A Woman of Firsts. Edna Adan Ismail
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EDNA ADAN ISMAIL was Foreign Minister of Somaliland from 2003 to 2006, and had previously served as Somaliland’s Minister of Family Welfare and Social Development.
She is the director and founder of the Edna Adan Maternity Hospital in Hargeisa, which opened in 2002, and an activist and pioneer in the struggle for the abolition of female genital mutilation. She is also President of the Somaliland Association for Victims of Torture.
In 2010, she opened the Edna Adan Ismail University in Hargeisa, Somaliland. She was married to Mohamed Haji Ibrahim Egal who was Head of Government in British Somaliland five days prior to Italian Somalia’s independence and later the Prime Minister of Somalia (1967–69) and President of Somaliland from 1993 to 2002.
A Woman of Firsts
Edna Adan Ismail
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First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2019
Copyright © Edna Adan Ismail 2019
Edna Adan Ismail asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Ebook Edition © July 2019 ISBN: 9780008305369
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This book is dedicated to my father Adan Ismail and to all those, like him, who devote their lives to caring for others with humanity, compassion and kindness.
This memoir is based on my recollection of events which may not be as others recall them. Where conversations cannot be remembered precisely, I have re-created them to the best of my ability. Any mistakes are my own.
The borders of Somaliland
Contents