(contenu disponible en anglais uniquement)
Pacific girls speak out: Championing rights and resilience at CEDAW Talanoa
When the largest volcanic eruption ever recorded struck Tonga in 2022, it triggered a devastating tsunami. Amid the chaos, a single mother of three clutched her youngest children, aged three and five, while her eight-year-old daughter ran a few feet ahead. As the first wave receded, it dragged the daughter toward the ocean.
“All she could do was pray,” recalled Olive Mafi of the Tonga National Youth Congress, as she shared this story of a single mother affected by the Tsunami during a powerful side event at the CEDAW Pacific Technical Cooperation Session in April this year. Miraculously, Olive shared that the little girl grabbed hold of a branch and was saved. As the family fled inland, the child turned to her mother and whispered, “Mommy, I’m cold.”
This is by no means a one-off incident. “It’s the story of many,” Olive shared with the audience in the room at the University of South Pacific (USP) Japan Pacific ICT Lecture Theatre. “And it underscores why we must invest in young women in order to equip them with the right resources, skills, and knowledge to thrive amidst disasters.”
This moment set the tone for the thematic side session titled “Children, Youth and Gender: Navigating Rights under CEDAW”, a standout talanoa facilitated by the Pacific Women Lead at the Pacific Community's (SPC) Pacific Girl Programme together with the Human Rights and Social Development Division's desk during the April 2025 CEDAW Pacific Technical Cooperation Session in Suva, Fiji.
Across the Pacific, adolescent girls face intersecting challenges from gender-based violence, unequal access to health and education, and climate vulnerability, to persistent exclusion from leadership and decision-making spaces. And yet, Pacific cultures also hold deep reservoirs of strength and values, including resilience, respect, and collective care.
The session brought together diverse youth voices, young and adolescent girls, feminist leaders, CEDAW Committee members, regional CSOs, government officials, and multilateral partners to explore what it meant to grow up in the Pacific and as a female through the lens of CEDAW, cultural resilience, and the lived experiences of youth.
Designed by PWL at SPC’s Pacific Girl programme and the Human Rights and Social Development Division, the session combined regional technical expertise, people-centred methodology, and deep relationships across the Pacific. It blended visual storytelling through a compelling and touching video featuring the voices of young women and adolescents from across the Pacific (Pacific Sista Tok), which started the discussions in the room, followed by a panel discussion, and interactive dialogue with CEDAW Committee members, creating a rare platform where adolescent girls were not only present but leading.
“CEDAW is a call to action,” shared Melissa Bule, one of the speakers at the Talanoa session. Melissa is the Vice Chair of the Pacific Youth Council and a member of the PWL Youth Working Group. “But for it to be impactful, it can’t just exist as a set of principles on paper. We need to make it tangible, something experienced by young people every day in our villages, communities, towns, and cities.”
Melissa highlighted how Pacific girls are already leading in so many areas, whether advocating for education, steering climate movements, or mentoring peers. “Young people in the Pacific are not waiting for permission to lead, we are already leading, every day in our homes, our schools, and our communities.”
Building on this, Olive Mafi reflected on the role of national youth structures: “In Tonga, while CEDAW has not yet been ratified, young women are driving climate action and disaster response. From tree planting to food security efforts and post-disaster water relief, they are redefining what leadership looks like on the ground.”
As part of her reflection, Olive parted with a challenge to leaders and stakeholders in the room: “How confident are you that the youth we have today will lead us to a future we can all look forward to? If we think otherwise, then either we’re doing something wrong, or we’re not doing enough.”
Olive’s reflection was followed by yet another strong young woman from the Pacific: Ms Patrina Tawake, Girls Officer at the Fiji Women’s Rights Movement (FWRM), who shared insights from FWRM’s pioneering feminist leadership programme for adolescent girls, including girls with disabilities.
“Young girls face double discrimination: for being young, and for being female. Add disability, and the barriers deepen,” Patrina explained.
“Our Girls Arise programme, which is supported by the Pacific Women Lead at SPC, builds leadership skills, confidence, and advocacy among girls aged 10 to 17, including deaf girls from the Fiji Gospel School for the Deaf, because girls with disabilities matter, too.”
Patrina spoke of Emma, a graduate of the programme, now working in a garment factory:
She told us: ‘I’m grateful to be part of the FWRM Girls Programme. Now, I can speak up for myself.”
And Lucy, another participant, shared: “I now have the confidence to tell stories as a deaf girl, because we matter.”
Patrina closed off her reflection with a vision, “My dream is to see a world where girls are not held back by gender bias, poverty, or discrimination. Where every girl, no matter her ability, is not just a recipient of help, but an active agent of change. Through Girls Arise and our partnerships, such as those with PWL at SPC and the Pacific Girl programme, we’re building a generation that will not be left behind.”
