By: Alieu Jallow
Tabou Sarr, the country representative for the Westminster Foundation, believes that The Gambia has more pertinent issues to tackle than FGM/C, which has received significant attention and investment of resources in recent months.
Sarr, a staunch advocate for banning FGM/C in The Gambia, expressed satisfaction with the ban’s continuation, describing it as a crucial step. However, she was unimpressed by the substantial resources invested, noting that these resources could have been used to address more urgent issues such as building industries to reduce youth unemployment and irregular undocumented migration.
“Everything came to a standstill with this bill. While maintaining the ban is important, it’s time to shift our focus to discussing and addressing other critical issues facing our country. We should be talking about development trajectories, improving gender equality, enhancing food security, reducing the cost of living, providing better farming tools for women, ensuring quality education, improving health services, reducing maternal and child mortality, increasing economic and political representation for women, combating gender-based violence, addressing irregular migration, and the list goes on.”
Female rights activists praised the democratic process demonstrated by Parliament during the vote on the Women’s Amendment Bill 2024 but urged the nation to unite and tackle other ongoing development challenges. They emphasized that it would have been disappointing if Parliament had decided to repeal the ban.
“The costs — in terms of energy, time, and money — invested in reaching this point would have been wasted if the ban had been overturned. In a developing country like The Gambia, this would have been unfortunate. We need to focus on issues other than FGM/C. As a country, we need to be more serious,” she emphasized.
Having recently assumed office as the Westminster Foundation’s country representative, Tabou also mentioned how the bill provided an opportunity for Gambians to extensively discuss FGM/C and reach a decision that protects women and girls.
“Our women should be empowered to contribute to nation-building rather than having discussions centered around cutting their bodies. This is painful and saddening for our country. I hope we can move forward and prioritize more urgent matters from now on,” she pleaded.
Many believe that prolonging the debate on FGM/C held little significance, considering The Gambia’s ongoing challenges such as high youth unemployment, soaring costs of basic food items, and corruption, among others.
