Let us stand with the women of the Sahel in recognition of their power to shape a better future

I will highlight how five of these overlapping crises land, specifically, violently and disproportionately, on the bodies of women and girls and on their futures. Some of the data I present draws on recent briefings shared by the UN Special Coordinator for the Sahel.

First: terrorism. No region is more affected. Life for women and girls under terrorist control is one of erasure from public space. Their freedom, movement, and appearance are policed and restricted.

In Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso, over one million girls are out of school because of attacks or threats.

Abduction is not a by-product of terrorism in the Sahel; it is a tactic. In Burkina Faso alone, the number of women and girls abducted rose by over 218 per cent last year.

Across the wider region, 60 per cent of out-of-school girls have never set foot in a classroom. When a girl loses her education, she becomes vulnerable to mutilation, to early marriage, to early pregnancy, and to trafficking.

In Mali, Niger, Chad, and Burkina Faso, child marriage rates rank among the highest in the world.

Female genital mutilation affects 90 per cent of women in Mali, and 76 per cent in Burkina Faso.

Maternal mortality—itself driven by early pregnancy and poverty—is tragically among the highest anywhere on Earth.

Second: poverty. As violence displaces families and shutters markets, women’s livelihoods vanish and household resilience collapses.

Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, and Niger are in the bottom ten countries globally on the Human Development Index, and on the Gender Development Index.

Third: food insecurity. Levels nearly doubled this summer compared to just 18 months ago.

Droughts grow harsher, with heat-related mortality expected to increase four-fold in the region by 2080.

The distances women and girls travel to fetch water or firewood are growing longer, while their safety is shrinking.

Two-thirds report feeling unsafe on these journeys, in a region that already ranks among the highest globally for reported cases of sexual and gender-based violence.

Fourth: the world is pulling away. Humanitarian funding is drying up: only 8 per cent of this year’s humanitarian needs were funded by this May. Development assistance has dropped by nearly 20 per cent in the last two years. The impact of this cannot be denied.

In Burkina Faso: 45 per cent of women’s empowerment projects have been suspended.

Inflation and debt is squeezing gender equality out of budgets. Funding for women, peace, and security is often the first to go out.

Gender ministries are being merged, erased, or defunded.

Fifth: democratic space closing in. In many parts of the Central Sahel, the space for civil society, media, and women’s political participation is shrinking.

In Niger, just 14 per cent of participants in a recent national conference on institutional reforms were women.

In Mali, only two women took part in drafting the new National Charter, out of 36 members.

Despite all this, there is hope.

In Chad, women now hold 34 per cent of parliamentary seats, double the previous share, and the 2023 constitution pledges to end child marriage and female genital mutilation.

Women’s organizations in the Central Sahel continue to engage with transitional authorities.

In Mali and Niger’s border zones, women’s participation in conflict prevention rose from 5 to 25 per cent, helping resolve over 100 natural resources conflicts.

Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have committed to advancing women’s political participation and upholding Security Council resolutions on women, peace, and security.

The European Union has committed EUR 6 million to Chad’s Women, Peace and Security Plan. I encourage others to do the same.

Joint UN programming increased adolescent girls’ return to school by 23 per cent, and doubled women’s local governance participation in 34 conflict-affected communities.

The World Bank–funded Sahel Women’s Empowerment and Demographic Dividend Initiative has reached over three million adolescent girls with health care, safe spaces, and life skills.

The Gender Compact for the Sahel, led by UNOWAS, the Special Coordinator, and UN Women, is ensuring the UN system delivers tangible targets on women’s leadership, participation, and gender analysis.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration, and the 25th anniversary of Security Council Resolution 1325—an opportunity to recommit to the women and girls of the Sahel.

I call on you to:

• Urge governments and regional bodies to ensure women’s full, equal, meaningful, and safe participation in transitional governments and peace and security efforts.
• Implement affirmative action laws, and ensure a safe, open space for civil society.
• Invest at least 15 per cent of violent extremism prevention funding in gender equality, and ask for engendered updates from sanctions and counterterrorism bodies.
• Support the rapid deployment of Women Protection Advisors to UNOWAS to monitor sexual violence trends, engage with parties to conflict, and secure time-bound commitments.
• And, even in a challenging financial landscape, I urge international partners to provide direct, flexible, long-term funding to women-led and women’s rights organizations through mechanisms such as the Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund and the Peacebuilding Fund.

Above all, Excellencies, let us recall that women from the Sahel have been telling us all along: we cannot abandon the Sahel—whatever the politics, whatever the funding landscapes, whatever the geopolitical headwinds.

So let us stand with the women of the Sahel—not out of charity, but in recognition of their power to shape a better future.

Thank you.