It is an absolute slap in the face for all of us.
In Sierra Leone — where more than eight in ten women have undergone female genital mutilation — the country's first lady, Fatima Maada Bio, has declined to publicly condemn the practice, saying she requires 'reliable data' before taking a stance. Her position, offered despite an ECOWAS court ruling that FGM constitutes torture and a legal order to criminalize it, has drawn sharp rebuke from survivors, health professionals, and human rights advocates who see in her silence not neutrality but permission. It is a moment that asks an old and painful question: when a person of power withholds condemnation, who bears the cost of that silence?
- A filmed appearance in which Maada Bio told FGM practitioners 'not to fear anything' sent a signal that survivors and UN professionals described as an endorsement from the highest office in the land.
- More than twenty signatories — including Sierra Leone's first gender minister and a UN human rights expert — sent an open letter warning that her stance threatens to unravel decades of advocacy and contradict the country's own international commitments.
- Maada Bio has pushed back, calling her words misrepresented and sharing a BMJ ethics article questioning the 'standard narrative' on FGM, while publicly labeling prominent anti-FGM campaigners 'scammers' to her 600,000 Facebook followers.
- An ECOWAS court ruling in 2025 declared FGM meets the threshold for torture and ordered Sierra Leone to criminalize it — but President Bio has neither acknowledged the ruling nor included FGM provisions in the Child Rights Act he signed into law.
- With 83% of Sierra Leonean women cut — 71% before age fifteen — and no criminalization law in place, advocates warn that the first lady's data-demand framing normalizes inaction while girls continue to be harmed.
Fatima Maada Bio, Sierra Leone's first lady, has become the center of a widening controversy after refusing to publicly condemn female genital mutilation, saying she will not speak against the practice until presented with what she calls 'reliable data' on its harms. The position has alarmed health professionals, human rights lawyers, and survivors across the country and beyond.
The backlash took formal shape on June 10, when more than twenty signatories — including Sierra Leone's first minister of gender and children's affairs and a UN human rights expert — sent an open letter to the Organisation of African First Ladies for Development, which Maada Bio currently leads. They warned that her perceived support for the practice threatened years of advocacy and contradicted Sierra Leone's national and international commitments.
The alarm deepened after a filmed public appearance in which Maada Bio addressed FGM practitioners known as soweis, telling them not to fear anything and that she stands with them. Ranya Kargbo, a senior UN professional and FGM survivor who signed the letter, said the words amounted to an endorsement from the highest office in the land. 'It is an absolute slap in the face for all of us,' she said.
Maada Bio told the Guardian her comments had been misrepresented and were intended to encourage dialogue. She said she is not in favour of forced circumcision but does not use her platform to campaign either for or against the practice. She also shared an article questioning the dominant anti-FGM narrative and publicly called prominent campaigners — including a UK government adviser on violence against women — 'scammers.'
The stakes are concrete. Sierra Leone has one of the world's highest FGM rates: 83% of women have been cut, most before age fifteen, with serious consequences including infertility, chronic pain, and death. The country has no law criminalizing the practice. A 2025 ECOWAS court ruling declared FGM meets the threshold for torture and ordered Sierra Leone to legislate against it — but President Bio has never acknowledged the ruling, and the Child Rights Act he signed last October contained no FGM provisions. His wife's demand for data, critics say, offers political cover for a silence that costs girls their health and their lives.
Fatima Maada Bio, the first lady of Sierra Leone, has found herself at the center of a widening controversy over her refusal to publicly condemn female genital mutilation. In an exclusive statement to the Guardian, she acknowledged the rising anger around her perceived approval of the practice but stopped short of the unequivocal denunciation that advocates and survivors have demanded. Instead, she said she would not openly speak against FGM until presented with what she called "reliable data" demonstrating its harms—a position that has alarmed health professionals, human rights lawyers, and survivors across the country and beyond.
The backlash crystallized in an open letter sent on June 10 to the Organisation of African First Ladies for Development, the organization Maada Bio currently leads. More than twenty signatories, including Amy Smythe, who served as Sierra Leone's first minister of gender and children's affairs, and Isha Dyfan, a human rights lawyer and UN expert, expressed deep concern about what they described as her perceived support for the practice. They warned that such positioning, whether direct or indirect, threatened to undo years of advocacy work and create misalignment with commitments Sierra Leone has made at national, regional, and international levels.
Maada Bio, 45, is a former film producer and actor who fled to the United Kingdom as a teenager to escape a forced child marriage. She has built a public identity around women's rights, leading a campaign called "Hands off our girls" in Sierra Leone. Yet since her husband, President Julius Maada Bio, took office in 2018, she has consistently declined to condemn FGM. In a recent public appearance that was filmed, she addressed practitioners known as soweis—the women who perform the cutting—and told them not to fear anything, saying she stands with them. Ranya Kargbo, a senior UN professional and FGM survivor who signed the letter, described the impact of those words. "When you are in a leadership position, your words matter," Kargbo said. "When she said to the soweis not to be afraid and that she stands with them, those were powerful words from the highest office in Sierra Leone. It means 'I have all the resources and support, do what you want.' It is an absolute slap in the face for all of us."
