David Moinina Sengeh | |
---|---|
Chief Minister of Sierra Leone | |
Assumed office 10 July 2023 | |
President | Julius Maada Bio |
Preceded by | Jacob Jusu Saffa |
Personal details | |
Born | 1986or1987(age 37–38) [1] |
Alma mater | |
Scientific career | |
Institutions | IBM Research |
Thesis | The use of a novel residuum model to design a variable-impedance transtibial prosthetic socket (2016) |
Doctoral advisor | Hugh Herr |
David Moinina Sengeh (born 1986) is a Sierra Leonean politician who has served as the chief minister of Sierra Leone after being appointed by President Julius Maada Bio in 2023. He previously served as the minister of basic and senior secondary education and chief innovation officer for the Directorate of Science, Technology and Innovation. [2] [3] He is a TED Senior Fellow.
Sengeh was offered a scholarship to study in Norway, and joined the UWC Red Cross Nordic College in 2004. [4] [5] His uncle was a surgeon. [6] He studied biomedical engineering at Harvard University. He researched aerosolised vaccines for tuberculosis and graduated with a bachelor's degree in 2010. [7] [8] During his time at Harvard University, he was cofounder of Lebone Solutions, a start-up that developed inexpensive batteries from microbial fuel cells. [9] He was listed in the 2013 Wired magazine Smart List. Sengeh joined Massachusetts Institute of Technology for his postgraduate studies, working under the supervision of Hugh Herr. [10] [11] [12] He was inspired to work on prosthetics because he grew up surrounded by victims of civil war. [13] [14] He used MRI to map amputee's limbs, then assessed where artificial materials could create pressure points, and used 3D printing to generate new sockets. [5] [10] His prototypes were tested by veterans and amputees from the Boston Marathon bombing. [15] He was named as a TED fellow in 2014, delivering a talk entitled The sore problem of prosthetic limbs. [16] [17] He was selected as one of Forbes 30 Under 30 in 2014. [18] He won the 2014 Lemelson–MIT Prize for his innovations in healthcare. [15] He was selected as one of Face2Face Africa's Young Africans Committed to Excellence. [19] He completed his PhD at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2016. [6] After completing his PhD, Sengeh toured makerspaces in America talking about his work on prosthetics. [20]
During his PhD research, Sengeh founded the NGO Global Minimum Inc, a program that supports the Innovate Salone entrepreneurship program in Sierra Leone, Kenya and Cape Town. [21] [22] [23] He wanted to change 'aid to Africa' to 'Made in Africa'. [24] The "A De Mek Am" Innovate Salone program supports teams from secondary schools to develop solutions to local problems. [25] It was created in collaboration with the MIT Media Lab and MIT Public Service Center and modelled on the MIT innovation competitions. [26] [25] Sengeh supported the winning student projects to travel to the United States, where they spoke at Maker Faire. [6] He supported Kelvin Doe, a thirteen year old inventor who had never left a ten-mile radius of his house in Sierra Leone, to join the MIT Visiting Practitioner's Program. [27] [28] Sengeh became Kelvin Doe's mentor. [29] He returned to the TED stage in 2015, speaking to Kate Krontiris about innovation and inspiration. [30] He has spoken at the NextEinstein Forum. [31]
Sengeh was offered a position at IBM in Africa, working on data-driven healthcare. [32] He worked with IBM Research in Nairobi, as well as in their newest lab in Johannesburg, designing and developing healthcare technologies in Africa. [33] There are fewer than 50 doctors for every hundred thousand citizens in Africa, so Sengeh is exploring the use of artificial intelligence. [33] He worked with Waheeda Banu Saib from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. [34] He partnered with Port Loko Health Management Team to design a web-based tool that allows districts to monitor Ebola. [35] He writes for HuffPost. [36]
In May 2018. Sengeh joined the Office of the President of Sierra Leone, working as chief innovation officer. [8] In 2019 he was named Minister of Education of Sierra Leone. [37] He ensured that each child in the Pujehun District had access to a laptop. [38] He spoke at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and was described as a trailblazer. [39] [40] He is a prolific musician. [41]
On 10 July 2023, Sengeh was appointed as the Chief Minister of Sierra Leone by President Julius Maada Bio. [42] [43]
Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered to the southeast by Liberia and by Guinea to the north. Its land area is 71,740 km2 (27,699 sq mi). It has a tropical climate and environments ranging from savannas to rainforests. As of the 2023 census, Sierra Leone has a population of 8,908,040. Freetown is both its capital and its largest city. The country is divided into five administrative regions, which are further subdivided into 16 districts.
