Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has won Liberia's presidential run-off, becoming the first woman to be elected head of state of an African country, the National Elections Commission said today.
The commission said official voting results from the run-off showed the Harvard-trained World Bank economist, also known as Liberia's 'Iron Lady' beat soccer millionaire George Weah by winning 59.4 percent of the valid votes, compared to Weah's 40.6 percent.
Throughout the campaign the Harvard-educated economist argued that after more than 100 years of political mismanagement by male politicians it was time for a woman to take the helm of the country founded by white Americans for freed slaves, who declared its independence in 1846.
Johnson Sirleaf has had a volatile political career. She first came to prominence in the late 1970s as finance minister under former president William Tolbert who was murdered following a coup in 1980 led by staff sergeant Samuel Doe.
In 1985 she was sentenced to 10 years in prison for speaking out against Doe's military regime, but was released after one year in detention and allowed to leave the country to take up a position with the World Bank.