On July 7, 2017, Dr. Ghada Hatem's team welcomed themediators of change from the European Change Plus project to the Maison des Femmes in Saint-Denis. Themediators had the opportunity to present their work on the prevention of female genital mutilation (FGM) within West African communities in France.
Mediatorscommitted to promoting the abandonment of FGM
The change mediators—DieynabaBall, Fatima Dia, Roukiatou Sissoko, and Soumaïla Sissoko—were present at the Women's House to share their experiences and feedback on community awareness. Soumaïla gave a quick recap of all the training provided to the mediators. As Fatima pointed out, "the Change Plus training provided us with solid communication tools that we put into practice during awareness-raising sessions." In addition, the project offers mediators the opportunity to join European networks working to promote the abandonment of FGM:
- training on MSFs,
- meetings between mediators from other European countries involved in the project,
- End FGM EU network ambassador program.
A promising intra-community dialogue
For Sokhna Fall Ba, project manager for Change Plus, "this project implements an important concept: people from the communities talking to their communities."The mediators are unanimous on the importance of using their native languages during awareness-raising sessions. Moreover, they are multilingual and have a thorough understanding of the customs and communication methods used within their communities. During the meeting, Roukiatou presented a short glossary on female genital mutilation and genital organs in Bambara, Fulani, and Soninke. This was an opportunity to explain to the Maison des Femmes team the linguistic taboos that exist around FGM and which can make discussions very complex.
Those present were also able to watch the screening of the short film "Amina," about the care provided to a young Somali woman who had undergone female genital mutilation and found refuge in Germany.
This meeting provided an opportunity to explore avenues for collaboration between Equipop and La Maison des Femmes, which could become a space for mediators of change to intervene.
