 Ellen Johnson, certainly former president of the Republic of Liberia. Glad to be here at USIP and to thank them for the occasion. Women have never been able to reach the level that enabled them to compete for high position of leadership. That's because of stereotyping of many years of being excluded. Women don't have the resources, financial resources particularly to be able to build the kinds of of institutions and organizations that's required for them to compete effectively. In some places the laws and the policies are not sufficiently open to give women a fair chance to be able to take leadership because they are locked out through political parties that are largely dominated by men and so they face all of these obstacles and it's really a tribute to women that continue under these circumstances to push and this is why women must act collectively across national boundaries and form the networking where we can reach out to each other and we can provide the kind of support that everyone needs once they can demonstrate the qualities and the leadership and the integrity and the strong personal commitment to go past their fears we must find a way to help them all to achieve their goals. Well I think we can look at the example that's tearing us in the face. If you look at women leadership even those in societies like ours that have rural women in leadership positions you find that first of all they are strong in taking decisions they exercise empathy for the protection of lives and livelihood and they're very courageous enough to take hard decisions. Now as we move up the ladder in leadership women's contribution to development is well stated I mean we've we've had empirical evidence about you know the the value of the trillion in trillions of dollars that women bring to economies with their participation and with their leadership with their knowledge and what they bring and I so I think there's no denying that it's been researched it's been proving the evidence is there it's just we don't have the societies and the leadership the dominating the dominant male leadership to accept that this is a given that this this is a movement they can't stop they can delay it we've heard oh it's going to take 130 years for women to get a full gender equity I don't believe that it's not going to take us 130 years there's no stopping us now what African leaders need to look at their constitutions their laws and their policies and ensure that they're fair ensure that there's full equality you know for women and men that's what gender equity is all about in many cases those laws are there but being able to see those laws implemented is also an issue because people do not respect those laws many times you know and so we've got to make sure that we bring to consciousness of everybody when the law is there and not respected and not implemented then the women have to point this out and we have to put some pressure to make sure that they do but for many countries that don't have those we've got a viewer to point out that this is an essential element of a person we mean our persons too you know and women leadership women bring to every position of leadership the same courage the same knowledge the same commitment you know the same but we also bring passion that the men don't have the passion of the values we share the passion of the people we believe in the passion of our families you know and our friends that's where we excel and that's where women rule the world we would have such a safe world