Across the Pacific, young and adolescent girls face complex challenges from gender-based violence and lack of access to sexual and reproductive health and rights, to climate vulnerability and exclusion from decision-making spaces. Yet, Pacific cultures also uphold values of resilience, collective care, and deep respect for women and girls. The April 2025 Pacific Technical Cooperation Session of the CEDAW Committee provided a rare and valuable platform to explore these intersecting dynamics through a regional lens, focusing specifically on the lived experiences of children and youth.
The talanoa also showcased grassroots innovations, such as the Talitha Project’s adolescent leadership programme, which Vanessa Heleta has championed in Tonga’s outer islands.
“We don’t do one-off workshops. We embed ourselves in the community, working with girls, families, teachers, and faith leaders,” Vanessa shared. “We create space for girls to lead, whether that’s giving the welcome remarks, saying the prayer, or running the sessions. They need to know their rights, as well as their responsibilities. That’s how leadership is grown.”
One of the most powerful testimonies came from 19-year-old Anna, a graduate of Talitha’s programme and the youngest member of the Pacific Women Lead Governance Board.
“When I first heard the word CEDAW, I thought it meant same-sex marriage,” Anna reflected. “That’s what we were told in our village and schools.” Years later, through her journey with Talitha and Pacific Girl, Anna now mentors others and advocates at the highest levels of regional governance.
“This is why we need to invest early. Because when young people have access to the right information, resources, and support, they grow into informed, unstoppable leaders.”
The Children, Youth and Gender talanoa was more than a side session. It was a model of Pacific Women Lead’s (PWL) core approach, bringing together a diverse group of actors, connecting global human rights frameworks, such as CEDAW, to grassroots realities, and catalysing tangible change through partnerships, storytelling, and youth-led engagement.
The talanoa session showcased the power of youth and regional civil society, and at the core, how PWL at SPC is creating platforms and spaces for the voices of young adolescent girls and youth across generations, cultures and sectors to share and lead global conversations on their human rights. The talanoa session was also an opportunity to inspire greater attention to the realities of Pacific girls, including girls with disabilities and the compounded barriers they face.
This side event was one of the most talked-about sessions of the entire CEDAW week. CEDAW Committee members were deeply moved, describing the session as a ‘standout’ and ‘excellent’ for its honesty, relevance, and innovation. The voices of young Pacific people shifted the dynamic from extractive consultation to genuine co-creation, giving the Committee a deeper, more nuanced understanding of how rights are experienced, or denied, across the Pacific. The session brought lived realities into formal UN spaces, reshaping global dialogue on youth, gender, and human rights. It demonstrated that Pacific youth are not passive recipients but credible change-makers, and it reinforced PWL’s leadership model through its Pacific Girl programme, which combines technical expertise with deep regional relationships built through its Pacific Girl Reference group model.
In closing the talanoa session, CEDAW Vice Chair Corrinne Detmeijer reminded the room that while frameworks like CEDAW and the CRC exist, adolescent girls often fall through the cracks: “Not fully children, not yet women” and called for the global community to recognise this gap by appointing a dedicated Special Rapporteur for the girl child.
“We have a Special Rapporteur for child abuse. We have one for gender-based violence. But we have none for the girl child. And yet she is uniquely vulnerable, facing discrimination not just as a child, but not yet protected fully as a woman. She is special. And she deserves a dedicated global voice. That is what I leave you with: we must fight for the girl child to be seen, heard, and protected,” Ms Detmeijer reiterated.
Human stories shared by young women leaders from the Pacific, such as Emma’s and Lucy’s, as well as those of the tsunami survivors, carry legal frameworks further than any policy brief alone. These stories give international treaty bodies like CEDAW life, grounding abstract rights into lived experience. At the same time, regional frameworks such as the Pacific Youth Development Framework (PYDF) are vital tools for turning global commitments into meaningful, culturally rooted local action.
The work led by Pacific Women Lead at SPC, together with the Pacific Girl programme, reflects a transformative approach and one that centres girls and young women as agents of change, not just recipients, and ensures that their voices, stories, and solutions shape the systems intended to protect and empower them.
Drawing on long-standing partnerships with organisations such as the Fiji Women’s Rights Movement (FWRM), the Talitha Project, the Tonga National Youth Congress, and the Pacific Youth Council, PWL ensured that the session featured diverse and representative youth voices, including adolescent girls from outer island communities and girls with disabilities. These trusted relationships enabled the meaningful participation of young people who are often excluded from formal policy spaces, allowing them to lead rather than be token participants.
As a result of PWL’s technical leadership and convening power and participatory approach, this talanoa session prompted serious consideration by the CEDAW Committee of a potential Special Rapporteur for the Girl Child and highlighted the need to better protect adolescents who fall between the cracks of existing frameworks. Ultimately, this talanoa session alongside other similar side sessions showcased PWL’s ability to combine policy expertise with grassroots insight, turning global human rights commitments into locally relevant, youth-led action.