Sierra Leone first became inhabited by indigenous African peoples at least 2,500 years ago. The Limba were the first tribe known to inhabit Sierra Leone. The dense tropical rainforest partially isolated the region from other West African cultures, and it became a refuge for peoples escaping violence and jihads. Sierra Leone was named by Portuguese explorer Pedro de Sintra, who mapped the region in 1462. The Freetown estuary provided a good natural harbour for ships to shelter and replenish drinking water, and gained more international attention as coastal and trans-Atlantic trade supplanted trans-Saharan trade.
The Revolutionary United Front (RUF) was a rebel group that fought a failed eleven-year war in Sierra Leone, beginning in 1991 and ending in 2002. It later transformed into a political party, which still exists today. The three most senior surviving leaders, Issa Sesay, Morris Kallon, and Augustine Gbao, were convicted in February 2009 of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Brigadier David Lansana was the first prominent Sierra Leonean in the Sierra Leone Military during the colonial era. After Sierra Leone gained independence, he served as Military Attaché to the United States.
Frank Moss is a researcher, technology and biotechnology entrepreneur, academic and author. Moss was the director of the MIT Media Lab from 2006 to 2011, where he was the Wiesner Professor of the Practice of Media Arts and Sciences and the principal investigator for the New Media Medicine research group, which he founded.
The Special Court for Sierra Leone, or the "Special Court" (SCSL), also called the Sierra Leone Tribunal, was a judicial body set up by the government of Sierra Leone and the United Nations to "prosecute persons who bear the greatest responsibility for serious violations of international humanitarian law and Sierra Leonean law" committed in Sierra Leone after 30 November 1996 and during the Sierra Leone Civil War. The court's working language was English. The court listed offices in Freetown, The Hague, and New York City.
Ernest Bai Koroma is a Sierra Leonean politician who served as the fourth President of Sierra Leone from 17 September 2007 to 4 April 2018.
LeTourneau Engineering Global Solutions (LEGS) became LIMBS International in 2010 and is a non-profit initiative based in Longview, Texas, focused on bringing innovative, extremely low cost, high-quality prosthetic technology to people in developing nations. The focus of LEGS/LIMBS technology is its M1 Knee, a polycentric knee joint that meets international standards and can be manufactured locally for as little as $15 USD.
Kelvin Doe, also known as DJ Focus, is a Sierra Leonean engineer.
Jeroen Tas is a Dutch entrepreneur and senior executive in the healthcare, information technology and financial services industries. In February 2017, he assumed the role as Chief Innovation & Strategy Officer at Philips Healthcare, a position he held until July 2021. He currently works on Strategic Business Development and is also a member of the executive committee at Royal Philips.
Abdulai Hamid Charm is a Sierra Leonean judge, who was formerly the Chief Justice of Sierra Leone until his resignation in December 2018.
Sierra Leone Ministry of Education is a Ministerial department of the Government of Sierra Leone that is in charge of planning, overseeing, and implementing the educational policies of Sierra Leone. The Ministry of Education advises the President of Sierra Leone and the Government of Sierra Leone on issues related to Education. The Ministry has its headquarters in the capital Freetown.
Marc-David Munk is an American and Canadian physician, writer and healthcare executive who, according to the Advisory Board, a US healthcare consultancy, has "a reputation as an innovator." Munk is recognized as a thought leader in the area of value-based, consumer-facing healthcare and global health.
Samantha Joanne Payne MBE is an English entrepreneur. The co-founder of Open Bionics, a bionics company developing affordable prosthetics for children, Payne has won a number of international awards for her work. These include the MIT Technology Review 'Innovators under 35' in 2018, James Dyson gong for innovative engineering and Wired Innovation Fellow in 2016. In the Queen's Birthday Honours list 2020, Payne was awarded an MBE, for her work making bionic technology more accessible.
Jimmy B, born Jimmy Bangura, is a Sierra Leonean musician, filmmaker, producer and entertainer. He has been called the "Godfather of Sierra Leone music".
Nabeela Farida Tunis is a Sierra Leonean politician who has served as the country's Foreign Minister since May 2019.
Yakama Manty Jones is a Sierra Leonean multipotentiality living this through her portfolio career. Jones is an economist, entrepreneur and philanthropist with a Ph.D. in finance and economics. She is the Director of Research and Delivery at the Sierra Leone Ministry of Finance and a Focal Person for the World Bank's Human Capital Project in Sierra Leone. In 2021, she was selected as an Amujae leader by the EJS Center. Jones has authored and co-authored multiple scholarly articles and spoken at TEDxYouth, Africa Oxford Initiative, and the World Bank.
Jacob Jusu Saffa is a Sierra Leonean politician who served as Chief Minister of Sierra Leone from 30 April 2021 to 10 July 2023.
Events in the year 2024 in Sierra Leone.
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