President Gurib-Fakim is at home among scientists

Dr. Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, the president of Mauritius and a researcher on medicinal plants [PHOTO JOY WANJA MURAYA /STANDARD}

She is a torch bearer in the quest for scientific knowledge that she hopes will solve Africa’s problems.

Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, the president of Mauritius is a living testimony that women in science can break the glass ceiling

A respected researcher on medicinal plants, Dr Gurib-Fakim was in Kenya a week ago and liberally mingled with fellow scientists at the meeting of the Alliance for Accelerating Excellence in Science, a new research body that aims to provide research opportunities for and in Africa.

As fellow of the African Academy of Sciences, the president-scientist was at home, and did not surprise many as she crisply gave her reasons for supporting intensive domestic funding for science.

She networked across the floor from early morning till evening while sharing her vision of an African continent rising in science and research capacity, and where evidence gained through scientific data can be used as a basis for policy formulation.

Even as the president, Dr Gurib-Fakim had comfortably and unobtrusively sat on a panel discussing research dynamics in Africa and fielding questions from journalists.

“This new research funding body, Alliance for Accelerating Excellence in Science is  a game changer for health-related research in Africa, especially looking at orphaned diseases,” she said.

In an exclusive interview at her hotel suite at the Villa Rosa Kempinski, she spoke about the challenge of science education and research in Africa, and her determination to promote the twin opportunities in Mauritius.

It is hoped that AESA, which is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, The Wellcome Trust and the UK Department for International Development, will hasten long term development projects by encouraging local research to provide solutions within the continent.

She says that her passion for science was nurtured by her teachers at primary school and subsequent education levels, and she is keen to spread science diplomacy to her peers in Africa.

“I was infected by the science bug and my teachers encouraged me to pursue uncharted grounds, and I kept going. I believe all children in Africa should be exposed and nurtured in the sciences,” she said, adding that science is great fun.

“Girls should especially be encouraged to study science subjects, they will do amazingly well,” she added.

“In order to receive fundamental research towards improving lives in our continent, we must build capacity for science, engineering and mathematics courses right from an early age,” she said.

She studied for her Bachelors of Science degree in Chemistry at the University of Surrey, United Kingdom and graduated in 1983.

She then proceeded to the University of Exeter, UK for her Organic Chemistry doctorate in 1987 and worked with various research teams in the UK before taking up teaching positions in universities in Mauritius.

Before she become the president, Dr Gurib-Fakim was a full professor at the Department of Organic Chemistry at the University of Mauritius from 2001, later serving as Dean of the Faculty of Science and Pro Vice Chancellor between 2004 and 2010.

As a founding member of the Pan African Association of African Medicine, Dr Gurib-Fakim believes that the time is ripe for African leaders to address development issues by enhancing research of medicinal plants in the continent.

In a research paper titled Medicinal plants: traditions of yesterday and drugs of tomorrow, Dr Gurib-Fakim appreciates the role plants have played over the years.

They have been a reliant source of not only shelter, clothing, food, flavors and fragrances but also medicines.

The root, bulb, leaf, bark, flower, tuber, seeds, fruit and other parts of the plants have curative powers and she is calling for their appreciation and acceptance.

Intensive research, she says, can transform these parts of medicinal plants into lotions, syrups and tablets, bathing extracts, or injectable medicines that can treat various illnesses and conditions.

“I believe that, with rigorous tests and research, traditional knowledge is safe, affordable and efficacious as a source of our medicines,” she said.

However, she cites limited information on biodiversity as the challenge to optimally develop this area.

She urges budding scientists to keenly reconsider their environments and forage them to provide solutions to illnesses. She says that harnessing this knowledge will propel African governments faster towards development. “African governments have not recognized and endorsed the role of medicinal plants that have formed the basis of sophisticated traditional medicine systems like they have in India and China,” she said.

In October last year, she gave a TED Talk, titled Humble plants that hide surprising secrets, that focused on Mauritius’ rich ecosystem and how plants are the answer to the growing problem of antibiotic resistance.

During the talk, she shared that plants found in the tropics continue to provide chemists with invaluable compounds that are reliable starting points for the development of new drugs.

However, she is aware that the potential of getting new drugs from these plants is under-utilized considering that only about one per cent of tropical species have been studied for their pharmaceutical potential. “The flora of the tropics, by virtue of its diversity, has a significant role  and can provide new leads,” she says in her paper, which was published in 2006.

She says that the drugs that are today used in the treatment of leukemia and ovarian and testicular cancers were sourced from North American plants like Pawpaw, the Western Yew Tree and the Mayapple which Native Americans used as medications.

Dr Gurib-Fakim, who was born in a village known as Surinam 56 years ago,attributes her success to her parents, Hassenjee Gurib and Firdaus Durgauhee who believed that education was an empowerment tool.

Her father was a primary school teacher while her mother was a housewife.

They both sacrificed and utilized the meager family finances to see their through school both in Mauritius and abroad.

“My parents never discriminated against me and paid my school fees since I studied before 1967 when free primary education was introduced,” says the mother of two who now takes care of her parents in their sunset years.

Her husband is a surgeon and he “prefers to live a quiet life” given the busy clinical demands.

She is a travel enthusiast and her favorite destinations are the Far East and Turkey.

She considers Kenya a warm country both because of the tropical weather and the hospitable people. “Africa must move forward,” she says as we wind up the interview.