In her response to the Guardian, Maada Bio insisted her comments had been misrepresented and taken out of context. She said they were "intended to encourage dialogue and reassure women who felt marginalised." She also stated she is "not in favour of any form of circumcision that is forced upon an individual" and that she is not using her platform to campaign either for or against the practice. As a circumcised woman herself, she explained, she expects to see solid evidence of harm before taking a public stance. Last week, she posted an article on her Facebook page—which has more than 600,000 followers—titled "Harms of the current global anti-FGM campaign," published in the BMJ Journal of Medical Ethics. The piece argued that a standard narrative about FGM obscures the diversity of practices and experiences among those affected. In the same post, she named prominent anti-FGM campaigners, including Nimco Ali, an independent UK government adviser on violence against women and girls, and Anita Koroma, founder of Girl Child Network Sierra Leone, and wrote that "they do nothing for our country." In another post, she called them "scammers."
The context for this dispute is stark. Sierra Leone has one of the world's highest rates of FGM. A national survey found that 83 percent of women have been cut, down from 90 percent in 2013. Seventy-one percent of those subjected to the practice were under fifteen years old. The procedure—the partial or total removal of external female genitalia—can result in severe long-term health consequences, including infertility, chronic pain, and complications during childbirth. Every year, women and girls in Sierra Leone suffer serious medical complications from FGM rituals, and some die. The practice is often performed as part of a rite of passage into womanhood, carried out by members of the influential and secretive Bondo and Sande societies.
Currently, Sierra Leone has no law criminalizing FGM. That absence takes on particular weight given a 2025 ruling by the Economic Community of West African States court of justice, which described FGM as "one of the worst forms of violence against women" and said it "meets the threshold for torture." The court ordered Sierra Leone to enact and implement legislation criminalizing the practice and to take steps to protect victims. The ruling came shortly after President Bio assumed the chair of Ecowas. He has never publicly acknowledged it. In October of last year, he signed the Child Rights Act 2025 into law—but the legislation contained no provisions addressing FGM.
Maada Bio told the Guardian that her criticism has not been "directed at survivors of circumcision or those genuinely working to improve the lives of women and girls" but rather at individuals she believes have misrepresented her position. The distinction, however, has done little to quiet the alarm among those who see her stance as a significant obstacle to progress on an issue that affects millions of girls and women in her country.
Citações Notáveis
When you are in a leadership position, your words matter. When she said to the soweis not to be afraid and that she stands with them, those were powerful words from the highest office in Sierra Leone.— Ranya Kargbo, UN professional and FGM survivor
I am not in favour of any form of circumcision that is forced upon an individual.— Fatima Maada Bio, first lady of Sierra Leone
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
Why does the first lady's insistence on "reliable data" matter so much? Isn't that just asking for evidence before taking a position?
In principle, yes. But in Sierra Leone, the evidence already exists—medical, documented, from their own national surveys. When someone in her position says they need more data before condemning a practice that kills and injures thousands of girls every year, it reads differently to survivors. It reads like a delay tactic.
She says her comments were taken out of context. Is that plausible?
She told the soweis not to be afraid and that she stands with them. That's pretty direct. You can argue about tone or intention, but the message the cutters heard was clear: the first lady has your back. In a country where there's no law against this, that's not a small thing.
But she also leads a campaign against child marriage. She fled a forced marriage herself. How does that fit with her position on FGM?
That's the contradiction everyone is struggling with. She's built her public identity on protecting girls from harm. Yet on this one practice, she's drawn a line. Maybe she sees them as separate issues. Maybe she's trying to navigate cultural sensitivities in a way that outsiders don't understand. But from the perspective of survivors and advocates, it looks like she's choosing not to use her power when it matters most.
What does the Ecowas court ruling change?
It's supposed to change everything. A regional court just said FGM meets the legal threshold for torture and ordered Sierra Leone to criminalize it. But the president hasn't acknowledged it publicly, and the child rights law he signed doesn't address it. So the ruling sits there, unenforced, while the first lady says she needs more data. It's a kind of institutional silence that protects the status quo.
Is there any world in which her position makes sense?
If you believe that global anti-FGM campaigns have sometimes been paternalistic or culturally insensitive, yes. If you think Western activists have oversimplified a complex practice, there's an argument there. But that argument doesn't require refusing to condemn a practice that causes documented harm. You can critique how campaigns are run and still say: this causes injury and death, and it should stop.