by Fatima Babih, EdD
PART II
At the end of Part I, I revealed something that fundamentally changed the direction of this investigation. Venice was not the first time First Lady Fatima Bio had taken charge of Sierra Leone’s representation at a major international pavilion.
Five years earlier, she had occupied an even more explicitly governmental-sounding position at Expo 2020 Dubai. But before we go to Dubai, there is another person I need to properly introduce.
His name is Tony Lloyd Morgan.
If you have followed the activities of Sierra Leone’s Office of the First Lady over the years, you may already have encountered his name. Morgan’s name has repeatedly appeared around Fatima Bio as a communications strategist and Office of the First Lady official.
But that is not where their relationship started.
And understanding that history is essential to understanding what I subsequently found in Dubai, and why Morgan’s reappearance in Venice in 2026 deserves scrutiny.
Tony Morgan / Nelson Spyk
Long before Julius Maada Bio became President of Sierra Leone, Tony Morgan was in the UK African film scene under the professional name Nelson Spyk.
This is not an identity I am connecting to him through speculation. Morgan’s own later film material identifies Tony Morgan and Nelson Spyk, while contemporary film records document Nelson Spyk’s activities in UK Nollywood during the same period that Fatima Bio was associated with UK Nollywood as Fatima Jabbe.
And that is where the two trails meet.
Tony Morgan & Fatima Jabbe
Before she ever met Julius Maada Bio, Fatima Jabbe was struggling, without much success, to become an actress in the UK’s African film scene.
She is sometimes mistakenly described as a former Nollywood actress. She was never part of the actual Nigerian Nollywood industry. She was part of something smaller: UK Nollywood, a British-based imitation of Nollywood.
That’s where she met Tony Morgan, a British Nigerian who was himself trying, largely in vain, to become a movie producer in the UK. Morgan had attempted to replicate Nigeria’s Nollywood model on British soil, founding a company called UK Nollywood, and he worked under the professional name Nelson Spyk.
Under that banner, Fatima Jabbe and Nelson Spyk produced a few low-budget videos. Fatima Jabbe was credited as an actress, and on at least one or two productions, as writer and producer as well.
The video credits document the working relationship directly. In Battered, Fatima Jabbe was credited as actress and producer, while Tony Morgan, as Nelson Spyk, was credited as associate producer. In another production, Shameful Deceit, Fatima Jabbe appeared in the cast while Morgan, again as Nelson Spyk, was credited as cinematographer. Contemporary African entertainment reporting from the period independently places both of them within the UK Nollywood environment.
This establishes an important fact for the chronology of this investigation: Tony Morgan and Fatima Bio were associates years before either of them set foot in State House.
Then, in 2013, everything changed. Fatima Jabbe met Sierra Leone’s presidential candidate, Julius Maada Bio. She saw a far more lucrative future in African politics than in low-budget African film, and she pivoted. Julius Bio, for his part, left his Catholic marriage and entered a relationship with Fatima Jabbe.
It’s worth remembering what her life actually was like during this entire period, through the failed acting years and even after she met Julius Bio: Fatima Bio was a struggling indigent single mother living in government housing in south London.
Not the “leading cultural figure” or wealthy socialite she is described as today. A woman scraping by in council housing while chasing a failed acting career.
Then, in 2018, Julius Bio became President.
And almost immediately, Fatima Bio and Tony Morgan packed up their UK video production operation and moved straight into State House and the Presidential Lodge.
Since then, the two have remained part and parcel of the Sierra Leone Presidency, just with new titles. Fatima Bio became the First Lady actress in the limelight, polishing her acting skills and accumulating wealth along the way.
Tony Morgan became the producer behind the scenes, running the “crew” under the far more convenient title of Communications Strategist.
This is precisely why, since becoming First Lady, everything Fatima Bio does, in Sierra Leone and abroad, has the texture of a movie production. The political rallies staged like set pieces. The constant, camera-ready international departures and arrivals. The takeover of the SLPP. The quiet absorption of government institutions into her orbit. Access to government and donor funds flowing into the production budget.
All of it bears the same fingerprints: a First Lady playing the lead role, and a producer managing the shoot, at the expense of the people of Sierra Leone, who are paying for a production they never agreed to fund.
