30.2% of Senegalese women aged 20 to 24 were married before the age of 18, and 9% before the age of 15. One in three women in Senegal had their childhood cut short by marriage. These findings come from data from the 2023 Senegal Demographic and Health Survey (DHS).

According to the 2020 COSYDEP report, 77% of obstacles to girls' education are linked to child marriage. In 2022, 53.1% of school dropouts were girls, compared to 46.9% for boys. Consequently, the risk of dropping out of school is 1.2 times higher for a child living in a rural area (statistics from the Thiès regional education authority).

To combat the scourge of child marriage, Senegal has signed and ratified numerous relevant international and regional texts, in particular the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child and the 2003 Maputo Protocol.

At the national level, it also adopted a legal arsenal: the Family Code, which sets a minimum age for marriage, and the Penal Code, which provides for sanctions.

He also put in place strategies, national action plans, programs and projects, in accordance with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on gender equality.

Given the complexity of the issue, the Association of Senegalese Women Jurists (AJS), in consortium with the Siggil Jigeen Network (RSJ) and the Senegalese Council of Women (COSEF), launched, in March 2025, the project "From community to regional: multi-sectoral approach against child marriage in Senegal and development of a common agenda with Niger".

Funded by the Basque Cooperation and Peace Assembly (BLB/ACPP) with the support of the Basque Agency for Cooperation and Solidarity (AVCS), this project, which has Niger and Senegal as intervention areas, more particularly the Thiès region, has adopted a multi-sectoral and community approach, in order to bring together the different strategic actors to strengthen the synergy of actions in the fight against this harmful practice.

Thus, the AJS carried out a series of advocacy and awareness-raising activities, namely two high-level panels in Thiès, with institutional actors (lawyers, magistrates, judicial police officers, sociologists, specialized educators, teachers, psychologists, midwives…) and community actors (neighborhood chiefs, religious leaders, "Bajenu Gox", paralegals, young people, grassroots community organizations and women's groups).

To strengthen these actions and contribute to the protection and promotion of children's rights, particularly girls' rights against child marriage, AJS is committed to setting up three human rights clubs in three educational centers in Thiès: on November 26, 2025 at CEM Ousmane Ngom, on November 29, 2025 at Lycée Jules Sagna, on December 3, 2025 at École Brigadier-Chef Makan Diébaté.

The overall objective is to create spaces for knowledge, advocacy, and protection of human rights within these institutions, in order to prevent and combat violence against children. Specifically, this will involve establishing a human rights club of 30 students in each of the targeted institutions, with the aim of "introducing children to human rights in general," "informing them about the project's content, particularly regarding child marriage," and "raising children's awareness of human rights, especially children's rights and gender-based violence."