Women of Other Faiths
Using common values contained in their respective teachings, women of all religious traditions can work together and collaborate in many areas especially peace building and women’s empowerment. Collectively women of all faiths can learn from each other’s struggles and histories, while showing support for women’s religious leadership roles worldwide. Please contribute to this archive by suggesting women of all faiths to be featured through our recommendation form.
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Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala
It is a sense of anger that drives me. Anger that this country [and] the Nigerians that I know are being maligned by a small percentage. You have to do something to clean this up. You can't always look up to other people do to it. The fight begins with you.
Photo credit: International Monetary FundKnown For: First female Nigerian minister of both finance and foreign affairs; a managing director of the World Bank
Dates: 1954 -
Faith: Christianity
Country: Nigeria
About
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is a managing director at the World Bank and was appointed the first female Nigerian minister of finance by President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2003. In June 2006 she became minister of foreign affairs but was let go from the position in August 2007, while continuing as Head of the Economic Reform Team. Under her direction for more than three years, the team devised and implemented a comprehensive reform program that stabilized Nigeria’s economy before tripling its growth rate.
In 2003 Ngozi, a mother of four, took on the momentous task of resolving Nigeria’s disastrous financial situation caused by its corrupt government, which exported $20 billion worth of oil the previous year while Nigerians survived on an average dollar-a-day income. Ranked the second most corrupt location in the world after Bangladesh by Transparency International, Nigeria’s oil money is often lost to bribes, its economy having been mishandled for years. Ngozi, former Harvard and M.I.T. student, set out to ensure that more of these funds went to essential public services such as roads, schools, and health care. She began by cutting back its excessive civil service and fuel expenses, and systematically accounting for government spending.
Previously, Ngozi led a 21-year career as a World Bank development economist, serving as vice president and corporate secretary, and toured both East Asia and the Middle East regions to implement reform agendas during financial crises and to facilitate involvement in high level policy discussions.
Ngozi speaks fluent French, Ibo and English with functioning knowledge of Yoruba. Her numerous awards include: Honorary Doctorate of Letters from University of Dublin, Trinity College, 2007; Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Northern Caribbean University, Mandeville, Jamaica, 2005; and TIME Magazine’s European Hero of the Year Award, 2004, for her work on economic reform in Nigeria.
Ngozi is on numerous boards and advisory groups, has advised several international investment groups, and lectured internationally on Africa and development. She founded NOI Polls, Nigeria’s first indigenous opinion research organization, and co-founded the Makeda Fund to support female entrepreneurs in Africa.
