Ending female genital
mutilation.
RFLD's continental campaign for the abandonment of FGM — anchored in the Maputo Protocol Article 5, in survivor leadership, and in the conviction that durable change is led by communities themselves. This is RFLD's campaign hub: the publications, the podcast, the field updates, and the regional advocacy that carry the work forward.
Engaging the entire ecosystem.
Ending FGM cannot be achieved by any single actor. RFLD's campaign engages six categories of stakeholders simultaneously — recognising that durable abandonment depends on alignment between traditional authority, religious leadership, justice institutions, education systems, health services, and survivors themselves.
Traditional leaders
Engagement with chiefs, queen mothers, and council elders — separating the cultural value of initiation from the practice of cutting, and supporting community declarations of abandonment.
Imams & pastors
Theological dialogues with Islamic and Christian leaders on the absence of religious basis for FGM, equipping them to use their authority to protect the bodily integrity of girls and women.
Police & magistrates
Training of law-enforcement actors on national anti-FGM laws — including Loi n° 2003-03 du 3 mars 2003 in Benin — and on victim-centred protocols that protect those who report.
Teachers & educators
Tools for teachers to identify at-risk girls, integrate FGM awareness into school programmes, and create safe spaces in which students can report threats.
Health workers
Training of medical staff on clinical care for women living with FGM, on psychosocial support for survivors, and on the Do No Harm framework that prevents the medicalisation of FGM.
Survivors as advocates
Survivors are not beneficiaries of the campaign — they are leaders within it. Trained as mentors and advocates, they carry the dialogue in their own communities with an authority no external voice can replace.
A collection of survivor testimonies.
In June 2022, RFLD launched a manual that gathers the voices of women who have lived through FGM. The publication serves three purposes — documenting the harm in survivors' own words, providing an advocacy tool grounded in lived experience, and creating an evidentiary record for legal and policy reform.
Survivor testimonies as advocacy.
The Recueil de Témoignages de Survivantes de Mutilations Génitales Féminines amplifies the voices of women who have lived through FGM. The manual brings together survivors' own accounts — the circumstances of their cutting, the consequences they have lived with, and the calls they make on policymakers, religious leaders, traditional authorities, and the women in their own families.
The publication has become a primary tool in RFLD's training of police, magistrates, health workers, and educators. It is also the foundation of much of the campaign content that follows on this page — the podcast episodes, the community dialogues, and the regional advocacy at the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights.
Download the manual →Field updates & community work.
A continuous record of what the campaign looks like in practice — workshops with frontline actors, community dialogues, youth advocacy, and the slow, persistent work of changing the social conditions under which FGM persists. Each card links to the original post.
Frontline actor workshops
Workshops with local authorities, police, and social workers on the practical interpretation of anti-FGM laws — including identification of at-risk girls, victim-centred interview techniques, and the protections owed to those who report.
View Facebook post →
Survivor legal support
Coordinating legal accompaniment for survivors and women at risk through RFLD member organisations — including engagement with magistrates and prosecutors on the consistent application of national anti-FGM legislation.
View Facebook post →
Dialogues with leaders
Intergenerational dialogues bringing together village elders, religious leaders, and youth — examining the future of traditions on the community's own terms, and supporting communities ready to make public declarations of abandonment.
View Facebook post →
Action in images
A visual record of the campaign — survivors speaking publicly, women's groups gathering across francophone West Africa, and the daily texture of the community work that the headlines never see.
View Facebook photo →
Young women leading
University and high-school engagement creating peer-to-peer networks for education, support, and the public refusal of FGM as a cultural inheritance — using social media, community theatre, and intergenerational dialogue.
View Facebook post →
Regional & parliamentary engagement
Engagement with parliamentarians across the ECOWAS region on the harmonisation of anti-FGM legislation — addressing the cross-border movement of girls between countries with differing levels of enforcement, in coordination with the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights.
View Facebook post →The Ending FGM podcast.
A 16-episode podcast series examining FGM through the perspectives of survivors, traditional authorities, religious leaders, lawyers, parliamentarians, and youth. The full series is available on RFLD's YouTube channel.
Role of State & Legal Actors
How legal frameworks and state institutions can reinforce — or undermine — the fight against FGM in Benin, with a focus on the practical application of Loi n° 2003-03.
Legal regulations on FGM
Gender-based violence & FGM
Mobilising men and boys
Community dialogue & engagement
Sensibilisation & action
Youth engagement strategies
Legal perspectives on FGM
Voices of community leaders
Social media's role in the fight
Vision of young girls in the North
Child protection & FGM
Means and methods of FGM
Existential dimension of FGM
Regional advocacy & the African Commission.
The campaign extends beyond national borders. RFLD coordinates with feminist civil society across West Africa on legislative harmonisation, and engages the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR) on the continental enforcement of women's-rights protections.
West African advocacy & ACHPR engagement
FGM is a cross-border issue that requires cross-border solutions. Families travel between jurisdictions to access the practice in countries with weaker enforcement. RFLD coordinates with civil society partners and parliamentarians across the ECOWAS region to support legislative harmonisation — closing the geographic loopholes that perpetuate harm.
In coalition with partner organisations, RFLD has engaged the Government of The Gambia on its commitment to upholding the laws prohibiting FGM. RFLD holds Observer Status with the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR) and is an active participant in continental human-rights mechanisms — using these platforms to mobilise local organisations to engage directly with Special Rapporteurs and AU bodies.
Read the Open Letter to President Adama Barrow →Get in touch.
For partnership opportunities, programme enquiries, member organisation collaboration, journalist training requests, or to invite RFLD to speak on the work — please reach the appropriate channel below.