Chartered accountant and attorney Toni Smart experienced a traumatic betrayal in 2018, and instead of remaining quiet about it, she is telling her story in the hopes of affecting change.
In 2018, the now 47-year-old single mother moved to Accra, Ghana from Australia with her two sons to work with prestigious Ghanaian-British architect Sir David Adjaye.
According to Smart and two other former employees, all reportedly fair-skinned black single mothers in their forties at the time of the alleged abuse, he took advantage of them sexually and financially.
The women, dubbed "the FT3" after their stories were published under pseudonyms in the UK newspaper the Financial Times (FT) in July, said he disrupted their careers and caused them financial hardship and emotional distress, as he often did not pay their salaries on time and took his time over securing their work visas.
In addition to that distress, Smart, who featured in the FT article under the name Gene, said Adjaye, a friend of 12 years, tried to proposition and pressure her and another female employee into sex after the three had had dinner and drinks.
Smart left the room, claiming she was on her period, but the other woman, who said she was tipsy and felt emotionally and physically overpowered, stayed.
[caption id="attachment_1032346" align="alignnone" width="683"] Toni Smart is one of three women the Financial Times featured in a report on sexual abuse claims against Ghanaian-British architect Sir David Adjaye. - Angelo Marcelle[/caption]
The article said Smart confronted Adjaye about his behaviour that night, but he brushed off her concerns. However she continued to deal with him in a cordial manner, as she needed an income and did not want to uproot her children.
Four months after the incident, she was fired and initially offered a US$10,000 cheque. Eventually a US$40,000 financial settlement was reached, which she received in May 2019, but out of spite, Smart refused to leave Ghana until the pandemic hit in 2020. She now lives in Martinique.
As part of the initial FT investigation, during which the women were vetted by lawyers and thoroughly investigated for about a year, reporters contacted Adjaye with questions on the alleged assaults, using the women’s chosen pseudonyms.
His UK lawyers sent a response, using the real names of the women, to the FT and the Ghanaian government. After the FT article came out in July, the letter was somehow leaked to the Ghanaian press, and the names of two of the three women were published.
Speaking to WMN in Maraval during a visit to TT last week, Smart said she believes this was done in Ghana because it is against media guidelines to use the names of accusers, victims and survivors in the UK.
“They clearly leaked the names to make sure that we were trolled, slut-shamed and survivor-blamed, which is pretty intimidating. When my name was leaked, security was a bit of a concern, so I had to shut down all my social media.
“He leaked the names in the Global South because it could go on the internet an
