Louise N'Jie

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Louise Antoinette N'Jie,

feminist and politician who was the first woman to serve as a cabinet minister
in The Gambia.

Early life and education

Louise Antoinette Mahoney was born in Bathurst (now

Speaker of the National Assembly of the Gambia and her mother, Hannah, was the first Gambian woman to work as a clerk in the Government Secretariat in the 1910s.[2] Her younger sister Augusta was the first female candidate to stand in a Gambian national election and later married Gambia's first President, Sir Dawda Jawara.[3] Her brother John later married Florence Mahoney
, the first Gambian woman to obtain a PhD.

N'Jie attended the

Cambridge School Certificate in 1942.[2] She then won a scholarship to attend the Achimota School in Accra, Ghana from 1942 until 1945,[1] where she trained as a teacher.[2][3] From 1963 to 1964, she studied educational administration at the University of Oxford.[4]

Career

N'Jie taught in various primary and secondary schools in Gambia for ten years and was principal of Bakau Primary School from 1957 until 1963.[2][3]

In 1953, she was one of five female members of a 34-member consultative committee to

constitutional reform.[5] In 1958, she was appointed to the Committee for the Preparation of the Royal Visit and the Reception of Queen Elizabeth II to The Gambia in 1961.[2] In 1960, she participated in the United Nations Seminar on Participation of Women in Public Life in Addis Ababa.[6] In 1970, she was one of the founders of the Federation of Gambian Women.[2]

N'Jie was a member of the

primary healthcare.[1]

N'Jie was a member of the PPP's Central Committee and led the formation of a Women's Bureau. In 1989, she led a delegation to Havana to the World Conference on Women.[1] She founded and led the Soroptimist Society and was president of the Gambia Red Cross Society for ten years.[1] In 1991, she was one of the few PPP members to encourage party leader Dawda Jawara to retire.[7]

N'Jie retired from politics in 1992. She died on 2 May 2014 in Bakau.[3]

Personal life

N'Jie married Denis Ebrima N'Jie, the Gambia's first

dental surgeon, in the United Kingdom in 1950 and they had one son who died in 1997.[2][3] She was a committed Christian and active in local churches throughout her life.[1]

Awards and honours

N'Jie was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire in June 1963.[3] In 2015, on the fiftieth anniversary of Gambia's independence from Britain, she was named by The Standard as one of "50 prominent Gambians who helped to shape the nation."[9]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Manneh, Ebraima (17 May 2014). "Tribute To Aunty Louise Antoinette Njie". Kairo News. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Ceesay, Hassoum (7 May 2014). "Tribute: Louise Antoinette Njie (1922–2014)". The Point. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
  3. ^
    ISBN 9781442265264
    .
  4. ^ a b c d Ceesay, Hassoum (7 May 2014). "[Tribute]Louise Antoinette Njie (1922–2014)". The Standard. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
  5. ISBN 9781491869819
    .
  6. ^ "Full text of "Seminar on Participation of Women in Public Life,: Addis Ababa, 12 to 23 December 1960"". January 1961. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
  7. ^ a b Dabo, Bakary (14 May 2014). "Tribute to Louise Antoinette N'Jie". The Point. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
  8. ^ Akyeampong, Emmanuel K.; Gates, Henry Louis (2012). Dictionary of African Biography. Vol. 4. Oxford University Press. pp. 475–476.
  9. ^ Jawo, DA (11 March 2015). "The Gambia at 50: fifty prominent Gambians who helped to shape the nation". The Standard. Archived from the original on 23 September 2017. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
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