Vacation time is mutilation time

TARGET e. V. Rüdiger Nehberg launches radio campaign in Guinea-Bissau to protect girls

The rainy season is beginning in Guinea-Bissau and with it the vacations for schoolchildren. What is freedom for German children means becoming a woman for girls from the age of around 7: they undergo genital mutilation.

That's why we launched a timely radio campaign in the traditional languages Kreol, Mandingo and Fula with short daily radio spots to protect girls.

"Don't cut off our daughters' future. It's good that we respect our tradition, but fanadu harms their bodies and their souls. Let's stop the fanadu," it warns through the ether.

In the secret initiation course, the fanado, which usually lasts several days, the girls are prepared for their role and task as women. They are subjected to the custom of genital mutilation. During the school-free days, they are then supposed to recover from this brutal and serious ritual.

"With the radio spots, we are reaching people even in remote villages," says TARGET founder Annette Nehberg-Weber based on a TARGET survey on media consumption by people in Guinea-Bissau, "they will be broadcast several times a day on the most important stations until September 15."

We have produced a total of six short reports on genital mutilation in the context of tradition and religion, which are broadcast daily and at different times. This allows us to capture and resolve the various justifications for genital mutilation.

In the religion-based radio spots, for example, an imam explains that female genital mutilation is incompatible with Islam. This is because the practice is always justified as a religious duty and most of the victims are Muslim. In close cooperation with Islam, this is a further step towards protecting girls from the 5,000-year-old tradition.

Listen to such a radio spot of the Imam in Creole here: