In the latest episode of African Voices Playmakers, CNN’s Larry Madowo meets Juliet Ukah and Ramla Ali, two modern warrior women breaking barriers.First, CNN speaks with Somali-born boxer Ramla Ali, a refugee, runway muse and a relentless trailblazer.
She’s championing inclusion, empowering survivors through her charity and redefining what it means to fight for change.After her brother was killed during the Somalian civil war, Ali and her family fled to the UK.
She tells CNN that boxing began as an escape but soon became her calling, her source of strength and purpose, “I was a young girl, bullied in secondary school and it was a space where I could make friends.
I was gaining a lot of self-confidence as my body was changing, as I was getting healthier.
At that time, that is what I love the most, but obviously progressing now to many years past, it’s the idea that I just want to get better at a sport that I love so much.”Outside the ring, Ali’s building spaces for women through the Ramla Ali Sisters Club, a nonprofit that provides free fitness and boxing sessions for women of all backgrounds.
She tells CNN more, “Sisters Club was born in 2018, and it started off as me donating an hour of my time a week […] to very vulnerable women. […]
There’s not a lot of safe spaces in London that have women only sections in gyms and for ethnic minorities as well. Not only that, but for women who come from low-income families, there’s always that barrier of paying £15 per class to go to work out, so I wanted to create this safe space for all these women to come together as sisters and practice a sport
.”Once a refugee herself, now a UNICEF ambassador, she’s using her platform to give back to the very communities that once sheltered her. Ali reflects on her return to Kenya in September,
“I think this trip means to me on a personal level, because I was once in Kenya and had I not left Kenya, this could have been me in this situation, in a refugee camp like Dadaab. For me it was like reallyimportant to see and to connect with all of the women and the children in the camps, because it’s like similar to today.
I saw a lot of myself in these women who just want help.”Juliet Ukah is a Nigerian MMA fighter, police officer, and the first African woman signed to the Professional Fighters League. Madowo sat down with her in Lagos to talk about this monumental accolade,
“I feel so excited, I don’t know the words I’m going to use to explain that. It’s very stark because it’s like being the first out there. Everybody is looking up to you.
Everybody wants to learn what you know.”When Ukah is not training or fighting, she’s a police officer for Nigeria. For her, both worlds demand discipline, focus, and courage,
“In the cage, your opponent is like someone who stole something from you — you fight to take it back. In the police, you fight to protect what’s right.”Ukah is redefining what women in uniform and in the ring can do.
She offers free classes teaching self-defence and MMA, empowering women to protect themselves and pursue the sport. She tells Madowo, “I had a dream of having my own gym So, in that dream I will have a specific placefor just for women to encourage them, to motivate them, to tell them that maybe theyheard the story someone has told them sometimes back then. […] I think the advice I give to myself was that I never give up, despite the challenges when growing up, despite everything, the distractions, everything, I think I did not give up.”African Voices Playmakers airs on CNN International at the following times:
Saturday 15th November 2025 at 08:30 WAT and 12:00 WATSunday 16th November 2025 at 04:30 WAT and 19:00 WATMonday 17th November at 04:00 WATTuesday 18th November 2025 at 18:45 WATSaturday 22nd November 2025 at 08:30 WAT and 12:00 WATSunday 23rd November 2025 at 04:30 WAT and 19:00 WATMonday 24th November 2025 at 04:00
