Dr Isatou Touray, former vice president of The Gambia, has said that religious leaders defending the practice of female genital mutilation “hate” women.

Dr Touray, who is also a leading women’s rights activist in the country, urged those religious leaders to go read the “Qur’an and stop misleading the public with their ideology”. 

A bill has been tabled in the country’s parliament to lift the ban on female genital mutilation by the National Assembly member for Foni Kansala, Almameh Gibba.

Influential Muslim clerics led by Imam Abdoulie Fatty have since been pushing for the law to be scrapped. However, women’s rights activists and the UN have condemned the move and called for the ban to remain. The practice was outlawed in 2015 by the Jammeh regime. 

Dr Touray warned that the clerics championing for the law to be banned are “misinforming them and they will pay for it” but added that they “want peace in this country”. 

“In the fight against female genital mutilation, a lot of things have been associated with Islam and I think it is blasphemy. For those (Imams) standing firm footing misinterpreting or not understanding the Qur’an, I am urging them to go and read in ‘the name of my Lord ‘who knows what you don’t know. Let them read the Qur’an and authentic hadiths. Let them not talk out of their heads because they hate women,” she said.

“Let’s talk about the issue of female genital circumcision. This is not an Islamic practice. That’s a cultural practice and if a Muslim is  doing that horrendous type of action, this is unIslamic and if they are in society like ours, they will be punished. Unfortunately, it’s a tribal practice widespread in different parts of Africa and Asia.”

Reporting by Adama Makasuba