The reporter, Mae Azango, works for the newspaper FrontPage Africa and is a fellow for New Narratives, a media development NGO founded by Prue Clarke, a former visiting associate professor at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. Clarke, who taught courses in international and audio news reporting, left the School at the end of the Fall 2011 semester to move to England for professional and personal reasons.
Since publishing the first article on genital cutting in Liberia last week, Azango and her newspaper colleagues have received several threats to their safety. “While [genital cutting] is being eradicated elsewhere in Africa, it has never been discussed in Liberia because of a dominant secretive religion there that punishes those who talk about it with death,” Clarke said. The threats against Azango have forced her to go into hiding.
“We hope the government of Liberia will come out and condemn these threats against a leading Liberian journalist and media house,” Clarke added. “Another of our partners, a radio station, is bravely planning to run a radio version of the story this week in spite of the threats. We expect more trouble.”