Kenyan deputy Environment Minister Wangari Maathai won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday, cited for her work as leader of the Green Belt Movement that has planted more than 30-million trees across Africa.
Her win wasn’t expected as she was not among those in the broad speculation leading up to the announcement of the prize by the secretive committee. She is the seventh African to win the prize since it was first awarded in 1901.
Maathai is also the first African woman to win the prize.
Previous winners from Africa include United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, who shared the prize with the United Nations in 2001, and Nelson Mandela and FW de Klerk from South Africa, in 1993.
“Thank you so much, I am so surprised,” she told Norwegian state television.
“I am absolutely overwhelmed and very emotionally charged, really. I did not expect this.”
With a record 194 nominations, the committee had a broad field to choose from.
The award, which includes 10-million Swedish kronor ($1,3-million), is always presented on December 10, the anniversary of the death of its founder, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel. The peace prize is awarded in Oslo, and the other
Nobel prizes are presented in the Swedish capital, Stockholm.
Kenya’s green role model