Joyce Banda

Joyce Hilda Banda Mtila ( born April 12, 1950 in Malemia in Zomba ) is a Malawian politician (People's Party ) and since 2012 the state president of their country.

Life

Joyce Banda is the daughter of John Stewart Mtila Gray, a police officer and musician. In 1975, at that time the mother of three children and live in Nairobi, Banda left her abusive husband after she had come to the incipient women's movement in contact. As a result, she was working as a businesswoman and activist for women's rights. As part of this she founded in Malawi, the National Association of Business Women, the Young Women Leaders Network, the. Joyce Banda Foundation for Better Education and the local branch of The Hunger Project Her work has received several international awards, including the 2006 International Award for the Health and Dignity of Women Friends of UNFPA. Forbes magazine described it in 2011 as the third most powerful woman in Africa.

Policy

Banda served as Minister of Gender, Child Welfare and Community Services, and from 2006 to 2009 as Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation in the government of the newly elected in 2004, the third President of Malawi Bingu wa Mutharika 2004-2006. From 2009 to 2012 she was Vice President of the State. This first in the United Democratic Front and subsequently from 2005 in the newly formed Democratic Progressive Party of Mutharika.

In 2010 there was a dispute between Mutharika and Banda over the selection of candidates for the upcoming 2014 presidential election. Mutharika, who was allowed to take not again after two terms of office even after the Constitution, sat by the candidacy of his brother Peter Mutharika Foreign Minister. Banda was expelled from the DPP, but remained in office as Vice - President. She founded as a consequence the People's Party.

After the death Mutharika following a heart attack April 5, 2012 Banda took over as acting vice - president of the shops and wondered the Constitution accordingly, on April 7 the oath of office as president of the country from.

Private

Joyce Banda is married to Richard Banda, a former top athlete and Chief Justice of Malawi and Swaziland.