Atty. Cornelia Wonkerleh Kruah may hold an important role in government and the Unity Party, but her political journey began when she was a bubbling teenager at the St. Teresa Convent, an all-girls Catholic school ensconced on Randall Street near the Atlantic Ocean.
Taking a bold step, she threw her heart in the race for the senior class leadership. Though she suffered a loss, it led her to blaze a trail where too few women tread.
"I didn't win that election. But that was the beginning of my participation in democratic processes," the lawyer said during an interview at her office on the complex of the SKD Sports Stadium in Paynesville before she departed for a tour to five counties in Liberia, where she assessed the lives of young people to unlock opportunities for them.
Today, after formerly serving as Deputy Minister of Presidential Affairs at the Ministry of State, Atty. Kruah serves as the youngest Minister of Youth & Sports, one of the few women who's been appointed to the post, including Madam Etmonia David-Tarpeh, Cllr. Wheatonia Dixon-Barnes, and Justice Jamesetta Howard-Wolokollie.
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Atty. Kruah did not lose her steam following her graduation from high school. When she traveled further afield to Johannesburg to attend the African Leadership Academy in Johannesburg, she served as captain of her group. Upon completion of her graduate studies at the Kingston University in the United Kingdom, she contested the district #13 bielection in Montserrado County in 2018.
She lost.
Again, she made another go for the seat during the 2023 general and presidential elections and suffered a defeat.
"I tell people in my district that I will keep coming until they get tired and elect me," she said last year at the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (EJS) Center's inaugural "Country Talks" series, where she served as a panelist.
In Liberia, women like Atty. Kruah, who did not get elected via ballot boxes, gets appointed to work as public official. In her case, she was one of the first batch of Unity Party stalwarts who were appointed by President Joseph Nyumah Boakai in January 2025.
Her post changed after spending nearly a year as deputy minister of administration at the Ministry of State for Presidential Affairs. This pattern is not unique to Atty. Kruah. Advocates and feminists are beginning to query if the country is ready to elect women despite electing Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Jewel Howard-Taylor as the nation's first female president and vice president. However, women's representation in the Legislature remains low, at just 11 percent in the House of Representatives and 10 percent in the Senate.
Dr. Tanya Garnett, a researcher in gender studies and development, said while the country has made history by electing Africa's first democratically elected female president, "the population still has a challenge accepting women's leadership." "That's why women currently occupy only 11 percent of the House of Representatives and 10 percent of the Senate.
The disparity, she says, is clear. "We see the differentiation in how women can be appointed in the executive, but not necessarily as they can be elected in the legislature. What does it tell us? It tells us that a president can come and appoint strategically, but is the population as a whole willing and ready to elect women?"
Atty. Kruah is not the sole female who contested and lost the election that was appointed by the president. Others include Liberia's foreign minister, Sara Beysolow-Nyanti, and presidential press secretary, Kula Fona, among others.
Numerous women contested seats during the 2023 elections. Sara Beysolow Nyanti and Bendu Alehma Kromah were the only two female presidential candidates; both lost, though Nyanti was later appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs. Three women--Cllr. Charlyne Brumskine, Grace Kpaan, and Celia Cuffy Brown contested the vice presidency, but their parties also fell short.
Of the 1,030 representative candidates in 2023, 152 were women. However, only eight women were ultimately elected to the House, compared to 65 men. In the Senate, only two of the seven women who contested were successful. One of them, Senator Nyonblee Karnga-Lawrence, now serves as the president pro tempore of the Senate.
"Our current president Joseph Boakai believes in the power of women," said Cllr. Yvette Chesson-Wureh at a program to honor Liberian women who fought for peace during the country's civil conflict which lasted for 114 years.
She says he's demonstrating that by the number of women in his cabinet.
Under the current administration Women heads key posts including the Ministries of Education, Health, Defense, the University of Liberia, Gender, Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission (LACC), and Liberia Petroleum Regulatory Authority.
Currently, women make up 37% of the cabinet, marking Liberia's highest score on the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (EJS) Center Data Hub. Liberia's overall score for women in public leadership--which tracks representation in the legislature, judiciary, and executive--is 60.4/100. For comparison, Rwanda leads the continent with a score of 90.4/100. Sierra Leone, which has a legislated gender quota law, scored 33 percent for women in the cabinet while leading 30 percent in the lower house. Nigeria, Benin, Togo, and Morocco have fewer women.
"Politics is not safe for women."
Her early involvement in politics hasn't been violent. cyberbullying, sexism, and physical attacks. One incident she vividly remembers is one in which she was attacked by men with cutlasses, reportedly led by former Mayor of Monrovia, Jefferson T. Koijee, during a campaign rally in 2018.
"Politics is not safe for women," she said. "Because society does not easily accept women as politicians, they will easily accept you as a mother, as a wife, as a caregiver, which will lead them more to seeing women as their nurses and teachers than politics, which is considered like a boy's club."
Now, one of her major concerns is security. "After that incident, I realized that security is important. But before then, when my team would bring security budget and say they need like 20 bodybuilders to come with you to a rally, I would be like, "Why do I need that--I will cut it down to two," but after that I have seen the significance of security for women, and I think women need to pay attention to that."
Kruah further emphasized the importance of security. Kruah said she has been subjected to intense trolling online as a young woman in the rugged jungle of politics that historically has been dominated by men.
In early January 2026, during the period her confirmation hearing as deputy minister of state for presidential affairs was scheduled, Liberian Facebook buzzed with pictures of her wearing beach apparel. The posts were accompanied by several degrading and sexist comments.
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"Well, that one, I think you can manage. I have managed it--I can't speak for everyone. I can only encourage women involved in politics to turn a blind eye to bullying," she mentioned.
"It hurts. Obviously, there are times it will be painful--some of the things that are said about you--but the way I have managed it, I have a coping mechanism, and that is to make a joke of most things. So if you make a post to bully me, I will use that post and crack a joke, and like just move past it. That has worked for me--I don't know whether it will work for everybody else, but overall, it's just to say accept that you are in that space, and once you are in that territory, it comes with the territory that there will be a lot of combat and people would want to try to intimidate you, so how you respond to it gives you peace of mind and keeps you focused to continue to project yourself for whatever.
"No one else can be you. Live well."
Atty. Kruah urged young girls to enjoy their youthfulness and be themselves, no matter how society sees them. She added that while pursuing their dreams and aspirations, they must "find time to relax, find time to be themselves, and find time to have fun." She added that women should be an example of balance. "I am the perfect example of balance. I can be social; I can be very social, and I can be very serious. If you put me in a space where they are discussing the law. I can discuss the law fully if you put me in a space where there is politics. I can fully participate in politics. If you put me in an academic space, I will survive, and if you put me in a social space, I can really be social."
