The Réseau des Femmes Leaders pour le Développement (RFLD) convened a high-level consultation in Dakar on Monday, uniting feminist leaders and Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) from across West Africa to strengthen protection mechanisms amid growing threats in the region.
Titled “Solidarity, Protection and Lineage of Resistance,” the gathering at RFLD’s Dakar Office in Cité Keur Gorgui brought together approximately 30 participants. Women defenders from Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Guinea joined representatives from Senegal’s feminist civil society, institutional actors, donors, and journalists. The event adopted a deliberate Afrofeminist framework, placing the voices and leadership of African women at the center.
RFLD opened the session with defenders from its extensive network of 670 member organizations, followed by expert inputs and contributions from institutional and donor representatives. “She who arrives is bound to those who came before. We move forward by remembering them,” the network declared, invoking the long history of African women’s resistance to guide both the structure and substance of the discussions.
“The methodology of the Dakar convening was to centre, explicitly and structurally, the voices, analyses and leadership of African women themselves, rather than speaking on their behalf,” RFLD explained. This approach underscored a commitment to authentic representation and collective memory as drivers of progress.
The consultation featured prominent voices, including Mme Hannah Forster, former Executive Director of the African Centre for Democracy and Human Rights Studies (ACDHRS), and Prof. Mabassa Fall, a respected jurist and African human rights expert. Hon. Prof. Remy Ngoy Lumbu, ACHPR Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, represented continental institutions, while Mr. Naji Moulay Lahsen of the International Commission of Jurists provided insights from the Sahel and North Africa.
Diplomatic and donor presence reinforced international solidarity. Mme Katja Roeckel, Country Director of GIZ Senegal, and H.E. Catharina Cappelin, Ambassador of Sweden to Senegal, attended alongside senior Senegalese government officials. Both GIZ and Sweden’s development agency Sida reaffirmed their sustained, trust-based partnership with RFLD.
RFLD, an African feminist intermediary conceived, governed, and led by African women, operates offices in Porto Novo, Accra, Banjul, and Dakar. The network manages the WAFFF Fund and Africa Portfolio Grant to support grassroots groups, runs the DƆNÙESÈ Data Center, and coordinates rapid response for defenders at risk. Monday’s consultation formed part of its BRAVE programme, which links bodily autonomy, the Maputo Protocol, sexual and reproductive health rights, and defender protection.
Organizers emphasized the broader significance of such spaces. “They restore the dignity of being heard to defenders whose work is too often silenced. They signal to defenders themselves that they are not alone,” RFLD noted.
The event concluded by reaffirming its guiding principle in both French and English: “Celle qui arrive est liée à celles qui sont venues avant. Nous avançons en nous souvenant d’elles.” – “She who arrives is bound to those who came before. We move forward by remembering them.”
RFLD holds African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) Observer Status No. 553 and currently co-chairs the SEA-T Programme Advisory Council, funded by Germany’s BMZ and implemented by GIZ.