There is nothing inherently improper about two people having worked together in the film industry. But that history becomes relevant when one of them subsequently becomes First Lady and the other repeatedly appears in positions connected to her office, the State House and in positions associated with Sierra Leone’s official representation abroad.
Tony Morgan therefore should not be understood simply as an official of Office of the First Lady/State House who happened to appear in Venice in 2026. He was an associate of Fatima Bio before she became First Lady.
UK Nollywood to First Lady Office
After Julius Maada Bio became President in 2018, Morgan’s name appears publicly in connection with the Office of the First Lady.
We do not have to rely on a newspaper description for this. On October 31, 2019, the Office of the First Lady itself issued a public notice signed:
Tony Lloyd Morgan
Head of Communication
The notice concerned allegations about funding for the Office of the First Lady and explicitly spoke in the institutional voice of that office. (firstlady.gov.sl)
Morgan’s association with Fatima Bio’s office would continue for years. This gives us the beginning of a striking chronology.
And then something else happens. Morgan moves from communicating for the First Lady into a leadership position connected to Sierra Leone’s representation at one of the largest international exhibitions in the world, Expo Dubai 2020.
Fatima Bio/Tony Morgan Takeover Dubai Expo
At Dubai Expo 2020, Fatima Bio was not simply the First Lady attending an international event. She was Sierra Leone’s Commissioner-General, and Tony Morgan was not merely there as her communications officer. He was Deputy Commissioner-General.
That distinction is crucial. The two people whose relationship can be traced to the UK Nollywood industry before the presidency were now occupying the two leading titles in Sierra Leone’s Expo operation.
Sierra Leone’s Embassy in the United Arab Emirates subsequently identified Fatima Bio as Sierra Leone’s Commissioner-General for Expo 2020 Dubai.
And Morgan’s title was not something he used once and abandoned. In December 2021 he was publicly described as Deputy Commissioner General of the Dubai Expo Team at a symposium concerning development of Sierra Leone’s film industry. (The Calabash Newspaper)
Even in July 2022, months after Expo Dubai had ended, an article published under Morgan’s name identified him as: “Tony Morgan (Deputy Commissioner-General – EXPO Dubai)”. (The Calabash Newspaper)
But the most revealing evidence about what Morgan actually did in that position came from a source I had not initially seen.
He visited NASSIT.
What Is NASSIT?
Before examining Tony Morgan’s visit, it is important to understand the significance of NASSIT to the people of Sierra Leone.
The National Social Security and Insurance Trust (NASSIT) is Sierra Leone’s statutory social-security institution. It administers the country’s national pension and social-security system, collecting contributions from taxpayers and managing funds intended to provide benefits to workers and their beneficiaries.
In other words, NASSIT is not a private company, a political organization or informal development group. It is a public institution established by law, entrusted with significant public responsibilities with substantial financial resources.
That makes Tony Morgan’s August 2021 visit to NASSIT particularly important to this investigation.
Tony Morgan At NASSIT as Deputy Commissioner-General
On August 26, 2021, Tony Morgan visited the Director-General of the National Social Security and Insurance Trust, Mohamed Fuaad Daboh, at NASSIT’s Walpole Street office in Freetown.
The contemporaneous publication by NASSIT-Sierra Leone, preserved in screenshots of its Facebook post, introduces him plainly:
“The Deputy Commissioner General of Expo Dubai 2020, Mr. Tony Morgan…”
Morgan was not making a social call. He was not simply meeting businesspeople or potential Expo sponsors. He was approaching one of Sierra Leone’s major statutory institutions while acting under the title Deputy Commissioner-General of Expo Dubai 2020.
According to NASSIT, he explained that his visit arose from a desire to engage the institution concerning Expo Dubai 2020 and, where possible, collaborate with NASSIT to make Sierra Leone’s representation “worthy and rewarding.”
A man whose publicly documented role had previously been Head of Communication in the Office of the First Lady was now lobbying a statutory institution of the Government of Sierra Leone as the Deputy to Fatima Bio who was acting as Commissioner-General of Sierra Leone’s Expo Dubai operation.
And NASSIT appears to have received him in precisely that official capacity. Then comes the passage that makes this old NASSIT record particularly important to my investigation.
According to NASSIT, Morgan disclosed that:
The Secretariat headed by the First Lady, Madam Fatima Bio, was tasked with the responsibility of galvanising and soliciting national collaboration that would showcase Sierra Leone’s investment opportunities.
