World Poetry Day was marked on Tuesday, March 21. Throughout Africa, spoken word art is taking firm roots, especially when it explores social issues. Spoken Word artist Valentine Onyeka Ogunaka aka Brainbox from Nigeria shares his experience.

Three members of the Bohra community in Australia were recently convicted for performing FGM on two little sisters, bringing to global attention continued existence of the condemned practice among this global community whose origins is India. Five Bohra women are working hard to end this practice, as they discuss in this interview.

Diana Kendi is the winner of the inaugural Efua Dorkenoo Pan African Award for Journalists reporting on FGM across the African continent. The award is intended to increase media awareness and engagement on FGM within community, national and regional media outlets. Diana shares her views on the suesses and challenges of ending FGM in Kenya.

Last year news that medicalization of FGM is an increasing trend in Kenya went online. Considering that Female Genital Mutilation is outlawed in Kenya, there’s a huge need to build a national and transnational strategy to tackle and address the issue in order to eradicate it.

Ethiopia remains of the African countries with the highest rate of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). Ethiopian activist Tesfaye Melaku Aberra tells Valentina Mmaka about the practice and his fight against it.

Female Genital Mutilation leads not only to severe physical consequences but also psychological and emotional ones ranging from depression, to lack of self-esteem, isolation, solitude, marginalization, insecurity, memory loss and fear of sexual intercourse to post-traumatic stress disorder. A counseling psychologist working with girls in rural Kenya shares her experiences in this interview.

Jecinta Isei, aged 20, talks about the difficulties of refusing circumcision in her Maasai community, the implications of this harmful practice deeply rooted in various communities in Kenya and her fight to end it.

Writer and human rights activist Valentina A. Mmaka tries to put into words the utterly hearbreaking massacre of young lives – real human beings, not just numbers - at Garissa University College in Kenya last week. Irritatingly, mass murders are a part of Kenya’s history.