In less than one month, the Justice for Girls Convening & Festival will take place in Kenya, bringing together activists, survivors, policymakers, governments, funders, and movement leaders committed to ending female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) and child marriage within a generation. More than a convening, it is a space for bold ideas, shared strategies, and collective action grounded in lived experience and global collaboration at a critical moment for the gender justice movement.
Ahead of the convening, Survivor Expert Leader Aarefa Johari reflects on the movement’s vision, why survivor leadership matters, and what she hopes participants will build together in Kenya and beyond.
About Aarefa Johari: Aarefa Johari is an award-winning journalist, writer, and co-founder of Sahiyo. She has been speaking out about FGM/C in her community since 2012 and has been at the forefront of the movement to end the harmful practice in India. In addition to shaping and co-leading Sahiyo’s transnational work, her grassroots work in India involves community engagement and campaigning, advocacy, and media sensitization about FGM/C.
Building a Movement
More than a decade before Justice for Girls came together, Aarefa was already helping build a movement to end FGM/C in India. She sees joining the initiative not as the beginning of something new, but as the next chapter in work that has been unfolding for years.
“Joining the Justice for Girls movement is an extension on the work I have already been doing for over 13 years at the forefront of the movement to end FGM/C in India. Around 2012, we were just a handful of survivors and allies trying to break the silence about the practice of khatna in the Bohra community by talking about it publicly. Since then, we have been joined by more and more voices, found strength and healing with each other, and formed grassroots organisations. We have engaged with communities, doctors and policy makers, provided safe spaces for survivors, carried out research, and joined regional and global networks of organisations working to end FGM/C. There is a lot we have achieved, but changing social norms is difficult work, and we still have a long way to go.”
As the movement has grown, so have its ambitions, but so have the challenges. For Aarefa, one of the greatest barriers isn’t a lack of commitment or expertise, but a global funding system that has consistently overlooked survivor-led grassroots organizations.
“One of the biggest hurdles we face, of course, is funding, without which our ability to carry out community-based programmes is severely limited. When it comes to women and children’s rights, global funding structures have unfortunately been lopsided for a very long time, with survivor-led grassroots organisations in communities of colour inevitably getting the (very) short end of the stick. This is precisely the problem that the Justice for Girls movement aims to address, and I am happy to be a part of it.”
Reimagining Global Funding
One of the Justice for Girls initiative’s goals is to develop a movement-led global action plan for the next five years. For Aarefa, that plan must go beyond broad commitments and address one of the movement’s biggest structural barriers.
“I hope this plan includes the creation of a joint group of global stakeholders – survivor-experts, organizations, and funders – who work towards a systematic overhaul of our current funding structures.
If we truly want to end FGM/C in communities around the world, grassroots organizations need to be trusted, fully supported, and funded directly. For this to happen, the racism at the heart of our funding systems needs to be examined with honesty and rooted out.
This plan prioritizes survivor-activists, who are best placed to be effective changemakers in their communities. I therefore hope that it also includes the creation of a fellowship for leadership development among survivors, something that was proposed at a convening of survivor-leaders just last year.”
Centering Survivor Expertise
For Aarefa, survivor leadership isn’t symbolic — it’s essential. She believes those with lived experience are uniquely equipped to lead change within their own communities.
“Survivors have lived experience within their communities, know the complexities and cultural nuances that affect any kind of grassroots work to end FGM/C, and survivor-activists, in particular, are individuals who have already demonstrated their courage and willingness to carry out that grassroots work.
For far too long, survivors have been treated by iNGOs and high-level global stakeholders largely as victims whose value is limited to the stories of their trauma, rather than as experts who are best placed to lead movements within their communities. The Justice for Girls convening aims to flip that pattern, with the help of allies.
Standing Firm in the Face of Backlash
That work doesn’t happen in isolation. Around the world, advocates are confronting increasingly organized efforts to undermine women’s and girls’ rights. Even so, Aarefa believes the movement has no choice but to keep speaking out.
“In an ideologically and communally polarized world, this is getting increasingly difficult and exhausting. However, we have no option but to keep calling out the people who throw women’s and children’s rights under the bus, try to appropriate our causes for their own motives, and those who actively turn against us. We must continue to stand by our principles and assert our right to fight for women’s rights.”
Healing Is Part of the Work
The Justice for Girls Convening & Festival intentionally makes room not only for advocacy, but also for healing, celebration, music, and storytelling. For Aarefa, these aren’t separate goals— they’re deeply connected.
“First, because there can be no advocacy work without healing. Working towards social change, particularly on issues of gender-based violence, can be exhausting for anyone; survivors have the added burden of their past traumas and triggers to deal with. In order to refill the inner resources needed to carry out advocacy work, taking the time to heal is essential.
Second, survivors are so much more than the trauma we were made to suffer. We are full human beings with careers, passions, desires, and interests, and we belong to communities that are rich in their own culture. When we convene at events like Justice for Girls, we need to embrace the celebration of all of ourselves rather than just the parts of us that are labelled ‘survivor.'”
Investing in Lasting Change
Ending FGM/C, Aarefa argues, requires more than awareness campaigns or policy changes. It requires sustained investment in the grassroots organizations doing the difficult, long-term work of changing social norms.
“There is no single, magic solution to the problem of FGM/C. Laws imposed on an unwilling community have not proved to be effective in most countries, often pushing the practice underground. Movements led mainly by advocates who are not from practicing communities are also regarded with suspicion.
Helping communities abandon a deeply entrenched social norm requires the sustained, long-term work of education, engagement, difficult conversations, and gradual changing of minds. This work cannot be carried out by grassroots activists who are either unpaid, underpaid, or lacking necessary resources.
When survivor-led grassroots organizations are backed by the long-term investment it deserves, they can reach out to communities in more geographical areas, experiment with different programmatic approaches, identify the most effective ones, and actually effect change.”
Learning From One Another
One of the aspects of the convening that excites Aarefa most is the opportunity to exchange ideas with advocates from around the world. She hopes to share lessons from Sahiyo’s own work in India while learning from the experiences of others.
“I think we all have so much to learn from each other, and that’s one of the best parts of convening with activists from around the world. In India, the FGM/C-practicing Bohra community is small and very insular, and the fear of excommunication makes it difficult for members to engage with us openly. In this cultural context, our most impactful grassroots programme has been Thaal Pe Charcha, which loosely translates as ‘conversations over food’. We have been doing it since 2017 – creating safe, intimate spaces for small groups of women and men from the community, where we facilitate difficult conversations about FGM/C while we all bond over a traditional Bohra meal. This programme has empowered dozens of community members to take a stand against FGM/C in their own homes, raise awareness, and, in some cases, prevent girls in their families from being cut.
I would love to share our learnings from this programme with my colleagues at the Justice for Girls convening, and also discuss ways to overcome the challenges we face.”
Looking Beyond Kenya
For Aarefa, the convening isn’t an end point—it’s the beginning of deeper collaboration and long-term accountability.
“I have no doubt that we will take our conversations forward into the coming years by agreeing on a clear message to send out to the world, and by staying connected to hold each other accountable.”
Ultimately, she hopes the convening’s impact extends far beyond the movement to end FGM/C and child marriage.
“I hope that we inspire all human rights movements and funders to value survivor-leaders for everything that they bring to the table, and to ensure that there is systemic change in the way grassroots work is supported.”
