Senegal 2022 – Io Donna, Sky Italia

Fatoumata Seydi is a young girl from Sédhiou ( Casamance). In her community, Female genital mutilation (#FGM) is still common as a rite of passage for young children and #girls.

Fatoumata was subjected to it when she was a child. Her mother was one of the women in charge of practicing it on young girls in the community. According to tradition, Fatoumata is now supposed to replace her mother in her role. She has already received the knife used to conduct FGM. She stores it under her bed, but refuses to use it.

In the past elderly woman, Kadiatou Boiro has practiced FGM on dozens of young girls in Sédhiou. Thanks to NGO’s work to raise awareness against FGM, she is now trying to convince other women to abandon FGM practices.

She was the one who convinced young Fatoumata to refuse to follow in her mother’s footsteps.
Because of this both of them, like many other women who have made this choice, are stigmatized by part of the community as they are abandoning ancestral traditions.

FGM still exists even though we talk about it very little. A project carried out in collaboration with Amref for the world day against FGM on Feb. 6