Ellen Sirleaf Interview (page: 8 / 8) Nobel Prize for Peace	Print Interview

Were there teachers that were important to you as you came up through high school?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Oh, very much so. Some of the teachers that taught us in high school were really missionaries, from the Methodist church. Many of them had left the United States and were serving in the school. One or two of them are still alive today. There's been some contact recently to try to re-establish contact with them. But I do remember -- Robert Griffin is the name -- so many others.

It must be fulfilling for your teachers to see their student become president of the country.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: I think so. The one I mentioned that has re-established contact, as a matter of fact, did write a note to congratulate and to say, "How pleased I am. We didn't know, in those years when we were helping you to get an education, that you would reach where you are today." I guess some credit must go to them too. They must have moved us in the right direction.

How did you decide to study accounting? Had you enjoyed math?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Not particularly.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. In school I thought I would be an English teacher like my mother, but then after I got married I had to work. We had to support four children. So I got a job in a small garage, an automobile outfit -- automobile spare parts and repair shop -- and I happen to have been assigned to someone who was an accountant, as his helper. So I picked up a little bit of bookkeeping there, and I suppose that's what set me on that track.

You turned out to be pretty good at it, after all.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Well, yes. It's the one sort of after-school occupation that I had, and I was able to pick it up quite readily. So when I went to college I just pursued it. I already had some rudimentary knowledge about it, having been exposed to it through work, so it was easy to just continue on that path. And since then I just remained in the financial and economic field.

It's a long way from helping an accountant at an auto repair shop to working with the World Bank.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Yeah. It's a stretch. But in between, I picked up a lot of things. To get to the World Bank, I had already left the shop. That was a long time ago. I had gone and finished college, I had come back from college. I was working in the Treasury Department, what we now call the Ministry of Finance, and had actually worked with people who exposed me to things other than accounting, but things that had to do with economics and management and all of that. That really prepared me to go back to graduate school, and in graduate school I did economics. That's how come I did my graduate work at Harvard.

So you worked as an Assistant Minister of Finance before Harvard?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: I was a Special Assistant to the Minister of Finance in '69 and then went off to graduate work at the Economics Institute of the University of Colorado at Boulder, and then to Harvard, where I completed my master's. Then I came back as a Deputy Minister, didn't I? No, it wasn't Assistant Minister before. When I went off I had been Assistant Minister, you're correct. Sometimes I get those dates mixed up.

I can well imagine. So once again you had to leave the kids in Liberia when you went off to graduate school?

By this time I was divorced and trying to get back to school. Having to work after coming back from undergraduate school put a good strain on the family and ultimately there were domestic problems, domestic violence. I had already had a divorce before I went into graduate work.

How old were your kids at that point?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Oh they were what, born between '57 and '61. That would make them what, 15? Somewhere between 10 and 15 years old.

Did they stay with their grandparents again?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: They stayed, yeah.

So are you saying that your ex-husband actually became violent at times?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Yeah, there was domestic violence.

Was there any problem getting a divorce at that time in Liberia?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: No. He didn't protest. Had there been a protest maybe there could have been some problems.

By turning to a master's in public administration at Harvard, it sounds like you already were starting to think about being an administrator, being a leader of an organization.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Well, I already was. By the time I got there I had already, in a way, established my leadership in the Ministry where I worked. The opportunity to get a scholarship to go into graduate work was on the basis of having already established, with performance, that I was on the way up and that the potential there was good. So yeah, I had already earned that.

We've read that you are alternately referred to as "the Iron Lady," and sometimes as "Ma," as the mother of your people. Do you identify with one of these or the other?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: I think in our environment you have to be both.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. On the one hand, you have to be strong enough to take the hard decisions that classify you -- characterize you -- as an Iron Lady. Meaning, in the midst of what may be formidable forces, you have to make the right decision and stand by it with the course it takes. But then we're also in a society of many young people, children. Children who had lost all hope, and just a few years ago you saw nothing but despair in their eyes. You want to be able to reach out to them with the sensitivity of a mother and grandmother. So in that environment you have -- and I'm so glad that one of the things I always said was -- to make the children smile again. Whereas before, if they saw a presidential convoy approaching, they would all run helter-skelter, because they didn't know what would happen to their parents. Security agents coming to look for... but today, if the siren sounds, they all gather on the streets, and most times I get down off the... so the "Ma" comes from that. It's a nice name for a grandmother.

[ Key to Success ] Vision

Is there any evidence of Al Qaeda activity in Liberia?

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: I don't know if Al Qaeda is in Liberia, frankly. We've heard rumors in the past, during the Taylor era, when he was doing dealings with a lot of shady characters that he had. But to say that we know of Al Qaeda being in Liberia today, I don't think so. I haven't had any evidence of that at all, and I'm always in touch with the U.S. Ambassador and all who have intelligence. If that were ever brought to us we would rule it out very quickly. I doubt it.

What are you most proud of so far? I know you have a long way to go in your career.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: The progress we've made at home. For example, our debt issue.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. We inherited a 3.7 billion debt for our population and our export earnings. Today a majority of that debt has been cancelled and we've completed our first program with the IMF (International Monetary Fund). And also the restoration of hope. Today, you know, our image of being a pariah state, a failed state, has turned around completely. Whereas people -- Liberians -- were afraid to carry a Liberian passport, because you'd be seen as this nation of death and destruction. Today, Liberians are very proud to carry their passport because everybody sees Liberia as beginning to be uplifted and beginning to become a possible model of success, a post-conflict success story. I'm very proud of that turnaround in our image.

Thank you very much Madam President. It was a real privilege to talk with you.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Thank you.

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