Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala
Minister of Finance
Incumbent
Assumed office 11 July 2011
President	Goodluck Jonathan
Preceded by	Olusegun Olutoyin Aganga
In office 15 July 2003 – 21 June 2006
President	Olusegun Obasanjo
Preceded by	Adamu Ciroma
Succeeded by	Nenadi Usman
Minister of Foreign Affairs
In office 21 June 2006 – 30 August 2006
President	Olusegun Obasanjo
Preceded by	Oluyemi Adeniji
Succeeded by	Joy Ogwu
Personal details
Born	(1954-06-13) 13 June 1954 (age 58) Ogwashi-Uku, Nigeria
Political party	People's Democratic Party
Alma mater	Harvard University Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (born June 13, 1954) is a globally renowned Nigerian economist best known for her two terms as Finance Minister of Nigeria (her current position) and for her work at the World Bank, including several years as one of its Managing Directors (October 2007–July 2011). She briefly held the position of Foreign Minister of Nigeria in 2006.

In 2007, Okonjo-Iweala was considered as a possible replacement for former World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz.^[1][2] Subsequently, in 2012, she became one of three candidates in the race to replace World Bank President Robert Zoellick at the end of his term of office in June 2012.^[3][4][5] On April 16, 2012 it was announced that she had been unsuccessful in her bid for the World Bank presidency, having lost to the US nominee, Jim Yong Kim. This outcome had been widely anticipated.^[6] However, this was the first contested election for World Bank president after the demise in 2010 of the Gentlemen's Agreement that the US would appoint the World Bank president and Europe would appoint the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund.^[7]

Education and personal life [edit]

Okonjo-Iweala is an Igbo^[8] from Ogwashi-Uku, Delta State where her father Professor Chukuka Okonjo is the Obi (King) from the Umu Obi Obahai Royal Family of Ogwashi-Uku.

Okonjo-Iweala was educated at Harvard University, graduating magna cum laude with an A.B. in 1977, and earned her Ph.D. in regional economic development from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1981.^[9] She is married to Ikemba Iweala from Umuahia, Abia State,^[10] and they have four children. The eldest, Onyinye Iweala received her Ph.D. in Experimental Pathology from Harvard University in 2008 and graduated Harvard Medical School in 2010. Her son, Uzodinma Iweala, is the author of the critically acclaimed novel Beasts of No Nation (2005) and the newly released thoughts on the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa [Our Kind of People] (2012).

Career [edit]

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, at the 2004 Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group

Prior to her ministerial career in Nigeria, Okonjo-Iweala was vice-president and corporate secretary of the World Bank Group. She left it in 2003 after she was appointed to President Obasanjo's cabinet as Finance Minister on 15 July 2003.

In October 2005, she led the Nigerian team that struck a deal with the Paris Club, a group of bilateral creditors, to pay a portion of Nigeria's external debt (US $12 billion) in return for an $18 billion debt write-off. Prior to the partial debt payment and write-off, Nigeria spent roughly US $1 billion every year on debt servicing, without making a dent in the principal owed.

Okonjo-Iweala also introduced the practice of publishing each state's monthly financial allocation from the federal government in the newspapers. This action went a long way in increasing transparency in governance. She was instrumental in helping Nigeria obtain its first ever sovereign credit rating (of BB minus) from Fitch and Standard & Poor's. Nigeria is considered to have defaulted on its sovereign debt in 1983 (debt rescheduling is considered a type of default by rating agencies).^[11]

Some controversy surrounded Okonjo-Iweala’s appointment as Finance Minister, and that of Foreign Affairs minister, Olu Adeniji, United Nations over the payment of their salary in dollars. Okonjo Iweala and Olu Adeniji were paid US$240,000, compared with their own $6,000 base salary. The controversy was spearheaded by reform-minded media reports, although Okonjo-Iweala felt that her critics were unjustified because of the temporary nature of the payment, which came out of the donor-supported Diaspora Fund negotiated by the Nigerian government.^[12] On Friday, 20 July 2007, the Court of Appeal ruled that the salary payment was not done within the ambit of Nigeria's laws, and directed her and Adeniji to pay back the excess to the account of the state.

Both Okonjo-Iweala and the Federal Government of Nigeria have appealed the case to the Supreme Court, and judgement is pending. The appeal is on the basis that the appeal court made its judgment due to erroneous information provided to it that the Nigerian government was making the salary payments, when in fact it was not.

