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"CAIRO DECLARATION ON FGM
+5"
High
Level Meeting
13-15 December
2008 Cairo, Egypt
Meeting Overview
No Peace Without Justice (NPWJ)
and the Egyptian National Council for Childhood and Motherhood
(NCCM) organized, under the patronage of H.E. Mrs Suzanne
Mubarak, First Lady of Egypt, the "Cairo Declaration on
FGM +5" High Level Meeting on 13 15 December 2008 in Cairo,
Egypt, bringing together representatives of governments,
parliaments, and civil society from 20 Afro-Arab countries
affected by FGM as well as international and regional organizations
and representatives of other stakeholder governments, parliaments
and civil society.
The meeting provided the opportunity,
at five years from the Cairo Conference "Afro-Arab Expert
Consultation on Legal Tools for the Prevention of Female
Genital Mutilation" of 21-23 June 2003, to undertake a systematic
review of progress achieved and challenges encountered following
the campaigns aimed at the eradication of FGM and to strengthen
and accelerate the global movement conducive to the eradication
of FGM as a violation of the rights of girls and women,
as proclaimed in the "Cairo + five declaration: ending FGM
by outlawing it once and for all: a goal we can achieve".
By shifting the focus to legislation
as an essential instrument in combating FGM and stressing
the fact that FGM must be recognized and treated as a violation
of human rights, the 2003 Cairo Conference represented a
turning point in the campaign against the practice, and
"The Cairo Declaration on the Elimination of FGM" encouraged
governments to pass legislation aimed at the progressive
elimination of the practice continues to be a benchmark
document, elements of which have informed pivotal texts,
such as national legislation) as well as Article 5 (which
explicitly confronts FGM) of the African Union Protocol
on the Rights of Women in Africa; to date 18 African countries
of the 28 in which FGM is practiced have laws.
In the intervening five years,
there have been a number of positive developments, including
the adoption of the Maputo Protocol on the Rights of Women
in Africa, the presentation of the United Nations Secretary
General's Study on Violence Against Children, the adoption
or revision of anti-FGM legislation by a number of countries
which participated in the 2003 Cairo Conference, including,
most recently Egypt, the creation of National Action Plans
on combating FGM, the creation of independent national human
rights bodies and ombudsman positions, monitoring mechanisms
including telephone help-lines, the development of new and
emerging initiatives by international organizations, and
strengthened, more coherent advocacy initiatives.
However, much work still remains
to be done, and NPWJ organized the 2008 High Level Meeting
with the intention of beginning a campaign to mobilize political
will, turning stated commitments against FGM into a shared
political strategy that marginalizes the practice and strengthens
and broadens the political impact of campaigns to date.
Among its aims was to generate a "positive competitive environment"
that may spur activists, parliamentarians and governments
to work towards the enactment of the best possible legislation
on FGM, though the sharing of experiences from countries
where effective laws have been adopted as positive templates
for other countries so as to encourage the building of technical
capacity in developing effective legislative measures.
The High Level Meeting was
attended by H.E. Mrs Suzanne Mubarak, First Lady of Egypt
and H.E. Mrs Chantal Compaor, First Lady of Burkina Faso
and delegations representing 20 affected countries of the
region, at the Ministerial level (Mali, Senegal, Sierra
Leone and Togo) as well as representatives of ministries
and parliamentarians who have been at the forefront of work
to pass effective FGM legislation, prominent members of
civil society whose campaigns to end FGM in their respective
countries have been of key importance, and international
representatives and UN and regional organizations.
The main work of the High Level
Meeting took place in three working sessions each of which
confronted a central issue in current worldwide work on
FGM. In the session on FGM Legislation as a Tool for Behavioral
Change, participants agreed that legislation is both a
reflection of society and has a role to play in leading
society towards changing behavior, and that FGM should not
be defended under the guise of culture or tradition,
but should explicitly be treated as a human rights violation.
Participants launched an appeal to outlaw FGM in all its
forms at the local level, in national legislation and through
any appropriate regional and international instruments,
pointing out that adequate rights-based legislation is a
pre-requisite for outlawing FGM entirely, with a view to
its total eradication.
The session on Reaching the
FGM Communities: the Role of Outreach, Public Information
and Media Campaigns discussed the critical role that media
has to play in informing communities, and specific target
groups within communities, about the basic facts related
to FGM, engaging them in discussions to challenge historical
attitudes and persuading them that FGM is harmful to the
best interests of their children and, in their recommendations,
participants emphasized that use be made of new and existing
technologies that allow individuals to engage in interactive
two way communication.
In the session on Measuring
Success: Sharing Knowledge Useful in Understanding Trends
on FGM participants focused on the fact that since recent
strategies for eliminating FGM focus on changing communities
perceptions of women's rights, the indicators and measures
used for evaluating the success of anti-FGM projects must
undergo a similar reorientation away from medical indicators
towards ones that can express changes in societal attitudes
and behaviors.
The final declaration presented
the occasion for all participants to call for accelerated
action, to keep the momentum and redouble efforts, to make
ending FGM - by outlawing it once and for all - not only
an achievable goal, but one that will be achieved. To keep
the momentum, participants suggested that within a year,
a follow-up conference be organized to continue the assessment
of implementation of the High Level Meeting recommendations
and all other efforts to address FGM as a human rights violation.
Planned Follow-up Activities
With the High Level Meeting,
NPWJ has relaunched its FGM campaign, with a view, on the
one hand, to seek opportunities and possibilities to increase
worldwide awareness through advocacy aimed at international
instruments and commitments of the need to pass legislation
outlawing FGM, and on the other hand to strengthen the commitment
and the political will of concerned states, in particular
in 2009 in West Africa, to work towards the elimination
of the practice.
To this end, NPWJ aims to organize
a series of actions, also to determine a possible host for
the follow-up conference called for in the "Cairo + five
declaration: ending FGM by outlawing it once and for all:
a goal we can achieve", so that at the highest levels it
will provide an opportunity for the reaffirmation of political
commitment to FGM legislation, to fight against FGM and
to consolidate technical capacity. NPWJ will hold consultations
with stakeholders in countries with high FGM prevalence,
and, in collaboration with its local partners, will organize
seminars in three of the interested countries to accelerate
the implementation of effective anti-FGM legislation.
To build on the momentum generated
by the High Level Meeting, NPWJ is seeking ways to widen
its advocacy in the international sphere to mobilize resources
for FGM elimination activities, such as lobbying at the
parliamentary, government and inter-governmental levels
for the adoption of relevant documents, resolutions and
others instruments, as well as other actions, including
notably the organization of a high-visibility event harnessing
prominent artists to help spread the message, aimed at public
opinion and decision-makers on the need to better fight
FGM by outlawing it.
As part of its campaign, NPWJ
is also planning activities aimed at addressing the regional/subregional/transregional
elements of FGM practices and campaigns, where there is
increasing need for a systematic and coherent approach:
as part of this activity will be the development of a comparative
assessment of the enactment and implementation of specific
legislative measures on FGM, a "FGM Legislation Toolkit"
which would serve as an instrument for parliamentarians,
government representatives and civil society in their legal
reform on FGM advocacy efforts.
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