A thirty-five year-old Nigerian Esther Agbaje has been elected into the Minnesota House of Representatives in Tuesday’s US general elections. Agbaje will represent District 59B in the 134-member House on the platform of the US Democratic Party.
The Nigerian
polled 17,396 votes or 74.7 per cent of the total ballots cast.
She defeated her closest rival Alan Shilepsky of the Republican Party who
pulled 4,128 votes, representing 17.7 per cent of the total.
Elections to
the lower chamber of the state legislature hold every two years, and there are
no term limits for the lawmakers.
The daughter
of Nigerian immigrants, Agbaje was born in St. Paul, the state capital of
Minnesota.
Her father
Rev. John, an Episcopal Church priest, met her mother Bunmi, a librarian at the
University of Minnesota where they were studying.
Agbaje
graduated from George Washington University, Washington, D.C. with a bachelor’s
degree in Political Science.
She holds a
master’s degree in Public Administration from the University of Pennsylvania,
and also a law degree from Harvard University.
She currently
works as an attorney in Minneapolis with focus on general civil litigation and
medical malpractice.
She once
served at the US Department of State as a foreign affairs officer, charged with
managing rule of law projects in the Middle East.
Her
priorities as a lawmaker include affordable housing, environmental justice,
police reform, public safety and racial equality.
“As a
negotiator, as a lawyer, and as a former program manager, I know how to
advocate for the district and find common ground with other legislators in St.
Paul. I look forward to hearing from you about your ideas for the district and
for Minnesota,” Agbaje was quoted on her campaign website.
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