The Minister of Health and Social Services, Dr Esperance Luvindao, has been named to the prestigious fifth cohort of Amujae Leaders.
This elite leadership initiative is spearheaded by the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Centre for Women and Development (EJS Centre).
The appointment recognizes Luvindao’s leadership capabilities and places her among a select group of African women leaders dedicated to driving public service and development across the continent.
The Centre, in a statement, said this year the Amujae Initiative is the most geographically and sectorally diverse selection in the Initiative’s history, with fifteen women being named. “The cohort stretches from the oil fields of Liberia to the parliaments of Kenya and Senegal, from an AI research center in southern Algeria to a rural district council in Zimbabwe. Across sectors, it spans artificial intelligence, gender and social protection, energy regulation, environmental governance, parliamentary law, peace building, and public health.”
They explained that each of the women carries the Amujae name, drawn from the Kru language of Liberia, which means, ‘we are going up’, which was chosen by the Founder and former President of Liberia, Ellen Sirleaf. “It signals not competition but collective ascent, women lifting one another and in doing so, lifting the institutions and communities around them.”
Sirleaf said each cohort of the Amujae Leaders reflects the extraordinary depth of talent and determination found among African women at every level of leadership. “I look at these fifteen women, and I see the full breadth of what African leadership can be: a minister reshaping her country’s health system, a senator legislating for the invisible, a scientist democratising artificial intelligence in a region the world over looks at, a diplomat who has become the first woman to chair an entire diplomatic corps. This is what the Amujae Initiative was built to honour and to multiply.”
EJS Center Executive Director, Ellen Pratt-Harris, said the fifth Cohort arrives at a moment of acute urgency. “Across the continent, the shrinking of international development funding, including deep cuts to gender equality and women’s empowerment programming, threatens to stall progress that has taken decades to achieve. We believe that investing in African women’s leadership is not a peripheral concern; it is one of the most consequential things the continent can do for its own future.”
The Center highlighted that the fifteen leaders of the fifth cohort will access sustained coaching and direct mentorship from Sirleaf, participate in high-level convenings with peers and senior leaders, and join a network designed not just for professional exchange, but for the kind of candid, cross-border solidarity that sustains women in the most demanding public roles. “They will also have access to platforms to amplify their work across the continent and globally.”
At the time of her appointment, Dr. Luvindao became the youngest health minister in Africa. She is a medical doctor by training, a Forbes 30 under 30 honoree, and an international speaker. She is recognised for her leadership in advancing equitable healthcare systems across the continent.
She has been appointed as Chair of Committee A at the 78th World Health Assembly in Lusaka, Agenda Champion by the Africa CDC. She has overseen the direct procurement of medications from manufacturers, the recruitment of over 2 000 healthcare workers, and Namibia’s first digital health policy.
In 2019, she founded Osaat Africa Health Foundation, launching digital health innovations including Menga, Emily’s Health, and a portable sonar probe for rural communities. In November 2025, she tabled the 2025 Mental Health Bill, repealing a long-outdated 1973 act, a landmark step for public health in Namibia.
