Parliament of Guinea-Bissau bans female genital mutilation

07/25/2011

Human rights activists in Guinea-Bissau have won an important achievement: the country’s parliament has passed a law banning female genital mutilation. Since June 2011, the practice is punishable by five years in prison.

Female genital mutilation is a deep-rooted practice in some ethnic groups in Guinea-Bissau. “Changing the mind-set is a slow process, and throughout this process we encountered violent pockets of resistance, particularly in the early stages. It is extremely gratifying to reap the rewards of an arduous effort that began many years ago, even after some of its pioneers are no longer alive,” recalled Augusto Mário da Silva, vice president of Guinea-Bissau Human Rights League, an organization that was actively involved in the struggle against this violation.

In 2008, Augusto took part in Conectas’ Human Rights Fellowship Program for Lusophone Africa (link). As a participant, he developed a project to combat the practice of female genital mutilation. “Conectas is part of this victory, to the extent that it participated directly and actively in the development of strategies that were adopted to achieve this result,” he said.

The project proposed by Augusto was implemented by the Guinea-Bissau Human Rights League, and it included advocacy with public institutions with the authority to intervene in the legality of the abusive practice. The league was also committed to raising the awareness of the population about the problem through conferences and education campaigns targeting religious and community leaders, doctors, fanatecas (women who perform the mutilation) and victims. “The idea was to allow them to talk about the effects of this practice on women’s health and on children’s personality development,” he said. The work was conducted in partnership with other NGOs from Guinea-Bissau and with United Nations (UN) agencies such as the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).