She resigned as Nigeria's Foreign Minister on August 3, 2006 following her sudden removal as head of Nigeria's Economic Team by former President Olusegun Obasanjo. She left that administration at the end of August 2006.^{[citation needed]}

On October 4, 2007, World Bank President Robert Zoellick appointed her to the post of Managing Director, effective December 1, 2007.^[13]

In 2011, Okonjo-Iweala was reappointed as Minister of Finance with the expanded portfolio of the Coordinating Minister for the Economy by President Goodluck Jonathan. She took a lot of heat, more-so than any other government official for the unpopular fuel subsidy removal policy by the Nigerian government which led to Occupy Nigeria protests in January 2012.^[14]

During her confirmation as a Minister, she stressed the need to reduce the country's recurrent expenditure which is presently 74% of the National Budget and embark on capital projects which could improve the 14% unemployment rate in the country.^[15] In her role as the Coordinating Minister For the Economy and Minister of Finance, she has extensive influence/exercise to shape the direction of the Jonathan economic team and the transformation agenda.^[3]

Non-profit work [edit]

In 2007, Okonjo-Iweala's NGO, NOI Global Consulting, partnered with the Gallup Organization to introduce an opinion poll, the NOI poll, into the Nigerian polity.^[16] She is a fellow at the Brookings Institution.^[17] Okonjo-Iweala also serves on the Advisory Board of Global Financial Integrity^[18] and on the Board of Directors of the World Resources Institute.^[19]

In 2011 Ngozi Okonjo Iweala was called back to Nigeria by President Goodluck Jonathan to head the economic team as Nigeria's Finance minister. It was from this position that she contested the presidency of the World Bank. She received support for her ultimately unsuccessful campaign from a number of former World Bank employees and from publications including The Economist, Financial Times and Newsweek, which said "If competition follows normal process, Kim stands no chance [against Ngozi Okonjo Iweala]."^{[citation needed]}

Criticism [edit]

On January 1, 2012, the Nigerian government removed the fuel subsidy. That action triggered a nationwide riot which had Dr. Iweala in the cross-fire. She got the blame more than any other public servant for the removal of subsidy.^[20][21][22]

Honors and awards [edit]

• Silverbird Man of the Year. 2012
• Time Europe Hero 2004^[13]
• This Day Nigeria Minister of the Year 2004^[13]
• Euromoney Magazine Global Finance Minister of the year 2005^[13]
• Financial Times/The Banker African Finance Minister 2005^[13]
• Nigerian of the Year 2006.^[23]
• Honorary Doctorate from Brown University, Providence, RI, USA.
• Honorary Doctorate from Trinity College, University of Dublin, Ireland.
• Honorary Doctorate from Colby College, Maine, USA.
• Honorary Doctorate from Northern Caribbean University, Mandeville, Jamaica.
• Honorary Doctorate from Amherst College, Amherst, MA, USA.
• Who's Who in Anioma, 2011^{[citation needed]}

On September 28, 2007, Irish musician Bono was awarded the Liberty Medal. Bono donated the $100,000 prize to the Washington-based Debt AIDS Trade Africa, which he co-founded, and Okonjo-Iweala accepted the award on the organization's behalf.^[24]

Works [edit]

• Chinua Achebe: Teacher of Light - a biography of Nigerian author Chinua Achebe, published by Africa World Press, (2003), co-authored with Tijan Sallah.
• The Debt Trap in Nigeria: Towards a Sustainable Debt Strategy - an academic piece, published by Africa World Press, (2003), co-edited with Charles C. Soludo and Mansur Muhtar
• Reforming The Unreformable: Lessons From Nigeria - an account of Ngozi's work under Obasanjo's administration between 2003 - 2007, published by MIT Press, (2012)

Politics [edit]

Okonjo-Iweala has not expressed interest to contest political office in Nigeria. However, she has been vocal in her denunciation of the manner in which the country is currently accumulating huge debts.^[25] Recently, she was pictured at the Nigeria's ruling party convention in Abuja.

References [edit]

External links [edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala

• Video of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala at the TED Conference
• Time Europe's Heroes of 2004
• 'I keep my ego in my handbag', interview in The Guardian, August 2005
• 'Okonjo-Iweala is second highest paid official– World Bank'^{[dead link]}
• '2011 budget not good for development – Okonjo-Iweala'
• The Center for Global Development and The Washington Post Present: A World Bank President Candidate Event: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala