Dr. Satang Nabaneh Says Laws Alone Cannot End FGM, Calls for Community Action

By Fatou Sillah

Dr. Satang Nabaneh, a Gambian legal scholar and human rights practitioner, has said that criminalizing female genital mutilation is an important tool in combating the practice, but warned that legislation alone cannot change the deeply rooted attitudes that sustain it.

In an interview with Kerr Fatou, Dr. Nabaneh said The Gambia’s experience since banning FGM in 2015 demonstrates both the importance and the limitations of relying on criminal law to eliminate a practice embedded in social and cultural traditions.

The country’s anti-FGM law has faced renewed scrutiny in recent years, including an unsuccessful effort in the National Assembly to repeal the ban and a legal challenge before the Supreme Court.

Dr. Nabaneh said similar debates have unfolded elsewhere in Africa, where governments have criminalized FGM but continue to face difficulties with enforcement and implementation.

“We cannot just use criminal law to change mindsets,” she said.

Instead, she argued, criminal penalties should be accompanied by sustained engagement with communities, religious and traditional leaders, policymakers, and other decision-makers who can influence attitudes toward the practice.

Dr. Nabaneh pointed to Kenya, where a challenge to the country’s anti-FGM legislation argued that the prohibition infringed on constitutional protections for culture and tradition. Kenya’s High Court rejected the challenge, finding that FGM violated fundamental rights, including those related to dignity, bodily integrity, and health.

She said debates over FGM should also be viewed within a broader international context.

Dr. Nabaneh cited research examining links between conservative movements in African countries and groups in the United States and other Western nations, including the exchange of ideas, advocacy strategies, and financial support.

She called for further research into the role of external actors in debates over FGM in Muslim-majority West African countries, including greater scrutiny of how advocacy seeking to preserve the practice is financed.

Turning to The Gambia, Dr. Nabaneh said research by UNICEF, the Gambia Bureau of Statistics, and other institutions has indicated a slight decline in FGM since the ban was enacted in 2015.

But she cautioned that enforcement can produce unintended consequences.

Families seeking to avoid detection, she said, may subject girls to FGM at increasingly younger ages. In some cases, she added, the practice has been performed on babies, with potentially severe and sometimes fatal consequences.

Dr. Nabaneh also highlighted the difficulties that can arise when an accused person is a parent, caregiver, or primary breadwinner.

Prosecuting and imprisoning such a person, she said, can leave children and other dependents without adequate support, particularly in a country where social protection services may lack the resources to immediately meet the needs of affected families.

Those concerns, however, should not prevent authorities from enforcing the law, she said.

Dr. Nabaneh welcomed the prosecution of alleged FGM cases, arguing that enforcement is necessary if the prohibition is to serve as a meaningful deterrent. At the same time, she acknowledged that prosecutions can provoke resistance and backlash in communities where support for the practice remains strong.

“Again, law itself should not be the only strategy and the only approach,” she said.

She cited Burkina Faso as an example of a country that has combined stronger enforcement and prosecution of anti-FGM laws with sustained community engagement.

For The Gambia, Dr. Nabaneh said, the broader lesson is that ending FGM will require more than legislation or prosecutions. Criminal law can establish clear boundaries and consequences, she said, but lasting change will also depend on addressing the social attitudes, community pressures and beliefs that allow the practice to persist.