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President of the Republic of Liberia

As the first woman ever elected President in Africa, Johnson-Sirleaf is an example of what can happen when girls are educated. Educated women are better positioned to contribute to their economies and their countries. When women are equipped with knowledge, they can be better mothers (Laura Bush, Time Magazine, 2006).

Mrs. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the 23rd President of Liberia was born in Monrovia, Liberia, 67 years ago. From 1948 to 55 Ellen Johnson studied accounts and economics at the College of West Africa in Monrovia. After marriage at the age of 17 to James Sirleaf, she travelled to America (in 1961) and continued her studies, achieving a BA in Accounting at Madison Business College in Madison, Wisconsin. She later obtained a diploma at the Economics Institute at the University of Colorado and a Master’s Degree in Public Administration from Harvard University in 1971. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf then returned to Liberia and began working in William Tolbert's (True Whig Party) government.

Prior to her inauguration as President of Liberia on January 16, 2006, she led a distinguished career spanning nearly four decades in local and international public life. In 1979, as the first female Minister of Finance of Liberia, Mrs. Sirleaf spearheaded many innovations to curb the mismanagement of government finances. After the military coup of 1980, she was appointed President the Liberian Bank for Development and Investment (LBDI). Mrs. Sirleaf worked as Assistant Administrator and Director of the Regional Bureau of Africa for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) with the rank of Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations. She left that post in 1997 to run as presidential candidate of the Unity Party in the first postwar elections in Liberia.

In the private sector, Mrs. Sirleaf served on the Advisory Board of the Modern Africa Growth and Investment Company (MAGIC), the Hong Kong Bank Group. She was also Vice President of CITICORP’s Africa Regional Office and a Senior Loan Officer at the World Bank. Madam Sirleaf was an initial member of the World Bank Council of African Advisors. Madam Sirleaf has shared her experience and competence on many advisory boards and committees, both in her home country and abroad. Notably among these are: the International Crisis Group (USA); Songhai Financial Holdings Ltd. ( Ghana); Center for Africa’s International Relations, University of Witwatersrand ( South Africa); and Women Waging Peace ( USA). She chaired the Open Society Initiative of West Africa (OSIWA). She was a founding member of the International Institute for Women in Political Leadership and has written widely on financial issues, development and human rights. She is a founder of Kormah Development and Investment Corporation, a financial management advisory consultancy firm and Measuagon, a community development NGO in Liberia.

After fighting for freedom, justice and equality, spending time in jail more than once and forced into exile, President Ellen Sirleaf is now entrusted with the most challenging task any leader has ever faced in Liberia. On 23 November 2005, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was declared the winner of the Liberian election {mosimage}and confirmed as the country's next president. Her inauguration, attended by the likes of US First Lady Laura Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, took place on Monday 16 January, 2006. The social, political and economic decay the nation is currently undergoing will require a great deal of creativity and energy. The woman that many have come to know as the “Iron Lady,” is confident that she has the ability to “transform adversity into opportunity”.

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, divorced mother of four boys and grandmother to six children is Liberia's first elected female president, as well as the first elected female leader on the continent.

Source:

1. US Embassy of Liberia
2. Biography: Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Liberia's 'Iron Lady', http://africanhistory.about.com/od/liberia/p/Sirleaf.htm
3. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, (by Laura Bush), http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1187159,00.html
4. Image © Justin Sutcliffe / Polaris