And that immediately raises the question at the heart of this investigation: Tasked by whom?
What Was This Secretariat?
That one sentence opens an entirely new administrative question.
- What was the legal or administrative identity of this Expo Secretariat?
- Who established it?
- Was it created by Cabinet?
- By the President?
- Was there a formal government instrument?
- Who appointed Fatima Bio to head it?
- Who appointed Tony Morgan Deputy Commissioner-General?
- Who else served in the Secretariat?
- Where was it institutionally located?
- Who funded it?
- To whom was it accountable?
And under what authority was a Secretariat headed by an unelected presidential spouse soliciting cooperation and resources from Sierra Leone’s public institutions?
These are not accusations. They are questions generated by NASSIT’s own contemporaneous description of the arrangement.
NASSIT Discusssed Real National Business With Tony Morgan
The rest of the NASSIT account makes the encounter even more significant. The Director-General Mohamed Fuaad Daboh discussed NASSIT’s desire to establish an ultramodern teaching and diagnostic hospital serving not only Sierra Leone but the wider Mano River region.
According to the NASSIT account, the Trust had developed a concept note and approached UNOPS for technical support.
The proposed facility was envisioned as a 300-bed teaching and diagnostic hospital, with residential facilities and capacity for numerous diagnostic services.
And the NASSIT Director-General reportedly suggested that this turnkey project could constitute Sierra Leone’s proposal to Expo Dubai 2020.
The meeting concluded after Morgan and the NASSIT Director-General discussed further possible avenues of collaboration.
Think about the institutional significance of that.
A Sierra Leone statutory institution was treating Tony Morgan as a person through whom it could engage Sierra Leone’s official Expo operation. His Deputy Commissioner-General title therefore appears to have carried practical governmental-facing authority.
Which makes the unanswered question more important: Who gave Tony Morgan that authority?
Fatima Bio Opened Pavilion at Dubai Expo 2020
When Expo Dubai eventually opened in October 2021, Fatima Bio officially opened Sierra Leone’s pavilion. She was not merely performing the ceremonial duties of a First Lady.
She was Commissioner-General.
And according to the NASSIT record, the Secretariat she headed had been tasked with mobilizing national collaboration to showcase Sierra Leone’s investment opportunities.
So, by 2021 the Fatima Bio/Tony Morgan squad already had a takeover structure. This structure matters enormously when we arrive in Venice five years later.
The Squad Reappears in Venice Five Years Later
At the 2026 Venice Biennale, Fatima Bio once again takes over the Commissioner position for Sierra Leone.
And Tony Morgan once again appears within the machinery coordinating Sierra Leone’s international pavilion.
But something has changed. His institutional title. The official Sierra Leone Pavilion website presents him as:
Head of Strategy and Communication State House
And simultaneously as
Chief Executive Officer, 10X Consulting.
More importantly, Morgan himself states that, in his role at State House, he coordinated Sierra Leone’s presence in this international context. The pavilion also uses his contribution to discuss infrastructure, commercial initiatives, logistics and future projects. (Sierra Leone Pavilion)
So, the Tony Morgan who had been publicly identified with the Office of the First Lady was now presented to an international audience under the institutional identity of State House.
Office of the First Lady or State House?
- When did Tony Morgan become Head of Strategy and Communication at State House?
- Who appointed him?
- What is the formal title of his government position?
- Is he a civil servant?
- A presidential appointee?
- An employee of the Office of the President assigned to the Office of the First Lady?
- What is his reporting line?
- And where is the appointment record?
I have not located a publicly available appointment instrument resolving those questions.
That does not mean one does not exist. But it means that, once again, the publicly accessible record does not readily explain the governmental authority Morgan is exercising in the name of Sierra Leone.
Tony Morgan’s proximity to Fatima Bio has been considerably consistent. The title under which he exercises public authority appears to have changed over time.
Once might be an unusual appointment. Twice begins to look like an institutional pattern worthy of public explanation.
And that discovery led me to another question. If Tony Morgan was not simply accompanying the First Lady in Venice, but says he was coordinating Sierra Leone’s presence in his capacity at State House, what exactly was he coordinating, and where did his public responsibilities end and his private business interests begin?
MAMA SALONE ~ Lioness of the West Coast 