27/04/2026
has officially kicked off and COVAW is in the room, representing the voices of the women and girls we serve.
Our Acting Programs Manager, Ivy Marigi, opened the Global Platform to End FGM/C pre-conference. Standing before global leaders and advocates, she brought the conversation back to where it belongs, to the real lives of women and girls who continue to bear the weight of a practice that systems have been too slow to dismantle.
Ivy reminded the room that behind every statistic is a girl whose body, future, and choices were taken from her. And that the global community owes her more than awareness campaigns, it owes her action, accountability, and resources.
She challenged governments to stop hiding behind existing frameworks and start funding and enforcing them. The laws exist. The conventions exist. What is missing is the political will to act.
She spoke truth about who gets left out of the global FGM/C conversation, because when countries like Libya, Morocco, and Zimbabwe are excluded from the data, the women living within those borders become invisible. And invisible women do not receive protection.
She called out the global tendency to fly in experts from outside the continent while sidelining the African researchers who have spent years on the ground, building evidence, building trust, and telling these stories with integrity and context.
FGM is not culture. It is a human rights violation. It is a political failure. And the women and girls who survive it, and those who don't deserve a world that finally treats it as such.
We are proud to have Ivy carry COVAW's voice into this critical global space and we will keep showing up. In Nairobi. In Geneva. In every room where these decisions are made.
