African Personality of the Month October 2026
Wangari Maathai
Environment · Kenya
The Kenyan scientist whose Green Belt Movement planted tens of millions of trees and tied the land to democracy.
The Citation
Wangari Maathai (1940–2011) was the first woman in East and Central Africa to earn a doctorate. In 1977 she founded the Green Belt Movement, which organised rural women to plant tens of millions of trees across Kenya.
Her campaigns to protect public land, from Uhuru Park to Karura Forest, set her against the government of the day, and she was arrested and beaten for them.
In 2004 she became the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. The African Mail honours her posthumously for showing that caring for the land and defending democracy are one fight.
