Sierra Leone: Haja Zainab Bangura nominated for the 2023 Top 50 African Trailblazers Awards

Sierra Leonean Diplomat, and the Director General of the United Nations Office in Nairobi, Haja Zainab Hawa Bangura, has been nominated for the Top 50 African Trailblazers Awards.

The award scheme is to recognize 50 African trailblazers who made significant impacts in their respective fields, leading the way in science and technology, finance, sports, and entrepreneurship. This year’s event is the inaugural ceremony, and the nominees were selected by Dashboard Africa Research Institute and some freelance journalists to ensure integrity.

Haja Bangura was nominated alongside Senegalese International, Sadio Mane, and many other Africans across the continent. The event is scheduled to take place on May 1, 2023, in Johannesburg, South Africa. 

She is the current Director General of the United Nations Office in Nairobi and her professional life has been great over the years. In 2012, she became a Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict. In her position, she serves as Chair of the interagency network, UN Action Against Sexual Violence in Conflict (UN Action). 

As a human and women’s rights campaigner and democracy activist, she has fought corruption and impunity – notably as coordinator and co-founder of the Campaign for Good Governance and executive of the National Accountability Group. She has been instrumental in advocating for the elimination of female genital mutilation (FGM). 

She served most recently as Minister of Health and Sanitation for the Government of Sierra Leone and was previously Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the second woman in Sierra Leone to occupy this position. 

However, she holds a bachelor’s degree from Fourah Bay College in Freetown, Sierra Leone, and advanced diplomas in insurance management from the University of London and Nottingham University.