Ellen Johnson Sirleaf - 1st woman president in Africa
By Khmer Democrat, Phnom Penh
Expanding our Mind Series
Liberia and Cambodia share many dark similarities of war, child-soldiers, fractured society etc. See the award-winning film Pray the Devil Back to Hell to be inspired how Christian and Muslim women came together to usher in the way for Ellen Johnson Sirleaf to become not only the first female president of Liberia but in the whole of Africa, and how they successfully advocated for the international trial of Charles Taylor.
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (born 29 October 1938) is the 24th and current President of Liberia, a country founded by freed slaves now with a population at 4 Million. She served as Minister of Finance under President William Tolbert from 1979 until the 1980 coup d'état, after which she left Liberia and held senior positions at various financial institutions. She placed a distant second in the 1997 presidential election. Later, she was elected President in the 2005 presidential election and took office on 16 January 2006. Sirleaf is the first modern, and currently the only elected, female head of state in Africa.
In 2006, Sirleaf established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission with a mandate to "promote national peace, security, unity and reconciliation" by investigating more than 20 years of civil conflict in the country.
Forbes magazine named Sirleaf as the 51st most powerful women in the world in 2006. In 2010, Newsweek listed her as one of the ten best leaders in the world, while Time counted her among the top ten female leaders. That same year, The Economist called her "the best president the country has ever had."
For further information, see Ellen Johnson Sirleaf at Wikipedia, inter alia.
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (born 29 October 1938) is the 24th and current President of Liberia, a country founded by freed slaves now with a population at 4 Million. She served as Minister of Finance under President William Tolbert from 1979 until the 1980 coup d'état, after which she left Liberia and held senior positions at various financial institutions. She placed a distant second in the 1997 presidential election. Later, she was elected President in the 2005 presidential election and took office on 16 January 2006. Sirleaf is the first modern, and currently the only elected, female head of state in Africa.
In 2006, Sirleaf established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission with a mandate to "promote national peace, security, unity and reconciliation" by investigating more than 20 years of civil conflict in the country.
Forbes magazine named Sirleaf as the 51st most powerful women in the world in 2006. In 2010, Newsweek listed her as one of the ten best leaders in the world, while Time counted her among the top ten female leaders. That same year, The Economist called her "the best president the country has ever had."
For further information, see Ellen Johnson Sirleaf at Wikipedia, inter alia.
