster the message will filter through to those who seem to care little about young lives. Their shameful conduct must not and will not be tolerated.

In 2014, Health MEC Dr Pumza Dyantyi said “even one death is [one] too many”.

Indeed, she summed up perfectly the tragedy of circumcision deaths.

But the responsibility cannot rest on the authorities alone. The guardians of tradition must exercise oversight, as must parents and communities in order to protect the custom.