{"id":4605,"date":"2015-06-03T19:32:07","date_gmt":"2015-06-03T18:32:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/?p=4605"},"modified":"2015-06-03T19:32:07","modified_gmt":"2015-06-03T18:32:07","slug":"mauritius-designates-its-first-woman-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/mauritius-designates-its-first-woman-president\/","title":{"rendered":"Mauritius designates its first woman president"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Mauritius-designates-its-first-woman-president.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-4606\" src=\"http:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Mauritius-designates-its-first-woman-president.jpg\" alt=\"Mauritius designates its first woman president\" width=\"274\" height=\"184\" \/><\/a>The government of Mauritius on Monday designated Ms Ameenah Gurib-Fakim as the Indian Ocean island nation\u2019s new president, making her the first woman to hold the ceremonial position.<br \/>\nThe appointment of Ms Gurib-Fakim, an internationally renowned scientist and biologist, is subject to parliament approval, due to take place on Thursday.<br \/>\nThe opposition has said it will support her appointment, making the vote a mere formality.<br \/>\nHer inauguration is expected to take place on Friday, officials said.<br \/>\nGurib-Fakim, 56, will be the first female president of the island, which gained independence from Britain in 1968 and which replaced Britain\u2019s Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state in 1992.<br \/>\nFormer president Kailash Purryag, who had been put in place by the previous government, stepped down as the island\u2019s figurehead on Friday.<br \/>\nHe had served as president since July 2012, when he was appointed by the island\u2019s previous Labour party government of former premier Navin Ramgoolam.<br \/>\nThe previous government had fought the elections on a platform of delivering constitutional reform notably with a divisive proposal to strengthen presidential powers.<br \/>\nRamgoolam himself had hoped to eventually run for the new, strengthened position. Since his election defeat Purryag has been seen as an unwanted figurehead, while Ramgoolam has been embroiled in corruption allegations that have shocked the country.<br \/>\nMauritius is one of the richest and least corrupt countries in Africa, a middle-income country of some 1.3 million people with a per capita GDP of just over USD 9,000.<br \/>\nOnce dependent on sugar exports, the island has built up a strong outsourcing and financial services sector, and an important tourism industry. -The Times of India<\/p>\n<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\r\n<script>(function(d, s, id) {\r\n  var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\r\n  if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\r\n  js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\r\n  js.src = \"\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_GB\/all.js#xfbml=1\";\r\n  fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\r\n}(document, \"script\", \"facebook-jssdk\"));<\/script>\r\n <fb:comments href=\"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/mauritius-designates-its-first-woman-president\/\" font=\"arial\" num_posts=\"\" width=\"\" height=\"\" colorscheme=\"light\"  style=\"background:#FFFFFF;padding-top:0px;\r\npadding-right:0px;\r\npadding-bottom:0px;\r\npadding-left:0px;\r\nmargin-top:0px;\r\nmargin-right:0px;\r\nmargin-bottom:0px;\r\nmargin-left:0px;\r\n\"><\/fb:comments>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government of Mauritius on Monday designated Ms Ameenah Gurib-Fakim as the Indian Ocean island nation\u2019s new president, making her the first woman to hold the ceremonial position. The appointment of Ms Gurib-Fakim, an internationally renowned scientist and biologist, is subject to parliament approval, due to take place on Thursday. The opposition has said it &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,2],"tags":[],"wps_subtitle":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4605"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4605"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4605\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4607,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4605\/revisions\/4607"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}