JOHANNESBURG (AP) — First lady Michelle Obama landed in Africa on Monday with her daughters and her mother for an overseas trip promoting education for girls, starting with a country recovering from the recent Ebola epidemic.
The Obamas were welcomed in Liberia’s capital with a red carpet and traditional dancers wearing the red, white and blue colors of both the American and Liberian flags. They also will visit Morocco and Spain.
Their first stop is Liberia, where the first lady will meet with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the continent’s first elected female head of state. and have a discussion with local teenage girls, moderated by actress Freida Pinto.
The Obamas then visit a leadership camp for girls in the town of Kakata.
“People are going to consider her to be a sister to them,” Mayor Eddie Murphy said. “We are overwhelmed.”
A main topic of the trip is how to address the barriers facing girls trying to get an education after the Ebola outbreak. More than 4,800 people died in Liberia, and children missed several months of school.
The recent Ebola outbreak in Liberia created even more challenges for girls’ education in the West African country, where just one-third of girls are enrolled in secondary education. Liberia ranked second only to South Sudan in the share of primary school-age girls who aren’t enrolled in school, a global report by UNESCO said earlier this year.
The Obamas’ last stop in Liberia is at a school in Unification Town to speak with adolescent girls, according to Tina Tchen, the first lady’s chief of staff.
Founded as part of an effort to resettle freed American slaves, Liberia has deep ties to the United States. The country’s oldest technical and vocational high school, located in Kakata, is named for the African-American educator and civil rights activist Booker T. Washington.
The school suspended mid-term exams scheduled to start Monday “to allow the students to give Mrs. Obama a rousing welcome to appreciate what the United States has done for us,” principal Harris Tarnue said.
“She will be a real inspiration to the young girls around here,” he said.
Actress Meryl Streep then will accompany Mrs. Obama in Marrakech, Morocco, on Tuesday for another conversation with adolescent girls. The North African country’s rates for girls’ education are well below regional averages, U.S. officials told reporters Friday, with a high dropout rate for girls after primary school.
In Madrid, the first lady on Thursday will speak about the Let Girls Learn initiative, launched by her and President Barack Obama last year to encourage developing nations to educate the more than 62 million girls worldwide who don’t attend school.
President Obama is also scheduled to visit Spain shortly after the first lady. His trip will focus on security cooperation, deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters Friday.