A Table Discussion titled Together to unite efforts to eradicate female genital mutilation in Egypt
In light of the celebration of the international day for Health; Tadwein Center for Gender Studies has arranged a table discussion titled “Together to unite efforts to eradicate female genital mutilation in Egypt” on the 7th of April 2021. The Table included participants from a variety of governmental, parliamentary, medical syndicate representatives, and NGO members. The table included four main Dialogue sessions: the first session discussed the new amendments on the Egyptian Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) Law; the second discussed the difficulties and challenges faced by the medical syndicate in eliminating medical FGM; the third explored mechanisms to increase reporting and response to FGM crimes, and the fourth session discussed enhancing collaboration between governmental and non-governmental institutions.
Among the top recommendations were:
- The inclusion of men in all activities supporting women and their social rights.
- Unifying efforts among all state institutions concerned with working on the issue of female genital mutilation.
- Intensely working on initiating law implementing mechanisms and finding ways to increase the reporting rates on this crime.
- Training judiciary and prosecution men as well as centers for legal studies on dealing with the issue of FGM to understand the full scope of the issue as well as its dangers to deal with it in a realistic and effective manner.
- Raising awareness to doctors, especially those influential in their areas, on the physical, psychological, and sexual dangers to FGM, as they’ll get to have a strong impact and influence on their societies.
- Increasing the collaboration between the concerned national councils concerned and civil society institutions.
- Launching a media campaign directed to some groups, such as media figures, representatives, and other socially influential characters to encourage them to address and work on the issue of FGM.
- The importance of discussing FGM from a legal perspective and avoid discussing it from a religious one. Moreover, it must be dealt with as a crime rather than a social habit.
- The creation of protection mechanisms for those who report crimes of FGM.
- Obliging the medical syndicate to penalize FGM practicing doctors as this practice is considered a violation of medical ethics.
- Training students in all faculties and institutes on the physical, psychological, and sexual damages of FGM and the laws criminalizing it.
- Expanding social research on FGM to draw a clearer picture on this issue.
- Training concerned personnel working in the field of combating FGM on effectively communicating their messages.
- Creating a database for all NGOs that displays each organization’s scope of work to facilitate their cooperation.
- Necessitating holding periodic meetings for the institutions working on the cause of combating FGM to prioritize their needs and proposing ideas to work on them unilaterally and parallelly.