Demba Diawara

Unilateral declaration and problem Diawara had been initially concerned in 1997 when he heard that the nearby village of Malicounda Bambara was declaring that it intended to stop the Bambara tradition of female genital cutting. A second village, Nguerigne Bambara, followed on November 6, 1997. Diawara took this advice and he saw the benefits of change. Diawara wanted his village to follow their lead but he foresaw two problems. He realised that other villages would still consider his village's girls unclean because they were not cut and these girls may have to remain unmarried. He realised that he needed to look at the whole of the village's extended social network if they were to create permanent change. He said "A person's family is not their village. The family includes one's entire social network: their relatives in many surrounding villages, in all of the places they marry ... If you truly want to bring about widespread change ... they must all be involved Diawara chose the village of Diabougou as the site of the ceremony.

The agreement was translated into other languages but it was first drafted in the Wolof language. Amongst the crowd was the woman who had performed the cutting and despite losing her income she was committed to the change.

Legacy Weeks after the Diagoubou declaration Hillary Clinton (and her husband who was then the president) gave a speech against FGC on 2 April in Senegal which attracted international coverage. Diawara's approach to communicating with his social network was later used as a model by the anti-FGC charity Tostan in their training of activists. Diawara's views were not universally welcomed. Some lamented the loss of tradition and saw Hillary Clinton's speech as "white people" telling Africans what to do. Diawara's approach grew and in 1999, another multilateral declaration involved 105 villages with an estimated total population of 80,000 people. The Senegalese government outlawed the practice, but laws may not effect a whole village's traditions in the same way as Diawara's persuasion.