A report by South African-based NGO, Sonke Gender Justice, claiming that 42 youths passed away as a result of customary illegal circumcisions has been rehashed.
The figures come in the wake of pledges by the country’s provincial governments for the national police service to exert “zero tolerance” on “illegal initiation schools.”
The practice is considered a rite of passage for boys belonging to the country’s 10-million-strong Xhosa ethnic group. It entails taking youths from their homes–sometimes against their will–into huts in the bush where they are kept for a month.
Highlights
- Sonke Gender Justice reported 42 deaths from illegal circumcision rituals within just three weeks in 2012.
- Despite 2025 rumors, South African officials have not publicly confirmed any fatalities this initiation season.
- The UN’s circumcision programs in Africa have drawn criticism for fueling a profit-driven sub-economy.
Reports indicate that illegal circumcisions are executed with a razor blade
Image credits: SABC News
The process, which is steeped in spirituality and tribal lore, is treated as the turning point from boyhood to manhood.
But over the last three decades of South Africa’s democracy, it has riddled the country’s reputation with dozens (sometimes as many as 100) of fatalities every winter.
In 2012, Sonke Gender Justice reported that 42 boys had succumbed to the procedure, which, in illegal circumstances, can be executed with anything from a handmade knife to a razor blade
Image credits: SABC News
“The figures of young boys dying at initiation schools are shocking,” the advocacy reported.
“The death toll, as at July 11, was 42, in just three weeks. According to reports, this is nearly double last year’s figure of 26.”
A local NGO describes the practice as a “cultural practice” that “robs young people of their future”
Image credits: Masixole Feni / Groundup
While the fatalities were as unmissable as the voids left by the deceased victims, Sisonke–which translates to “we are together” in Zulu, the language of another South African endemic group–claims they were treated with “silence.”
“Why do we, as a caring, compassionate, democratic society, look the other way?” the missive lamented.
“Why do we allow certain cultural practices to rob young people of their future?
“What it means to be a ‘proper’ man and the fact that it has been reduced to the practice of circumcision, is detrimental not only to the young men who go through the process, but to society as a whole.”
The report follows last year's 93 fatalities and 11 amputations
Image credits: CRIN
In the country’s northern province of Mpumalanga, the department for Co-Operative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs issued a stern warning against traditional practitioners.
The warning, which was published on May 30 this year, called on parents to be wary of “bogus traditional surgeons intending to run initiation schools without a legal permit.”
Part of the government's measures to practice, which the majority of the ethnic groups' boys see as an obligation for the fear of never being seen as a grown man, was ensuring that trained medics perform the practice.
Image credits: WVI
The communique noted at the time of publication that it had already “received a total of 405 applications to conduct initiation schools this year and approved 403 of those, whereas two of them were declined due to non-compliance.”
It went on to say that the initiation season was scheduled to run from June 21 to July 21, and that anyone operating outside those parameters was liable to prosecution.
The warning comes in the wake of 2024’s 93 fatalities. It was reported by the local News 24 that “11 boys suffered life-altering injuries, including penile amputations.”
No mention has been made of the internationally circulating reports about 2025 in South Africa
Image credits: SABC News
These fatal initiation practices have drawn attention to themselves and been followed hawkishly by the public for the last three decades.
Despite numerous outlets’ claims that 39 initiates succumbed to the practice in 2025, oddly, there have been no indications of fatalities following the close of the season this year—not by the South African national or local governments, or the country’s media outlets.
The United Nations has been called out for its role in mass circumcisions in Africa
Image credits: SABC News
Going on its voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) project, it appears that the United Nations also promotes mass circumcision in Africa under the belief that circumcised men are less likely to contract HIV.
According to Child Rights International Network (CRIN), it has since become a multimillion-dollar sub-economy that thrives off Africa’s AIDS pandemic.
Image credits: SABC News
“Circumcision seems like the answer to those working within the global AIDS response, because the number of people who can be targeted for circumcision business runs into hundreds of millions,” the advocacy claims.
“Every year, millions of male children would be available to keep the programs profitable.”
The public is appalled
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