Ellen Johnson Sirleaf

Who is Ellen Johnson Sirleaf?

Ellen Eugenia Johnson Sirleaf (née Johnson; born 29 October 1938) is a Liberian politician who served as the 24th president of Liberia from 2006 to 2018. Sirleaf was born in Monrovia to a Gola father and Kru-German mother. She was educated at the College of West Africa. She completed her education in the United States, where she studied at Madison Business College, the University of Colorado Boulder, and Harvard University. Sirleaf is a Harvard-trained economist. She returned to Liberia to work in William Tolbert's government as Deputy Minister of Finance from 1973 to 1974. Later, she worked again in the West, for the World Bank in the Caribbean and Latin America. In 1979, she received a cabinet appointment as Minister of Finance, serving to 1980. After Samuel Doe seized power in 1980 in a coup d'état and executed Tolbert, Sirleaf fled to the United States.

She worked for Citibank and then the Equator Bank. She returned to Liberia to contest a senatorial seat for Montserrado County in 1985, an election that was disputed.

Historical significance

Sirleaf was the first elected female head of state in Africa.