TheCable

Diezani Alison-Madueke, Nigeria’s minister of petroleum resources, has become the first female president of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

She was elected at the cartel’s 166th ordinary meeting, in Austria on Thursday.

Madueke succeeds Abdourhman Atahar Al-Ahirish, Libyan vice prime minister for corporations.

She has held different positions both in the private and public sectors.

In 2006, Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company, appointed her as its first female executive director. However, in 2008, the late president Umaru Musa Yar’Adua appointed her as the minister of mines and steel development.

Madueke became the minister of petroleum resources in 2010.

Alison-Madueke was first nominated for the post of OPEC secretary-general in June, but it was decided at the 165th ordinary meeting of OPEC that her nomination would have to wait another six months, as the tenure of long-serving incumbent, Abdullah al-Badri, was extended from December 2014 to June 30, 2015.

As OPEC president, she will retain her position as Nigeria’s minister of petroleum resources.

In October, TheCable reported that she was resisting attempts to make her assume the full-time role of OPEC secretary-general because she would lose her position in government.

The position, it was thought, was President Goodluck Jonathan’s way of easing her out of government following a series of allegations against the minister, who is the first woman to occupy the powerful position in Nigeria.