Community protective mothers guiding girls to a better path.
In Mali, the local approach "protective mother, protected daughter" is preventing child marriage, female genital mutilation and other forms of gender-based violence.
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They look like mother and daughter sitting together, chatting away. It's like that. Kadidiatou Daou, 50, is the "protective mother" of Mariam Bakayoko, 15, a pupil in Year 9. They both live in the same street in Niamakoro, a district in the Malian capital, Bamako.
Almost every day, usually after school, Mariam, Kadidiatou's "protected daughter", visits her "protective mother" before going home. During this time, the teenager chats about her daily life and experiences. At the same time Kadidiatou encourages her learning and gives advice on how to look after her health, how to manage her menstrual cycle, and how to prevent unintended pregnancy.
"Kadidiatou is like my second mum. I find it easier to talk to her than to my own mother. I can share things with her that I wouldn’t share with my mother. Like, for example with my mother, sexuality is a taboo subject", Mariam explains.
But just two years earlier, Mariam and Kadidiatou had never even really spoken to each other. The "protective mother, protected daughter" pairing was formed by drawing random lots. Some 15 teenage girls were entrusted to 15 community mothers trained to help protect them from gender-based violence (GBV), child marriage and dropping out of school, and to support their sexual and reproductive health.
"Kadidiatou is like my second mum. I find it easier to talk to her than to my own mother."
"I'm the first-person Mariam confides in when she experiences important events. For example, when she had her first menstrual period or when she passed her grade 10 exam. I often go to her school to talk to her teachers. Thanks to the close relationship we've established, she listens to my advice and hasn't dropped out of school despite the difficulties that were pushing her to do so," Kadidiatou says.
"If it hadn't been for Kadidiatou and her advice, I would already have stopped school. I was really on a bad path. I was spending my days on the streets with friends, exposed to all sorts of dangers. I could have been mugged several times. What's more, if I hadn't gone to school, my parents would have given me away in marriage and I would have become pregnant even before I was 15", Mariam adds.
In this district of Niamakoro, the "protective mother, protected daughter" approach was implemented after an alarming number of children were dropping out of school and cases of child marriage and early pregnancy were on the rise in this community of nearly 64,000 inhabitants.
The "protective mother, protected daughter" approach was already familiar to most of the protective mothers. When they were younger, they had also been entrusted to village mothers or grandmothers who supported their education, especially around reproductive health. The practice, which is common in certain local customs and cultures, has been replicated and promoted in this community by the Association pour la Promotion des Droits et le Bien-être de la Famille (APSEF) thanks to UNICEF, the only organization funding this approach in Mali. It is a component of the project to promote community-based approaches to the prevention and transformation of social norms linked to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), child marriage and other forms of GBV.
More than 3,960 "protective mother, protected daughter" pairs have been set up in Mali in 198 localities in the regions of Koulikoro and Kayes, and 30 sectors of Commune VI of the District of Bamako. These have contributed significantly to preventing more than 211 cases of child marriage and 50 cases of FGM in just twelve months (between 2022 and 2023).
The strengthening of confidence and self-esteem among adolescent girls through this approach contributes, at both individual and community levels, to the adoption of attitudes and norms conducive to gender equality and their right to reproductive health.
The promotion of community-based approaches to the prevention and transformation of social norms related to FGM, child marriage and other forms of GBV has been funded through contributions from the UNFPA-UNICEF joint programme for the elimination of FGM.
